Lobbyists Help Fund Ripon Society Travel

[spindrifter]

GOP Group Took Lawmakers to Europe


By Thomas B. Edsall
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 23, 2006

Since 1964, the Ripon Society has tried to create a more inclusive GOP through "moderate, progressive policy formation," according to its official mission statement.

In recent years, however, a leading public watchdog group suggests, the Ripon Society has added an unofficial mission: travel agency to lobbyists.

<snip>

...people who represent corporate interests before Congress have "spent millions taking lawmakers to European capitals and U.S. resorts" under the auspices of the Ripon Society and the affiliated Ripon Educational Fund, the group Public Citizen charged in a new report.

<snip>
According to Public Citizen, members of Congress have gone on trips costing the Ripon Society and Ripon Education Fund $742,000 since 2000. In addition, Kessler's clients have provided another $273,000 for congressional travel.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/22/AR2006012200979.html

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Truly pay for play--in more than one sense. Because Ripon, according to the article, pays for the travel of Congress people and their staff and the "academics" or speakers who make presentations at the conferences Ripon steers them to, with lobbyists/member groups paying for their own travel costs, it makes me wonder whether people like J. Miller (remember her, or has collective memory faded?) got their way paid to stuff like Aspen?

[Trillo]

1. Are lobbyists now the fourth branch?

Or has the numbering been changed, with chief executive #1, lobbyists #2, legislative #3 and judicial #4?