Throw Them All Out , Peter Schweizer's explosive new expose, has pulled back the lid on congressional insider trading, revealing the shocking regularity with which elected officials use their legislative positions to reap financial rewards.

This 'honest' graft is by no means limited to using inside knowledge to play the stock market. Schweizer, a fellow at the conservative Hoover Institute, reports that members of Congress are also making a killing in real estate, using federal funds to boost their personal land holdings.

Like Congress's questionable trading practices, mixing real estate investments with taxpayer money is technically legal. Actually, it's pretty easy for members of Congress to get rich off of federal projects — land deals are more difficult to detect than trades, and land, unlike stocks, doesn't have a set price. Members of Congress aren't required to disclose if a land deal would benefit them personally.

In the corporate world, using company money for personal financial gain would at minimum get you fired. But in Congress, the practice is not only legal, but common.