The Rich got Richer in Congress!

The wealthiest members of Congress grew richer in 2009 even as the economy struggled to recover from a deep recession.

The 50 wealthiest lawmakers were worth almost $1.4 billion in 2009, about $85.1 million more than 12 months earlier, according to The Hill’s annual review of lawmakers’ financial disclosure forms.

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) tops the list for the second year in a row. His minimum net worth was $188.6 million at the end of 2009, up by more than $20 million from 2008, according to his financial disclosure form.

While the economy struggled through a recession during much of 2009 and the nation’s unemployment rate soared to 10 percent, the stock market rebounded, helping lawmakers with large investments. The S&P 500 rose by about 28 percent in 2009.

Total assets for the 50 wealthiest lawmakers in 2009 was $1.5 billion — that’s actually a nearly $36 million drop from a year ago. But lawmakers reduced their liabilities by even more, cutting debts by $120 million last year.

There are various reasons why asset values dropped. Some lawmakers saw their real estate holdings fall as the housing crisis intensified. A handful of lawmakers also had other investments or businesses that turned sour.

The only newcomer to the Top 10 list is Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), who came straight in at No. 5. He replaced Rep. Harry Teague (D-N.M.), the 10th wealthiest member in 2008. Teague fell off the top 50 list after the value of a company he has a stake in — Teaco Energy Services Inc. — fell in value from $39.6 million in 2008 to at the least $1 million in 2009.

There were a few other new faces in the Top 50, including Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.), who received an inheritance after his late father, Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), died in 2009.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rep. Tom Petri (R-Wis.) also made the list.

Twenty-seven Democrats along with 23 Republicans make up the 50 richest in Congress; 30 House members and 20 senators are on the list.

The bulk of Kerry’s wealth is credited to his spouse, Teresa Heinz Kerry, who inherited hundreds of millions of dollars after her late husband, the ketchup heir Sen. John Heinz (R-Pa.), died in a plane crash in 1991.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), with a net worth of $160.1 million, is the second-richest member of Congress under The Hill’s formula, even though his wealth declined by more than $4 million in 2009.

He is followed by Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), who saw her net wealth leap to $152.3 million, a jump of more than $40 million from a year ago.

The rest of the top 10 are Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), McCaul, Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.), Rep. Vern Buchanan (R-Fla.), Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.).

To calculate its rankings, The Hill used only the lawmakers’ financial disclosure forms that cover the 2009 calendar year.

Lawmakers are only required to report their finances in broad ranges. For example, a $2.5 million vacation home in Aspen, Colo., would be reported as being valued at between $1 and $5 million on a congressional financial disclosure form.

To come up with the most conservative estimate for each lawmaker’s wealth, researchers took the bottom number of each range reported. Then, to calculate the minimum net worth for each senator and member, the sum of liabilities was subtracted from the sum of assets.

As a result, the methodology used to find the Top 50 wealthiest in Congress can miss some of the richest lawmakers.

Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) is certainly one of the wealthiest lawmakers on Capitol Hill. As owner of the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks, Kohl has a $254 million asset on his hands, according to Forbes magazine.

But under The Hill’s methodology, his team ownership only counts for $50 million, the highest range reported on the congressional financial disclosure form. Because of high liabilities on his 2009 form, Kohl actually is listed as being more than $4.6 million in debt on the 2009 form.


—Walter Alarkon, Richard Barry, Silla Brush, Jordan Fabian, Beth Hawley, Michaela Martens and Eden Stiffman all contributed to this report.

Glenn Beck's generic God

Fox News host Glenn Beck muddled biblical references with fragments of American history, recreating a pottage of civil religion that says America has a divine destiny and claiming that a national revival is beginning.

At the very beginning of the "Restoring Honor" Rally at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, Beck proclaimed, "Something beyond imagination is happening. Something that is beyond man is happening. America today begins to turn back to God."
Forty-seven years ago to the date, Martin Luther King Jr. gave his famous "I Have a Dream Speech," a historical note that Beck and others played off.

"The story of America is the story of human kind. Five thousand years ago...God's chosen people were led out of bondage...Man first began to recognize God and God's law. The chosen people listened to the Lord. At the same time those things were happening, on this side on this land another group of people were gathered here. And they too were listening to God," said Beck.

As he spoke, two Native Americans appeared behind him to stand next to a rabbi. They were followed by a white preacher.

Facing these three individuals with arms outreached, Beck said, "God's chosen people, the Native Americans and the pilgrims."

Beck claimed, "When people came together of different faiths... the first thing they did was to pray together."

Some two hours later, during his lengthy, disjointed speech, Beck said, "This day is a day that we can start the heart of America again. And it has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with God...turning our faith back to the values and principles that made us great."

