WASHINGTON,
DC -- A new investigation reveals an astonishingly large number
of wife-beaters, drunks, shoplifters, check-bouncers, business
failures, and drug abusers in the U.S. House and Senate -- which
ought to make Americans think carefully before turning to Washington,
DC for moral leadership, the Libertarian Party said today.
"Mark
Twain once said Congress may be America's only 'distinct criminal
class' -- and this new study suggests he was correct," said
Steve Dasbach, the party's national director. "If even half
these charges are true, expecting Congress to serve as a moral
role model is like asking Bill Clinton to serve as a poster boy
for monogamy." According to an investigation by Capitol Hill
Blue, an online publication that covers federal politics, a remarkable
number of U.S. Representatives and U.S. Senators may have spent
. . . time in a jail cell . . . After researching public records,
newspaper articles, civil court transcripts, and criminal records,
Capitol Hill Blue discovered that:
* 29 members
of Congress have been accused of spousal abuse.
* 7 have
been arrested for fraud.
* 19 have
been accused of writing bad checks.
* 117
have bankrupted at least two businesses.
* 3 have
been arrested for assault.
* 71 have
credit reports so bad they can't qualify for a credit card.
* 14 have
been arrested on drug-related charges.
* 8 have
been arrested for shoplifting.
* 21 are
current defendants in lawsuits.
* 84 were
stopped for drunk driving in 1998 alone, but released after they
claimed Congressional immunity.
Capitol Hill
Blue did not list the names of all the individual members of
Congress accused of the various crimes, but did note that some
were "serial offenders" with extensive track records
of fraud or violence. For example, reported Capitol Hill Blue,
Rep. Corrine Brown (D-FL) has a "long, consistent record
of deceit," including tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid
bills, allegations of bribery, and numerous lawsuits against her.
And Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) faces charges that he beat his wife,
has a history of barroom brawls while mayor of Alexandria, and
has publicly stated that he likes "to hit people."
"With
a rap sheet like that, you have to wonder why Americans expect
Congress to solve the problem of crime -- since Congress seems
to be causing so much crime," said Dasbach. "In fact,
if this study is correct, the best way to cut crime may be to
lock up [some members of] Congress and throw away the key."
And given
the obvious economic incompetence of so many Senators and Representatives,
you have to wonder why voters trust them with the federal budget,
he said. "Here are politicians [some of whom] routinely bankrupt
businesses, write bad checks, engage in fraudulent practices,
and have bad credit," said Dasbach. "That could explain
why the country is more than $5 trillion in debt, why federal
programs are so wasteful, and why taxes are always going up. Are
these really the kind of economically illiterate people we want
to trust with our money?"
If nothing
else, said Dasbach, the Capitol Hill Blue investigation
may help puncture the myth that Senators and Representatives are
somehow superior to ordinary Americans, or better equipped to
solve the nation's problems. "By its very nature, [the kind
of politics we have now] tends to attract . . . people who crave
power, who want to control the lives of other people, and who
think they are above the law," he noted. "This study
makes that point clear -- and illustrates that when it comes to
politicians, the only thing worse than their voting records are
their criminal records."
