I have often wondered if the FBI and the Keystone Cops share the same parentage. I will explain my lack of regard for this august body in just a bit.

The FBI was brought to mind by an article I read. It reported that Wikipedia had been threatened if they did not discontinue displaying the FBI’s logo on their site’s article devoted to the agency.

Silly me. I thought the Feebies were busy catching communists terrorists; saving all of us innocents from what’s-his-name.

The legal office of the FBI opened with:

“Unauthorized reproduction or use of the FBI Seal is prohibited by 18 United States Code, Section 701, which provides:

One would hope that we had put the messianic personality of JEHoover behind us. It has been 40 years and more since I was involved to the extent that I felt I had a realistic take on the tragicomedy that was the FBI. When I was involved, there were eleven investigative agencies in the federal government. The last count I heard was sixteen.

The agency with the best conviction rate was Customs. That was likely because, the way they worked, they almost always secured the evidence at the time of the apprehension.

The FBI had the lowest conviction rate. I lay that to incompetence, sloppiness and hubris. They tended to believe their press clippings.

Have you been watching reruns of The FBI Story, I Led Three Lives or any other series based on that agency? No? You would bust a gut at how consistently cornball those shows were. Hoover’s office demanded and got editorial control of essentially anything portraying the agency. Though several presidents wanted to get rid of Hoover, no one had the guts to upset him.

The majority of cases that the FBI handled, when I was paying attention, were stolen cars. You didn’t know that, did you? When a car was stolen, it was assumed that after 24 hours it had crossed a state line. This caused the local law enforcement to notify the FBI. They, in turn, issued a regional (not all-points) bulletin. Yep. That’s what they did.

When the car was eventually found by a local police or sheriff’s department, they notified the FBI. The FBI fetched the vehicle and returned it to the original jurisdiction. That counted as a successful case for the Bureau. Padding their statistics thusly, they still had the worst record of any agency.

At a Washington party, Hoover once refused to shake hands with the Soviet Union’s ambassador and pretended to ignore him. His obsession with communism caused him, and therefore the Bureau, to see them everywhere. It was said that he could see communists under the bed who weren’t there but couldn’t see a real, live communist standing in front of him.

His devotion of resources to ferreting out communists caused him to flood the Communist Party USA with spies. While there  were only about 9,000 members of the Party, 1,500 were FBI agents. It was truly comic with so many agents stepping on each others toes.

There was a directive sent out to all 1,500 of these agents not to pay their dues on time. They were afraid it would be a giveaway that they were FBI and could afford dues. The average member of the Party was rarely successful enough to be able to afford to pay their dues on time. This is what Hoover feared so much and, by his efforts, brought the public to an irrational level of fear of a takeover of the country.

Did the FBI discover the Shoe Bomber? The Bloomers Bomber? I think ordinary citizens discovered them. The FBI did find a bunch of kids who intended to blow up the Sears Tower, despite not knowing how to construct a bomb and not having enough for bus fare to Chicago. I think they did know that the Tower was in Chicago.

The Brits discovered a plot over there and told the Yanks. They regretted it. It seems Bush needed to boost his image and the Americans forced the operation to be closed down before the British could round up the entire group of plotters. Public relations trumps national security and relations with competent members of friendly foreign agencies.

Please don’t turn me in for posting their badge. If I were eating when they came a-calling, I might choke during my hysterical reaction.

It would not get me in trouble to post the logo of the CIA. It’s likely no one there would recognize it.

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©2010 The Couth Hillbilly. All Rights Reserved.

We need to send some senators to Guantanamo. They are far more dangerous to our country than any of the people already in residence there.

I’m certain you have at least heard the name of Christopher Bond, Senator from Missouri. You, however, may be forgiven for not recognizing Martha Johnson’s name.

Miss Martha was the President’s nominee to head up the General Services Administration. It’s difficult to think of a political appointment to a less political position. The GSA is primarily the nation’s landlord and maintenance arm. They do the grunt work so that government employees have a roof over their heads.

What connection is there between these two?

Little Chris (Kit) was pissed about something to do with a new Federal building in Kansas City. So, he did what any grammar school kid would do. He took “his” ball and refused to let the others play. He put a hold on her nomination.

Believe it or not, the Democrats finally showed some backbone and forced a vote. What was the outcome of this controversial nomination? She was confirmed: 96-0.

Senators are so impressed with themselves that they refer to the Senate as the world’s most exclusive club. Sometimes they call it the world’s most exclusive debating club. One problem – they no longer debate. They just pose for the cameras and talk past each other.

Given how impressed they are with themselves, they feel they deserve special privileges. So, they give themselves a bunch of special considerations. My problem with that, beyond the attitude that engenders it, is that essentially all of these privileges are anti-democratic. Somehow that doesn’t seem meet in, arguably, the world’s most successful democracy.

The privilege pertinent to the above embarrassment is the rule that permits any Senator to put a hold on any nominee or bill, for any reason, or for no reason. Any single Senator can put the whole country on hold, at his pleasure. It this any way to run an airline?

Now, another Senator has taken the next illogical step. He has put a hold on all nominations. Who is this terrorist? He goes by the American-sounding name of Richard Shelby. Unsurprisingly, he comes out of Alabama, our leading state – at least alphabetically.

Surely there is a serious national danger that calls for such a drastic measure. What could it be?

Old Dick wants a government contract to go to a defense contractor who would do assembly work on a new tanker back home in Alabama. I’m convinced that he merely wants government-funded jobs for his constituents. It has nothing to do with his being on the contractor’s payroll.

