As Bootrib member AP first noted:
This is a hugely significant development. Just yesterday, DeLay’s office issued this statement.
But that charade came to an end today. DeLay is out as majority leader. He says he is planning to seek re-election. I would not be too surprised to see that change, too. The reason?
The firm, Alexander Strategy Group, is of particular interest to investigators because it was founded by Edwin A. Buckham, a close personal friend of Mr. DeLay’s and his former chief of staff, and has been a lucrative landing spot for several former members of the DeLay staff, people who are directly involved in the case have said.
Although the firm’s name has circulated in connection with the case for many months, prosecutors’ questions about Mr. Buckham and Alexander Strategy – which did not respond to requests for comment – have intensified recently, participants in the case said.
One of the delights of running Congress is that you get to create laws, revoke laws, create loopholes…and that means that you can carve out schemes to make buttloads of money and consolidate power. And even if any casual observer would think your scheme unethical, you can send them to a lawyer to have the legality of your racket explained in fine detail. If anyone complains, you can accuse them of engaging in the criminalization of politics.
In recent years, DeLay has been reprimanded by the House Ethics Committee three times. In spite of this, DeLay issued the following statement to his fellow lawmakers today.
I am confident that time will not bear this out. DeLay’s schemes were always skirting the law and the self-imposed rules of the House. To protect himself from any consequences for his unethical activity, DeLay had to resort to all kinds of heavy-handed tactics.
Here is a sampler:
- Changed House ethics rules to let a complaint die if the ethics committee cannot decide whether it should be investigated within 45 days. Link
Source: “After Retreat, G.O.P. Changes House Ethics Rule,” The New York Times, January 5, 2005 - Changed House ethics rules to allow either party to block an ethics investigation by voting along party lines, thus denying a majority vote to allow it to proceed.
Source: “After Retreat, G.O.P. Changes House Ethics Rule,” The New York Times, January 5, 2005 - Changed House ethics rules to allow several members involved in a single ethics investigation to hire the same attorney. House rules had prohibited this practice in order to ensure one attorney could not gain access to too much information and potentially coordinate testimony.
- The House Republican Conference changed its internal rules, rescinding a provision that required a member to step down from a leadership post if indicted. The rule change was itself later rescinded after adverse publicity. Link
Source: “GOP Pushes Rule Change To Protect DeLay’s Post,” The Washington Post, November 17, 2004 - Unsuccessful attempts were made to change House ethics rules to eliminate the broad rule that Members should conduct themselves in a manner that “reflects creditably” on the House. This had been the basis for sanctions by the ethics committee and the House. Link
Source: “House to Consider Relaxing Its Rules; GOP Leaders Seek Ethics Changes,” The Washington Post, December 31, 2004
Rather than calling this the ‘criminalization of politics’ we should more properly call it the ‘legalization of graft and corruption’.
The fall of DeLay represents more than the end of one particularly powerful man’s career in politics. It represents the restoration of some standards (ethical and legal) to the way our elected officials conduct official business.
This is just the first step in a long process. But it is a highly significant first step.
Will DeLay survive as a member of the House, and actually run for re-election in Nov.? Will GOP leaders require him to resign before election time??
What are your thoughts on this?
my prediction is that he is going to jail. How fast that happens is up to the prosecuters.
I predict that he will abandon any attempt to get re-elected before too long.
And I really doubt he can win re-election.
For now, it helps him legally to pretend he is still viable. Announcing his retirement would prejudice a jury against him in the Texas case.
He’s talking big ish now, but he knows he’s going down, and I can’t really see him keeping his seat in the House. Assuming he could win re-election (I don’t doubt it, depending upon how repub it is), he’d go back to being 1 of 435 and for him–anybody really, but esp. him–that ain’t enough. He’s been in leadership for 12 years, and half that time or better being the de facto Speaker (Hastert was DeLay’s lieutenant, not the other way around) and he obviously has a lifestyle and deference from others that he’s become accustomed to, so I don’t see it.
