[ Photo via Flickr]

Newt Gingrich personally urged members of Congress to vote for a controversial Medicare expansion bill in 2003, confirm two GOP congressmen who were in the room.

Gingrich, who is running for president, has said he never lobbied members of Congress after he resigned as House speaker in 1998. But U.S. Rep. Jeff Flake and former congressman Butch Otter - now his state's governor - told The Des Moines Register this week that Gingrich met with on-the-fence Republicans to persuade them to vote for the prescription drug bill.

Flake and Otter, who have both endorsed Mitt Romney for president, said about 30 Republican House members were holding out against the bill in the fall of 2003 because they were concerned that the proposal would expand the federal deficit when Gingrich held a private meeting of Republican House members.

“He told us, ‘If you can’t pass this bill, you don’t deserve to govern as Republicans,’ ” said Flake, who represents an Arizona district. “…If that’s not lobbying, I don’t know what is.”

Otter said: “I can’t define lobbying, but as a Supreme Court justice once said about pornography, I know it when I see it. I felt we were being lobbied.”

Yes, it was the Republicans driving the clown car the last time that Congress screwed with Medicare. In case you don't recall, Medicare Part D was passed in 2003, and went into effect in 2006 leaving thousands of seniors without medication, and introduced us to the "doughnut hole." Trips to the pharmacy became a "nightmare" for seniors with new co-pays for previously free medications, mountains of time-consuming, mind-numbing paperwork to fill out even with staff especially trained to help navigate the mess.

Seniors enrolled in Medicare Part D plans pay 58 percent more for the most commonly prescribed drugs than Americans who buy their medications through health plans administered by the Department of Veterans Affairs, according to a 2007 report.

Under the 2003 Medicare prescription-drug law, the government is barred from harnessing the buying power of 22.5 million Americans - the number of people now receiving some kind of drug benefits under Medicare - to get a better deal on prescription medications.

For example, the cholesterol-lowering drug Zocor, the cost of a year's supply of 20 milligram tablets would be $1,485.96 under the cheapest Medicare Part D plan, compared to $127.44 under the VA.

$1,485.96...that's a lot of doughnut holes.

I once worked for an online strategy firm, and I know we had to register as a lobbyist - because I had to follow up on the paperwork. The idea that Newt Gingrich was collecting so much money for "advising" organizations, and still claiming he wasn't speaking to legislators is absurd. Think Progress' Lee Fang has the particulars:

To help clear the record, ThinkProgress has compiled a short history of Gingrich’s influence peddling:

– Helping To Secure Health IT Earmarks For GE, Microsoft, IBM: Gingrich headed a for-profit health care consulting firm that engages in activities identical in nature to lobbying. As Business Week reported, firms like GE have hired Gingrich to figure out “on how to grab some of the $19.6 billion in federal stimulus money” on healthcare IT grants. A follow-up ThinkProgressinvestigation found that Gingrich had been paid to bring health IT lobbyists together with lawmakers like Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN) and Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN).

– The Ethanol Lobby’s “Consulting” Contract With Gingrich: Growth Industry, the trade association for the ethanol energy lobby, provided a $312,500contract to Gingrich’s consulting firm in 2009, according to a report by iWatch News. An association publication conceded that Gingrich was paid for “strategy and communication issues.” The retainer allowed the lobby group, then pressing for further government subsidies, to use Gingrich to “speak positively on ethanol related topics to media.”

– Gingrich Lobbied To Deregulate Insurers, While Accepting Hundreds Of Thousands From Health Insurance Corporations: Through his for-profit healthcare consulting firm, Gingrich accepted up to $200,000 in annual fees from insurers like WellPoint and UnitedHealth. As ThinkProgress reported, Gingrich not only pushed anti-health reform conspiracies like the infamous “death panel” smear, but he also crafted model legislation that formed the basis of GOP deregulatory proposals for health insurers. In March 2009, Gingrich met with Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA) and other members of the GOP Doctors Caucus to help write conservative health reform alternative legislation. “Gingrich provided us with great insight as we work to craft health care solutions for the 21st Century,” proclaimed Gingrey after the meeting. Gingrich also wrote healthcare legislation introduced by Rep. Nathan Deal (R-GA), and “consulted” with Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) on health reform legislation that would deregulate the insurance industry. During this blitz of what many would consider lobbying-like activity, the BlueCross & BlueShield Association and AHIP, the umbrella lobbying group for the health insurance industry, paid Gingrich fees as well.

