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Jump to full article: Daily Kos (blog), 2009-06-12
Author: ScottyUrb
Intro: If you want to know what a conflict of interest looks like, here are some examples. First from Yahoo! News:
Influential senators working to overhaul the nation's health care system have investments and family ties with some of the biggest names in the industry. The wife of Sen. Chris Dodd, the lawmaker in charge of writing the Senate's bill, sits on the boards of four health care companies.
Members of both parties have industry connections, including Democrats Jay Rockefeller and Tom Harkin, in addition to Dodd, and Republicans Tom Coburn, Judd Gregg, John Kyl and Orrin Hatch, financial reports showed Friday. . . .
Congressional and Presidential elections aren't the same - but even so, it would be hard for any of these people to justify letting any conflict of interest get in the way of doing right by the people.
Senator Burr, for instance, faces a potentially competitive re-election campaign next year. Senator McConnell, on the other hand, doesn't face the voters again until 2014. And yet both felt the need to break from the vast majority of their colleagues to vote against the best interests of the people of our nation.
Members of Congress are supposed to represent We the People. That's why we have a Congress in the first place. If a lawmaker won't do right by We the People, then what does that tell you about their integrity - and whether they're fit to stay in Congress?
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