Our governing elite

I had a wonderful dream the other night. It was that every voter in the next election voted against every Congressional incumbent. A clean sweep, a new dawn. I was so sorry to wake up, I nearly wept. But Congress, where the job is to spend other people's money, is such an inherently corrupting institution that the new dawn would only have lasted a year or two anyway.

Recently, the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) analyzed the financial assets of US lawmakers based on required annual disclosures, and found that there are 237 millionaires in the US Congress.

Precisely the governing by a semi-permanent wealthy aristocracy that the Founders had in mind. Oh, wait...

How many of these Plutocrats feel enough noblesse oblige to return their salaries to the Treasury? Or pay for their own first class airline tickets? Or anything? On the other hand, when you work as long and hard for your money as, say, John Kerry has, it's natural to try to hang onto it. Just to show how high the bar is set, Kerry's getting kudos for flying commercial (eeewww!) to Copenhagen, instead of in a private jet.

It really is quite hopeless.

Byron

The Richest Members of the US Congress

1. Cynthia Marie Lummis (R-Wyo) $48.29 million
2. Bob Corker (R-Tenn) $52.35
3. James E. Risch (R-Idaho) $53.33
4. Alan Grayson (D-Fla) $54.45
5. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) $69.62
6. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif) $72.38
7. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) $74.74
8. Jay rockerfeller (D-WV) $94.31
9. Vernon Buchanan (R-Fla) $142.43
10. Jared Polis (D-Colo) $158.17
11. John Kerry (D-Mass) $208.80
12. Mark Warner (D-VA) $209.70
13. Herb Kohl (D-Wisc) $214.57
14. Jane Harman (D-Calif) $244.80
15. Darrell Issa (R-Calif) $251.03