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File this in the "why am I not surprised?" folder, please. Republican FCC Commissioner Meredith Attwell Baker is leaving her post at the FCC to become Comcast's Senior VP of Government Affairs.

Ars Technica:

The news, reported this afternoon by the Wall Street Journal, The Hill, and Politico, comes after the hugely controversial merger of Comcast and NBC earlier this year. At the time, Baker objected to FCC attempts to impose conditions on the deal and argued that the "complex and significant transaction" could "bring exciting benefits to consumers that outweigh potential harms."

Four months after approving the massive transaction, Attwell Baker will take a top DC lobbying job for the new Comcast-NBC entity, according to reports.

The response of groups like Free Press was expected in its anger, but not without merit. "No wonder the public is so nauseated by business as usual in Washington—where the complete capture of government by industry barely raises any eyebrows," said Free Press' Craig Aaron. "The continuously revolving door at the FCC continues to erode any prospects for good public policy. We hope—but won't hold our breath—that her replacement will be someone who is not just greasing the way for their next industry job."

Baker has spoken against net neutrality regulations in the past. I imagine Comcast will be very happy to have her on the team. Sigh.

In case you're not familiar with Baker's connections, here's her pedigree:

Baker, an ebullient Houston native, needs little introduction within Washington. She is daughter-in-law of former secretary of state James A. Baker III. Husband James A. Baker IV is a senior partner at law firm Baker Botts.

Her introduction to Washington was in high school, when she was an exchange student. Coincidentally, she stayed with the family of FCC chief of staff Edward Lazarus and attended a semester at Sidwell Friends School.

After working at the State Department, she fell into technology policy by accident. Baker followed Steven Barry, a former boss from State to wireless trade group CTIA. Baker then joined the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to work on spectrum management before taking over for John M. R. Kneuer in November 2008.

Yippee.

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Virginia Thomas. You remember her? The wife of Clarence Thomas, head cheerleader at Liberty Central, foam crown and all? The one whose income Justice Thomas "forgot" to disclose? That One.

After leaving her gig with Tea Party front group Liberty Central, Virginia Thomas has moved on to start up her own lobbying firm, Liberty Consulting, Inc (catchy name, that). According to that raving liberal site (NOT) The Politico, Ginni Thomas is on to the next venture:

Now, Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, has recast herself yet again, this time as the head of a firm, Liberty Consulting, which boasts on its website using her “experience and connections” to help clients “with “governmental affairs efforts” and political donation strategies.

Thomas already has met with nearly half of the 99 GOP freshmen in the House and Senate, according to an e-mail she sent last week to congressional chiefs of staff, in which she branded herself “a self-appointed, ambassador to the freshmen class and an ambassador to the tea party movement."

Interesting that these very same freshmen aren't admitting to it or had no idea what Politico was talking about when asked if they had met with her.

An interesting thing, though -- Politico had a hard time finding a freshman who has actually met with Ginni Thomas. "This is the spouse of Justice Thomas?" said a seemingly surprised Rep. David Schweikert (R-AZ). "No, I've never met her. It's not something I've heard about. And I hang out with a lot of freshman," he said.

I sought info from some high-ranking GOP aides, who also have no idea what this is about. In addition, I have left a message with Ginni Thomas, but I doubt I'll be any more successful than Politico's efforts on that front:

Reached by phone on Wednesday, Thomas said she was having trouble with the signal, telling a POLITICO reporter: "I would be happy to talk with you, but I really can't understand clearly what you're asking, so maybe this is not a good time to talk."

A visit to the website for Thomas' new venture reveals things I never knew about her. Like how she's connected to the "center-right movement." If the Tea Party is "center right", we're all screwed. Just emigrate now. The endorsement page includes glowing reviews from Steve King, Donald Rumsfeld, Morton Blackwell, and the ever-annoying Rick Berman. Yeah. Center right.

