See what I mean....

Voting is useless!

Big Companies, Special Interests Hire Private Congressional Delegations to Lobby Government - OpenSecrets Blog | OpenSecrets

When AT&T goes forth to lobby the U.S. Congress, the company brings its own congressional delegation -- six members in all.

These politicos are no longer elected officials, but close enough: Former Sens. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and John Breaux (D-La.) represent the telecom giant, as do ex-Reps. J.C. Watts (R-Okla.), Vic Fazio (D-Calif.), Jim Davis (D-Fla.) and Michael Forbes (R-N.Y.).

And AT&T is hardly alone in tasking congressional alumni to do its corporate bidding on Capitol Hill.

In all, 43 different companies, organizations and special interest groups last year employed at least three former congressmen as registered federal lobbyists, a Center for Responsive Politics analysis indicates.

Together, they spent hundreds of millions of dollars last year lobbying the federal government on a spectrum of issues, from the highest of profile -- health care reform, financial regulatory reform -- to the comparatively obscure -- technical taxation matters, lithium-ion battery cells, digital television converter boxes.