Ethics Orgy in Congress

The Glenn Fellows had a thorough briefing last week on Congressional ethics, delivered by an expert on the subject, Ted Van Der Meid. It was just in the nick of time, as it turns out.





"Dozens in Congress Under Inquiry," the lead story in yesterday's Post read. It seems that a low-level staffer--let us hope it was not an intern--was responsible for a breach of security that allowed public access to a secret report of the House Ethics Committee. Anyone who knows anything about how Washington, D.C., works knew what would happen next: the staffer in question was fired. Yes, the low-level Munchkin is toast, dead meat, roadkill. The republic is once again secure.





An accompanying story, "Seven on Defense Panel Scrutinized," focused on the practice of "earmarking" and how it has comprimised members of the House Appropriations Committee, the subject of last week's speaker, OSU alumna Christine Kontra, an aide in the office of Rep. Steve La Tourette (R-Ohio). According to the Post, both the House Ethics Committee and the Office of Congressional Ethics are looking into questionable activities involving PMA, a lobbying firm with close ties to Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa) and other appropriators, including Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio). The revelation is regrettable, because most ethics inquiries result in exoneration--or gentle wrist-slaps, at most. That's why they're supposed to be kept confidential. Thanks to the leak, seven House members, deservingly or not, have had their reputations besmirched.

The pity, as Ms. Kontra explained at our policy salon, is that one legislator's "pork" is another legislator's "bacon," which is why earmarking is not likely to go away any time soon. And if we are to consider Congress a "broken branch," we should recognize that it has been in that state for a very long time. Could it be that we have simply become a lot more squeamish over time?

November 2 update: While we're on the subject of corruption and Congress, you might find this Timothy Noah piece (from Slate, May 24, 2005) arguing for abolition of the Senate filibuster an interesting take on everybody's favorite Frank Capra film, "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington."

November 6 update: The Hill reports that Marcy Kaptur is fighting back.

The Difference between Bacon and Pork

This little piece in today’s Post made me think of Ted Van Der Meid's presentation on Congressional Ethics earlier this week:

The last time we saw Elizabeth Kucinich, the gorgeous redhead was on her husband's arm as he campaigned for the Democratic presidential nomination. That didn't pan out, so Rep. Dennis Kucinich went back to Congress and she went back to her work as a monetary policy wonk.

Now she's back in the spotlight, this time as the new director of public affairs for the nonprofit Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Kucinich was on Capitol Hill on Wednesday to drum up support for the Great Ape Protection Act, which would phase out invasive medical research on chimpanzees. "For me, it's a moral issue, about practicing good science and moving with the times," she told our colleague Marissa Newhall. The longtime animal-rights advocate wants to end federal funding involving chimps -- which gets into the tricky business of, well, lobbying her husband and his colleagues.

So the couple met with ethics officials Wednesday morning. "We want to make sure everything we do is absolutely by the book, and it's a thick book," she said. Most of her work will be off the Hill, so she's not required to register as a lobbyist. But she'll
make a few personal appeals in Washington -- not lobbying, mind you, but "educational awareness around a particular bill."

The distinction between educational awareness and lobbying sounds a little like the difference between bacon and pork. Well, never mind.

The Many Faces of Public Service

Today’s Post has a story, replete with graphs that even Joel Best would like, about how U.S. ambassadorial appointments are used by grateful presidents to reward major donors. It turns out, according to Al Kamen, who writes “In the Loop,” that the grandees so honored have a marked preference for service in Western Europe and the Caribbean. Imagine that.

Luckily, that leaves a somewhat shorter queue for the less glamorous posts, of which there are many between, say, Sofia and Kabul, or Astana and Luanda. Kamen, citing data gathered by the American Foreign Service Association, the union that represents America’s professional diplomatic corps, estimates that a quarter to a third of U.S. ambassadorial posts are reserved for donors and cronies. Note Kamen’s reference to Larry Lawrence, a former U.S. ambassador to Switzerland (one of the most succulent of the plums). His is a most fascinating story, in which Arlington National Cemetery features prominently, if only momentarily.