Is it just me, or is there something deeply unethical about the spouse of a Supreme Court justice being paid by conservatives to lobby against things like health care reform, and financial regulatory reform, and just about anything that might be called progress? In some ways, this is even more blatant than Liberty Central was. Liberty Central was astroturf advocacy aimed at ordinary people. This is another hack lobbying firm aimed at shaping legislation toward conservatives corporate persons, not citizens. You know, those people Justice Thomas legitimized in the Citizens United decision?

Dave Weigel thinks her situation is a mess. I'm not so sure, but I'd like to think so. He puts it this way:

So you can hire Ginni Thomas to help determine whether a bill will pass constitutional muster if it comes before, you know, her husband. And she's having trouble getting work! It's quite possible that a combination of media blackout and embarrassing gaffes that echo for weeks (the call to Anita Hill) is not a good way to build a consulting shop.

About that drunk-dial late-night telephone call to Anita Hill. It seems to have displeased some conservative donors. Ohhh, can't have that. But no worries. They've already got their bought-and-paid-for justice in place. No need to worry about the spouse, right? Perfectly consistent with the current conservative trend these days to shove women back into their "place".

Perhaps Ginni should spend some time listening to progressive women after playing handmaiden to conservative old men who use women and toss them aside routinely.

Officials in Broward County, Florida were confronted by the annoying truth that their voting machines do in deed count votes, but they count them in the negative direction. In a story broken by the Palm Beach Post, election officials sheepishly revealed today that the software used in their county and others can handle only 32,000 votes. After that, the system continues to count votes - but in reverse!
As of today, stunned Broward County Mayor Ilene Lieberman was still trying to learn why a voting system would even be designed to count backward.
The problem originally cropped up in 2002. Lieberman said that ES&S told her it had sent software upgrades to Florida Secretary of State, but the office, for unexplained reasons, kept rejecting the software.
This election, the glitch affected 97,434 ballots in Broward County alone, according to Broward Elections Supervisor Brenda Snipes, a Jeb Bush appointee with ties to the White House.

The same software is used in Martin and Miami-Dade counties.
Secretary of State spokeswoman Jenny Nash said all counties had been told that such problems would indeed occur if the votes got above the 32,000 mark.
Lieberman replied adamantly, "No election employee has come to the canvassing board and made the statements that Jenny Nash said occurred."
Late Tuesday night, ES&S issued a statement changing it's tune. It now claims that it found out about the problems in 2002 and said the software upgrades would be submitted to Secretary of State Hood's office next year. The company released the following statement: "While the county bears the ultimate responsibility for programming the ballot and structuring the precincts, we regret any confusion the discrepancy in early vote totals has caused."

Omaha-based Elections Systems and Software initially refused to return any calls, but as pressure mounted late Thursday, an ES&S spokeswoman sheepishly admitted she did not know whether ES&S contacted the Secretary of State two years ago or whether the software is designed to count backwards.

Crack Palm Beach Post reporter Eliot Kleinberg who broke this story locally, found that while the problem surfaced two years ago, current Broward County Elections Supervisor Snipes claimed it was under another supervisor and a different secretary of state and hence, she could not be held accountable.

In the pre-election issue of the Broward-Palm Beach New Times, an expose on Snipes revealed, " Snipes calls herself a Democrat, but Jeb Bush and local Republican power brokers like William Scherer pull the strings."
The New Times article goes on to state: "You might remember Scherer - a co-chair for the governor's campaign and a fundraising Ranger for the president's campaign. He's the charming fellow who started yelling on live television during the 2000 recount and had to be removed from the Broward County Courthouse."
"Scherer works closely with lobbyist Jim Blosser, who is perhaps the most influential Republican power broker in South Florida," explains New Times.
Snipes a black Democrat, chose Dorsey Miller to emcee her appointment ceremony, "Miller an opportunistic and oft -investigated black Republican was tapped by Jeb {Bush} to engineer Snipes' ascension." explains New Times.
More later.

It's not what you think. Boehner isn't afraid of undue influence by lobbyists. It's something far more puerile:

Some Republican congressmen have been warned to keep their distance from the female lobbyists who prowl Capitol Hill.

