Louise Slaughter: Supernanny
The City Paper article about Louise Slaughter (Exile mentioned it earlier) is full of tasty info. The overall impression I get is that she is in a good position to take a bite out of crime.
Anyone who’s paid attention to and been disgusted by the unfettered antics of the GOP-controlled congress for the last 6 years will be glad that she’ll be in charge of the unglamorous House Rules Committee.
The 109th Congress (the one that is just wrapping up this month) has been among the tawdriest in recent memory. One of its members, Randy “Duke” Cunningham, is in jail for accepting lavish bribes. Another, Ohio Congressman Bob Ney, is headed there after pleading guilty to taking gifts from uber-lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Montana Senator Conrad Burns, on the defensive for similar activities, lost his seat in the Senate, previously considered a safe one. Abramoff himself is in jail, and former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, influential in coordinating the lobbyist-congressional complex, resigned after being indicted.
They then do the obligatory “fair and balanced” mention of Democrats.
(The Democrats haven’t been free of the taint that’s infected Washington, either. Louisiana’s William Jefferson is in the middle of a bribery investigation; the FBI found $90,000 in cash in his freezer. But Jefferson won reelection in a run-off last Saturday.)
Which is understandable but irritates me when you compare 1 or 2 Dems as opposed to the “Abramoff 60″. Makes me wish even more that Karen Carter had beaten him in the runoff.
Asked whether she anticipates trouble getting members of her own caucus to go along with her measures, she replies: “I think so. Yes, I believe we will.”
What she doesn’t believe is that there’ll be enough opposition to derail the package of reform rules.
“I’m just going to say to them: ‘Look [how] we got elected. Six out of 10 people said their vote had a lot to do with corruption. And we’re going to clean this up, and you better get on board. And you either came here to fly around on jets or pass legislation, one of the two,’” she says.
Funny.
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