Probably the most sensational case of a diplomatic career originating outside the “merit system”—at least as that would be defined by OPM, which is scrupulous about such things—is that of Pamela Churchill Harriman. If you’re like me, you’ll discover from her Wikipedia entry just how boring your life has been. You couldn’t make this stuff up.

Greek Revival, Indian Summer

The Glenn Fellows toured northern Virginia on a gorgeous October day, inspiring speculation at one point about the etymological origins of the term "Indian summer." At such times, one reaches--cautiously, to be sure--for Wikipedia. Here's the link. I lean toward the explanation that stresses the late harvesting of squash and other crops associated with Indians in the northeast.

We also had some lessons in architectural history along the way. Carlyle House, in Old Town Alexandria, is the fulfillment of the ambitions of an English gentleman of the Georgian era. Only fifty years later, George Washington Parke Custis was building Arlington House, a Greek temple, part of early-nineteenth century effort to express the distinctiveness of American cultural values.

Photos, from top to bottom: the Glenn Fellows in front of Arlington House; the Greek Temple at Paestum, Italy; the Glenn Fellows at Arlington Cemetery, a Roman Revival city in the background.

The Road Not Taken

The October 15 issue of the Washington Post featured a story, “From Civil War to Civil Rights,” on the 150th anniversary this week of John Brown’s raid on the armory and arsenal at Harpers Ferry. The author, Michael E. Ruane, argues that Harpers Ferry is a complex tourist destination—and as such well suited for our times—because John Brown was simultaneously a freedom fighter and a terrorist. He's right. It is as easy to understand why Brown is celebrated as an abolitionist martyr as it is to relate to the rage that animated those who hanged him. Ruane does a nice job, too, of extolling the virtues of Harpers Ferry National Historic Park, which has turned this town of 307 souls into one of this region’s best day trips.

Everyone knows that Harpers Ferry was the overture to an American tragedy, the Civil War. What isn’t as widely known is that the town played a key role in civil rights history. In 1881, Frederick Douglass delivered a moving eulogy to John Brown. In 1906, Storer College, a historically black institution in Harpers Ferry, hosted what W.E.B. Dubois called “one of the greatest meetings that American Negroes ever held.” Storer College, ironically enough, expired in 1955, a victim of Brown v. Board of Education.

I hope that those who come this way again will take the road that leads to Harpers Ferry.

The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that, the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

two roads diverged in a wood, and I --

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Copyright © 1962, 1967, 1970 by Leslie Frost Ballantine.

Historic Sites in Northern Virginia

Here are some links that might enhance the value of a field trip to Arlington and Alexandria, which originally were part of the national capital district:

• Arlington National Cemetery: http://www.arlingtoncemetery.org/


• Custis-Lee Mansion, tp://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/hh/6/hh6d.htm



• United States Marine Corps Memorial (Iwo Jima statue): http://www.nps.gov/archive/gwmp/usmc.htm



• Carlyle House: http://www.nvrpa.org/parks/carlylehouse/index.php

Anyone interested in doing more on his or her own should consider visiting the Lee-Fendall House at 614 Oronoco Street: http://www.leefendallhouse.org/, and the George Washington Masonic Memorial: http://www.gwmemorial.org/index.php. Both are in Alexandria.

General Petraeus Is a Tough Act to Follow

Greg Jaffe had an interesting piece, called "Obama Wanted a Petraeus. Buyer Beware," in yesterday's Post. I hope you've had a chance to read General McChrystal's report on the war on Afghanistan. Dr. Wise is scheduled to lead the discussion of the report starting at 10:00 on Wednesday. We'll meet as usual at 8:30, and we'll lead off with the four internship reports (Amy, Sam, Josh, and Jessica).

We will be joined on Wednesday by Nila Whitfield, a retired OSU employee and friend of the Washington Academic Internship Program. I'm going to ask Nila to talk a little bit about her own career and her current activities. At 1:00 Nila's friend and former Glenn Fellow, Maribeth Linmore, will talk about her work at PriceWaterhouseCoopers.

October 13 Addendum: Fareed Zakaria had an interesting piece on Afghanistan in yesterday's Post.