January 3, 2017 6:00 AM
Morning Reads for Tuesday, January 3
Good morning! I’m fresh off of a(nother) long car trip, and once again, it’s time to ease yourself back into reality – although, unlike last Tuesday’s mid-holiday fugue, this time, it’s for keeps.
- In what seems like a borrowed page from the Georgia Legislature’s playbook (cough*JQC*cough), House Republicans voted last night to kill the Office of Congressional Ethics because apparently they can to a better job of enforcing Congressional ethics themselves.
- Per Gallup, a majority of Americans don’t think Trump is actually up to the task of being president, and 66% apparently don’t think Trump will avoid any major scandals during his administration.
- HR executives and others who initially championed 401(k) savings plans now lament what those plans meant for more secure defined benefit and pension plans.
- What the suburban south means for 2020.
- Which states won – and lost – the biggest political battles of 2016.
- Bad news for every community that’s embraced luxury rentals as a housing option over the past few years.
- Medicare is penalizing one fourth of Georgia’s hospitals – including several in metro Atlanta – for their high rates of patient injuries and complications.
- Here’s what Chatham Area Transit hopes to achieve this legislative session.
- And here are the cultural events happening in metro Atlanta that you don’t want to miss in 2017.
- I truly intended to lay off the Hamilton links in 2017 but what does it say about this cultural juggernaut that well over a year into this endeavor, I have two links to share this week:
- First, this column that ran in the Washington Post over the weekend about why Hamilton truly preferred his frenemy Jefferson to Burr, the “unruly tyrant” who, he wrote to a friend, “would consider a scheme of usurpation as visionary.” (Somehow, that column relates to 2017.)
- Second, Terry Gross will interview Lin-Manuel Miranda on today’s Fresh Air, which means that if you live in metro Atlanta, it will air for pretty much the entire second half of the day.
- Let it be known that last week when I visited the White House with my family I had a conversation with a Secret Service officer in the Red Room about the merits of Franklin Pierce: Hottie President.
And on that note – onward into 2017! And the rest of the work week!
About Author
Teri
Teri Anulewicz is a Democrat who represents House District 42 in the Georgia General Assembly. She previously spent nearly a decade on the Smyrna City Council. A native New Orleanian and quasi-Texan, Teri graduated from Agnes Scott College in 1998. She's been a front page contributor since 2015, and she compiles each Tuesday's Morning Reads.
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Of course gopers killed the Ethics Office. The Trumpistas taking over DC in 2017 is the richest opportunity for personal wealth-building since the Bushies ran Baghdad. We have to expect them to do what they can to get rid of even nominal opposition.
I think you may be misplaced in your understanding of what the Ethics office (aka Office of Congressional Ethics) does and what the vote that “killed” the office does. That vote hasn’t actually happened.
The Office of Congressional Ethics will now be named the “Office of Congressional Review” because that is what it was. A review committee that allowed constituents to report wrong doing of a member. That still can and will occur. The only difference being that it can’t be anonymous complaints and there is now a time frame for the review process.
The Office of Congressional Ethics always reported directly to the House Committee on Ethics. That does not change under this vote that has not yet occurred.
But don’t let those little facts get in the way.
The OCE existed independently of congressional members. Under Goodlatte’s plan, that will no longer be true. That’s the big fact.
At the end of the day the office always reported to the the House Committee on Ethics and they will continue to do so.
You are entitled to due process shouldn’t a member of Congress have that same right? You are entitled to know what you are being accused of and who is accusing you. Shouldn’t a member of Congress have the same right?
Also, the Committee on Ethics is a 50/50 committee. No one party controls the committee and all investigations are bi-partisan votes.
Anonymous sources are used in police investigations all the time. It is only when you are being tried in a court of law that an accuser is required to testify IF there is not other evidence to back up their statement.
Again, you are entitled to know who is accusing you and of what. That is not how the current office operates. It will in the future if this vote passes.
Right now I can call the committee and file a complaint. That complaint then will show up on their searchable database. If I were an a$$ hole political consultant I would file an anonymous ethics complaint with no evidence. Then make a mailer saying Congressman X has an ethics complaint. That has happened many times.
Now, if I have evidence, I can call the committee and file a complaint. That complaint will still be investigated and will still be sent to the House Ethics Committee just as before.
Facts facts facts are important people.
will the elimination of anonymity chill complaints for fear of retaliation?
I don’t know. Probably not.
Will it stop a$$ holes from filing BS ethics complaints? Yes..
Will it stop members of Congress from being investigated for wrong doing? No…
i dug into this one a little bit. the above arguments do have some mixed accuracy. for one, i never believed anything was truly “independent”, and in fact, there is only one real aspect of “independence” at play here. the OCE already is directed by political appointees, and is an intermediary to, and answers to, the House Ethics Committee. and don’t forget who funds and authorizes it. so it’s not independent. but what it can do is conduct investigations without additional authorization from the House Cmmttee. This investigative power (no subpoena power in any event) is now going to get contemporaneously entangled with the House Committee. And the publication of such investigations is possibly now on the line. So, transparency could easily suffer, and that is concerning. and perhaps one motivator for some House members push for these bills. as for frivolous complaints, the state formerly ethics commission handled this by increasing penalties. there are also other options to address that, like a pre-review for frivolity before a complaint is even docketed. overall, the solution is clearly not so narrowly-tailored, and risks legitimate investigations and transparency thereto. if frivolous complaints and due process are the real concerns, they can improve those without such risks. what appears to be the founding Resolution for the OCE is here: http://oce.house.gov/pdf/H.Res.895.pdf
Just keep spinning, just keep spinning, just keep spinning….
The Office was independent. Now, it’s under the thumb of partisans on the Ethics Committee without the ability to grant anonymity (and protect whistleblowers within the House from retribution), communicate with law enforcement or the public. And even when it did report to the Ethics Committee, it created a public record viewable by the voters to allow them to make their own judgments of their Representatives. Now, it’s to be a cover-up factory. It’s taking the same agency that was an independent check on politicians, and turning it into institutionalized Obstruction of Justice. Some draining of the swamp.
See my comment above. You can scream all you want, but that doesn’t make you right.
GOP just pulled the bill, announced an ’emergency’ meeting to discuss. http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/gop-congress-ethics-office-233123
It really is amazing just how dumb GOP leaders are when they get majority power. Instead of doing what voters strongly suggested in November (drain the swamp, stop business as usual), they decide to create a negative issue by altering ethics investigation methods. Kind of like Perdueless attempting major tax increases right after being the first ‘GOP’ governor elected in 150 years.
I will be the first to say that the optics of the late night caucus vote was terrible. To have this be the first thing that republicans do looks terrible. Especially since they didn’t really explain what was happening.
I just don’t like the misinformation about what the committee does and what this vote would have done.
on this issue, at least trump saw the optics.
That is true.
Megyn to NBC. Daytime pablum show. Sunday hard news show? Other. Contributing assignments? Mistake. She will become Couric -ed and Norville-d.
A secret vote at a meeting on a National holiday to reduce the independence of House ethics complaints investigations. Ryan’s “better way” in action.
Trump nailed it when he said the swamp would be drained.
Didn’t they stop it at the last minute and leave things be?
Conservatives warned that if a majority of Americans voted for Clinton there would be historic corruption in Washington. Signs are that they were right.