Sources say House Minority Leader John Boehner has told GOP congressmen who partied with lobbyists "to knock it off." His spokesperson said, "Boehner has always told all our members that they will be held to the highest ethical standards."

Yeah, ethical. That's not usually a word I associate with Republicans, but it does strike me as typical that Boehner is fearful of these wicked women "prowling" around the halls of Congress, waiting to lead some poor man astray.

Of particular concern apparently is Rep. Lee Terry, a married Republican congressman from Nebraska, who was seen drinking and carousing with a female lobbyist:

Who, particularly is [Boehner] targeting? Maybe Rep. Lee Terry of Nebraska, whom a Post reporter overheard asking a female lobbyist “Why did you get me so drunk?” at the Capital Hill Club, until he realized the reporter was nearby and changed the subject to her family.

Of course, he's not the only one:

Meanwhile, a Kansas City blog posted photos of Missouri Rep. Sam Graves dining with a blond lobbyist from the Patriot Group at a DC restaurant. His office didn't respond to our repeated requests for comment.

And lobbyist Glenn LeMunyon's DC row house has been a hot spot for lobbyists who want to meet House members, including California's Duncan Hunter, Pennsylvania's Bill Shuster and Terry.

LeMunyon uses the house as an office during the day, a fund-raising space Some nights, and a place for congressmen to mingle after-hours with lobbyists.

As part of his release program to a halfway house and re-entry to society, Jack Abramoff has a new job at Tov Pizza in Baltimore.

Mr. Abramoff started his new gig this week at Tov Pizza — “the best kosher pizza in town,” according to a catchy jingle that plays while callers are on hold.

He has so far stayed largely cloistered in a back office. He will work about 40 hours a week, said the owner, Ron Rosenbluth. He comes in around 10:30 a.m., leaves around 5:30 p.m., and wears a yarmulke to work, as many of the male customers and employees here do. He earns between $7.50 and $10 an hour (“or a little less than what he used to make”). He has been responsible, punctual, courteous. “He is not the monster he has been portrayed as,” Mr. Rosenbluth said.

Well, of course he isn't. If he were a monster, he couldn't have gotten away with half of what he did. It is precisely because he isn't a monster -- outwardly at least -- that he was able to bilk millions out of various Indian tribes. Monsters eat children. Abramoff just took the food off their table and left them to starve, laughing all the way to the bank.

Watch for this to be the emerging theme, this idea of Abramoff not being such a bad guy after all. Here was the quintessential College Republican in all his glory, screwing one tribe for the benefit of the one that paid more, delivering nothing to them in return but living high on the hog for as long as it lasted.

My one comfort is figuring out how long it will take him to make restitution for all the millions he stole if he makes ten bucks an hour. Then again, at least he has a job.

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Via Raw Story:

And as soon as this week, or next, Abramoff will he on his way out the doors of a federal prison and into a halfway house, where he will reside until he's formally released.

I'm still amazed at what he got away with and how light a sentence he received, because I'm idealistic enough to think somehow, somewhere, justice should be done. After his 3 1/2 years in prison, he will go to a halfway house, then he will go home to his wife and children. He may be disgraced, but I doubt he is repentant.

Caution: Rant ahead

He will probably write a book and recover enough money to allow him to travel in the circles of days past. Perhaps not with the kind of high-rolling money that he wishes for, but with enough that he will never worry about where his next unemployment check will come from. While he may not be the influencer that he was once, he will have enough influence to move in the same circles as though nothing had ever happened, as though he hadn't bilked tribes out of millions, as though he hadn't sold Congressmen on the idea of giving oil companies and financial firms lots of legislative breaks in exchange for campaign booty.

I suggest you see Casino Jack to remind yourself of the evil this man is and represents. He should spill it all, name names, hand over receipts and affidavits and hammer all of his College Republican buddies. Maybe then I could forgive his easy payment of his "debt to society."

The truth of Abramoff is this: our democracy is inexorably weaker because of what he did and because he did not pay a fair price for his malfeasance.

More on Abramoff in the archives.

