The gilded age

Ah, it's the fuzzy rules that are the problem, is it?

A lushly produced video on DVD arrived in lobbyists' mailboxes all over Washington this summer. In it, Sen. Michael D. Crapo narrates what amounts to a sales pitch for them to pay $2,500 each to party with him later this month in beautiful Sun Valley, Idaho.

"We shoot all day. We fish all day. We ride horses all day. And then we finish the day with the best barbecue in the West," the Idaho Republican boasts. "Frankly, I think this is the best event in the country."

For many years, Congress has regularly responded to the public's anger over the power of moneyed interests by reining in campaign donations and limiting the ways that lobbyists can enrich the lawmakers they're paid to influence. But lawmakers and lobbyists have often found ways to get around the restrictions -- on "soft money," on gifts, on travel and the like. What lobbyists get is extra access to federal decision-makers that average citizens rarely have.

For example, congressional rules prohibit a lobbyist or any other outsider from spending more than $100 a year to feed or entertain a federal lawmaker or any of his staffers. But the "Crapo Hook & Bullet" event is exempt from the limitation because it's a campaign fundraiser. Governmental ethics rules don't govern election financing.

"One of the capital's great ironies is that lobbyists can't treat lawmakers to golf or an expensive meal unless they're handing over a check for the congressman's election or for his charity, which, of course, only compounds the problem," said Bill Allison, editor-at-large for the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity. "Some of the most outrageous things that happen in Washington are perfectly within the rules."

But what the Post article fails to point out, rules or no, there is absolutely no ethical oversight of the Congress whatsoever.

However, the chances that the committee would discover such a violation are nearly zero. In both the House and the Senate, the committees tend to limit their investigations to complaints from other members of Congress. In recent months, despite months of front-page stories about congressional ethics violations, no member of the House or Senate has filed a complaint calling for a broader investigation. Watchdogs expect the issue to fade from public view. "Nobody has anything to worry about," says Sloan, from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, "because ethics committees don't do anything."

I can't leave this subject without adding the following, which really says everything you need to know about the frat house...er...Congress.

The competition for donors is so intense that lawmakers try to outdo each other with innovative fundraising come-ons. Four members of the House Ways and Means Committee held what they called a "block party" to make it easier for lobbyists to drop off checks. The lawmakers, who live on the same block on Capitol Hill, each offered a different alcoholic beverage to donors as they stopped by on the same evening this spring.

"There are 20 to 40 fundraisers a day that people have a chance to go to, and they can't make them all," said Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.), who conceived and benefited from the block party. "You want to make sure yours stands out and that people say, 'That's fun!'"