Do you know you your congressmen???? assault, drugs, shoplifting DUI..>>

[greenbriar]

Can you imagine working for a company that has a little more


than 500 employees and has the following statistics:


29 have been accused of spousal abuse


7 have been arrested for fraud


19 have been accused of writing bad checks


117 have directly or indirectly bankrupted at


least 2 businesses


3 have done time for assault


71 cannot get a credit card due to bad credit


14 have been arrested on drug-related charges


8
have been arrested for shoplifting


21 are currently defendants in lawsuits


84 have been arrested for drunk driving in the


last year




Can you guess which organization this is?




Give up yet?




It's the 535 members of the United States Congress. The


same group of idiots that crank out hundreds of new


laws each year designed to keep the rest of us


in line.

[Syrinx]

1. snopes

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/congress.htm

[NYCGirl]

2. Not quite right. Snopes says:

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/congress.htm

[MrMonk]

3. See Snopes

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/congress.htm

This list has been circulating in the e-mail for years. It's from a dubious source and it's unverifiable.

[NYCGirl]

5. Interesting that the "dubious source"

Snopes cites is DUer very favorite dubious source, Capitol Hill Blue:
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/congress.htm

All that said, this list wasn't made up out of whole cloth. The information was taken from a series of articles that appeared in an on-line publication called Capitol Hill Blue (whose motto is "Because nobody's life, liberty or property is safe while Congress is in session . . .") in August 1999, and gained widespread currency when a brief summary (stripped of what little supporting evidence the articles had in the first place) was irresponsibly run in a syndicated weird news column with no clue as to where the reader might find the source material on which it was based.

What appears in the original Capitol Hill Blue articles doesn't exactly validate the list by any responsible journalistic standards. The series includes lengthy articles about four of Congress' worst offenders, a screed about how Congressmen have "a long tradition of corruption and ambivalence," and a heap of vague innuendo. We're told that "117 members of the House and Senate have run at least two businesses each that went bankrupt, often leaving business partners and creditors holding the bag," but no detail about who these members were, the nature of the businesses that failed, why the businesses failed, or who was left "holding the bag" (and for how much). We're informed that "seventy-one of them have credit reports so bad they can't get an American Express card," but we're provided with no details about whom or why. Have these people been kiting checks, did they absent-mindedly make a few late credit card payments, or were they innocent victims of credit reporting agency screw-ups? And since when is not qualifying for an American Express card the standard by which "bad credit" is judged? I probably couldn't qualify for an AmEx card because I don't have sufficient income. Does that mean I have "bad credit" unquestionably caused by personal fiscal irresponsibility?

Most everything found in the Capitol Hill Blue articles continues in this vein. "Twenty-nine members of Congress have been accused of spousal abuse in either criminal or civil proceedings," it says. Well, at least we know the "accusations" were made in the context of court cases, but they remain nothing more than accusations nonetheless. Were any Congressmen actually convicted of spousal abuse, or did any of them have to pay civil damages because of their abusive behavior towards their spouses? You won't find out from Capitol Hill Blue. "Twenty-one are current defendants in various lawsuits, ranging from bad debts, disputes with business partners or other civil matters." Is this really supposed to have any significance in a society where people can and do sue at the drop of a hat, often for the most frivolous of reasons? How about telling us who was successfully sued, and why? That effort appears to be beyond the ability (or the inclination) of Capitol Hill Blue staff. Why ruin a good story with pesky facts, after all?

[MrMonk]

7. DUers seem to respect CHB only when it says what they want to hear.

There are plenty of DUers who look sceptically at any CHB column.

[Salviati]

4. from snopes:

...
The claims that numerous Congressmen have been "accused" of various wrongdoings is even more specious. "Accused"? By whom? Journalists? Jealous rivals? Bitter ex-spouses? Childhood enemies? Muckrakers? Gossip mongers? I suspect that every single member of Congress has been "accused" of something bad at one time or another. By what standards does an accusation become "serious" or "official" enough to merit inclusion in this list?
...

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/congress.htm

[ovidsen]

6. This does not pass the smell test

I know there are a lot of assholes in Congress... BUT

Some of the numbers you cite seem, shall we say slightly exaggerated?

84 have been arrested for drunk driving in the last year

And out of those 84, how come I didn't see even one of those arrests posted here? Okay, maybe I'm blind and a doofus, but I'd sure like to see some stronger evidence before I start throwing numbers like these around. A link or two would help.

Edit: Never mind. Thanks for the SNOPES link, fellow DUers. Capitol Hill Blue is a rag that gives political reformers and Democrats in general a very bad name. IMO of course.

[A Simple Game]

8. Relax it's not as bad as it seems.

9 out of 10 of all those charges are Tom Delays.