James Traficant

James Anthony "Jim" Traficant, Jr. (May 8, 1941 – September 27, 2014) was an American politician who served as a Democratic, and later independent, member of the United States House of Representatives from Ohio. He represented the 17th Congressional District, which centered on his hometown of Youngstown and included parts of three counties in northeast Ohio's Mahoning Valley. He was expelled from the House after being convicted of 10 felony counts including taking bribes, filing false tax returns, racketeering, and forcing his Congressional staff to perform chores at his farm in Ohio and houseboat in Washington, D.C.

Quotes

 * Beam me up, Mr. Speaker.
 * Said on numerous occasions at the end of speeches in Congress, quoted in


 * Mr. Speaker, we are here now in chapter 11. Members of Congress are official trustees presiding over the greatest reorganization of any bankrupt entity in world history, the U.S. government.
 * Speech in Congress (1993)


 * Mr. Speaker, Kodak is laying off 10,000 workers. Now if that is not enough to overexpose your most recent negative, Fruit of the Loom is cutting 3,000 jobs and moving to Mexico. Unbelievable. It is getting easier to find Charlie Trie and Elvis than it is to find a good factory job here in America. Beam me up. I think it is time for Congress to ask themselves a very simple little commonsense question: If our trade program is so great, why does Japan not do it? Think about that. I yield back all the balance of jobs and say one last thing here. From snapshots to long johns, American workers just keep getting their assets kicked.
 * speech on the House floor (12 NOV 1997)


 * Beam me up. The IRS does not need more workers. The IRS does not need more money. These stumbling, fumbling, bumbling mistake-prone nincompoops have got to go.
 * speech on the House floor (18 July 2001)


 * Many of them are so dumb they could throw themselves at the ground and miss.
 * Denunciation of the press (18 July 2002), quoted in