Jack Abramoff and the Politics of 2006
The Nation
John Nichols
The Nation -- By any serious definition of the word, Republican super-
lobbyist Jack Abramoff is a rat. His decision to enter guilty pleas
Tuesday to three felony counts of defrauding his own clients merely added
a personal acknowledgement of the fact to the official record. Frank
Clemente, the director of Public Citizen's Congress Watch, summed things
up succinctly, and accurately, when he said Tuesday: "Make no mistake
about it: Abramoff is a crook."
In Washington, more so than in most places, it remains true that there is
no honor among thieves -- nor among rats.
So the notion that Abramoff will now rat out his former associates,
including Republican members of the House and Senate, is not a
particularly difficult one to comprehend -- even for conservatives
commentators who are generally unwilling to admit even the slightest
signs of shakiness in the Republican infrastructure. Radio ranter Rush
Limbaugh was already warning his listeners on Tuesday about the "A-bomb"
that is expected to explode when Abramoff starts cooperating with Justice
Department investigations of members of Congress. Limbaugh suggested that
the scandal will become "a modern-day version of term limits" that
potentially could do more damage to Republicans than the increasingly
widespread public discontent with the unwavering support most GOP members
of Congress have given to the Bush administration's failed Iraq policies.
There is no question that the potential for damage to GOP political
prospects from the Abramoff scandal -- with its deliciously detailed
evidence of bribery, influence peddling, pay-to-play politics and
sweeping abuses of the public trust -- is great. Between 2001 and 2004,
close to 220 members of Congress collected more than $1.7 million in
political contributions from Abramoff and the lobbyist's associates and
clients. More than 200 of those members still serve in the House, and the
vast majority of them are Republicans.
But the difference between the potential that fallout from the scandal
could loosen the GOP's grip on the House and Senate and the reality of a
transforming "throw-the-bums-out" vote in 2006 remains significant. While
Clemente says that the scandal "is likely to take down a number of
members of Congress and members of their staffs," the precise number has
yet to be established. And if it is limited merely to those members of
Congress that Abramoff's testimony places in the prosecutorial
crosshairs, then both chambers could well remain in Republican hands.
To be sure, some of the members of Congress who have been most closely
linked with Abramoff, a former elected chairman of the College
Republicans who counts among his longtime associates people like
Americans for Tax Reform founder Grover Norquist and former Christian
Coalition chief Ralph Reed, will have a very hard time getting reelected
-- if they even choose to run.
That list is topped by former Majority Leader Tom DeLay, whose onetime
aide, Michael Scanlon, was Abramoff's primary partner in crime. Like
Abramoff, Scanlon is cooperating with the investigation and it is hard to
imagine that DeLay's name won't be among the first to come up. Already
under indictment for campaign abuses in Texas, DeLay faces a serious
challenge from former Democratic Representative Nick Lampson, who this
week filed the necessary paperwork to make the race. Lampson's
campaigning as a bipartisan reformer in a district that is now one of the
more competitive in Texas, and the Abramoff scandal will give him a great
deal of ammunition.
Even more vulnerable than DeLay at this point is Ohio Republican Bob Ney,
who for some time has been identified as "Representative No. 1" in the
Abramoff investigation. Ney is in big trouble. The chairman of the House
Administration Committee, he already stands accused of accepting overseas
trips, gifts and hefty campaign donations from Abramoff, allegedly in
exchange for using his position to advance the interests of the Indian
tribes and casinos that were among the lobbyist's big-ticket clients. If
Abramoff lays out the dirty details of his relationship with Ney,
Republicans will start pushing for the congressman to drop his reelection
bid.
Montana Senator Conrad Burns, who accepted $150,000 in campaign
contributions from the lobbyist's operation and helped an Abramoff client
score a $3 million federal grant, is the most vulnerable senator. Burns
has just announced that he will return the money he took from Abramoff
and the lobbyist's clients and associates, but that's not going to be
enough to get the senator off the hook legally -- or politically. Up for
reelection this year, he has suffered a damaging drop in the polls since
details of the scandal have begun to dominate media in Montana, which was
already trending in a Democratic direction before the scandal surfaced.
Several other prominent Republicans are now likely, because of their
associations with Abramoff, to face more serious challenges in 2006 than
had previously been expected. They include: House Speaker Dennis Hastert,
R-Illinois, who collected more than $100,000 in campaign contributions
from Abramoff's firm and clients between 2001 and 2004 and in 2003 urged
Interior Secretary Gail Norton to favor the lobbyist's clients in an
Indian-gaming dispute; House Majority Leader Roy Blunt, R-Missouri, who
accepted more than $10,000 from Abramoff's firm and clients between 2001
and 2004, and who intervened at least three times in matters involving
those clients; and California Representative Dana Rohrabacher (news, bio,
voting record), who accepted thousands of dollars in campaign
contributions from Abramoff and turned up as a financial reference for
the lobbyist's purchase of a casino cruise line. Dozens of Republican
House members, including vulnerable incumbents such as Connecticut's Bob
Simmons, have banked direct contributions from Abramoff.
The extent to which the Abramoff scandal is of political significance in
2006 will depend on just how many of those members who accepted
contributions from the lobbyist and his associates and clients are
implicated in the Justice Department investigation. If the numbers move
into the double digits, this scandal could pose a genuine threat to GOP
control of the House. But it is important to remember that there are
Democrats who have Abramoff problems, as well, including Senate Minority
Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, who appears to have collected more than
$65,000 in Abramoff-linked contributions between 2001 and 2004.
If a desire to protect Reid and other Democratic recipients of the
lobbyist's largesse causes the opposition party to pull its punches,
Democrats will gain no more ground as a result of this scandal than it
did from the Enron imbroglio. Thus, the ultimate question does not boil
down to what Abramoff will reveal. Rather, it is this: Will Democrats
hold every member of Congress who has been implicated to account. If
Democrats are smart, they will recognize that this is, at its core, a
Republican scandal. And they will say: Throw all the bums out -- just as
Republican Newt Gingrich did in the early 1990s when several Republican
House members were linked with scandals that generally involved
Democrats. Only by being genuine in their commitment to clean up Congress
will Democrats turn the Abramoff scandal fully to their advantage. And,
as everyone in Washington knows, it has been a long time since Democrats
were that genuine -- or that smart politically.
--
Enkidu AA#2165
http://www.thoughts.leaddogs.org/
EAC Chaplain and ordained minister,
ULC, Modesto, CA
PGP ID: 0xC4CE8CF0
"The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has
killed a great many philosophers."
-- Denis Diderot
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