An excerpt from Roll Call [1], 6/1/09
Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Jo Bonner (R-Ala.) have gone off on a tangent.
The top lawmakers on the House ethics panel are in the midst of evaluating the chamber’s ethics rules — the value of restrictions added in recent years, and whether some changes cause too much confusion for staff and mean too little to constituents — but now they’re talking about ice cubes.
Inside the committee’s office suite in the basement of the Capitol, Lofgren and Bonner are recalling an earlier round of reforms, when then-Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) curtailed ice delivery to House offices in 1995 and then showcased the move as an effort to trim Congressional perks and operating costs. “I thought it was a great idea,” Lofgren said. “I could not make them stop delivering the ice.”
“And I thought it was a terrible idea because, as a young staffer, I used to go get the ice,” Bonner chimed in.
Read more [2]
Links:
[1] http://www.rollcall.com
[2] http://www.rollcall.com/issues/54_137/news/35339-1.html