The water gets higher; Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) has alleged that DeLay might have violated a federal statute that prohibits threatening members of the federal judiciary when he said, "The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior," in response to judges ruling repeatedly that 11th hour congressional interference did not require doctors to reinsert Terri Schiavo's feeding tube. Arkansas Traveler (Registration may be required)

The campaign by Republicans to allow Congress to dictate to the judiciary in specific cases such as Schiavo violates the constitutionally mandated separation of powers among executive, legislative and judicial branches of government. Judges are bound by their oath of office to follow the law, not the opinions of elected officials playing to particular constituencies. In their attack on the judiciary, Cornyn and DeLay are really calling for their own version of politically inspired judicial activism. Houston Chronicle

The New York Times reported Wednesday that DeLay's wife and daughter have been paid more than $500,000 since 2001 by his political action and campaign committees.

Separately, the Washington Post reports there are questions about who paid for a 1997 trip the Texas Republican took to Russia. CBS News

DeLay reported that the trip was sponsored by a Washington-based nonprofit organization. But interviews with those involved in planning DeLay's trip say the expenses were covered by a mysterious company registered in the Bahamas that also paid for an intensive $440,000 lobbying campaign. WA Post

To make an accurate call here I think we'd have to research the rules set forth by the ethics committee and the penalties associated with them. We'd also have to know the details of the law about threatening federal judges. So I guess the answer is "I don't know" until I can research it a little bit.

You should be aware that your comments yesterday may violate a Federal criminal statute, 18 U.S.C. §115 (a)(1)-B-. That law states: (ibid.)

-B- threatens to assault, kidnap, or murder, a United States official, a United States judge, a Federal law enforcement officer, or an official whose killing would be a crime under such section, with intent to impede, intimidate, or interfere with such official, judge, or law enforcement officer while engaged in the performance of official duties, or with intent to retaliate against such official, judge, or law enforcement officer on account of the performance of official duties, shall be punished as provided in subsection -b-. capdefnet

The statute he is accusing DeLay of violating is:

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay stepped up his attack on federal judges Thursday, telling a gathering of religious conservatives that the judiciary has "run amok" and demanding that Congress assert authority over the courts.

His videotaped remarks broadened the criticism he voiced last week after the death of Terri Schiavo, a severely brain-damaged woman in Florida, after judges declined to order her feeding tube reinserted.

ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE - President Bush on Friday said he supports "an independent judiciary" and declined to endorse comments by House Majority Tom DeLay that were critical of judges.

<snip>

Bush, asked about DeLay's remarks, did say he would ‘continue to put judges on the bench who strictly and faithfully interpret the Constitution.’

In a Houston Chronicle poll in the district this week, 49 percent of respondents said they would vote for someone else. That number has sparked the most interest in a Democratic primary in the district in years.
"Now that DeLay is being pushed ever closer to the political brink, everyone is realizing that any of these challengers on his worst day might be better than DeLay on his best day," said Kelly Fero, a longtime Democratic strategist.

Also, given all of the legal action pending with DeLay, I would not at all be surprised to see him end up in some country club prison for a few months.  I guess he can complain about the lack of cappuccino like Martha Stewart did, but at least he'll be out of office.

So, unless something that's actually unethical or illegal surfaces against DeLay, I don't see why any action should be taken against him at all.

There will be some in the caucus that will cut and run cause they do that best, but as of now, I doubt he's losing that much support.

Every day brings more bad political news for embattled House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.

A weekend poll showed his home district support has dropped into a danger zone. Though national surveys cast doubt on the Republican strategy in the Terri Schiavo case, he continued to denounce judicial decisions. Vice President Dick Cheney and some other top Republicans pointedly differed with his comments.

<snip>

A recent editorial in The Wall Street Journal said Mr. DeLay's ethical transgressions "sooner or later will sweep him out." This week's National Journal poll of "political insiders" in both parties showed Republicans split on whether Mr. DeLay is a liability or an asset. Virtually every Democrat said he is now a GOP liability.

Weakening support was also evident in a survey commissioned by the Houston Chronicle in Mr. DeLay's suburban district. Taken by pollster John Zogby, whose work for candidates in both parties included Mr. DeLay's 2002 opponent, it showed that more people said they would vote now against Mr. DeLay than for him.

<snip>

Republicans are unlikely to lose control of the House next year, despite a historic pattern of losses in an administration's sixth year. That's at least partly due to the way they've been able to draw districts in key states, including Texas.

