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...is because they are too busy engaging in circular firing squads and slinging their own party members under the proverbial bus.
How can the Democratic Party take back Congress and the White House, when they can't even agree on more stringent ethics regulations under which they would be governed? If Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois), the "point man" for creating stronger ethics can't get a warm reception from his own party, how can the Democrats portray themselves as being "better than the GOP" when they are equally unwilling to do what it takes to regain the trust of the American people?
The GOP has virtually gift-wrapped, hand-delivered, and emailed all types of greed, corruption, lying, pay-for-access Congress, violating every written rule there is, and probably a few that aren't. They have engaged in every impeachable offense imanginable (as Jon Stewart said on the Daily Show the other night, "Think of all the trouble Clinton could have avoided if he'd only said his penis was 'classified'"...)
But what got my goat is that Senator Obama did what he was tasked to do; he created a resolution that would not only facilitate more stringent ethics, he also included a measure that called for the forming of an indenpendent body to oversee the new ethics reform, and make sure every congress critter followed and abided by it. And members of his own party slung Senator Obama's efforts under the bus.
So much for the Democrats being the "Party of Change" when they make it very clear that they prefer status quo, and are the epitome of the Keystone Kops when it comes to capitalizing on the foibles that the GOP continues to hand to them, gift-wrapped and with a very pretty bow.
How can the Democratic Party take back Congress and the White House, when they can't even agree on more stringent ethics regulations under which they would be governed? If Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois), the "point man" for creating stronger ethics can't get a warm reception from his own party, how can the Democrats portray themselves as being "better than the GOP" when they are equally unwilling to do what it takes to regain the trust of the American people?
The GOP has virtually gift-wrapped, hand-delivered, and emailed all types of greed, corruption, lying, pay-for-access Congress, violating every written rule there is, and probably a few that aren't. They have engaged in every impeachable offense imanginable (as Jon Stewart said on the Daily Show the other night, "Think of all the trouble Clinton could have avoided if he'd only said his penis was 'classified'"...)
But what got my goat is that Senator Obama did what he was tasked to do; he created a resolution that would not only facilitate more stringent ethics, he also included a measure that called for the forming of an indenpendent body to oversee the new ethics reform, and make sure every congress critter followed and abided by it. And members of his own party slung Senator Obama's efforts under the bus.
So much for the Democrats being the "Party of Change" when they make it very clear that they prefer status quo, and are the epitome of the Keystone Kops when it comes to capitalizing on the foibles that the GOP continues to hand to them, gift-wrapped and with a very pretty bow.
The Democrats have totally let this corruption issue get hijacked by, like you said, not doing enough. There's no reason they couldn't just outlaw lobbying period, instead of bickering about $20 gifts vs. $50 gifts. Then there would be a difference between the parties.
As is, the Democrats have let the issue become framed the wrong way: now the biggest debate is about earmarks, which may not be the best thing, but aren't really related to the issue at hand. And right now, out of anybody, the term "anti-corruption crusader" is applied most often to John Mccain, who is looking more and more like an '08 hopeful, rather than any Democrat. And that's kind of backwards, IMO.