Some people wear their hearts on their sleeve. Members of Congress should wear their sponsors on their chest.
This isn’t an original idea. About a month ago, a friend forwarded me a post that was making its way around the blogosphere at the speed of light: “Members of Congress should be compelled to wear uniforms like Nascar drivers, so we could identify their corporate sponsors.”
Great idea. Just imagine what that would look like.
Senator Chris Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and ethically challenged head honcho at the Senate Banking Committee, files into a congressional hearing room, wields his gavel and calls the committee to order. The dress code is business casual: Collared shirts, no jacket required.
Dodd is sporting a pink Lacoste shirt, with his “endorsements” emblazoned across his chest in large, black letters (the corporate logos go on the back):
Citigroup Inc $428,294
United Technologies $380,550
Bear Stearns $347,350
American International Group $281,038
Deloitte & Touche $270,220
And that’s just a list of Dodd’s Top 5 lifetime contributors, according to the Centre for Responsive Politics.
The list goes on: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase, Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers.
PUBIL INFORMATION
You get the idea. Aside from United Technologies, based in Dodd’s home state, his major contributors all have business before the Banking Committee. This is publicly available information, courtesy of CRP’s opensecrets.org Web site. Aside from a handful of journalists, political junkies and those with an ax to grind, most people don’t spend their days combing through details of who gave how much to whom.
Which is why lawmakers should publicise their donors. AIG’s largesse didn’t seem to dissuade Dodd from inserting an amendment into the $787 billion fiscal stimulus bill limiting executive compensation at companies receiving money from the Troubled Asset Relief Programme.
On the other hand, one might wonder if Dodd was persuaded to look the other way by large contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He was the No. 1 recipient of cash from the two government-sponsored (now owned) enterprises, which were trying to fend off regulations that would curb their size, risk and profitability.
STRATEGIC GIVING
Fannie and Freddie specialised in strategic giving, concentrating their contributions on committees with oversight responsibility, including Senate Banking and House Financial Services. Their efforts were successful until they collapsed into the government’s arms in September.
AIG has contributed $9.3 million to federal candidates and parties through political action committees and individual contributions over the last 20 years, according to CRP. Dodd was the No. 2 recipient of AIG cash from 2003 to 2008, right behind President Barack Obama.
PAY TO PLAY
If I didn’t know better, I’d think the stepped-up campaign contributions to Dodd and his Banking Committee cohorts in the last election cycle was a down payment on new regulations being crafted by Congress following the Panic of 2008.
It’s probably no coincidence that Senator Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, is another top recipient of AIG contributions. Baucus chairs the Finance Committee, which shares oversight of AIG with the Banking Committee.
Senator Richard Shelby, ranking Republican on the Banking Committee and chairman before the Democrats took control in the 2006 election, is beholden to — I mean, receives most of his campaign contributions from — lawyers and law firms.
With Congress pounding away at Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke for more transparency, and New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo threatening to release the names of the AIG bonus recipients — an invasion of privacy that has no relevance to anything — isn’t it time Congress let a little sun shine in?
RIGHT TO KNOW
The public has a right to know what sort of hanky-panky its elected representatives are up to. In order to fulfil our electoral responsibility, we have to make informed decisions about whether our congressman is doing the people’s business or catering to his corporate constituency. Without a handy list of sponsors, we can’t determine the extent to which money buys access, not to mention perks and tax benefits.
At a time when Congress is channelling public outrage at AIG for awarding $165 million of bonuses to its financial products group, lawmakers should appreciate how quickly mob outrage can ricochet back to them.
So why not do the right thing now and return AIG’s campaign contributions to the people? As it turns out, that idea is already resonating with the public. A new poll by the O’Leary Report and Zogby International found that 73 per cent of Americans think any members of Congress who received campaign contributions from AIG over the last two years should return the money.
RETURN ON INVESTMENT
Why stop there? Lawmakers should fork over all campaign contributions received from TARP-taking banks. These institutions doled out $114 million in the past year for lobbying and campaign contributions, according to CRP. Add that to the $50 million in AIG bonuses already returned by recipients, and we could put this whole bonus kerfuffle to rest.
It turns out the $114 million was money well spent. It bought the banks $295.2 billion in TARP money, a return of more than 258,000 per cent. Who needs off-balance-sheet vehicles when the government can provide that kind of return on investment?
©2009 Bloomberg News Service
