There is one advantage to losing an election: one's own party immediately becomes a smaller target, and the winners a bigger one. Early evidence suggests that this will be more fun for Republicans than it was for Democrats in similar circumstances. Republicans in Congress ultimately overplayed their hand after 1994, but at least at first they maintained an awesome discipline. So far the Democrats, to put it mildly, have not.
We have noted how soon-to-be Speaker Pelosi has set her caucus against itself with her unsuccessful bid to replace heir-apparent Steny Hoyer with John Murtha for majority leader. This was doubly unfortunate, as it undercut the two winning issues that put the Democrats in charge of Capitol Hill. Iraq was issue number one. Whatever one thinks of Murtha's position on Iraq (get out now), at least he has a position. Murtha's sound defeat seriously reduces the risk that the Democrats will adopt a policy of their own.
Issue number two was corruption. Murtha was named as an "unindicted co-conspirator" in the ABSCAM sting, the most serious Congressional scandal in recent decades. He has been known all along as a Congressman with whom one could do business.
Then of course there is Alcee Hastings, whom Pelosi wants to put in as Chair of the House Intelligence Committee, over Jane Harman who is in line for the job and very well-qualified. What sort of fellow is Hastings? Here is Byron York's report, from National Review:
William Borders was a prominent Washington, D.C. lawyer when, in 1981, he was charged with conspiring with his good friend, federal judge Alcee Hastings, to solicit bribes from defendants seeking lenient treatment in Hastings’s courtroom. Hastings was charged, too, though the men were tried separately. When it was all over, Borders was convicted, disbarred, and sentenced to five years in jail. Hastings was acquitted, but later impeached and removed from office.
By advancing Murtha and Hastings, Pelosi wrecked any chance that the incoming Democratic majority would be seen as a reform movement. Instead, it looks like business as usual in the worst sense. Moreover, the Hastings matter has a Clinton connection, which is not exactly what Ms. Clinton might want to see in the press. William Borders, mentioned above, had a powerful friend.
At various times over the years, Borders has tried to have his license to practice law in the District of Columbia restored. But his episodes of contempt, in addition to his original conviction for bribery, led the legal bodies involved to conclude that, even though he had done his time, he did not feel remorse for his actions nor a respect for the law under which he was punished. He remains disbarred today.
None of that, however, stopped President Bill Clinton from granting Borders a full and unconditional pardon as part of the flurry of controversial pardons Clinton issued during his last hours in office. The pardon documents listed Borders’s crime this way: “Conspiracy to corruptly solicit and accept money in return for influencing the official acts of a federal district court judge (Alcee L. Hastings), and to defraud the United States in connection with the performance of lawful government functions; corruptly influencing, obstructing, impeding and endeavoring to influence, obstruct and impede the due administration of justice, and aiding and abetting therein; traveling interstate with intent to commit bribery.”
Whatever the new Democrats are about, it isn't cleaning up Congress.
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