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Ban Stock Trading by Congress-Critters?
Love him or hate him, this best version of Joe Biden has his extraordinary moments. Fearlessly pardoning his beloved son—so unfairly maligned; being photographed wearing a scarlet “Make America Great Again” cap as his vice president ran, er, cackled for the office of President of the United States against WorseThanHitler.
With the earlier version of Joe Biden, there was his conduct concerning the Clarence Thomas Senate hearings for nomination to the Supreme Court. Republicans reviled him for bringing forth the ludicrous soda can the testimony of Anita Hill, and Democrats reviled him for allowing the Republicans time to cross-examine Hill in session. His is a long and storied career, but his latest is amazing, even by the standards he has set for himself.
Mallory Wilson writes in the Washington Times:
President Biden has thrown his endorsement behind a ban on stock trading by members of Congress.
“I think we should be changing the law,” Mr. Biden said in an interview published Tuesday. “Nobody in the Congress should be able to make money in the stock market while they’re in the Congress.”
Of course, CCP Joe has personally demonstrated that stock market trading, like the Clinton Whitewater deals, is too inefficient a ploy to attract officeholders with any actual clout. Since reforms like this have historically avoided provisions to curtail an officeholder’s family from participating in those money-making opportunities, the officeholder’s influence buys them (ref: Peter Schweitzer’s considerable opus).
We are very fortunate to have such a wise and able counselor as President Biden on matters so central to the crises of our time. His acuity in this matter caused my soda to evacuate via my nostrils. I despair of any hope that I might properly pay him back for this.
Published in Politics
Cojones bigger than Jupiter.
He’s shining his halo for the epic self blanket pardon. An Olympics event of the stringently honorable office holder.
If Pelosi (the biggest congressional insider trader of our current era) hadn’t played a prominent role in forcing Biden out of the 2024 presidential race, he wouldn’t be endorsing this bill.
He was just mad because he didn’t think of it first.
Add a retroactive tax on such “earnings” reaching back 25 years and I am all in. (A little extra penalty for the Clinton retroactive tax increase of 1993.)
I think we can get Trump on board.
Even just radio/TV/etc contests for rather modest prizes, exclude those people working for the company, or their agents, employees, relatives…
Why not for Congress too?
Just put them all in jail and if you find any with no funny stuff on their ledger, send them home.
If Peter writes the law, then I favor it. I think real estate and collectable deals should be outlawed too. We know those DC types like to buy and sell art for fun and profit–but mostly profit.
Without integrity and honor in public office, no ban has a chance of being effective. Officials can always find a friend or distant relative to hold their asset portfolios. Plus they write loopholes into the laws and regulations.
When I lived in Kazakhstan, it had stringent bans on officials holding stock and assets, yet everyone of them managed to become wealthy.
Bans on stock ownership only work to control the dishonest 5% if the other 95% are honest.
And what civil servant with a pension at risk wants to risk enraging a politician who might find a path to retaliation. Look at the abject failure of whistleblower protections for a taste of that nightmare. I applaud the guts of the IRS agents that took on the Hunter Biden case. Lord bless and keep them.
I’m opposed. I don’t think such a ban would improve things one bit.
However, a requirement that each MoC be a eunuch and have no living offspring, siblings, or parents while serving in Congress might be worth considering.
Even if there are ways around it, this should be a standard part of the oath, that at least on the surface we prohibit any direct stock trading for anyone currently holding an office. Avoidance of self-interest, minimizing influence of lobbyists, ensuring that votes are made for the public good vs. the individual’s self-interest, etc.
Window dressing, to be sure. But why wouldn’t this already be standard practice, given the enormous scope of spend and the opportunity to buy votes through government contracting, and the resulting impacts on stock prices?
Oh, wait, I already know the answer. They’re leeches.
He expects them to follow his example of bribing and blackmailing foreign actors for that “extra income.” Makes sense to me!
That was my starting point on this, but now, having reflected, I think the Ricochet Persons of the Year should be the IRS agents that dared to hunt the Hunter. I have spent a lot of time in federal offices and I can assure you that these guys have shown a kind of reckless bravery that is rare outside of special forces teams. When a federal employee is not recalculating or strategizing his next pension move he is avoiding with unaccustomed vigor and wiliness any action that might in any way jeopardize even a penny of that nest egg. This is Congressional Medal of Honor stuff here.
In theory, mandatory disclosure is supposed to fix this. The problem is that enforcement is done by Congress.
Back in the 1980s as I recall, many congressmen had an uncanny knack for getting in on lucrative IPOs but there was a rule change to limit that. I really don’t want rules so strict that we have a Congress comprised of rich people living off interest from inherited fortunes.
Maybe there needs to be an office that clears stock purchases–not a company doing business within the purview of the member’s committee assignments etc. and really competent professional journalists reviewing that. (Yeah, that last part was a stretch.)
A while back I was presented with Joe Biden’s income taxes and challenge to find the corruption. Naturally, the illicit income came through holding organizations or in undeclared transactions like rental and mortgage payments, plane tickets, “hospitality” services, and so on. Almost none of the real story appeared in the tax filings, just enough to lend credence that such things had been reported under superficial examination. This is what tax accountants and lawyers get paid for.
Right, like how Hunter was getting that Burisma cash etc, then paying Joe and Jill $50,000/month “rent” on that house in Delaware.
And brother Jim “repaying” Joe and Jill for something like a $200,000 “loan” that there was no evidence had ever been made.
They could not imagine a world in which any of this would ever be challenged. Brazen.
I’M GOOD WITH THAT! But all this is, obviously, just an FY to Pelosi from Dear Ol’ Joe on his way out. Congress will never pass a bill that diminishes any member’s pocketbook.
This whole “pocketbook” thing puzzles me. Why is it always “pocketbook” now? I remember when it was said that a tax increase or whatever, would hit people in their wallet. Or maybe the “back pocket” where a wallet would be. Men carry wallets. I’ve only ever known women to have “pocketbooks.”
We’re talking about Congress.
In Congressional circles pocketbook has been the term since at least the 60s. In those days, some banks worked using customer-carried pocket-sized account books that showed deposits and withdrawals stamped by the bank as you go. Now our accounts are linked to the Internet where our government overlords can snuff our balances on a whim. Ain’t progress grand.
I knew there was a whiff of something distasteful here.
I’ve heard of “bank books” before, for sure, but it wasn’t a “pocketbook” except for women, who carried money – and possibly the bank book for keeping track – in a pocket in their purse.
It only took him 4 years to do this. Must have been a tough slog.
“It’s a pocketbook issue.”
Who do you think really controls the money? As every man knows, it’s the wife. Therefore, pocketbook.
What I remember is “kitchen table issue” etc.
Tell me which term you prefer and whenever I am discussing the this issue in the future I will try to remember to use it.