The growing scandals involving Republicans at the federal and state levels seems to be a ready made campaign issue. Howard Dean seems to think so....but he's not getting much help from the elected Democrats. In fact, according to this piece in the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the opposite is true:
Indeed, at the DNC's executive committee meeting in Washington in early June, Dean publicly acknowledged that some congressional Democrats had urged him to tone down his "culture of corruption" rhetoric because they did not want to get caught up in the same ethics probe as DeLay. But Dean said he would not hold back.You're right, Howard. It is a moral issue...and a winning political issue. What a great combo.
"We have not spoken about moral values in this party for a long time," Dean said. "The truth is, we're Democrats because of our moral values. It's a moral value to make sure that kids don't go to bed hungry at night. ... It is a moral value not to go out on golf trips paid for by lobbyists."
This does explain why CREW hasn't found any Democrat to file ethics complaints in some of the most egregious cases:
"Howard Dean is pretty much out there on his own [among Democrats] in trying to take on the 'culture of corruption,' " said Melanie Sloan, executive director of the Committee for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the nonpartisan group that drafted the complaint Bell filed against DeLay in June 2004.If we want to win, folks, we have to play the game differently. And, we have to play hard ball.
"The Democrats [in the House] talk a good game, but that's all," she added.
"They're afraid to do anything that could blow back on them. They're all about the boys and girls club that Congress is."
Almost since the 109th Congress convened last January, Sloan's organization has been trying without success to get someone in Congress — Democrat or Republican — to initiate new ethics complaints, not against DeLay but two of his Republican colleagues: Bob Ney of Ohio and Duke Cunningham of California.
The Democrats have been handed a potentially winning issue. But they have to know how to use it. So far, not good.
