Re: Valuable Families :)

["Petem" <petem001@xxxxxxxxx>]

Bass why don't you post all this crap to Comp.Home.Automation too?

I am sure its only a slight mistake,don't worry I will forward it for you


"Robert L Bass" <robertbass1@xxxxxxxxxxx> a écrit dans le message de news:
tamdnfrK8soNh6nYnZ2dnUVZ_u2dnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>A note from the past....
>
> Republican Ethics
> By Molly Ivins, AlterNet. Posted November 18, 2004.
>
> DeLay is one of the leading forces in making "Republican ethics" into an
> oxymoron.
>
> My, my, gonna be a long four years.
>
> House Republicans have rewritten the ethics rules so Tom DeLay won't have
> to resign if indicted after all. Let's hear it for moral values. DeLay is
> one of the leading forces in making "Republican ethics" into an oxymoron.
>
> The rule was passed in 1993, when Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, chairman of the
> powerful Ways and Means Committee, was being investigated for ethics
> violations. And who helped lead the floor fight to force him to resign his
> powerful position? Why, Tom DeLay, of course. (Actually, it's sort of a
> funny story. The D's already had a caucus rule that you had to resign from
> any leadership position if indicted. The R's changed their rules to match
> the D's, except they deliberately did not make their rule retroactive, so
> the highly indicted Rep. Joseph McDade, senior Republican on the House
> Appropriations Committee, could, unlike Rostenkowski, retain his seat.)
>
> DeLay has already been admonished by the House Ethics Committee three
> times on separate violations of ethics rules. Please note, that is the
> Republican-dominated Ethics Committee. The hilarious rationale offered by
> the R's for the new rule to exempt DeLay is that no one can accuse them of
> taking the moral low road here because, "That line of reasoning accepts
> that exercise of the prosecutor in Texas is legitimate."
>
> Uh, that would be Ronnie Earle of Austin, who is a known Democrat. On the
> other hand, Earle is quite noted for having indicted more Democratic
> officeholders than Republicans, so it's a little hard to argue that this
> is a partisan political probe. Or it would be, if facts made any
> difference these days to talk-show screamers.
>
> Showing his usual keen sense of ethics, DeLay has already started a legal
> defense fund and raised $310,000 since last summer. According to the
> Austin American-Statesman, half the money has come from Republican House
> members, who are all dependent on the Republican Steering Committee for
> their committee assignments and chairmanships.
>
> DeLay has three votes on the 28-member committee and, of course, more
> clout than anyone else in the House. (See Lou DuBose and Jan Reid's new
> book, "The Hammer," for more charming details on DeLay's House
> dictatorship). The other half of the contributions for DeLay's legal
> defense has come from political action committees, corporations and
> individuals.
>
> Hey, no worries about corrupting influence there because DeLay already
> does favors for big contributors to his plain old political action
> committees, even without additional contributions to his defense fund.
> Moral values. DeLay is going to give born-again Christians a bad name.
>
> In furtherance of moral values, Congress now has to raise the debt limit
> by another $800 billion. We actually reached the debt ceiling in early
> October, but obviously the R's didn't want that vote coming up before the
> election. Then after they finish spending a staggering amount of money,
> the R's will return to make Bush's tax cuts permanent.
>
> Now I realize that the Bushies consider it a point of pride to pay not one
> iota of attention to what the rest of the world thinks about us. But I
> would like to point out that the rest of the world is holding our paper.
> And foreign investors have demonstrated elsewhere that they are quite
> capable of taking alarm over unsound fiscal practices and pulling out
> completely, leaving bankrupt countries behind.
>
> Speaking of what the rest of the world thinks of us, the matter was nicely
> summed up by Britain's Daily Mirror with its classic tabloid headline,
> "How Can 59,054,087 People Be So DUMB?" The Guardian just put a tiny,
> white-on-black headline: "Oh God."
>
> I realize the "liberal elites" are not allowed to even quote the word
> "dumb" lest we be accused of "cultural condescension" toward our
> salt-of-the-earth red-state compatriots. Since I'm a populist happily
> living in the midst of a quite red state (some of my best friends are
> named Bubba), I never pay any attention to such horse poop. But I do
> resent it when the people running the country think we're so dumb they can
> rip us off and then tell us to pray.
>
> Molly Ivins is a best-selling author and columnist who writes about
> politics, Texas and other bizarre happenings.
>
>