[Mb-civic] Molly Ivins: Let's Get Those Ethics Standards Where They Belong

[Kevin Walz]

> Molly Ivins
> TUESDAY, JANUARY 4, 2005

> Mission# 1: Let's Get Those Ethics Standards Where They Belong

>
>
>  AUSTIN, Texas -- Oh boy! Starting the year off briskly, lending it 
> such tone already, such cachet, such je ne sais quoi -- those 
> Republicans are so special, aren't they? Their first move, first rat 
> out of the trap, top priority: lower ethics standards. Yessiree, this 
> 2005 is going to be quite a year, some pip.
>
>  Let's put that to a vote. Many problems before us -- Iraq, a Social 
> Security "crisis," a real health care crisis, world terrorism, our 
> international reputation possibly at its lowest ever ... who is in 
> favor of lowering ethics standards first? Who thinks ethics standards 
> in Washington are too high?
>
>  House "Republican leaders" -- that would be your Tom DeLay, Dennis 
> Hastert and other moral heroes of our time -- want to repeal the rule 
> that makes it possible for the House to censure members for bringing 
> "discredit" on the House, even if their behavior does not fall under a 
> specific rule.
>
>  They also want to relax a restriction on relatives of lawmakers 
> accepting foreign and domestic trips from groups interested in House 
> legislation. How very ... Bourbon of them. Wives and kiddies are 
> already comped to go along on junkets. With the new rule, parents, 
> cousins and grandparents could go, too. Good grief, how can the 
> Republicans maintain family values without them?
>
>  Then there's the rules change that will make it possible for either 
> party to stop the House ethics committee. As it is now, if the ethics 
> committee, five Republicans and five Democrats, deadlocks, the 
> complaint automatically goes to an investigative subcommittee after 45 
> days. Nope, they want to change that to a majority of the committee. 
> More "Protect Tom DeLay" changes. Does it not occur to the Republicans 
> that Tom DeLay brings "discredit" on the House every day he is in 
> office?
>
>  At least Richard Nixon once paused to say, "But it would be wrong 
> ..." Does no one in this administration ever stop to ponder: "Perhaps 
> we should not do this. Perhaps this is not a good idea"?
>
>  For example, making long-range plans for indefinitely imprisoning 
> suspected terrorists whom they do not want to set free or turn over to 
> the courts in either the United States or other countries. They are 
> talking about "potentially lifetime detentions." According to Dana 
> Priest of The Washington Post, a "senior administration official" 
> said: "We've been operating in the moment because it's what's been 
> required. ... Now we can take a breath. We have the ability and need 
> to look at long-term solutions."
>
>  Nice to think of the Bushies "in the now," like a bunch of New Age 
> nature lovers. But their idea of a "long-term solution" is building a 
> 200-bed prison at Gitmo "to hold detainees who are unlikely ever to go 
> through a military tribunal for lack of evidence." Uh, how about 
> letting them go for lack of evidence?
>
>  That noted commie Sen. Dick Lugar, R-Ind., said: "It's a bad idea. So 
> we ought to get over it, and we ought to have a very careful, 
> constitutional look at this." Another com-symp, Sen. Carl Levin, 
> D-Mich., said, "There must be some modicum, some semblance of due 
> process ... if you're going to detain people, whether it's for life or 
> whether it's for years." Where do these people get such radical, 
> far-out notions?
>
>  According to Reuters, "The new prison, dubbed Camp 6, would allow 
> inmates more freedom and comfort than they have now and would be 
> designed for prisoners the government believes have no more 
> intelligence to share."
>
>  Let's see, there's no evidence against these people, they have no 
> more intelligence to share ... exactly where do we get the authority 
> to hold them for life, and why are we doing so?
>
>  Just to show you that such forms of accountability as are left in our 
> slightly tattered system of checks and balances are worth keeping, the 
> upcoming hearing on Al Gonzales for attorney general has already borne 
> fruit. Voila! The Justice Department has come out with a new memo on 
> torture saying it is not necessarily limited to "excruciating and 
> agonizing pain." Say, what a triumph for human rights.
>
>  Further, the memo says, "Torture is abhorrent to both American law 
> and values, and to international norms." So there. In other words, we 
> have repealed the infamous Gonzales memo, just in time for his 
> hearing.
>
>  Now, I'm not going to conclude that Fascism Is Upon Us just because 
> we have an administration that not only can't find the Constitution 
> but apparently doesn't know there is one. Too early in the year for 
> that. Long way to go. Got to save your indignation. But it is 
> unpleasantly reminiscent of Watergate, isn't it? That's what we're 
> looking at here, folks -- not just constitutional deafness, but moral 
> turp as well. All we need is one bag job and an alert night security 
> man.
>
>
>
>
>
>
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