DeLay Fills a Need for the Left

The left has come up with a target, and his name is Tom DeLay. He isn’t their first and won’t be their last, but for now he’s the Republican they hope to take down.

They’ve tried in the past to do the same thing to others. Vice President Cheney, Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld and White House adviser Karl Rove have all been portrayed as ethically challenged and sleazy by the same folks who are now going after the House Republican leader from Texas. Trumped-up charges of illegality, paid ads and reports from ethics groups that are little more than fronts for partisan and ideological assaults on their opponents are all part of the now familiar pattern.

If the attacks on those who have come before are any guide, this will go on for some time and then subside as they find new targets on whom to vent their bile.

DeLay is far from perfect, but he’s no criminal and one doubts if any of his colleagues really believes he’s motivated by anything other than his strongly held principles and a desire to win. In fact, the argument that he’s essentially a venal inside-the-Beltway operator is probably the weakest part of the left wing’s case against him because, while one can picture him crossing the line to achieve his ideological objectives, it is impossible to visualize him doing so to make a buck.

He is, however, both tough and an in-your-face conservative who isn’t in the habit of taking prisoners and knows that his opponents aren’t going to pull their punches as they try to take him out. His problem is that the very qualities that make him an effective leader and a hero to his partisans also make him an inviting target. He no doubt considers that part of the price of leadership, and to a remarkable degree in today’s Washington he’s right.

The situation in which the left finds itself these days gives the boys and girls at MoveOn.org and the like little choice. They don’t seem very adept at winning elections, but remain convinced that the problem is not their message but that the opposition cheats or at least won’t play fair with them. Thus, the Bush forces must have somehow cheated in Ohio and elsewhere or, as Teresa Heinz Kerry apparently believes, rigged the newfangled voting machines across the country to steal the election from her sainted husband.

In their minds, no Republican or conservative could win anything on the merits, so we must all be dishonest manipulators and mean-spirited crooks of one kind or another.

The fact is that activist, ideologically driven organizations need enemies to raise money and to fuel the passions of the grassroots activists that give them their strength. We on the right have Hillary Clinton now that Bill is passé and Teddy Kennedy is too long in the tooth to pose much of a realistic threat to anybody. George Soros and his friends have their devils as well, with DeLay being chief among them.

Indeed, if he didn’t already exist they would have to invent him or move on to someone else. But he does, and their attacks on him resonate well among the committed who hope against hope that even though they couldn’t defeat Bush they might at least be able to get one of their enemies. The charges themselves matter little. At one level at least it doesn’t even matter if they do get him because the fight itself will pay dividends if they can keep it up, raise money and whip up their troops in the process.

If they actually manage to shut DeLay up or persuade his colleagues to abandon him, that would be a bonus, but one doubts if they really expect that to happen. Nor is it realistic to expect that he will actually become an electoral liability to those of his colleagues who follow his lead or who have turned to him for help. Some will remember that Republicans tried this with then-Speaker Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill (D-Mass.) a couple of decades back. It didn’t work then, and it isn’t likely to work now.

DeLay himself strikes me as a prototypical example of an inner-directed politician. He doesn’t take positions based on polls or wind direction and seems not to care a whit if his opponents don’t like him. In that sense he’s much like former Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), who during his decades here simply ignored the panting of his opponents and did the job as he saw it.

Moreover, self-interest trumps all. His colleagues know that DeLay is widely admired among conservative and Republican activists for precisely the same reasons the left despises him and that abandoning him in the face of ideological and partisan assault would not go well with the people they will need to maintain a Republican majority in the House.

David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union, is a managing associate with Carmen Group, a D.C.-based governmental-affairs firm (www.carmengrouplobbying.com

Except the Clintons really are sleazy and unethical.

That's what they say about Delay. See, both sides have their boogie man.

Please. Hilary is responsible for the fact, hard as it is to even think, that x42 was president for 8 years. The best thing that you can say for her is that she acted as a Judas goat to lure us into the pit of corruption known as the Clinton Administration. All of it is on her head:

Cattlegate
Castlegrande
Waco
Travelgate
FBI Filegate
Black Hawk Down, and the failure to aggressively pursue Ben Laden
Rose Law Firm Billing Records
Vince Foster
Hazel O'Leary and nuclear security neglect.
Ron Brown's fundraising trips as Commerce Secretary
Monica and "the meaning of 'is'"
Elian
WH Coffeegate, Buddhist Templegate
Pardongate
Stickyfingers when moving out of the WH
White House vandalism
. . . and those are just some of the highlights. Nothing alleged against Tom Delay - nor all Republican presidents put together including Richard Nixon - comes close to that spectacle.
And note well, I said alledged - nearly all of it was untrue or exaggerated, whereas all the things in the above bullet list stand the test of historical perspective. FBI Filegate alone (including the feckless dissociation of the Administration from Craig Livingstone) would have gotten any Republican president in history impeached and convicted.
Hillary Clinton, I repeat, suckered us into having a president who spent eight long years serving himself at the expense of his office and our country. And there is no way to really dissociate her from anything that happened in the WH then because she openly dabbled in policy. Now tell me, just what do you think Tom Delay is even accused of that belongs on that bullet list above?

