Rhetoric:
Everybody has to make a sacrifice. If you’re asking everybody else in the country who has an interaction with the federal government — and that means our states and cities and all the rest, too — to cut back, then I think we have to subject every federal dollar to the very harshest scrutiny.
—Nancy Pelosi, January 28, 2010
Reality:
From IBD Editorials:
By everybody, [Nancy Pelosi] evidently was excluding herself; the speaker’s interest in Air Force jets does not extend beyond the ones that fly her and her family around.
Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by Judicial Watch show that Pelosi has incurred expenses of $2.1 million for her use of Air Force jets the past two years. Then there’s the matter of the $101,000 tab taxpayers picked up over that period for “in-flight services,” including a selection of top-shelf booze.
One receipt for “in-flight services,” World Net Daily reports, showed a liquor purchase for one flight that included Maker’s Mark whiskey, Courvoisier cognac, Johnny Walker Red scotch, Grey Goose vodka, E&J brandy, Bailey’s Irish Creme, Bacardi Light rum, Jim Beam whiskey, Beefeater gin, Dewar’s scotch, Bombay Sapphire gin, Jack Daniel’s whiskey and Corona beer
According to documents obtained by Judicial Watch, Pelosi has used Air Force aircraft to travel back to her district at average cost of $28,210.51 per flight. In 2007, Pelosi was criticized, justifiably, for using a 42-seat Air Force jet to taxi her and her staff from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., and back.
Of 103 Pelosi-led congressional delegations, 31 trips included members of the speaker’s family. Pelosi has reportedly requested on one occasion the dedicated use of an Air Force C-32, the military version of the Boeing 757-200 commercial jet that costs $22,000 an hour to operate.
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Rhetoric:
The stunning decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission will allow special interests—including the nation’s largest corporations—to spend an unlimited amount of money to influence political campaigns, drowning out the voice of the American people and rolling back decades of progress to ensure elections are fair.
—Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ), January 26, 2010In the upcoming elections, voters will face a choice between Republicans who are standing with Wall Street fat cats, bankers and insurance companies—or Democrats who are working hard to clean up the mess we inherited by putting the people’s interests ahead of the special interests.
—Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ), January 26, 2010
Reality:
From Politico [h/t Hot Air]:
Dem. senators spent weekend with bank, energy, tobacco lobbyists
February 01, 2010Twelve Democratic Senators spent last weekend in Miami Beach raising money from top lobbyists for oil, drug, and other corporate interests that they often decry, according to a guest list for the event obtained by POLITICO.
The guest list for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee’s “winter retreat” at the Ritz Carlton South Beach Resort doesn’t include the price tag for attendance, but the maximum contribution to the committee, typical for such events, is $30,000. There, to participate in “informal conversations” and other meetings Saturday, were senators including DSCC Chairman Robert Menendez; Michigan’s Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow; Bob Casey of Pennsylvania; Claire McCaskill of Missouri; freshmen Kay Hagan of North Carolina and Mark Begich of Alaska; and even left-leaning Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
Across the table was a who’s who of 108 senior Washington lobbyists, including the top lobbying officials for many of the industries Democrats regularly attack: Represented were the American Bankers Association, the tobaco company Altria, the oil company Marathon, several drug manufacturers, the defense contractor Lockheed, and most of the large independent lobbying firms: Ogilvy, BGR, Quinn Gillespie, Heather Podesta, and Tony Podesta.
It’s so easy being a Washington liberal/Democrat, isn’t it? One set of rules for you, another set of rules for eeeeeveryone else.
Related reading: Flopping Aces
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