Here The Post profiles the Dingells with a focus on congressional stock ownership and ethics issues.

Congressional stock ownership has soared over the past two decades. To prevent economic collapse over the past year, Congress has staged an unprecedented intervention in the private sector, meaning more and more lawmakers are voting on measures that could affect their personal wealth. For example, the government today owns 60 percent of GM.

Yet the ethics system on Capitol Hill requires little more than annual public disclosure of financial assets and transactions. And it allows lawmakers to largely police themselves and to decide whether their investments pose conflicts.