New scandal: lawmakers pocket taxpayer dollars

They get to travel overseas on the taxpayer's dime and, once over there, they spend money on shopping and spouse's expenses. Yeah, that sounds about right. Let's put em in charge of health care.

Former Rep. Thomas M. Davis III, Virginia Republican, the Wall Street Journal notes, admitted that it's "fairly standard" policy for lawmakers to use the leftover money "for shopping or to buy souvenirs to bring back to constituents."

In other words, members of Congress are using your tax dollars to go window shopping during congressional junkets.

Of course, to fully understand the depth of the problem, we would need to take a look at congressional records related to per diem use. The problem is there are none. Congress doesn't have a system in place to track per diems, and lawmakers aren't even required to keep receipts.