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Race & Corruption

The New York Times reports today on the ethics charges facing Charlie Rangel and Mad Maxine Waters (my characterization, not the NYT?s), emphasizing the effect of the corruption charges on the Dems. (?In Ethics Battles, a Partywide Threat,? by David Herszenhorn and Carl Hulse)

Here is the saddest and, I think, most significant and revealing paragraph in the piece:

Neither lawmaker, both Democrats, faces electoral jeopardy. Mr. Rangel, who was charged on Thursday by the House ethics committee with 13 violations, including failing to pay taxes on rental income from his Dominican villa, represents a safe district in Harlem. Ms. Waters, who is accused of using her office to help a bank in which her husband owned stock request bailout money, has a similarly secure seat in Los Angeles.

In other words, no matter how corrupt they might be (and, of course, the charges are only charges), their constituents will keep sending them back term after term. If it weren?t so cruel, I?d say they?re getting the representation they deserve. In fact, I may say it anyway.

Has anyone considered the possibility ? no, let?s make that a probability ? that the more secure the seat, the less incumbents fear retribution from their constituents, the more likely they are to engage in reckless and unethical behavior?

And let us not forget another safe seat incumbent leader of the Black Caucus, House Whip James Clyburn from South Carolina. He is quoted predictably predicting that those right wingers will try to make corruption a racial issue, saying

it was inevitable that some political opponents would try to turn the ethics questions into a race issue. ?Those Tea Party people that showed up at the health care debate, they will not hesitate for one moment to racialize something,? said Mr. Clyburn, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. ?They did, and they will.?

Batting better than usual, Clyburn is half right. Some have tried to make the corruption charges against Rangel and Waters a racial issue, but it wasn?t the Tea Partiers. As Politico reported yesterday,

The controversy over the cases and the prospect of the first simultaneous ethics trials for multiple members in more than 30 years mark the biggest challenge for the ethics committee?s and the House?s ability to police its own members since the mid-1990s, when then-Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and other leaders from both parties found themselves hauled before the secretive panel.

The question of whether black lawmakers are now being singled out for scrutiny has been simmering throughout the 111th Congress, with the Office of Congressional Ethics a focal point of the concerns. At one point earlier this year, all eight lawmakers under formal investigation by the House ethics committee, including Rangel and Waters, were black Democrats. All those investigations originated with the OCE, which can make recommendations ? but take no final actions ? on such cases.

There?s a ?dual standard, one for most members and one for African-Americans,? said one member of the Congressional Black Caucus, speaking on condition of anonymity....

?This is stacked against you once an accusation is made,? the lawmaker added. ?You?re guilty until proven otherwise.?

But then it?s far from novel, or even unusual, for Democrats to make an issue of race while blasting conservatives for making an issue of race.

And, after all, it?s not as though Democrats these days can make a principled argument (at least not with a straight face) against special treatment based on race.

Full post as published by Discriminations on August 02, 2010 (boomark / email).