Senator McCain made call to campaign fund-raisers -- from the Capitol
"McCain Call Raises an Ethics Question" is the headline of an article in today's NY Times. CREW is checking that out, but it sure seems like McCain was at least campaigning from the U.S. Capitol building on Tuesday:
About 3 p.m. Tuesday, Senator John McCain ducked off the Senate floor, entered the Republican cloakroom and took out his mobile phone. Just hours after accepting the resignation of his two top campaign aides, he was making a conference call to his top fund-raisers to urge them to keep up the fight.
The call, however, may only have exacerbated an already tough week for Mr. McCain. Senate ethics rules expressly forbid lawmakers to engage in campaign activities inside Senate facilities. If Mr. McCain solicited campaign contributions on a call from government property, that would be a violation of federal criminal law as well.
There is no evidence that Mr. McCain has made a habit of making such calls or otherwise exploiting his office for political gain, and he is hardly the first lawmaker to call a donor from under the Capitol dome. But he made the call as he was in the spotlight because of the staff shake-up, sagging poll numbers and disappointing fund-raising of his Republican presidential primary campaign.
It was the kind of technical mistake that seasoned aides — like the ones his campaign is now letting go — are supposed to prevent.
It would behoove members of Congress
to provide for an effective regulation of individual behavior so to avoid that which "does not reflect creditably" on the whole.
Members need to understand that a new age has arrived, and those who fail to see this will fall away- it's kind of like evolution.
ethics rules expressly forbid
Good bye dick head!!
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Congress: Listen Up!
Another needed reform concerns those who campaign when they have public duties which should preclude that. You have a choice: clean it up or pay the price.