Pelosi is a Peloser

I'm sad to say. Everyone knows that congress caved and gave Bush an Iraq supplemental with no timelines. I was also disappointed by the ethics bill. Pelosi also caved in to the crook caucus of Democrats who don't want to have to wait 2 years to cash in as lobbyists. This is revealed in paragraph 7 of a generally enthusiastic article by Elizabeth Williamson in the Washington Post

Democratic leaders and some watchdog groups hailed yesterday's bill as the most sweeping ethics package since the post-Watergate era. Even so, it lost proposals such as disclosure of "grass-roots" communications campaigns orchestrated by lobbyists and an extension from one year to two of the time lawmakers must wait between leaving their jobs and lobbying former colleagues. Instead, the bill would require that lawmakers interviewing for private-sector jobs publicly recuse themselves from issues involving their prospective new industry.

The extension from one year to two was the point of disagreement between Pelosi and greedy democratic congresspersons. Politics is indeed the art of the possible, and I think it is all too possible that Steny Hoyer is taking over, because he is so uhm flexible.

"The legislative process is the process of the possible, not the perfect, and this is a bill that is going to pass," said House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.).

Now I think 2 years is totally inadequate. This bit about "interviewing for private -sector jobs" is beyond pathetic. Clearly lobbyists and crooked congressmen get down to the details of compensation etc only after years of deniable hints about how the firm considers the congressman a friend and likes to hire people who ... well frankly who are collecting bribes with a delay.

The rule should be that legislators can never take a job with any firm that benefited from their legislation. Giving ex legislators pensions generous enough to make the job attractive anyway would be cheap compared to letting them take bribes so long as they are called salaries.