But if they do lose the House, or even a good deal of their majority, the instinct of self-preservation might displace the current GOP inclination to stand by its man.

I don't suppose you checked out any of the links I provided in my original post. Here again is a rather long list for DeLay's actions 2000-2003

Houston IndyMedia

and this one with some more recent stuff (2004).

There are just too many unethical and illegal items to put into a debate post and do each of them justice.

It seems people are beginning to smell what DeLay’s stepped in. Still like a bad hangnail, I predict DeLay will tough it out as long as possible.

Now, if you think there are some "unethical and illegal items" on your large shotgunned laundry list that you can actually make a solid case for, but all means, pick and choose which ones you'd like to debate. Citing rants in Indymedia and Democrats. com doesn't really constitute much in the way of any proof however. Other than of course that liberals don't like Tom DeLay. But then again, we all knew that and I would hazard a guess that he doesn't much care for them either.

Well, like a famous prophet once said “There are none so blind as they who will not see.” There is no point trying to provide information to someone who ignores anything that does not fit a preconceived notion.

When even Dick Cheney thinks DeLay has gone too far (pot/kettle, anyone?) and that still doesn’t convince you, far be it from me to bang my head against a concrete wall.

You disappoint me, DaffyGrl. One would think that with the myriad of charges your links have brought against Tom DeLay that there would be at least one of them that you would consider important enough to actually defend on it's own merits. In the absence of that it does look an awful lot like the time worn tactic of "if we can throw enough crap against the wall some of it is bound to stick".

[You disappoint me, DaffyGrl.  One would think that with the myriad of charges your links have brought against Tom DeLay that there would be at least one of them that you would consider important enough to actually defend on it's own merits.  In the absence of that it does look an awful lot like the time worn tactic of "if we can throw enough crap against the wall some of it is bound to stick".

And you disappoint me, Aquilla. Your knee-jerk dismissal of the neck-deep-and-rising-charges against Tom DeLay seem to indicate that you've staked out a position that reads, "Sure, Tom DeLay is a jerk, but he's our jerk, so we've gotta defend him."

Just because you ignore the grizzly bear that's in your tent doesn't mean he won't eat you.

Nobody's had to make up all these awful things about DeLay. He made this mess himself and his history of arrogance, shady dealing and thuggish behavior in Congress has earned him enemies a'plenty. But like most powerful and arrogant men, DeLay thought he was immune to the scorn of his foes. But stupidly, he has given them the means to hang him out to dry.

But not--just--yet! http://slate.msn.com/id/2116392/

There is no Republican--not Bush, not Cheney, not Rumsfeld, not Frist--that I would rather see ridden out of Washington in disgrace than DeLay. I think he has done more to poison the political waters than any other politician of either party. It is obvious to me that one reason he has taken such a strong stance against the power of the federal judiciary is that he probably is going to be spending a lot of his time and money in federal courthouses over the next few months.

I would love the spectacle of the Republican Party trying to defend the honor and virtue of its tainted House Majority Leader as he trudges from Texas courtroom to Washington courtroom trying to defuse the scandals as "part of the vast left-wing conspiracy."

I'm going to make a bet here. I'm betting that like Jim Wright, Tony Coehlo, Newt Gingrich, Bob Livingston and Trent Lott, DeLay is going to jump out his leadership position in disgrace before he's pushed out of it by his colleagues trying to save their own butts before the 2006 elections.

And like all the other quitters he can write a book about how he was hounded out of office. Should be great fun.

The mission of the Aspen Institute is to foster enlightened leadership and open-minded dialogue. Through seminars, policy programs, conferences and leadership development initiatives, the Institute and its international partners seek to promote nonpartisan inquiry and an appreciation for timeless values.

Barbara Boxer - Democratic Party
January 10, 2002 - January 15, 2002 (6 days)
Punta Mita, Mexico
Purpose - Participate in conference on Islam
Total Cost - $6,345.20

Barbara Boxer - Democratic Party
May 28, 2002 - June 2, 2002 (6 days)
Barcelona, Spain
Purpose - Participate in conference on global environment
Total Cost - $7,241.00

Barbara Boxer - Democratic Party
November 21, 2002 - November 26, 2002 (6 days)
Punta Mita, Mexico
Purpose - Participate in conference in U.S. policy toward Columbia
Total Cost - $7,016.96

Barbara Boxer - Democratic Party
August 15, 2002 - August 20, 2002 (6 days)
London, England
Purpose - To attend a conference on US-Russia relations
Total Cost - $8,260.00

On August 6th, a week after the Democratic Convention, a clandestine summit meeting took place at the Aspen Institute, in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains. The participants, all Democrats, were sworn to secrecy, and few of them will discuss the event. One thing that is certain, however, is that the guests formed a tableau that not many people would associate with the Democratic Party of the past. Five billionaires joined half a dozen liberal leaders in a lengthy conversation about the future of progressive politics in America. The billionaires were not especially close socially, nor were they in complete agreement about politics or strategy. Yet they shared a common goal: to use their fortunes to engineer the defeat of President George W. Bush in the 2004 election.

