The Fall of DeLay is a Shot of Hope

Once upon a time, I never imagined that the "most powerful man in Washington," as he was often called, would resign in disgrace. Remember, it was DeLay who strong-armed the impeachment of Clinton, even after the GOP lost 5 seats. For over seven years I have invested my entire life in opposing the hegemony of the Right Wing. Back in 1999, the Right was poised to control all three branches of government, and I believed that once that happened, there would be no turning back. And then with a little help from Katherine Harris, Jeb's pals, DeLay's Gucci riot squad -- and the Felonious Five on the Supreme Court -- the Right did control all three branches.

But then there was Jefford's courageous move that gave the Senate to the Democrats. That revived my hopes that there could be a check on the Right's power. In the run-up to the 2002 election, I still had the passion -- which I expressed through activism on the internet and in my local area. I so wanted the Dems to strengthen control of the Senate, and regain the House.

Unfortunately, the Dems fumbled that opportunity, right from the point when Jeffords gave them the Senate. Where were the investigations? Why weren't the Dems using the bully pulpit to expose Enron's influence of Bush's energy policy, Bush's failures around 9/11 -- and so much more??? Why were they still rubber stamping damn near everything Bush and the GOP wanted -- all those egregious bills and nominations???

Oh, the Dems wanted to work "in a spirit of bi-partisanship", to "raise the tone in Washington." They were parroting the very phrases that Rove & Co. had crafted to cow the Dems into submission. With the Democrats, it was like -- "oh if we're nice, you won't hurt us will you?" But Bush and the GOP just saw it as weakness, and kept beating the crap out of them.  The Dems were suckers and in some cases, maybe worse...

And after the 2002 defeats, there was one discouraging  episode after another -- through the 2004 (s)election, and the seemingly daily reports of the Dems caving in -- with the Alito nomination, and most recently on the Patriot Act. But now the mighty DeLay has fallen! Suddenly, I feel some hope that the tide can still be turned against Bush and the Right Wing. What will happen with the Limbaugh case? Will Fitzgerald pursue Libby's co-conspirators? What's more -- DeLay was faced with the very real prospect that he would lose the election. Does that mean that some elections still cannot be rigged, such as in DeLay's district? So it hasn't all been in vain...  Jackson Thoreau can certainly attest to that.

In 2003, I organized a petition drive to oust Tom DeLay from office and presented copies of the petition signed by several thousand fellow Americans to the offices of Rep. Joel Hefley, former chairman of the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, and Rep. Alan B. Mollohan, who is still ranking minority member of that committee.

The grounds I used were for misconduct and violation of House rules, especially the first rule of the House Code of Ethics, which states, "A member, officer, or employee of the House of Representatives shall conduct himself at all times in a manner which shall reflect creditably on the House of Representatives."

At the same time, Public Citizen and other groups and individuals contacted the same committee with similar requests. We couldn't file official ethics complaints because House leaders had passed rules years before stopping individual groups and citizens from doing so. Only members of Congress could file a formal complaint, and they rarely did.

So our efforts didn't immediately start an investigation on DeLay, and they were never really acknowledged by the House committee. But I believe they helped lead to an environment in which officials started questioning DeLay's abuses more and gave the committee some support to go after DeLay.