It’s pretty Republican, but last Nov, when Texas was a blow-out for Bush (cringes in embarrassment for my state), DeLay’s numbers were much lower than they had been in previous elections. Voters in his district were getting fed up with him even them. See my other comment about the upcoming race.
Yes, I just read them! But I do wonder: Are they disgusted at DeLay or disgusted that he’s been caught and that he doesn’t have the graciousness or the sense God gave grits to just go ahead and resign and stop embarrassing them?
I ask this earnestly, b/c DeLay has been corrupt from Day One. And I can’t imagine he’s even paid more than two seconds of attention on his district (outside of keeping his local allies happy and/or pacified) since he’s been extorting campaign cash and rewarding himself on lush greens far away from Sugarland.
I think most are genuinely disgusted. We forget that most people just aren’t as informed about what their reps are up to as we political obsessives. Most R voters around here vote that way because they just generally consider themselves “conservative” and don’t look into the details much.
By last Nov, even those who hadn’t been paying much attention couldn’t avoid facing how corrupt he is, which is why his numbers took a dive compared to previous elections.
And as for paying attention to his district – I think it’s fairly affluent. A willingness to cut their taxes is all they really “need” from their politicians. Their attitude is profoundly self-centered of course, but I don’t think that means they think this kind of true corruption is OK.
Oh yeah, I know it’s an affluent district, but the higher you are on the leadership ladder, the more pork you can bring home. And he, I’m sure, definitely brought home the bacon and fried it up in the pan to keep his supporters satisfied.
These wingnuts talk a good game, but they are all about the federal government and its projects when it comes to their districts. They know it’s money in the bank. It’s the best show of “constituent service” out there.
I’m not trying to be argumentative (really), but just to continue the thoughts in terms of how it seems to go.
Let’s say Rep. Jones is good at bringing home the pork – local paper frequently features his smiling face announcing that a rec center with a swimming pool and after-school programs, or a low-income housing project or a new bridge is, thanks to his tireless efforts, included in the latest federal budget.
Most of the voters in his district, if affluent, don’t need the rec center, would be horrified by the low-income housing, but might appreciate the bridge if it cuts a little time off their commute.
But the ordinary voters aren’t the real beneficiaries of this pork – that would be the contractors who build this stuff. They will keep pouring money into Rep. Jones campaign coffers (and offer him these little investment side deals that explain how politicians get so much richer than their salaries would seem to explain).
(In poorer districts, there are some true public servants that bring home “pork” that really does benefit their constituents, and those folks will vote those guys in forever – and more power to them I say.)
The ordinary Republican voters will vote for him because they’re convinced that he’ll prevent the government from taking their hard-earned money and giving it to those lazy minorities or immigrants. That’s the main thing. Saving those poor unborn babies and protecting their children from homosexuals or some such “conservative” position may be important to them too.
But most of them don’t really benefit directly from the lucrative government contracts. They just get up in the morning and go to work at jobs that pay better than most. This pretty much describes my in-laws – selfish, ignorant, unconsciously racist, but not evil. They’re not part of that incestuous truly rich elite that hang out at the country club and do each other the kinds of favors that make them even more obscenely rich, and which always involves crossing the lines ethically speaking, if not outright corruption. Those people think that’s just how the world works. (My parents weren’t rich, but – long story why – I was often the fly on the wall as a kid in places like those country clubs. Opened my eyes at an early age.)
Now the ethically-challenged greedheads are the ones that really have a stake in keeping Rep. Jones in office, but they are a tiny fraction of the district’s population. They can’t get anyone elected just by going to the polls and voting. They can spend their money on campaign ads, and the newspaper’s publisher is sharing a drink with them at the country club and so on – so the majority of the voters are persuaded that Rep. Jones is their kind of guy, but they do have to persuade them.
Folks like my BIL are the majority, and they’re not just sorry DeLay got caught – they really are disgusted. In spite of their failings, they are not at the moral depths of the greedhead in-crowd. And the spin the rich folks buy isn’t able to hide the truth anymore- totally out of the bag, as you say. But yeah, the greedheads are just pissed that he blew it.
