Posted on: Thursday, November 18, 2004

EDITORIAL
House GOP two-faced in protecting DeLay

Hypocrisy is not the exclusive province of either political party in Washington, but with the controversy swirling around their majority leader, Tom DeLay, House Republicans are staking an especially strong claim.

House GOP leaders yesterday repealed an 11-year-old party rule calling for any of their members in leadership positions to step aside if they are indicted on a felony charge.

That move comes as a Texas grand jury works to untangle a political action committee closely related to DeLay that, it is alleged, funneled illegal corporate donations to Texas legislative races.

DeLay led an aggressive redistricting effort in Texas last year that resulted in five Democratic House members retiring or losing re-election. It also triggered the grand jury inquiry and a couple of admonishments from the bipartisan House ethics committee last month.

DeLay denies the charges. His colleagues say they changed the indictment rule because they fear his political opponents will trump up an indictment simply to make him step aside.

The rule change won't make the least bit of difference if DeLay isn't indicted. But the grand jury has already indicted three of DeLay's political associates and is still on the hunt.

Where DeLay's colleagues reveal their hypocrisy is in the origin of the rule they've now repealed. They passed it in 1993 when they were trying to highlight the ethical lapses of Democrats.

They had a point. House Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski eventually pleaded guilty to mail fraud and went to prison.

Their purpose in passing the indictment rule at the time was to show how they held themselves to a higher standard.

The risk to Republicans now, of course, is that they'll be stuck with a majority leader who has the potential to do for their reputations what Rostenkowski did for Democrats a decade ago.