Rash of Scandals Tests Democrats at Sensitive Time

When Nancy Pelosi said that her congress was going to be the most ethical congress in U.S. history it was a knock against all Republicans.

What have the American people gotten in return for this promise?

Answer- How about a group of tax cheats like Charles Rangel and his dubious colleagues in the Congressional Black Caucus with their creative ways of stealing taxpayer money through non-profits? Lets throw in Eric Massa, an undercover homo who can’t stop chasing male staffers. Is this the kind of ethics Nancy Pelosi was talking about?

The New York Times reports:

The ethical woes facing Democrats are piling up, with barely a day passing in recent weeks without headlines from Washington to New York and beyond filled with word of scandal or allegations of wrongdoing.

The troubles of Gov. David A. Paterson of New York, followed by those of two of the state’s congressmen, Charles B. Rangel and Eric J. Massa, have added to the ranks of episodes involving prominent Democrats like Eliot Spitzer, Rod R. Blagojevich and John Edwards.

Taken together, the cases have opened the party to the same lines of criticism that Democrats, led by Representatives Nancy Pelosi, now the House speaker, and Rahm Emanuel, now White House chief of staff, used effectively against Republicans in winning control of the House and Senate four years ago.

The mix of power and the temptations of corruption can be a compelling political narrative at any time. But with voters appearing to be in an angry mood and many already inclined to view all things Washington with mistrust, the risks for Democrats could be that much greater this year.

With Election Day still eight months away, there is time to avert a history-is-repeating-itself storyline. But Democrats, who are already on the defensive over the economy, health care and federal spending and are facing a re-energized conservative movement, suddenly have a set of ethical issues to deflect as well. “Speaker Pelosi famously promised the most open, honest and ethical Congress in history,” Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the Republican leader, said Thursday. “Yet here we go again.”

In 2006, when Democrats were battling for control of the House, the message of their campaign against the Republicans could be boiled down to a three-word slogan: culture of corruption. Democratic leaders aggressively seized on each indictment of a Republican member of Congress or lobbyist, building an argument that the controlling party had become arrogant and was in urgent need of a housecleaning.

So is that moment — in reverse fashion — now approaching for Democrats?
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Via New York Times

The Last Tradition

Eric Massa Democrat Rep Will Not Re-Election Amid Homosexual Harassment Allegations

In 2006 the Dems rode the Mark Foley Homo train all the way through taking control of congress. Foley, a Republican congressman, was forced to resign as a result of allegedly sending sexual explicit text messages to male pages on Capital Hill.

As far was the Democrats were concerned, it was like manna falling from heaven because they along with their lap dog mouthpieces in the main stream media blarredthe Foley story 24/7 for weeks. A single day did not go by without a Foley update.

Four years later in 2010, the Dems are firmly in control of congress with a media-created fraud in the White House in President Barack Obama and low and behold comes this story of a Democrat from western New York with his own alleged homosexual proclivities.

However, count on the MSM to give this story very little activity beyond today for obvious reasons.
The Politico reports:

First-term Rep. Eric Massa announced Wednesday that he will not seek reelection, saying his doctors have told him that he can’t continue to “run at 100 miles an hour.”

But several House aides told POLITICO that the House ethics committee has been informed of allegations that the New York Democrat, who is married with two children, made unwanted advances toward a junior male staffer.

A more senior staffer — Ronald Hikel, Massa’s former deputy chief of staff and legislative director — took the complaints to the ethics committee and was interviewed about them twice.

Hikel declined to comment about the situation, but House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) confirmed that the Democratic leadership had been informed of the allegations before the news broke.

“I’ve heard of that allegation before,” he said. “I had some indication, yes, but I don’t want to go beyond that. And my presumption [is] it’s being pursued in the course of business.”

Hoyer said news of the sexual harassment allegation — coming on the same day Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) gave up his gavel on the Ways and Means Committee — shouldn’t give Republicans a leg up in November.

“I don’t think it helps anybody in the institution, any one of us on either side of the aisle. It certainly didn’t help Mr. Foley,” Hoyer said, referring to former Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.), who resigned from Congress in 2006 amid allegations that he sent sexually explicit instant messages to an underage male page.

“When there were allegations about Mr. Foley or others, I think the institution suffers,” Hoyer continued. “And that’s why it’s so important that each of us conducts ourselves in a way that won’t bring discredit on the institution.”
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By tomorrow, it will be, “Eric who?”

Via The Politico

Via Memeorandum

The Last Tradition