The Democrat Kingpin for the Most Corrupt Congress
by an American Patriot
April 11, 2005

Even though the Democratic party should not throw stones, they are adamant that three admonishments by the House "ethics committee" in one week disqualify House Majority Leader Tom DeLay for the chamber's second-highest leadership job. "Mr. DeLay has proven himself to be ethically unfit to lead his party," Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters in 2004 that "The burden now falls upon his fellow House Republicans to oust him." Ellen Miller of the Campaign for America's Future that is going to run ads for the removal of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, is calling him "the kingpin for the most corrupt Congress" saying his "dealings are a national disgrace."

Democrats are condemning House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and Republicans for considering impeachment proceedings against federal judges, but that should not come as a big surprise. Democratic Representative Alcee Hastings, a former federal judge in Florida, was impeached and removed from office in 1989 after being convicted on several Articles of Impeachment including: perjury and conspiracy to obtain a bribe. Now Alcee Hastings is a Democratic Representative in the House of Representatives serving as a member of the Committee on Rules and the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. This is a direct violation of the Constitution.

Supporters of impeached Alcee Hastings claims the Constitution permits the Senate, after voting to convict an official on Articles of Impeachment, the discretion to go beyond removal and vote for "disqualification." Disqualification to hold office is mandatory and automatic with removal from office under the Constitution not discretionary. The Senate was not given the power to pardon impeached Alcee Hastings and restore his privilege of holding an office of honor and profit under the United States -- not even the President has the power to grant "pardons for offenses against the United States . . . in cases of impeachment." Article I Section 3 of the Constitution expressly states "Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office, AND disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States" -- there is no discretion granted nor implied. Alcee Hastings is nonetheless a Democratic Representative in Congress in direction violation of the Constitution.

On March 17, 2005, Democrat Representative Alcee Hastings, along with other members of Congress, sent a letter to House Committee on Rules Chairman David Dreier stating "Hundreds of media reports have documented the Republican Leadership's push to alter the ethics rules to protect Majority Leader Tom DeLay from scrutiny for his actions over the past several years. In the wake of two unanimous Ethics Committee actions concluding that Majority Leader DeLay acted improperly on three separate occasions in the 108th Congress and a Texas grand jury indictment against two of the Majority Leader's top aides, the Republican Leadership undertook a systematic effort to shield Mr. DeLay from being scrutinized for his behavior."

The House of Representatives adopted seventeen articles of impeachment against Judge Alcee Hastings and he was convicted by the Senate on perjury and conspiracy to obtain a bribe and removed from office. But the Senate failed to do it's Constitutional duty when it failed to amend it's findings to include "disqualification" as dictated by the Constitution. Three admonishments by the House "ethics committee" in one week don't disqualify House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, but conviction of articles of impeachment and removal by the Senate disqualify Alcee Hastings to "enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States."

The Democrats held pejury and conspiracy to obtain a bribe qualified Representative Alcee Hastings for membership on the Committee on Intelligence -- that makes him "the kingpin for the most corrupt Congress" and "a national disgrace." Democratic Representative Alcee Hastings' impeachment was not an "ethical violation" or violations of "house rules" and "The burden now falls upon his fellow House [Democrats] to oust him."

Following the death of Terri Schiavo House Majority Leader Tom DeLay publicly stated the judicial committee "will look at an arrogant and out of control judiciary that thumbs its nose at Congress and the president" and "the time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior, not today. . . we need to look at the failure of the judiciary on the federal level," Outraged at the Congressman DeLay's comments, Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg sent a letter stating "You should be aware that your comments yesterday may violate a Federal criminal statute, 18 U.S.C. §115 (a)(1)(B). . . . Federal judges. . . in our nation, are honorable public servants who make difficult decisions every day. You owe them – and all Americans – an apology for your reckless statements." Perhaps Senator Lautenberg hasn't been introduced to Democratic Representative Alcee Hastings --- ". . . hypocrites! For you . . . have neglected the weightier provisions of the law; . . . You blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel" -- you owe all Americans an apology for contempt of the Constitution.

Can the American people actually trusts the Democrats in Congress to hold federal judges accountable for 'unconstitutional' acts? By clear and convincing evidence of Democratic Representative Alcee Hastings, the answer is NO.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.