Many of these representatives are members of the Equality Caucus and/or co-sponsors of ENDA, and they raise considerable sums by promising support for LGBT issues. But now that President Obama wants to take a dive on his 2008 campaign promise to support ENDA, they are nowhere to be found.

There’s no reason that members should be taking contributions from industries they regulate as members of a committee. Nor should they be on one that pays an immediate family member. Evan Bayh’s wife went around soliciting participation on boards of businesses regulated by the Senate Banking Committee when her husband was appointed. Family members are one of the principal ways that cash finds its way into the pockets of members of Congress (Tom DeLay, Tom Daschle, Chris Dodd, etc. etc.)

If a member of Congress feels the need to take donations from a particular industry, or if their family member feels a strong need to do so, the member should resign from the committee and find a different one. There are plenty of ways to serve that don’t involve such conflicts of interest.

Ed Perlmutter (D-CO) David Sirota interviews Ed Perlmutter: Knowing the public option topic was on the mind of listeners, I made sure to ask him whether he would vote for a health care bill that did not include the public option. Perlmutter responded that he didn’t know. He did, however, seem to begin conflating a [...]