Synopses & Reviews
While members of the House and Senate confront the public's changing attitudes toward money, sex, and power, they are also forced to raise ever-escalating sums to finance their campaigns. Practices tolerated a decade ago now may cost lawmakers their seats or land them in jail. Lawmakers often don't know if they live in Salem or Gomorrah. Using new information culled from dozens of Capitol Hill interviews, Susan and Martin Tolchin show how ethics in Washington have changed over two centuries while offering new interpretations of past ethics cases. The first book to analyze the politicization of the ethics process, Glass Houses reveals in wicked and telling detail the forces that drive the modern lawmaker into a maelstrom of fierce corruption battles.
Synopsis
The Congressional ethics process has been transformed into a lethal, partisan political tool, feared by lawmakers from both sides of the aisle.
About the Author
Susan J. Tolchin is a professor of public policy at George Mason Universitys School of Public Policy. She was elected a fellow and board member of the National Academy of Public Administration. In 1997, she received the Marshall Dimock Award from the American Society for Public Administration and the Trachtenberg Award for Research from George Washington University. Martin Tolchin, founder, publisher, and editor-in-chief of The Hill” newspaper, reported on Congress during most of his 40-year career at the New York Times. His numerous awards include the Everett M. Dirksen Award for Distinguished Reporting on Congress. Mr. Tolchin also received three Page One wards from the Newspaper Guild of New York, and awards from Sigma Delta Chi and the NYC Citizens Budget Commission.