The Senate is considering legislation (possibly voting on it today) that would ban spouses of senators from lobbying any part of the chamber—unless the spouse was lobbying a year before the senator was elected.

Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA), apparently taking a lesson from his very weak re-election numbers and widespread concerns over he and his wife's ties to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff, has decided to no longer employ his wife as his main campaign fundraiser. Doolittle drew criticism for employing her at a commission, directing 15% of all donations towards their household income.

From the front page of today's Washington Post a reminder of the power of the pharmaceutical lobby. Democratic leadership had a bill in mind for a goverment-run prescription drug program designed to cut costs for senior citizens. Then the drug lobby - and their checkbooks- started knocking at the door and cutting health care costs took a backseat to appeasing them.

In his speech on the floor of the Senate announcing his intention to introduce a full public financing bill, Assistant Majority Leader Richard Durbin (D-IL) asked his colleagues to think beyond initial ethics reform to a more comprehensive solution: "I hope it will only be the beginning and that we can move, even in this session of Congress, to meaningful hearings and the passage of public financing of campaigns that will truly reform the way we elect men and women to office at the Federal level and restore respect to this great institution of the U.S.

Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-IL) announced today on the floor of the Senate that he will be introducing a bill to establish full public financing of elections at the congressional level. The public financing system would be modeled on the successful systems already working in Maine and Arizona, see TPMmuckraker's coverage of the announcement.

There's no question: if we want a Congress that works for us full time, we need full public financing of elections. Further evidence comes in the form of the article from today's Roll Call (sub. required) indicating that the longer work week proposed for Congress this year will mean more and more fundraisers to satisfy the need for campaign cash.

From the article:

Saying they will crack down on lobbyists, then raising money from them the same night? It's a mixed message from the newly minted 110th Congress, something NBC notes in this story (story and video clip) on Congress' new ethics bill, with commentary from Public Campaign Action Fund's David Donnelly.

Joel Bleifuss, editor of In These Times writes on the need for reform in Congress that takes on the fundamental link between campaign contributions and legislation: full public financing, in the Clean Elections model, for congressional elections.

It's the first day of the 110th Congress and Democratic leaders in the House are rolling out their big ethics reform package designed to sever links between lobbyists and lawmakers with new restrictions inclusing a ban on travel, meals, and gifts to legislators paid for by lobbyists. It's a very good start, and we hope a prelude to serious consideration of full public financing of elections as the last step in "draining the swamp" and cleaning up Congress.

A busier work schedule and fear of scandal have put the kibosh on a lot of the lobbyist-funded January junkets for members of Congress, according to this story from MSNBC. No more jetting off to Hawaii for "conferences" and a mid-winter tan, looks like actually legislating will take precedence. Dry your eyes.