Lawmakers' stock holdings raise questions

[undeterred]

WASHINGTON, Nov. 23 (UPI) -- Ethical questions about U.S. lawmakers' stock holdings are becoming more acute as Congress intervenes in the private sector, watchdogs say.

The healthcare reform debate has shed a spotlight on longstanding family investments by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., in medical device companies. Both of them have opposed a proposed $4 billion tax on medical device firms to help offset the cost of healthcare reforms, The Washington Post reported Monday.

Although both say their positions are driven purely by concerns about jobs in their states and not by their families' investments, some observers say the growth of such investments by lawmakers is troubling because it can be impossible to know whether they are acting in the public interest or for their own stock portfolios, the Post said.

The newspaper found that in the medical device field alone, 108 U.S. lawmakers collectively own $6 million to $14 million worth of stock. "It is time for Congress to take a fresh look at the financial conflict-of-interest rules, and how they should be enforced -- starting with a thorough overhaul of the disclosure process," Harvard University government professor Dennis Thompson told the newspaper.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2009/11/23/Lawmakers-stock-holdings-raise-questions/UPI-17161258989373/

[Newsjock]

1. Funny how this was never an issue until now

I mean, what with Cheney and KBR and whatnot. Yeah, funny.

[DCKit]

2. Would it become a non-issue for the (D)s if they sold their stocks...

then just accepted "residual" payments like the (R)s do?

We need our houses cleaned.

[Igel]

3. The newspaper makes it look like a huge conflict of interest.

That's in the newspaper's interest.

The question is, Is there a conflict of interest?

Take the wording: "longstanding family investments" by Kerry. What does that mean? Longstanding investments by Kerry? Or by his family, which would imply either his Kerry relatives or his Heinz wife. Now, we know that his wife keeps her money separate from his. Should she be forced to sell any holdings she has to make sure his hands look clean? Or what--he should be forced to abstain from voting or divorce her?

Then there's the collective investment of $6 to 14 million. Now, that's a rather wide spread. Presumably they're going through financial holdings statements where a range is indicated and then summing all the lows and all the highs. If so, there's a problem: The financial statements (a) aren't up to the minute, and (b) a number of congressfolk have their investments in some sort of blind trust, so if their holdings have changed neither the WP nor the congressperson in question would know. So their holdings might be far less or far more, and the least well informed would be the WP.

Still, the observation holds that the more Congress gets involved in details the more their holdings matter. There are other observations. For example, the more Congress has sway over the private sector the greater the private sector's motivation to try to gain sway over Congress.