“No one was supposed to know about this,” an assistant to one participant told me, declining to be named. “We don’t want people thinking it’s a cabal, or some sort of Masonic plot!” His concern was understandable: the prospect of rich men concentrating their wealth in order to sway an American election was an inflammatory one, particularly given the Democratic Party’s populist rhetoric. This private meeting of plutocrats was an unintended consequence of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance-reform law of 2002. Previously, wealthy donors had contributed “soft money” to the political parties, which controlled how the funds were spent. The reform legislation had banned such gifts, forcing donors to find new ways of influencing the political process.

The meeting’s organizer was Peter B. Lewis, the seventy-year-old reclusive chairman of the Progressive Corporation, an insurance company based in Cleveland, Ohio. He has spent much of 2004 discreetly directing millions of dollars to liberal groups allied with the Democratic Party, such as America Coming Together and MoveOn.org, while cruising the Mediterranean Sea on his two-hundred-and-fifty-foot yacht, Lone Ranger. The yacht has communications equipment that allows Lewis to monitor political developments in America while sunbathing off the coast of Italy. Lewis, a major backer of efforts to decriminalize marijuana, has helped underwrite campaigns to hold referenda on decriminalization in Arizona and California. (In 2000, he was arrested in New Zealand for possessing marijuana.) According to Lewis’s friends, he concluded that it would be best to remain a shadow figure in the 2004 campaign; he has declined all requests for interviews.

Flying in from Arizona was John Sperling, an octogenarian businessman who in 1976 created the for-profit University of Phoenix. Sperling is also the co-author of a recent book, “The Great Divide: Retro vs. Metro America,” which suggests that the 2004 election is a contest between “ ‘God, Family, and Flag’ folks”—who live in the South, the Great Plains, the Rockies, and Appalachia—and forward-thinking metropolitans who support “economic modernity,” “religious moderation,” and “excellence in education and science.”

The wealthiest participant at this meeting of hard-core partisans—and the one whose presence was the most surprising—was George Soros, the seventy-four-year-old Wall Street speculator turned philanthropist. Soros, who was born in Budapest in 1930, is short, with a crest of gray hair, owlish glasses surrounding blue eyes, and a hearing aid in one ear. At Aspen, his deep Hungarian accent, and his taste for abstract ideas, made him seem like a European professor who had walked into the wrong seminar. “The participants kind of talked past each other,” a person who attended the meeting told me.

Once again, people here are long on accusations, short on specifics.  "See, he's a bad guy cause <fill in the blank> says so in an editorial!"  That proves it! 

Well, it doesn't really.  About all it proves is that DeLay is "Liberal enemy number one" at the moment.  No kidding?!

So, let's look at the first question posed for debate in that context.....

Is Tom DeLay becoming (or has he already become) a liability for the Republican party? Will the GOP steadfastly “stand by their man” or distance themselves by forcing him out as they did Trent Lott?

Why, in the absence of any real proof to any of these allegations would Tom DeLay be a "liability" to the GOP?  Because the Democrats say he is?  Because they are targeting him because they don't like what he stands for, not because what he's done?

Do they really want to open a full investigation in to the trips that members of Congress take on someone else's dime?  Do they really want to do that you think?  Go back to my link posted earlier on congressional trips and take a look at some of them.  Does anyone here honestly think this is going to be investigated by Congress????  (and yes, I'm still on topic here, bear with me, I'll tie it all in)....

Ok, let's use the "innuendo" and "association" method that is being employed against Tom DeLay, just for fun shall we? 

Let's take a look at The Aspen Institute.  Their claim is the following......



My claim is that in addition to their lofty goals as stated above, they are also a Congressional Travel Agency. According to this link, they have funded 490 trips for members of Congress. And these are not small dollar trips. You know I've tried to call my Senator Barbara Boxer a number of times for a chat, but she's never in the office it seems. Wonder where she is? Well, on these dates I know.....