Warning that Americans were at a crossroad and had to decide what they believed, Beck said, "Abraham Lincoln found God in the stars of Gettysburg. He was baptized and gave the second inaugural. He looked to God and set men free. America awakened again."

He soon segued to Moses.

"Moses freed them. Then they forget. They wander until they remember that God is the answer. He always has been. And then they begin to trust," said Beck.

"Have trust in the Lord. And recognize that Moses and Abraham Lincoln and George Washington were men. They were just like you...Man makes a difference. What is it that these men have that you don't?...The answer is nothing...They relied on God...America is great because America is good...We as individuals must be good so America can be great. America is at a crossroads...Look to God," pled the TV talk-show host.

He told the audience of religious and Tea Party conservatives: "If you find out who God truly is, I warn you, I warn you, if you know who he is, it will be the biggest blessing in your life. But it will also be the biggest curse in your life."

Saying that America needed to go to "God's boot camp," Beck said, "We must insist that our churches stand for things that we know are true because they are universal and endless in nature."

Having recalled earlier how disciples had fallen asleep in the Garden of Gethsemane before Jesus' arrest, Beck returned to that theme of slumber. He said that the nation and its churches had fallen asleep.

Beck said that 240 years ago America had the "black-robed regiment," preachers who opposed the British and were among the first killed by the British.

"The black-robed regiment is back again today," said Beck.

On cue, 240 men and women marched up and stood behind him. Obediently with arms linked on the front row were Southern Baptist Convention official Richard Land and fundamentalist pastor John Hagee. Religious-right mythmaker David Barton stood next to Sarah Palin.

"America, it is time to start the heart of this nation again. And put it where it belongs. Our heart with God," proclaimed Beck.

Claiming these clergy represented the thousands of clergy in the audience who represented 180 million people, Beck said, "We can disagree on politics. We can disagree on so much. These men and women don't agree on fundamentals. They don't agree on everything that every church teaches. What they do agree on is that God is the answer."

He called for a group of bagpipers to play "Amazing Grace."

Mixing Christian faith with military images, the rally included video clips of soldiers, flags and eagles. The Bible was also read.

C. L. Jackson, pastor of Houston's Pleasant Grove Missionary Baptist Church, prayed for the "ministry of Glenn Beck."

The crowd - as viewed on Beck's own streaming video broadcast - had very, very few people of color.

The white audience listened at one point as two African-American men read different passages from the Bible and two Africa-American women sang solos with recorded tracks.

Another African-American woman, Alveda King, a niece of Martin Luther King Jr., gave a sermon, referencing "Uncle Martin," failing public education, the "womb war" and hope that prayer would one day be welcomed back in public schools.

No amount of Bible reading, sermons masquerading as prayers and Christian hymns can cover up Beck's civil religion that slides back and forth between the Bible and nationalism, between authentic faith and patriotic religion.

He treats the "American scripture" - such as the Gettysburg Address - as if it bears the same revelatory weight as Christian Scripture.

What is important to Beck is belief in God - God generically - not a specific understanding of God revealed in the biblical witness, but God who appears in nature and from which one draws universal truths.

Not surprisingly, Beck only uses the Bible to point toward the idea of a God-generic. He does not listen to the God of the Bible who calls for the practice of social justice, the pursuit of peacemaking, the protection of the poor in the formation of community. Beck has little room for God's warning about national idolatry and rejection of fabricated religion.

For Beck, God-generic is a unifying theme and religion is a unifying force for what appears to be his revivalist agenda for Americanism - blended nationalism and individualism.

Robert Parham is executive editor of EthicsDaily.com, where this essay first ran, and executive director of its parent organization, the Baptist Center for Ethics.

Oval Office makeover

WASHINGTON -- When President Barack Obama addresses the nation on Iraq Tuesday night, his Oval Office setting will be sporting a new look - and one that pays homage to Martin Luther King Jr. and four previous presidents.

While the president and his family were away on vacation in Martha's Vineyard, workers installed new wallpaper, a new rug, new sofas, lamps and a coffee table. Officials gave photographers a look hours before the speech was to be delivered at 8 p.m. EST.

The rug - an oval-shaped wheat, cream and blue carpet woven by the Scott Group of Grand Rapids, Mich. - was made with 25 percent recycled wool, the White House said. Officials said it was donated by the manufacturer, which also made Bill Clinton's Oval Office rug.

The excerpts on the rug include some of the most famous words ever spoken by Americans:

- "GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE AND FOR THE PEOPLE" - From Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, among the most famous words ever spoken by a president.

- "NO PROBLEM OF HUMAN DESTINY IS BEYOND HUMAN BEINGS" - From JFK's American University speech June 10, 1963.

- "THE WELFARE OF EACH OF US IS DEPENDENT FUNDAMENTALLY ON THE WELFARE OF ALL OF US" - From a speech Teddy Roosevelt gave at the New York State Fair in Syracuse, N.Y., on Sept. 7, 1903.

