F*cked Company : Delay, Inc.
TAPPED offers an executive summary of the work being done by Think Progress, The Daily Delay, and The Stakeholder, in keeping tabs on the scandals surrounding the now-busily-circling-the-drain House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.
* Austin district attorney Ronnie Earle’s ongoing grand jury investigation into campaign finance violations on the part of Texans for a Republican Majority PAC (TRMPAC) during the 2002 state legislative elections; as recently as last week Earle appeared on 60 Minutes and pointedly refused to rule out a future indictment of DeLay (who set up TRMPAC).
* The just-concluded civil trial concerning a lawsuit filed against TRMPAC by several ousted Texas Democratic legislators, during the course of which new evidence surfaced of DeLay’s direct involvement in TRMPAC’s operations. The TRMPAC scandal has not only helped to fatten the coffers of DeLay’s legal defense fund, but has also inspired the creation of a similar legal defense fund for the already-indicted DeLay operative Jim Ellis, to which House reps like Roy Blunt, Tom Feeney, and Ralph Regula have already contributed.
* The ever-expanding comic opera that is the Jack Abramoff-Mike Scanlon Indian casino lobbying scandal. Not only were Abramoff and Scanlon long-time confidants (and, in Scanlon’s case, a former employee) of DeLay’s, there is also clear evidence that one of Abramoff’s tribal clients funded a trip DeLay took to London in 2000 by funneling money through a right-wing think tank. Months later DeLay helped kill a bill the tribe wanted defeated.
* New evidence that DeLay, along with a bipartisan roster of fellow House members, took trips funded by a registered foreign agent -- the Korea- U.S. Exchange Council -- in violation of House ethics rules. As a must-read new report in Time reveals, the council shares the same address as the lobbying office of DeLay’s former chief of staff.
* The breakdown of the House ethics committee, which is now mired in a deadlock as Democratic members refuse to agree to the rules changes that DeLay helped push through in January and continue to rail against the purge of disloyal Republicans from the panel and their replacement by reps who have donated to DeLay’s legal defense fund. (It turns out that one of the new members, Lamar Smith of Texas, has not only donated to the fund but also hosted a fundraiser for TRMPAC in 2002.) The ethics committee imbroglio is now a PR battle -- Republicans would have no problem letting the committee remain paralyzed indefinitely if they believed they could get away with it, but Democrats are counting on the slew of recent ethics-related news coverage to shine the spotlight on the situation in the committee.
* Austin district attorney Ronnie Earle’s ongoing grand jury investigation into campaign finance violations on the part of Texans for a Republican Majority PAC (TRMPAC) during the 2002 state legislative elections; as recently as last week Earle appeared on 60 Minutes and pointedly refused to rule out a future indictment of DeLay (who set up TRMPAC).
* The just-concluded civil trial concerning a lawsuit filed against TRMPAC by several ousted Texas Democratic legislators, during the course of which new evidence surfaced of DeLay’s direct involvement in TRMPAC’s operations. The TRMPAC scandal has not only helped to fatten the coffers of DeLay’s legal defense fund, but has also inspired the creation of a similar legal defense fund for the already-indicted DeLay operative Jim Ellis, to which House reps like Roy Blunt, Tom Feeney, and Ralph Regula have already contributed.
* The ever-expanding comic opera that is the Jack Abramoff-Mike Scanlon Indian casino lobbying scandal. Not only were Abramoff and Scanlon long-time confidants (and, in Scanlon’s case, a former employee) of DeLay’s, there is also clear evidence that one of Abramoff’s tribal clients funded a trip DeLay took to London in 2000 by funneling money through a right-wing think tank. Months later DeLay helped kill a bill the tribe wanted defeated.
* New evidence that DeLay, along with a bipartisan roster of fellow House members, took trips funded by a registered foreign agent -- the Korea- U.S. Exchange Council -- in violation of House ethics rules. As a must-read new report in Time reveals, the council shares the same address as the lobbying office of DeLay’s former chief of staff.
