But merchants and banks rained down a staggering sum of money in their fight -- on lobbyists, consultants, campaigns, public relations firms and any other bucket that Washington put out. That flow of dollars determines what gets on Congress agenda. The opposite dynamic dictates what doesnt get lawmakers attention. Six years earlier, and every year after, the inspector general for the Department of Veterans Affairs warned of serious backlogs and unreliable recordkeeping in the VAs health care system, on which millions of veterans rely. But the congressional calendar was not stacked with meetings with VA officials or auditors. Veterans didnt have the cash to be heard. Money molds not just the agenda but the shape of Congress itself. Think of it as a host-parasite relationship in which the host, Congress, adjusts to interact most effectively with the parasite, money. The House Financial Services Committee is one of the most desirable panels on the Hill, coveted for its access to bank cash. As a result, it has 61 members. Energy and Commerce is another money committee, as is Ways and Means, both of which enable members to profit off the big-dollar industries whose interests are at stake. Those panels have 54 and 39 members respectively, many with decades of congressional tenure and the clout that comes with it. There is much less jockeying for a seat on the House Veterans Affairs Committee. It has just 25 members. When Republican David Jolly won a special election in Florida this spring, the Houses most junior addition -- himself a former lobbyist -- probably knew where he was headed: Veterans Affairs. Democrats, meanwhile, couldnt even fill their seats on the committee at the beginning of this Congress and had to ask Rep. Tim Walz (D-Minn.) to take on an extra panel assignment in order to fill their 11 slots, sources familiar with the arrangement told HuffPost.
Posted on: Sat, 07 Jun 2014 23:57:13 +0000
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