Congress Went to Denmark, You Got the Bill

pelosiCBS News’ Sharyl Attkisson Follows the Money from Copenhagen to the U.S. Taxpayer

By Sharyl Attkisson

Thanks to recently filed Congressional expense reports there’s new light shed on the Copenhagen Climate Summit in Denmark and how much it cost taxpayers.

CBS News Investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports official filings and our own investigation show at least 106 people from the House and Senate attended – spouses, a doctor, a protocol expert and even a photographer.

Million Dollar Congressional Trip
Read the Congressional Expense Report

For 15 Democratic and 6 Republican Congressmen, food and rooms for two nights cost $4,406 tax dollars each. That’s $2,200 a day – more than most Americans spend on their monthly mortgage payment.

CBS News asked members of Congress and staff about whether they’re mindful that it’s public tax dollars they’re spending. Many said they had never even seen the bills or the expense reports.

Copenhagen Congressional Junket

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., is a key climate change player. He went to Copenhagen last year. Last week, we asked him about the $2,200-a-day bill for room and food.

“I can’t believe that,” Rep. Waxman said. “I can’t believe it, but I don’t know.”

But his name is in black and white in the expense reports. The group expense report was filed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. She wouldn’t talk about it when our producer tried to ask.

Read the rest of this story at CBS News.

20 Responses to Congress Went to Denmark, You Got the Bill

  1. Hal Groar January 26, 2010 at 5:37 pm #

    A tremendous waste of tax payer money. Can we take that off the bogus aid we promised? The tax payer is paying scam artists to scam us. Time to “Scott Brown” these people!

  2. Rob N. Hood January 27, 2010 at 9:25 am #

    That’s capitalism! Things ain’t cheap anymore. There is a LOT of waste by all our “government officials.” Plus they’re all crooks anyway (95 % or so). Get over it or rebel.

  3. Terry Parsons January 27, 2010 at 11:04 am #

    That’s not capitalism! That’s runaway government “socialists” gone wild! The people in Washington DC have no idea of what they are doing is absolutely breaking and ruining our country!

  4. Rob N. Hood January 27, 2010 at 12:52 pm #

    Really? do you have any idea the amount you are hysterical about is less than peanuts. It doesn’t even appear on the radar of money bleeding out of the middle and lower classes to feed the rich. You’re kidding right? You people are insanely off the mark and in looney-land. Get your heads straight on the real crimes being committed by our lovely “public servants “every day, and then let’s talk. If you could EVER figure that out, your head might just explode, like mine almost seems to do on a daily basis when I think about where this crazy country is headed.

  5. Dan McGrath January 27, 2010 at 1:57 pm #

    A million here, a million there, pretty soon, we’re talking about real money. Pelosi spends like this all the time. An interesting project would be to find out exactly how much Pelosi’s tenure as speaker has cost the taxpayers and compare that to past speakers’ expenditures. Her extravagance on our buck is undoubtedly unparalleled.

  6. paul wenum January 28, 2010 at 12:32 am #

    I thought my $900.00 vacation was expensive!! I should be working for the government!

  7. Cubanshamoo January 28, 2010 at 1:46 am #

    Like in Castro’s Cuba. This Obama administration have the same policy. In 1959 Castro even sent to prision “rich men” for having 3 cars. In 1980, the Minister of Transportation of Castro have 200 private cars and a driver who has a driver himself. Today, Castro still talking about the dangers of Global Warming.
    Forget it…. there will be always some usefull idiots trying to hide (not the decline) but this leftist adiction to spend without any control other’s money.

  8. Rob N. Hood January 28, 2010 at 7:48 am #

    You guys are hopeless. Whining about a couple thousand dollars. You’re already dropping the ball and eyeing the shiny objects they dangle in front of you while the real crimes go unnoticed. Like children you are, and that’s being kind.

    The U.S., which should be leading the world in innovation and marketing in fields such as non-fossil-fuel energy, stem-cell research and other scientific advances, is lagging way behind and may not be able to catch up. China and India and Brazil, among others, benefit big time, as the U.S. slips further down the list of vibrant, economically secure and growing societies. Part of the reason America can’t move quickly in these areas is that a third of the country is caught up in fundamentalist-derived fear and suspicion of science, egged on by political conservatives, who benefit by this Know-Nothing foundation of their base voters.

    Why is this system continuing as-is? At least one major reason is that the short-term (often quarterly) bottom-line rules. Profit is all and it must be immediate so that shareholders continue to buy into the corporation and the capitalist system. There is no room for consideration of long-range consequences of short-term actions. And there is precious little concern for something known in most Western societies as “the public good.”

  9. paul wenum January 29, 2010 at 12:39 am #

    The “Public Good” is profits from corporations that you work for as stated before. Absent profits you would not have a job my friend!!! Food lines are not fun. Oh yes, I had no money when I started but I just did not eat much, could not affor food. Bills first belly later. Ever live on simply potatos and that’s it, eh??? Been there done that for two years in 1968-70. Too Damned proud to ask for a hand out!! Still will be. At the rate the countries going, I will be eating a lot of potatos again. Just don’t eat them when they turn green. If you want to get sick. It’s on me! Hope spelled potatos right or am I Dan Quale?