* The breakdown of the House ethics committee, which is now mired in a deadlock as Democratic members refuse to agree to the rules changes that DeLay helped push through in January and continue to rail against the purge of disloyal Republicans from the panel and their replacement by reps who have donated to DeLay’s legal defense fund. (It turns out that one of the new members, Lamar Smith of Texas, has not only donated to the fund but also hosted a fundraiser for TRMPAC in 2002.) The ethics committee imbroglio is now a PR battle -- Republicans would have no problem letting the committee remain paralyzed indefinitely if they believed they could get away with it, but Democrats are counting on the slew of recent ethics-related news coverage to shine the spotlight on the situation in the committee.
posted by Management at 5:38 PM
1 Comments:
POOR HAMMER. Tom DeLay is all over the news these days with new revelations of dirty dealings and a spate of “can he survive?” pieces popping up in all the major dailies, seemingly without the explicit instigation of anything done or said by the House Democrats. The Stakeholder and The Daily DeLay provide one-stop spots for all the latest news, but to summarize, the majority leader’s current problems include:
* Austin district attorney Ronnie Earle’s ongoing grand jury investigation into campaign finance violations on the part of Texans for a Republican Majority PAC (TRMPAC) during the 2002 state legislative elections; as recently as last week Earle appeared on 60 Minutes and pointedly refused to rule out a future indictment of DeLay (who set up TRMPAC).
* The just-concluded civil trial concerning a lawsuit filed against TRMPAC by several ousted Texas Democratic legislators, during the course of which new evidence surfaced of DeLay’s direct involvement in TRMPAC’s operations. The TRMPAC scandal has not only helped to fatten the coffers of DeLay’s legal defense fund, but has also inspired the creation of a similar legal defense fund for the already-indicted DeLay operative Jim Ellis, to which House reps like Roy Blunt, Tom Feeney, and Ralph Regula have already contributed.
* The ever-expanding comic opera that is the Jack Abramoff-Mike Scanlon Indian casino lobbying scandal. Not only were Abramoff and Scanlon long-time confidants (and, in Scanlon’s case, a former employee) of DeLay’s, there is also clear evidence that one of Abramoff’s tribal clients funded a trip DeLay took to London in 2000 by funneling money through a right-wing think tank. Months later DeLay helped kill a bill the tribe wanted defeated.
* New evidence that DeLay, along with a bipartisan roster of fellow House members, took trips funded by a registered foreign agent -- the Korea- U.S. Exchange Council -- in violation of House ethics rules. As a must-read new report in Time reveals, the council shares the same address as the lobbying office of DeLay’s former chief of staff.
* The breakdown of the House ethics committee, which is now mired in a deadlock as Democratic members refuse to agree to the rules changes that DeLay helped push through in January and continue to rail against the purge of disloyal Republicans from the panel and their replacement by reps who have donated to DeLay’s legal defense fund. (It turns out that one of the new members, Lamar Smith of Texas, has not only donated to the fund but also hosted a fundraiser for TRMPAC in 2002.) The ethics committee imbroglio is now a PR battle -- Republicans would have no problem letting the committee remain paralyzed indefinitely if they believed they could get away with it, but Democrats are counting on the slew of recent ethics-related news coverage to shine the spotlight on the situation in the committee.
That’s where we are at the moment. DeLay certainly seems embattled, but he has appeared that way before and there's no evidence yet of a break in the solidity of GOP support for him. A tipping point in that respect will likely come only when GOP rank-and-filers start catching flack from their constituents back home. That's why the attempts to put lawmakers on the record on matters like the ethics rules are so important, and why local advertising and advocacy linking district reps to the swirling pool of slime and corruption in DC are so needed. The widening net of the Abramoff-Scanlon scandal is one way to do that, and the Tom Delay Legal Expense Trust donor list (pdf) is another. Here's a third: indicted DeLay aide Jim Ellis is still acting head of DeLay's mega-huge PAC, Americans for a Republican Majority (ARMPAC). How about some local Dems challenging House and Senate recipients of 2004 ARMPAC campaign contributions to explain their connection to a political fund being administered by a man under criminal indictment?
--Sam Rosenfeld
Post a Comment
<< Home