Charlie Rangel ruling puts Nancy Pelosi in a jam

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

The House ethics committee's decision to admonish New York Democratic Rep. Charlie Rangel over improper corporate-sponsored trips to the Caribbean leaves Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the ethics committee itself facing difficult questions.

When then-Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) was admonished by the ethics committee in October 2004, Pelosi and other Democratic leaders went on the offensive against him.

“Mr. DeLay has proven himself to be ethically unfit to lead the party,” Pelosi said at a news conference the following day. “The burden falls upon his fellow House Republicans. Republicans must answer: Do they want an ethically unfit person to be their majority leader or do they want to remove the ethical cloud that hangs over the Capitol?”

Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) — now the House majority leader — said DeLay "certainly ought to step aside as leader at this point in time because I think his credibility has been undermined by these findings."

Six years later, the shoe is on the other foot: Republicans have previously called for Rangel to lose his chairmanship over his ethical troubles, and some of them — including Indiana Rep. Mike Pence — renewed that call Thursday night.

How will Pelosi and Hoyer respond?

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/...l#ixzz0gg1S084d

At a Thursday evening news conference, Rangel lashed out at the ethics committee, and he was seen holding two closed-door meetings with Lofgren and Bonner off the House floor after the news broke that he would be the only one punished by the panel.

“I don’t want to be critical of the committee, but the common sense dictates that members of Congress should not be held responsible for what could be the wrongdoing of, or mistakes occur, as a staff unless there’s reason to believe the member knew or should have known. And there’s nothing in the record to indicate the latter,” Rangel told reporter. “So I have to now deal with my lawyer as to what the hell do they mean that something’s imputed. Does it mean that no matter what a staff member does if the member doesn’t know it that the member could be charged and admonished publicly for it?”

An ethics watchdog blasted the Ethics Committee for singling out Rangel for sanctions, saying all five members who went on the trips should have been admonished by the panel.

“The ethics committee's decision makes no sense. There is simply no reason for Rep. Rangel alone to be held accountable for taking this trip when a number of other members were also present,” said Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “The notion that Rep. Rangel alone was aware the trip was sponsored by corporate donors defies logic. There were banners identifying specific corporate donors and Rep. Donald Payne (D-N.J.), publicly thanked corporate sponsors. The fact is, each and every member of Congress present was equally as culpable as Rep. Rangel and all should be held to the same standard.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/...l#ixzz0gg1wY7gr

[scandal 951]

Charlie should take his lumps. Since when did "two wrongs make a right" and "they did it too" become an excuse? Oh, yeah. In Congress they don't play by the rules we all learned in kindergarten.

[Pooky 3,844]

Either he goes now, or he goes in November. Either way he goes.