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In the process of taking down Republican lawmaker Steven Fincher of Tennessee for trying to justify cutting food stamps for children in order to enrich himself via an ag bill, Lawrence O’Donnell let the cat out of the bag that it is currently legal for congressional representatives to vote on things in which they have a vested interest.

O’Donnell said, “The other reason, there is no law against conflict of interest in the congress… If you’re in the agriculture business and get elected to congress, everyone understands why you want to get on the agriculture committee and everyone is cool with that. You want to get on the agriculture committee to pay yourself money in addition to your congressional salary… So a socialistic looter of the people’s money, taking it right out of the treasury, sticking it in his pocket, can get away with saying things like this in congress.”

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Transcript from NBC News with slight modifications (my bold):

O’DONNELL: Imagine what the Washington scandal police would do if they discovered a congressman pushed for a bill written for his own personal enrichment. Imagine. Imagine if this congressman was shown to have already made millions of dollars off of exactly this kind of legislation…

… Tennessee’s republican socialism hating congressman, Steven Fincher has received over $3.5 million directly from the government in socialistic agriculture subsidies, which is of course the single stupidest form of socialism this country embraces. When Steven Fincher went to Washington, all he wanted to do was get a seat on the agriculture committee because that’s where his money is. He thinks it is his money. He thinks he deserves it. No one who takes money from the agriculture department thinks they don’t deserve it. They believe they earn their money the old fashioned way, by lobbying for it, and simply taking it straight out of the united states treasury.

You’d never know it if you heard Steven Fincher speaking in the agriculture committee markup of the farm bill from which he and his family have been living off millions and millions of dollars for generations.

Congressman Steven Fincher gets away with this socialistic thing for two reasons. One, Republicans and Democrats in congress love socialism much more than they understand or admit…

The other reason, there is no law against conflict of interest in the congress. No judge would be allowed to preside over a trial in which he had a financial interest in the outcome. There are conflict of interest trip wires all over the legal profession, but if you’re in the agriculture business and get elected to congress, everyone understands why you want to get on the agriculture committee and everyone is cool with that.

You want to get on the agriculture committee to pay yourself money in addition to your congressional salary. Not long ago, the Republican leader of the senate was a major owner of hospitals and medical facilities in this country and he never recused himself from a vote on legislation directly affecting his wealth and income.

Try to think back to the last time you heard about a senator or a member of the house reducing him or herself because of a conflict of interest. It does not happen.

They vote on tax provisions on real estate all the time, they’re heavily invested in oil stocks or energy sources vote on bills that can personally enrich them all the time, and no one thinks anything of it, no reporter in Washington uses the word scandal for that. It should be a crime. If you’re in the agriculture business, elected to congress, one committee you should not be allowed to serve on is the agriculture committee.

If you own banks and are elected to congress, you should not be allowed to serve on the banking committee. How hard is that to figure out? Congress hasn’t figured it out and the Washington press corp hasn’t figured it out, and there’s no editorial campaign anywhere to get conflict of interest out of congress. So a socialistic looter of the people’s money, taking it right out of the treasury, sticking it in his pocket, can get away with saying things like this in congress.

End transcript.

This is one of those times when both sides do it. Yes, Democrats push for legislation to get money out of politics and for disclosure, but that is not enough. So while it appears this is done more routinely by Republicans, it is a practice indulged in by both sides of the aisle and it needs to stop.

It is, quite frankly, insane to allow legislators to vote on matters in which they have a vested personal interest, and it’s even more outrageous that they are allowed, like Michele Bachmann, to use the treasury to enrich their family business. It is implausible to suggest that they don’t have an up on the competition applying for those subsidies.

The reason we pay these people such a good salary is ostensibly to attract people who are good at their job and could make a lot of money in the private sector, and it’s also supposed to keep the rich from dominating the pool. It is supposed to serve as enough — enough so that they don’t feel the need to “loot” the treasury.

It’s unlikely that all of our representatives would vote against their own personal interest in order to better represent the people of their district. In Fincher’s case, he tried to justify cutting food stamps for children in order to enrich himself.

The real scandal is that we are all paying for this, and it should be a crime.