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Thursday, May 25, 2006For the record:I don't care whether Denny Hastert took bribes or not. I don't care whether he's facing indictment or not. The Republican leadership's response to the FBI getting the goods on Jefferson is a dereliction of duty and a plain statement that the congressional club has ceased to think of itself as a group of citizen legislators and has started to think of itself as a special caste. Obviously there need to be protections in place to assure that the party in power doesn't arrest the opposition under false pretenses. At the same time, however, the public needs to be assured that the achievement of elected office is not a license to steal, nor to distribute taxpayer money to those who scratch one's back. If the FBI is not allowed to investigate and the Congress doesn't take the trouble to do so, we are pretty much back to all of Mark Twain's jokes about Congress and the other criminal classes. The ugly fact of the matter is that when I read about Hastert and co. closing ranks behind Jefferson, I find it much easier to believe they're nervous too than to discover in this otherwise spineless Congress the sudden appearance of principle. I think that as Porkbusters and others look into the earmark matter, we're about to head back to another cliché about our politics - that the embarrassment isn't that they're breaking the law but that their actions are actually legal. I can understand Rep. Hastert's desire not to have his fellow Representative's homes or offices raided. I'd prefer that law enforcement not raid my home too. But Corey Maye is in jail for shooting a cop who came in on a no-knock warrant in the middle of the night. Congress has not responded with a call for laws to assure that innocent citizens can assume they have the right to defend themselves in their own homes. For you and me, protection from illegal search and seizure has been reduced to "the cops meant well so sorry about that, and if you don't wait for them to shoot you and hope you live to sue for damages, you can assume you're a bad guy so it's alright for them to break down your door." By contrast, if you're in Congress, you can drive while seemingly intoxicated, take large sums of money in small bills from strange characters and more and the presumption of innocence means the presumption you shouldn't even have to stand trial? It is time for accountability in the Congress. It's bad enough that they waste our money, hamper our economy with idiotic regulations and distort agricultural and other markets with ill-considered subsidies. Now they're allowed to sell people favors paid for with our money and attempts to bring a little justice and protect us taxpayers get denounced? Can the National Taxpayers' Union or some other such group get standing? It's time for we the people to sue for our rights. That's our money Jefferson stole. Our money Trent Lott and Thad Cochran are passing out. Our money whose distribution Speaker Hastert says is none of our business. We the people deserve better. It's time for a new party. 
posted by gbarto at 11:27 PM |
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