Louisiana Embarrasses Democrats Everywhere

This last weekend, the citizens of the 2nd Congressional District of Louisiana re-elected Rep. William Jefferson to another term in the U.S. House of Representatives. They did this in spite of allegations of bribery and corruption. After all, the FBI found $90,000 hidden in Jefferson's home freezer -- and he has yet to satisfactorily explain why it was there.

Making matters worse, it was not even a close election. Jefferson was re-elected with 57% of the total vote. Evidently the citizens of the 2nd Congressional District don't care if their congressman is corrupt or not.

Now some Democratic leaders in Louisiana are asking that Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi [D-California] put Jefferson back on the powerful Ways & Means Committee. He was removed when the cash was found in his freezer, and it was learned that federal officials are investigating him for corruption.

This puts the national Democratic party in a quandry. They were given control of the House and Senate by the electorate, largely because the public was sick and tired of the corruption in Washington. Now one of their own, who most people believe is guilty of corruption, has been sent back to Washington. This does not inspire confidence that the Democrats will be able to clean up corruption in Washington.

As for putting him back on the powerful House Ways & Means Committee, I don't see how that could possibly happen. This is the committee that controls the purse-strings in Washington. They might as well put him on the Ethics Committee. It wouldn't look any worse than letting him return to Ways & Means. In fact, I don't see how Pelosi could put him on any committee of any importance.

This is just the kind of thing the Democrats did not need to happen. You can bet the Republicans will use Jefferson as the poster-boy of Democratic corruption from now through the next election. And you couldn't blame the Republicans if they did. They were able to dump their most corrupt politicians, but the Democrats returned theirs to Congress.

Thanks Louisiana! You just may have helped the Republicans return to power.