William Jefferson (a POV to ponder): A perfect storm of opportunism and racism

Warning: this is critical of Pelosi and the Democratic leadership, and what turned out to be part of an effective strategy to take back the House and Senate. Still, it's worth considering whether Jefferson has been treated fairly - especially when compared to Rep. Mollahan - and the Bush/Cheney/Halliburton/K-Street crooks. It's worth your time to click the link and read the article...and just consider...

http://www.workers.org/2006/us/jefferson-0629/
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Democrats demote Rep. William Jefferson
A perfect storm of opportunism and racism

By Fred Goldstein
Published Jun 24, 2006 9:09 AM

Crass political opportunism resulted in outright racism June 16 when Democratic Party leaders violated their own rules and precedent to oust Rep. William Jefferson from a key position on the powerful House Ways and Means Committee.

-snip-

Jefferson, whose Capitol Hill office had been raided on May 20 in an unprecedented, unconstitutional police-state act by the FBI, has been accused of bribery by that racist, repressive agency but not charged.

Democratic Party rules and precedent require that no representative be forcibly removed from a special committee before being indicted. Jefferson, the first African American from Louisiana to be elected to the House since Black Reconstruction, is also the first Democratic Party representative to be involuntarily removed from a committee position by the party. A vote by the 50-member Democratic Party Steer ing Committee set the stage for a full caucus vote of 99-58 to remove Jefferson, leading to the full House vote that formally removed him.

The FBI claims to have videotapes, marked bills and confessions from Jeffer son’s associates regarding the bribery charges, which have to do with a small technology firm getting business in West Africa. The FBI is notorious for stings and frame-ups of Black political figures. Jefferson has not been charged with any crime yet and therefore has not had a chance to defend himself.

Whatever the charges against Jeffer son, even if all true—and there is no reason to take the FBI’s word for anything—the consequences of his alleged act are insignificant in comparison to the damaging racism displayed by the Democratic Party leadership, its humiliation of the Con gressional Black Caucus—which called Jefferson’s removal a discriminatory act—and its willingness to jump on the FBI bandwagon by echoing the unproven charges made in an affidavit and calculatingly leaked to the press.

Furthermore, sending the FBI to raid Jefferson’s congressional office, allegedly to stop corruption, ignores the pervasive corruption in Washington. Mainly white, male lobbyists are busy bribing politicians with political action funds, campaign donations, trips, dinners and promises of future jobs. The politicians then write legislation to benefit every monopolized, multi-billion-dollar industry in the U.S., from weapons to pharmaceuticals, oil, agribusiness and so on.

-snip-

The drive to oust Jefferson was led by Nancy Pelosi of California, the House minority leader. The presumption of innocence was thrown overboard along with the party rules in order to pursue Pelosi’s politically bankrupt electoral strategy of campaigning against the Republican “culture of corruption.”

As part of the imperialist establishment, the Democratic leaders will never campaign against the police-state tactics of George W. Bush, the brutal colonial war of aggression, the racist treatment of Katrina survivors in New Orleans, the racist campaign against undocumented workers, and the imprisonment of a generation of African American and Latin@ youth.

Pelosi wants to run on the non-political platform of being against corruption—a slogan used ad nauseam by political demagogues to evade attacking the real evils of capitalism—and threw Jefferson overboard in an unprincipled attempt to gain political advantage and big contributors in the 2006 elections.
Pelosi showed her racism and opportunism when confronted by Tim Russert on the May 7 airing of Meet the Press.

Russert pointed out that “The top Democrat on the ethics committee of the House of Representatives, Alan Mollohan of West Virginia, was reported, first by The Wall Street Journal, to have quietly directed at least $178 million in taxpayer funds to a network of home-district friends, business partners, contributors, former employees. Along the way, he curiously became a multimillionaire in real estate, and federal investigators are looking at whether he failed to properly disclose scores of newly acquired assets.

-snip-

But she never responded to Russert’s charges against Mollohan, who is accused of enriching himself to the tune of millions. That is because Pelosi and the Democrats had negotiated a deal to get Mollohan to step down voluntarily from the Ethics Committee while keeping his seat on the powerful House Appropri ations Committee.

-snip-

The Dems can either be aggressive about cleaning the sleaze out of their party or look forward to losing it all again in 2008.

i realy doubt democrats are racist. Show me an unbiased news source and maybe i'll believe your claims. what i will believe are the unbiased reports that Jefferson was found with a hell of a lot of cash in his freezer. If he's corrupt, he should be forced to resign, even that sleazeball cunningham did that. it's about corruption, not about racism.

is far less damning than that against Jefferson, who is on tape excepting a briefcase full of money. The author is, I'm sure, aware of the particulars of both cases. What a completely dishonest piece.

He was also caught with $90,000 in cold cash in his freezer.
Mollohan may a conflict of interest, but Jefferson's offense
stands out both in its seriousness (bribery) and the quality
of evidence against him.

I'll accept that William Jefferson is innocent until proven
guilty, but he needs a better defense than a racist establish-
ment out to get him.

nt

money. it's amazing the things that people keep in freezers. so I've always wondered why finding money in his freezer made him guilty.

people have odd habits. knew a women who kept her money in a woodpile.

I don't know if he's guilty or not, just saying money in freezer doesn't make him guilty.

It just so happened it was the same $90,000 that was used in the sting operation against him. The fact that he would even entertain bribery, much less actually be bribed, would have been reason enough to kick him out. Shame on the voters of his district.

I won't consider shutting the case till at least an indictment is brought...and still, I'll hold out for a conviction.

interesting DU poster! :-)

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