Republican Congressman Collins and His Fearless Leader — The Nation

❝ Five GOP House members bought shares of an Australian biotechnology company in January 2017 that’s at the center of an insider trading indictment of New York Republican Chris Collins, congressional financial disclosures show.

Collins, who represents a district in western New York, is the only lawmaker accused by prosecutors of wrongdoing — stemming from his role on Innate Immunotherapeutics Ltd.’s board, not his position in the House.

But the allegations against him, along with the other lawmakers’ holdings, highlight how members of Congress face few restrictions on their investments, creating the potential for conflicts of interest, or the appearance of a conflict…

❝ Collins, one of the biotechnology company’s largest shareholders who served on the board and had access to information that wasn’t public, is accused of tipping off his son about the trial results for a drug to treat a form of multiple sclerosis, according to federal prosecutors in New York. His son Cameron Collins then passed along the information to others. The son and others who received the tip sold more than 1.78 million shares in the days before the trial results were announced, avoiding losses of $768,000…

Trump provides apt leadership for the majority of creeps in government. As Mark Twain said, “It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress”.