Delay's Reign May End -- article in WaPo

Muted Support for GOP Change Grows
Amid Scandals, Some Republicans Push to Permanently Replace DeLay as Leader

By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 3, 2005; Page A02

Widening corruption scandals in Washington are heightening Republican sentiments for a GOP leadership shake-up early next year that would permanently replace former majority leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), according to House members and GOP leadership sources.

"There is a lot of sentiment out there about DeLay's radioactivity," said a leadership source close to DeLay and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.).

Even if DeLay is never implicated, his return to the majority leader's post would create political "havoc," said one Republican House member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The lawmaker pointed to DeLay's decision in October to fly to Texas ahead of his first courtroom appearance aboard a corporate jet owned by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.

"The fact that he flew down on a corporate jet for his mug shot, and not just any corporate jet but Big Tobacco's corporate jet, that's a double whammy," the lawmaker said. "A number of my colleagues say he just doesn't get it. He doesn't understand how this plays."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/02/AR2005120201945.html

"The fact that he flew down on a corporate jet for his mug shot, and not just any corporate jet but Big Tobacco's corporate jet, that's a double whammy," the lawmaker said. "A number of my colleagues say he just doesn't get it. He doesn't understand how this plays."

Who are they trying to fool with this?

They put that criminal in the leadership role, knowing full well what kind of scumbag he is. To act surprised by the behavior of a crook they know well just doesn't pass the smell test. You get what you ask for, and in this case what they got they deserve.

He is a self made monster and now the Pubs want to prune him...too late...the Pub Tree is a weed of some sort, no fruit, no flowers, only bitterness and whining...

The Pubs gatta eat Tom for now but they still have to pay the price of backing him in the first place. Them Pubs just don't get it either.

They be on the wrong side of the fence Bush put up...

Come, we go sky diving....

You got to be pretty arrogant to pull the crap Delay's been up to. The whole thing with switching judges, trying to get the charges thrown out, taking fees for speeches, the traveling on corporate jets, taking money from Fortune 500 companies for his defense, etc., goes on without any hint of shame.

It must be the bug-exterminator psychology or something.

manner.

...before he will going by a different monniker. Inmate! Or, could be "convict". Either one would be fitting. I bet Ronnie Earle's next campaign gets generous donations!

they're worried about what the perception of corruption will do to them in November next year.

will bite him in the butt. He did it so that people would think he is proudly "not guilty" but the more evidence that comes in and the guiltier he looks, that mug shot just screams, "Up Yours!"