[The Non-Euclidean Blog] No House Investigation ... Again

[NEB]

For the ninth time, Rep. Jeff Flakes (R-AZ) has tried to open a House investigation into members who accepted donations from the defunct and federally-besieged PMA Group. For the ninth time, House Democrats have shut him down.

PMA Group earned its bread and butter by representing its defense industry clients with Congress. According to the Wall Street Journal, it allegedly did this mainly by dumping money into the coffers of well-positioned politicians, who expressed their gratitude by earmarking oceans of tax dollars for PMA's clients:

A new defense-earmarks scandal is brewing around PMA Group, a Washington lobbying shop that was run by Mr. Murtha's former staff member Paul Magliocchetti. PMA steered millions of dollars in campaign contributions to lawmakers who later requested earmarks for the firm's clients. No one has been charged in the Federal Bureau of Investigation probe.

In other words, you dump big dollars into my campaign, and I'll get you big defense contracts--whether the country needs them or not. In most dictionaries, that's called "corruption." According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) and his Democratic cronies have the greasiest palms of all when it comes to PMA:

In total, PMA Group's employees and its political action committee have given current members of Congress $3.4 million since 1989, with 79 percent of that going to Democrats.

As the chair of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, [John] Murtha and others on the subcommittee helped deliver more than $100 million in defense-related earmarks in appropriations bills for 2008....At $167,400, Murtha and his political action committee have received more money from PMA than all but two other members of Congress: Rep. Pete Visclosky (D-Ind.) ... and Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.)....Both sit on Murtha's subcommittee, which allocates the defense budget.

Not surprisingly, House Democrats have dragged their heels on investigating their own. After voting down eight Flakes resolutions to open a probe, they finally passed their own lackadaisical resolution in early June requiring the House Ethics Committee to let them know whether or not the committee was looking into it. The committee said it was, House Dems said great, and that's been that--for nearly two months.

With the fall recess a bare week away, Flakes yesterday introduced a ninth resolution requiring a full investigation of House members who've accepted donations from PMA, and Democrats again blew it away as soon as it walked through the door. Because we already kinda sorta talked about maybe thinking about checking it out. Besides, the Ethics Committee already told us they were reviewing the whole thing, and when has anything ever died in committee? There's absolutely no need to require...y'know, results.

Maybe if they stonewall long enough, they can avoid a Democratic Abramoff scandal. Lord knows we don't want Democrats looking like a bunch of corrupt puppets dancing to the tune of big money. That's the audacity of delay, baby.

P.S. Lest we forget the far-from-squeaky-clean GOP, two Republican representatives helped vote down Flakes's latest resolution: Tim Murphy of Pennsylvania and Don Young (shocker!) of Alaska. Constituents of these two guys should take a good, long, hard look at their campaign coffers when 2010 rolls around. On the flip side, 24 Democrats voted against tabling Flakes's latest resolution, most of whom took office no earlier than 2007. I'm making a good-faith assumption here, but it's encouraging to see glimmers of a new breed of Democrat who's at least willing to clean his own house.

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Posted By NEB to The Non-Euclidean Blog at 7/23/2009 01:12:00 PM