- "THE ONLY THING WE HAVE TO FEAR IS FEAR ITSELF" - From FDR's inaugural speech March 4, 1933.

- "THE ARC OF THE MORAL UNIVERSE IS LONG, BUT IT BENDS TOWARD JUSTICE" - These words from King's address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference Aug. 16, 1967, are easily Obama's favorite King quotation.

The White House declined to reveal the overall cost of the new look, but a statement said it was "in line with the amount spent by Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush on the redesigns of their Oval Office. The statement said funds would come from Obama's inaugural committee and the nonprofit White House Historical Association.

Presidents typically put their own touches on the Oval Office early in their terms. Bush brought in a rug designed by his wife, Laura. It included radiating stripes, which he often said suggested to him the optimism of a sunrise.

In Obama's makeover, the embroidered wingback chairs that Bush and visiting leaders sat on in front of the fireplace have been reupholstered, and covered in caramel-colored leather.

The sofas flanking the fireplace are new: and covered with a light-brown cotton fabric.

There's also a new coffee table. Again, it's got an up-to-date look- rectangular, and covered with marble-look tiles made of walnut and mica.

And finally, Obama has new brown-leather chair behind his desk.

Many items, though, have not changed. They range from the painting of George Washington over the fireplace to the Resolute Desk, built from the timbers of a British warship. A gift to President Rutherford B. Hayes, the desk was installed in the Oval Office by John F. Kennedy, and since has been used by presidents Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush.

We’ve Seen This Movie Before

NY Times By STANLEY FISH

‘ground zero mosque’, islamophobia, michael enright, timothy mcveigh


In the first column I ever wrote for this newspaper (“How the Right Hijacked the Magic Words”), I analyzed the shift in the rhetoric surrounding the Oklahoma City bombing once it became clear that the perpetrator was Timothy McVeigh, who at one point acknowledged that “The Turner Diaries,” a racist anti-government tract popular in Christian Identity circles, was his bible.

Associated Press An evidence photo of Timothy McVeigh taken April 19, 1995, just hours after the Oklahoma City bombing.In the brief period between the bombing and the emergence of McVeigh, speculation had centered on Arab terrorists and the culture of violence that was said to be woven into the fabric of the religion of Islam.

But when it turned out that a white guy (with the help of a few of his friends) had done it, talk of “culture” suddenly ceased and was replaced by the vocabulary and mantras of individualism: each of us is a single, free agent; blaming something called “culture” was just a way of off-loading responsibility for the deeds we commit; in America, individuals, not groups, act; and individuals, not groups, should be held accountable. McVeigh may have looked like a whole lot of other guys who dressed up in camouflage and carried guns and marched in the woods, but, we were told by the same people who had been mouthing off about Islam earlier, he was just a lone nut, a kook, and generalizations about some “militia” culture alive and flourishing in the heartland were entirely unwarranted.

This switch from “malign culture” talk to “individual choice” talk was instantaneous and no one felt obliged to explain it. Now, in 2010, it’s happening again around the intersection of what the right wing calls the “Ground Zero mosque” (a geographical exaggeration if there ever is one) and the attack last week on a Muslim cab driver by (it is alleged) 21-year-old knife-wielding Michael Enright.

First the mosque. It is wrong, we hear, to regard the proposed mosque or community center as an ordinary exercise of free enterprise and freedom of religion by the private owners of a piece of property. It is, rather, a thumb in the eye or a slap in the face of the 9/11 victims and their families, a potential clearinghouse for international terrorist activities, a “victory mosque” memorializing a great triumph of jihad and a monument to the religion in whose name and by whose adherents the dreadful deed was done.

But according to the same folks who oppose the mosque because of what it stands for, Michael Enright’s act doesn’t stand for anything and is certainly not the product of what Time magazine calls a growing “American strain of Islamophobia.” Instead, The New York Post declares, the stabbing is “the act of a disturbed individual who is now in custody,” and across the fold of the page columnist Jonah Goldberg says that “one assault doesn’t a national trend make” and insists that “we shouldn’t let anyone suggest that this criminal reflects anybody but himself.”

The formula is simple and foolproof (although those who deploy it so facilely seem to think we are all fools): If the bad act is committed by a member of a group you wish to demonize, attribute it to a community or a religion and not to the individual. But if the bad act is committed by someone whose profile, interests and agendas are uncomfortably close to your own, detach the malefactor from everything that is going on or is in the air (he came from nowhere) and characterize him as a one-off, non-generalizable, sui generis phenomenon.

The only thing more breathtaking than the effrontery of the move is the ease with which so many fall in with it. I guess it’s because both those who perform it and those who eagerly consume it save themselves the trouble of serious thought.