The House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill on Thursday to ban insider trading by members of Congress and to impose new ethics requirements on lawmakers and federal agency officials.
(Let's pause a moment to note that Congress had to pass a law that bans them from doing something illegal. Crickey.)
Now the bad news:
Democrats said that House Republican leaders had weakened the Senate-passed bill by stripping out a provision that would, for the first time, regulate firms that collect “political intelligence” for hedge funds, mutual funds and other investors. Under the Senate bill, such firms would have to register and report their activities, as lobbyists do.
Nothing like giving the hedge funds a little kickback in a bill that's supposed to create a firewall from members of Congress and Wall Street.