Bizzaro World

via PITZ

"(Bill) LD 908, would make it illegal in Maine to abort a fetus that is known to have the 'gay gene.'"Ah, the spectre of eugenics being used to drive a wedge between liberals who identify primarily as pro-choice and those who identify primarily as supporters of gay rights."

Of course a Republican proposed this bill. Rep. Brian Duprey told the Portland Press Herald that he got the idea for the bill while listening to Rush Limbaugh's radio talk show.

This legislation borders obviously on the insane. However, if enough anti-abortion lobbyist and evangelicals tried to sign on to this bill, then wouldn't it have to force them to acknowledge that homosexuality is not a learned behaviour? TWhen the bill goes down in flames,... you get the point.

If you're not really familiar with what, exactly, Jack Abramoff did and why he was convicted (taking many prominent Republicans down with him), "Casino Jack and the United States of Money" is a helluva good start to explaining the rise and fall of Washington's most powerful Republican lobbyist.

Documentary filmmaker Alex Gibney ("Enron: The Smartest Guys In The Room", "Taxi to the Dark Side" and "Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson") glosses over quite a bit to keep the complex story flowing smoothly (he mentions Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy aka CREA* only in passing) but still leaves out large, meaty chunks. What he sacrifices in detail, he makes up in digestibility. Even hewing to the bare facts, it's an awful lot to absorb.

He asks the question: Was it really more idealistic in the past, or was it always this bad? He never quite answers his own question.

Salon writer Thomas Frank ("What's the Matter With Kansas", "The Wrecking Crew") is one of the counterpoints throughout the film, as is convicted Rep. Bob Ney and Neil Volz, Ney's former chief of staff.

Volz, who went to prison, seems clearly regretful for his part in Abramoff's legalized bribery. "He could talk a dog off a meat truck," he says of Abramoff. Volz also talks about the revolving door between Congress and the lobby shops, and how easy it is to get caught up in chasing the money. "You forget why you came here," he says.

The film examines Abramoff's long-standing ties with Grover Norquist, Karl Rove and Ralph Reed from their days in the College Republican National Committee.

Volz's former boss Bob Ney is also seen in a candid interview, and comes off as relatively human - and bitter about the entire mess.

Tom DeLay, as you might expect, acts as if Abramoff's illegal acts were a total shock to him - even though we know they couldn't be.

Reporter Shawn Martin, a writer for the Lake Charles American Press, points out that members of Congress are so obsessed with getting campaign contributions, "They're willing to risk their careers for $25,000, or $50,000, or a golf trip."

Abramoff refused to go on-camera for this film, although he did take part in several interviews. It would have been more than a little interesting to hear how he feels about his achievements now.

In the bigger picture, "Casino Jack" makes the most powerful argument yet for public campaign financing, and of course we watch it knowing that the same kind of big-money lobbying that allowed sex slavery to thrive in the Marianas Islands also allowed the regulatory breakdown that is now polluting the entire Gulf of Mexico.

This documentary is a clarion call to get money the hell out of politics.

* Via Mary Beth Williams at Wampum, whose investigative work on Abramoff was used without attribution by many, many people:

Throughout its short but controversial existence (CREA was highly implicated in the Abramoff scandal, which is how I discovered it), CREA's central mission, despite purportedly being a 501(c)3, was to undermine the environmental credentials of high-profile Democrats, particularly Al Gore, and later, John Kerry. It accomplished this mostly through paid media, ads buys in major newspapers and on TV. How it paid for those high-priced ads is still a mystery, as CREA consistently claimed on its filings with the IRS that, outside of a three-month period in the summer of 2000 where it raked in $121K+, including $10,000 from Koch, it claimed it had no income. The half-million dollars from Abramoff tribal clients has yet to be declared, as well as any proceeds from the numerous fundraisers hosted by Julie Finley, the queen bee of Republican Washington society.

Groups like CEI, CREA, the Cato Institute (also Koch funded) and the National Center for Public Policy Research (also a laundry for Abramoff money) all began a non-stop brutal campaign, managed by Grover Norquist and Karl Rove, on VP Al Gore, a campaign aimed at cementing public doubt regarding Gore's superb environmental credentials. The effort worked so well, that Gore's own campaign advisors purportedly urged him not to focus on his green record.