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http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewWeb&articleId=9340
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Finally, Democrats appear to believe in something they’re willing to fight for. But it is the other, nastier fight where they seem to be going for the knockout.
Ethics debates are always a touchy subject on Capitol Hill. There is a MAD (mutually assured destruction) quality to them the can scare even the most reckless and partisan of members; an ethics complaint is a widely available weapon that can easily be turned against those who bring them. But in the current debates over Tom DeLay’s ethics troubles, Democrats have stopped holding back. Partly it’s because there’s blood in the water, but it’s also because a lot of people are playing a new game now: If you can’t legislate, agitate.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, who once observed an ethics détente with the Republicans, took questions about the majority leader to the floor this week, abandoning the pretense that the DeLay debate was going to be about individual House members expressing concern about the integrity and reputation of the institution. Now, clearly, it’s war, and Pelosi’s the general leading the charge. On the same day that DeLay was forced to address what Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer referred to as an “avalanche of allegations” against him, Pelosi introduced a resolution that began:
“WHEREAS, the Constitution of the United States authorizes the House of Representatives to determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behavior, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member."
Expulsion? Truce way over!
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