Actually, the Dick has another reason, as well. He wants the FBI to build an explosives testing facility in Alabama. We mustn’t locate such a facility too conveniently to the FBI’s primary offices in Virginia. That would only help one part of the government function more efficiently. That would violate one of his “conservative” tenants.

The Dick is famous for how tentative his tenants can be. He once pontificated, “Far too many of the president’s nominees were never afforded an up or down vote because several Democrats chose to block the process for political gain.” That, of course, was when Bush had a majority of Republicans in the Senate.

Another rule has become a “privilege.” That is the rule requiring a super majority. When the Democrats had 60 votes, that meant any Democratic Senator could stand in the way until he/she got what they wanted. That worked out so well we ended up with a joke called a healthcare reform bill. It was more like a ménages à cent.

Now, with the Republicans having 41 votes, one of that group can either stop the majority or broker a deal to get what they want. What about what the people want? Silly question.

How do they justify these privileges? They sometimes resort to calling them a part of the system of checks and balances. Pure BS.

The Constitution provides for several checks and balances. There are what are considered to be the main ones: between the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches. We also have another between the two branches of Congress. The primary one was to be between the people, on the one hand, and Congress and the White House on the other. That one has been effectively eliminated by the Senate.

There are several ways to eliminate these anti-democratic privileges. The Vice President could, at the beginning of the next session, declare them eliminated. It seems he is not so inclined. The Senate Majority Leader could also lead. Not much chance of that.

The Constitution begins, “We the People.” Forget the Constitution. The Rules of the Senate take precedence. The people have been beaten into complete submission. Do you really think the people are prepared to take time away from their 50″ flat screens and video games to regain the power promised by the Constitution? Sure, there are the teabaggers but they are a thankfully small group of yoyos that are too easily led by faux populists such as Dick Armey and the corporate interests he represents. They are ready and willing to blindly follow con men to support policies that are against their real self-interests.

It doesn’t make much sense to depend on such as the corporately mislead teabaggers to help rid us of the corporate-owned legislators. What is the solution? Realistically, there seems not to be one. They say knowledge is power. How I wish that were true.

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©2010 The Couth Hillbilly. All Rights Reserved.

What’s the difference? Well, they are both smiling. They are both wearing suits and ties. They are both using the flag to make people think they care about America. Neither gives a damn about their constituents.

Among the differences is the fact that one is a Senator; the other is a former member of the House of Representatives. One has been convicted; one hasn’t. One took $100,000 from the FBI. The other takes millions of dollars from lobbyists.

There’s really not that much difference. Why don’t they represent us? Why are they allowed to accept bribes? What standards should we hold them to?

William Jefferson was caught in an FBI sting. He was accused of accepting $400,000 in bribes. In the sting, he was video-taped receiving $100,000 from the FBI. $90,000 of the FBI’s money was found in his freezer. He was just convicted on 11 counts.

Max Baucus takes millions of dollars of bribes. He is an equal opportunity prostitute. He accepts money from any lobbyist that can find the Senate Office Building. He has taken millions from the healthcare industry, among others.

I have difficulty appreciating the difference between what Jefferson did and what all of the others do daily. A court says one is a felon. Is there really a difference?

What can we do? What should we do? I have a couple of suggestions.

When a judge has a relationship with anyone involved in a case before him, be it a litigant or their counsel, that judge is expected to recuse himself. Should such a rule not also apply to legislators? If they receive money from a lobbyist, play golf with a lobbyist or play with an escort provided by a lobbyist, I personally think that sufficient grounds for recusal from participating in the vote of any bill that might benefit that lobbyist or his employer. We might begin to see bills winning or losing by a vote of 1 – 0, or something close to that.

Back to the William Jefferson situation. If a legislator accepts money from a lobbyist, why is that considered legal? I realize that the FBI would have to hire substantial numbers to investigate all of the lobbyist-congressman relationships but isn’t that an important area of concern? I may have discovered the reason for the antipathy so many have for big government. It might have sufficient resources to maintain some semblance of propriety and rectitude.

Jefferson’s indiscretion indicates he is motivated by a venal spirit. Is that a rare psychological defect on Capitol Hill? It certainly doesn’t appear to be all that extraordinary. The Founding Fathers probably hoped that those elected to public office would be public-spirited. It hasn’t worked out quite that way.

These people were elected and are paid to serve the interests of their constituents. You would be hard pressed to cobble together a case for them actually working on our behalf.

They obviously like their jobs. They enjoy the perks, such as government-run healthcare and compliant staffers and interns. Their primary focus is to remain in that special bubble of privilege.

Keeping that office for 3 to 4 decades requires lots of money. You haven’t slipped your Representative a couple of hundred thousands lately, have you? My guess is that he is too busy catering to the moneyed people and their toadies to invite you to the country club for a round. You have no voice. You have no representation.

They will never vote term limits for themselves. They will never do anything to choke off their access to bribes. It is possible to hope that they might become a bit less acquisitive if the FBI and courts considered the largesse of lobbyists to be illegal bribes. These bribes corrupt our entire system. They deny the people’s right to expect the government to be on their side. It just isn’t supposed to be government of the banks, by the health insurance companies and for the corporations.

I should end it here but that last part hit a sore spot. The Founding Fathers, with one notable exception, considered corporations dangerous. The fiction that corporations should have legal personalities is ludicrous. Why is limiting an investor’s liability not considered antithetical to the most basic beliefs of capitalism? The concept reeks of hypocrisy.

There is no extra charge for that last bit of wisdom.

©2010 The Couth Hillbilly. All Rights Reserved.