{"id":4450,"date":"2014-01-13T03:28:44","date_gmt":"2014-01-13T03:28:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/?p=4450"},"modified":"2014-01-13T03:28:44","modified_gmt":"2014-01-13T03:28:44","slug":"capitol-hill-hypocrisy-keeps-mounting-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=4450","title":{"rendered":"Capitol Hill hypocrisy keeps mounting up"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n<p>Hypocrisy is a bipartisan affliction.<\/p>\n<p>Democrats are hypocrites, as are Republicans. They say one thing and do another.<\/p>\n<p>Meet U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., who now joins the Hypocrites Hall of Shame for taking full advantage of a congressional perk he once sought to abolish.<\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2014\/01\/12\/john-mccain-robert-gates_n_4585156.html?ncid=txtlnkushpmg00000037<\/p>\n<p>The perk is &#8220;franking,&#8221; the practice of using free mail service. Kingston once sought to get rid of it. Now we learn he&#8217;s one of Congress&#8217;s chief users of the franking privilege.<\/p>\n<p>Kingston has spent more than $124,000 in taxpayer money on mailings since 2009. But when he first ran for the office in 1992, he campaigned on a promise to work to get rid of the privilege. So which is it, congressman? Do you now approve of the privilege or are you using it to champion its demise?<\/p>\n<p>I love these hypocrites, the people who live by a &#8220;do-as-I-say&#8221; credo. They talk the talk but when it comes to living up to their high-minded words, well, all bets are off.<\/p>\n<p>My favorite hypocrites in recent times are, oh:<\/p>\n<p>* Republican U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich railing against President Clinton&#8217;s moral failings while cheating on his own wife by having an affair with a congressional staffer.<\/p>\n<p>* Democratic U.S. Sen. John Edwards proclaiming his abiding love for his wife, Elizabeth, as she battled cancer while he was fathering a child with a campaign staffer.<\/p>\n<p>* Democratic former Vice President Al Gore becoming a champion of energy conservation while running up staggering heating and cooling bills at his palatial homes.<\/p>\n<p>* Republican U.S. Sen. John Ensign touting his family values while consorting with women other than his wife.<\/p>\n<p>Yes, I&#8217;m leaving many others out. <\/p>\n<p>Hypocrites have long been a part of what ails Washington and, for that matter, government at all levels since the founding of the Republic. I don&#8217;t know how you get rid of hypocrites, other than to vote them out of office.<\/p>\n<p>Rep. Kingston likely is going to come up with some kind of bogus rationale for using the franking privilege that his Georgia constituents will accept. That&#8217;s their problem.<\/p>\n<p>I just think this kind of double-speak needs some exposure.<\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Hypocrisy is a bipartisan affliction. Democrats are hypocrites, as are Republicans. They say one thing and do another. Meet U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., who now joins the Hypocrites Hall of Shame for taking full advantage of a congressional perk he once sought to abolish. http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2014\/01\/12\/john-mccain-robert-gates_n_4585156.html?ncid=txtlnkushpmg00000037 The perk is &#8220;franking,&#8221; the practice of using free &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=4450\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Capitol Hill hypocrisy keeps mounting up<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[217,1977,2530,2531,3299],"class_list":["post-4450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-al-gore","tag-government-hypocrisy","tag-john-edwards","tag-john-ensign","tag-newt-gingrich"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4450\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}