E Pluribus Unum

by Mark Adams

With three you get eggroll. . .

First there was Representative Alan Mollohan (D-WV), ranking member of the Ethics Committee.  There's something fishy there, a bit of a pungent oder of less than appropriate behavior. However, no actual accusations of outright corruption, no real hint that his duties were compromise, that he sold his vote.  Just some eyebrow raising deals that financially benefited his friends and may have lined his own pockets -- but nothing very concrete.

The appearance of impropriety is enough -- Mollohan stepped down from the Ethics Committee, but still denies any wrongdoing whatsoever.

That's how it's done.  That's how you display integrity.

Next, we've got William Jefferson (D-LA).  Much more serious allegations here. Bribery allegations. A criminal investigation, plea deals, conspiracy.

No charges, yet, but this is a stinking cloud of criminality, not just some fishiness.  The Democratic leadership not only shunned him, but called for a full blown ethics panel investigation.

As you might recall, there's been a moratorium, a truce between the Dems and GOP on flinging ethics violations in the supercharged partisan atmosphere of what passes for political discourse today, ostensibly to avoid a meltdown of the legislative process.  (As if...)

I'm not sure, but I doubt if it counts as a violation of the "truce" when you haul one of your own before the committee to face the music.  Nevertheless, it looks like the truce is over.  It seems that Speaker Denise Hastert smells blood and wants to confuse the electorate into thinking that the kleptocracy he presides over which sells defense contracts to the most lubricated palm includes the minority party as well.

I don't usually heap praise on Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, but she's called this one early, often and right.  She was the one who called on Mollohan to step down and she wasted no time in distancing herself and the party from Jefferson.  This is completely 180 degrees from how the Republican leadership dealt with and is still dealing with the likes of Cunningham (jailed), Delay (indicted) and Ney (about to fall, and fall huge).  The GOP coddled, covered and protected their slugs, and by doing so swallowed the bile into how they conducted business.  They even changed the ethics rules to shelter the criminals they embraced.

So, the question this morning, is whether we hang another member of the House Democratic Caucus out to dry do to a strictly personal indiscretion involving an automobile accident, a "fluid" story denying alcohol but admitting to an ill-advised mix of prescription medication, and a D.C. police force seemingly all too willing to sweep the whole matter under the rug.

Thank god nobody was hurt, but did the guy's last name have to be Kennedy?