At least that’s how I imagine it. I don’t live in that district myself – just been watching Texas politics for more than five decades.
(Sorry for the long comment – but it was a train of thought that interests me.)
Absolutely excellent explanation. Thank you for that.
Rumors from his district: My extreme-right BIL lives in his district and reports that his Republican friends and neighbors are totally disgusted with DeLay and absolutely will not vote for him if he runs in Nov.
Though as was discussed at the DFT meeting the other night, he’s on the ballot now and if he withdraws or (please God) is in jail by then, and wins the primary anyway, the R’s can replace him with whoever they like for the Nov race. So theoretically, R’s could vote for him knowing that he’ll be replaced by a “clean” R candidate (oxymoron) that they’d like better.
I think that’s too convoluted for the voters though. Right now TX-22 has DeLay, several no-name R’s, an R running as an I, and Democrat Nick Lampson. It’ll be a free for all – and v-e-r-y interesting to watch, I think.
lawyers. This way Delay can ask for “contributions” to his legal fund. Out of power entirely it would be difficult to get those connections.
From the Beaumont Enterprise Poll says DeLay losing support
But the numbers shout:
“The poll, conducted Dec. 1-4 by CNN, USA Today and the Gallup Organization, showed DeLay, R-Sugar Land, with 36 percent support and any Democratic challenger with 49 percent.”
MInd you this is in his District. And a month ago before the Abramoff pleas were more than a hopeful gleam in an amphibian’s eye. Thirteen points down to Generic Dem. In Sugar Land. When the national coverage by and large predicted Delay would pull this out.
Toast.
This has made my year-2006- a success already!
Happy Days are here again.
We’re having a family game of leap-frog to celebrate. Ribbit.
Kerrrroooak!
Peace
LOL!
And he’s so cute, too…
A move was afoot within the House to depose Delay. 50 Republican signatures were required to bring the matter to a vote, and there were reportedly already 25 almost before the petition was circulated.
Booman, I agree with everything you wrote regarding the illegalities, but I also think Delay jumped ship before being forced to walk the plank by his fellow Republicans in the House.
and this hurts his legal case too.
He did not want his own colleagues to judge him as guilty, and they just did.
It looks bad to any jury that his own party thinks he did something wrong.
wooooosh…snap……ribbet
hmmm,webbugs
We also have to stress the uncovering of the system that was created that used DoD tax dollars to funnel back into one party rule.
I’ll have to wait until I’m done laughing to finish the comment.
He who DeLays is lost.
AG
We heard a BIG THUD this afternoon. So that was Delay?
I think that was just his ego deflating. The big fall is yet to come.
like his election defeat or going to jail?
I’ll bet my several penny pots, could add up to several dollars, that he’ll be measuring up for orange and pin stripe suits making for quite a handsome center-spread pic in Vanity Fair or Hustler’s mag.
I’m kinda saying I’m anxious.
I posted a link somewhere around here about another DeLay scheme that was being worked to block an investigation into a friends banking fraud charges. Another piece to (probably) come out will be his influence in the Mariannas and labor law influence in the textile sweat shops.
Yet another one is British lawyers linked to $1m payment for favours at US Congress
Christopher Geeslin, the then president of the US Family Network, has said that he was told by Ed Buckham, who was the group’s organiser and who was Mr DeLay’s former chief of staff, that the $1 million was paid on behalf of Russian energy entrepreneurs.
They were, Mr Buckham reportedly said, seeking Mr DeLay’s support for legislation backing an International Monetary Fund bail-out of the Russian economy. The Congressman denies any wrongdoing. Mr Buckham did not return a request to comment.
There are still more, too.
It was mentioned some time ago that Fitz or someone was looking toward the RICO act and that would be big, big trouble for them all.
Nice catch. Stick a fork, he’s done at the federal and state levels.
Today, 01.09, he’s got some real bad news from the Texas Criminal Court of Appeals – his motion to dismiss the money laundering charges denied.
Delay denied. Just the begining Tom.