Friday, September 30, 2005
Editorial: DeLay's presumption of innocence
The Republican leader may not be found guilty of the current charge. But he has fed the current atmosphere of corruption in Washington, D.C.
From the RoundTable blog
Read the latest entries
Even someone as hypocritical, viciously partisan and vindictive as former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay is entitled to the presumption of innocence.
His indictment by a Texas grand jury on a charge of conspiracy to violate state election law doesn't mean the congressman known as "The Hammer" is guilty of that particular crime, or any other.
But if DeLay is not guilty of something, it says more about the state of laws governing political corruption in this nation than DeLay's purity.
Among the things DeLay has done that ought to be against the law:
n He engineered the constitutionally suspect Texas redistricting that helped Republicans solidify their majority in the U.S. House. That redistricting was forced through the Texas Legislature just two years after the last redrawing based on 2000 Census figures.
During the intense battle over the redistricting, DeLay improperly used FAA resources to attempt to locate a plane carrying Texas Democrats who left the state capital to deny the legislature a quorum.
n DeLay was the architect of the GOP K Street strategy demanding that lobbying firms purge themselves of Democrats if they wanted to do business with the Republican Congress.
n Times too numerous to count, he raised money in ways that made it clear that access to congressional leaders was for sale.
The laundry list of DeLay's ethical lapses could fill a Stephen King-sized novel.
His response to the indictment has been typical: He attacked it as a partisan smear. Yet no one should buy the idea that the Texas prosecutor bringing the indictment is some party hack.
Ronnie Earle is a Democrat, but he has a long record of attacking public corruption, regardless of the party involved.
As Wayne Slater, senior political writer for The Dallas Morning News, told NPR, "If you really look at his record over the years, what he has really done is gone after people in power. ... I've watched Ronnie Earle for almost 20 years now, and what I see, based on the record, is that he's more of an idealist than an ideologue."
Earle delayed his retirement to see the case through. Slater said he is convinced that Earle is motivated solely by his distress at the corrupting influence of corporate and labor cash on the governing process.
To fully root that out, Earle would have to delay his retirement for decades. But bringing DeLay to account before the law would be a worthy start.
