This Is Why Lobbying and Ethics Reform Is Important

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An unbelievable $8 billion in financial fraud was enabled by the fact that Washington politicians, in exchange for feeding at Robert Allen Stanford’s campaign money trough, acceded to the money manager’s wishes and didn’t pass a 2002 bill that would have made preventing and discovering fraud of exactly his kind much, much easier. Hey, here’s a thought! Maybe when a guy spends millions of dollars urging you and your colleagues not to pass stricter controls on fraud, you should pause and consider his motivations! He’s probably into something he’s not supposed to be into!

This is infuriating. The lawmakers who took money from Allen should have to write personal checks to the people he defrauded. They bear responsibility for this.

(Serious kudos to OpenSecrets for uncovering this connection.)

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BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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