| That's not to say that Democrats are angels. They are politicans after all, and politicians have to be watched.
 | And that is where Republicans failed the country and the people. Someone said vigilance is the price for liberty and democracy. Well, Republicans - and I'm talking about the Republican voters as well as the Party - failed to be vigilant.
They stopped paying attention to what their party was doing. They stopped holding their public officials accountable, and when that happens, the power these politicians hold will corrupt them (and many of them started off a little shady). |
So when Jefferson was indicted, the GOP thought they could celebrate, but besides their own scandals there was another problem. The Democrats did not defend Jefferson and they moved very quickly to strip him of power.
As a Democratic voter, I am angry at Jefferson, and if he is found guilty, I say jail the S.O.B. so long it makes other politicians think twice before doing something like this.
And that's what Republicans - both party officials and the actual voters should've done. But the Party didn't, did they? When Haggard, Foley, Delay, Gonzales and others were caught in scandals, the GOP has defended them or at least refused to punish their party members. That only implicated their entire party - even the voters themselves who continued to vote in corrupt Republicans.
Well, Republican Congressmen had another chance recently to prove that they are ethical and accountable, to prove that they could do the right thing and put ethics and their nation above their party. That chance came with a call for a no-confidence vote against Alberto Gonzales' partisan firing of federal lawyers.
Gonzales sat in front of Congress and lied about his involvement. He tried to use the Justice department to intimidate and implicate the opposition and essentially rig the election. Just think about how dangerous that can be.
The Republican Party could've finally said it was serious about ethics. It could've said it wanted to clean up Washington as well. Many Republicans already want Gonzales to resign and they could've backed their talk with action.
And what did they do?
They blocked the no-confidence vote and let Gonzales off from a serious ethics charges. The same group that tried to score political points when a Democrat (Jefferson) was in trouble ducked their ethical responsibilites again when Gonzales, a Republican, committed serious ethical violations.
And if you look at political boards, many Republicans are wondering what the big deal is and are comparing this to Bill Clinton's firing of all federal prosecutors when he came in.
Well, if all it takes for something to be right is if that the perp just needs to be in your party, then you don't care about ethics anymore. You just care what team you're on.
By blocking the no-confidence vote against Gonzales after all that talk denoucing him, Republicans dropped the ethical ball again and proved that they still care more about their Party than their country. |