  10. Cubanshamoo January 29, 2010 at 1:39 am #

    Leading countries like Germany, with more than 20’000 wind mills and still depending on Rusia’s fuel, or China, where one kilometer of highway cost a bit more than a million because workers receive 2 dolars/hour, or the “advanced” Brazil directed by an ex-terrorist called Lula Da Silva, which only innovation to help the Amazonas has been changing the kind fuel (Benzine for ethanol) for more than a million motorized saws (probably made in China). Concerning Stem cells, where is the problem? Hundreds of thousands of American Scientist are working on that subject in collaboration with many other sceintists around the world. Look at PUBMED and you will see USA is a leading country in stem cells. I will say the same applies for the car industry, it just need time and adjustment, and Tata motors have nothing to teach USA while buying Land Rover, not China buying Hummer.

  11. Rob N. Hood January 29, 2010 at 1:27 pm #

    In a very real sense, George W. Bush’s presidency is still with us. He gave us a malevolent gift that could keep on giving for perhaps the next 30 years — Chief Justice John Roberts, a right-wing ideologue who helped engineer last week’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling that says nobody can limit what corporations can spend to influence elections.

    Last week was a wonderful one, if you happen to be a huge corporation or someone who makes a lot of money from the way things work now. The saddest thing is to see working-class idiots who think they scored a victory in Massachusetts. Yes, they sent Washington a message, all right: Feel free to keep screwing us over. Deny secure health care to all but the richest, and say you are doing that to protect personal freedom. That’s the message Massachusetts sent them, and you know what? They got it, big-time.

    It’s a terrible thing to have a supposedly democratic government that is actually owned by corporations, of course, and this certainly was not by any stretch of the imagination what the Founders had in mind when they spoke of “all men” being “born equal,” or what Abe Lincoln had in mind when he spoke of a government “of the people, by the people and for the people,” but that’s what we’ve got.

  12. Paul Wenum January 29, 2010 at 9:59 pm #

    You all got what you voted for and now you and your ilk are complaining? When you are wrong you always point fingers at Bush, the Tooth Fairy, anyone to get the problems off you. Grow up and learn from your mistakes. I can see it now, a democrat loses in 2010, oops George Bush caused it! Man, you people are annoying!! Have your elected representatives get on with life and run the country the way it should be for once in their lives which I doubt will ever happen. Not in my lifetime.

  13. Rob N. Hood January 30, 2010 at 5:18 pm #

    That is not what I’m saying at all. Why are you so —- one dimensional????!!! You read into everything you don’t like so you can crticize it in your repetive stale manner.

    To spell it out for you… (sheesh) : So far Obama is governing like a Republican and not unlike Bush (fact). So of course Liberals are going crazy and are very angry…!!!

    Do I have to be any clearer than that…????!!!! OK- And so…. this administration is just an EXTENSION of the Bush era. That’s all. I am NOT blaming Bush for that, right now anyway, I am blaming OBAMA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Got it?????????????????????? !!!!!!!!!!!!

    Bush was one of the WORST presidents ever (if not THE worst)- and now that a “Democrat” is basically doing what he did… is …………………………………………..MIND-BLOWING……………. to those of us that voted for him….!!!!!

    Get it NOW???????????? !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  14. paul wenum January 31, 2010 at 8:29 pm #

    Truman was chastised for years. Bush will have his day in history after you and I are gone. President Obama? Depends what he and his party does in the next three years. I highly doubt that he will change, however I never say “never” or “always”. Hate those two words.

  15. Rob N. Hood February 1, 2010 at 2:12 pm #

    I find it impossible to even consider cutting the Pentagon’s funding now. Look at the job they have before them! They’re fighting an aging 6-8 guy with a beard and bad kidneys who, apparently, can bring down WTC 7 with the wave of his hand. And have you noticed his trick where he can make entire jets disappear from the lawn of the Pentagon with not even so much as a pillow left behind? This guy has reportedly 100 fighters in Afghanistan and, wait for it, is WINNING.

    Ok we can’t let this guy recruit another 100 fighters and take over Turkey and Greece and Italy, and I’m not about to stand by and wait to have public beheadings in my town. We’ve got to fight them over there before they bring it here. Let’s roll. Bring ’em on! Mission Accomplished…

  16. Paul Wenum February 1, 2010 at 10:01 pm #

    I don’t read into, I read what YOU state along with your cut and paste plagurism etc. Must be nice to use others thoughts instead of your own. Do you actually think or do you have to “Look it up” before you respond?

  17. Rob N. Hood February 3, 2010 at 8:59 am #

    I paste what is pertinent and might just cause you all to think more clearly. Other than you Paul it may do just that…. You think I’m stubborn and one-dimensional- !- but it is you who is. You simply cannot think out of that box your mind is in. Much of what you/we think is reality is an illusion created by those with the money and power to do so. Wake up.

  18. paul wenum February 3, 2010 at 10:52 pm #

    I use my own words, not that of others. That is true thought. Right, wrong, indifferent.

  19. Rob N. Hood February 4, 2010 at 9:36 am #

    blah blah blah- whatever

  20. paul wenum February 5, 2010 at 10:16 pm #

    Did you cut and paste that as well?

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