Of course, as a dog lover, I would never swat a real dog with a rolled up newspaper. When it comes to Congress, however, I would have no such compunctions. Remember all the effort we put into getting the STOCK Act passed to ban Congressional insider trading? Remember how we suspected the House GOP leadership, especially Eric Cantor, were trying to kill it or at least water it down?
Well, I thought that was one battle won.
But now Broc Romanek reports that:
I guess Congress is not satisfied that it's approval rating is down to single digits. As noted in this CNN article, the House Ethics Committee came up with a 14-page memo to interpret the STOCK Act differently than its Senate counterpart and found that spouses and children are exempt from the new law that had banned insider trading in Congress. The Office of Government Ethics, which oversees all federal executive branch employees, sided with the House.
So there you have it. A different standard for Congress compared to other federal employees. A group of ethics officials who have no understanding of beneficial ownership (guess they should have read our new "Beneficial Ownership Table Handbook"). And back to Square #1 in providing some integrity on the Hill. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor now claims that his office inadvertently created the loophole.
Right. I don't believe Cantor for a minute. He's a bad pup who simply won't learn his lessons. I hope I never run into him with a rolled up newspaper in hand, or I'll be in big trouble.