--snip--

Based on the level of proof thus far offered here against Tom DeLay, I'm thinking maybe we need to investigate Barbie Boxer's travel arrangements, not to mention some of the others on that list. Was her objection to the 2004 election results an honest objection on her part, or was it a liberal form of frequent flyer miles? Inquiring minds want to know.

Ok, that was fun, off with the tin foil.  My point to this is that some Republicans may indeed cut and run on this DeLay business because in my opinion they are cowards and have their own skeletons.  The strong ones won't and they'll call the Democrats' (who have their own skeletons) bluff.  I guess we'll have to wait and see.

The Times just ran a front-page article reporting that DeLay's wife and daughter receive payments from his political operations. This story might have been news if it hadn't been known for years and been the subject of a detailed report in the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call on May 5, 2003 — meaning the Times did a follow-up 702 days later. And this story might have been scandalous if it weren't for the fact that having family members on the pay-roll is a common, bipartisan practice, accepted as legitimate so long as they actually do work (DeLay's daughter runs his congressional campaigns).

The same day as the Times front-pager, the Washington Post ran its own front-page article on a trip DeLay took to Russia that was ostensibly funded by a Washington think tank, but that really might have been funded by a Washington lobbyist, in violation of House rules. This might have been news if that trip hadn't taken place in 1997 and been reported in the National Journal on Feb. 25, 2005 — meaning the Post did a relatively brisk follow-up after 39 days. Most subjects of Washington scandals are undone by the steady accumulation of new allegations. DeLay might be the first brought down by the drip-drip of old allegations.

I wonder...if there is such an abundance of clear-cut evidence of Delay's wrongdoing...why is it that charges have yet to be filed against him? 

Well, it's just a thought, but maybe it has something to do with the legislative and executive branches of the federal government and the state of Texas being solidly dominated by the Republicans?

In response to the original first question--is Delay becoming, or has he become, a liability for the GOP?--I can only respond that I fervently hope so, but I'm not going to hold my breath hoping there will be severe repercussions if the party doesn't ditch him. I mean, suspicions of malfeasance aside, the man is obviously completely unfit to hold public office. His grasp of the concept of powers as being fundamental to any democracy is woefully lacking, and he's wilfully ignorant of the various international treaties the United States is party to, which is not a good trait in a man who is a member of the level of government responsible for foreign and defense policy. DeLay was one of the guys behind the American Servicemembers' Potection Act, which included the infamous "The Hague Invasion Clause." This clause authorizes the preseident to use "any means necessary," including armed force, to remove American or allied personnel (whoever the latter may be) from the custody of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The problem is that if the president were to initiate such an operation, it would involve invading the Netherlands, which is a member of NATO, and consequently, the United States would be required under the terms of the North Atlantic Charter (specifically Article 5) to go to war against itself. So that was some brilliant legislation, huh?

Well...the USA is not a member of the ICC so in effect if US serviceman or personel were held by the court...it would in fact be illegal.

So the President would be justified using whatever means necessary to rescue the person. It would be the same situation if NKorea took a US armymen hostage.

Article 5
The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.

Or could it be that nobody has filed the charges because they know they have no case?

Not if the US servicemember in question were being charged with committing a serious violation of international humanitarian law on the territory of a state party to the Rome Statute. This may come as a surprise, but US law doesn't apply outside US territory; it's that quaint concept known as "national sovereignty."
No, it wouldn't, because North Korea is not a member of NATO, whereas the Netherlands is. Just to make it crystal clear, I'll quote Article 5 of the North Atlantic Charter:This treaty was expressly designed to leave no wiggle room, lest the Soviet Union attack one member state and the rest said "uh, we think the Sovs have valid legal grounds to attack you; you're on your own."
The "The Hague Invasion Clause" (and I'll admit I'm hacked off to some extent due to the fact that The Hague is my home town) essentially authorizes the president to launch an armed attack on an allied country. Under the circumstances, demands akin to Bush's "you are either with us or you are against us" become rather a sick joke.

A Republican member of the U.S. House said Tom DeLay should step down as House majority leader, the Associated Press reported, as a Republican leader in the Senate said DeLay needs to answer questions about his ethics.

Representative Christopher Shays of Connecticut told the AP that DeLay's ``conduct is hurting the Republican Party'' and ``hurting any Republican who is up for re-election.''

Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, the second-ranking Republican in the Senate, said on ABC's ``This Week'' program that Texas Republican DeLay should ``lay out what he did and why he did it and let the people then judge for themselves.''  Bloomberg

At lunch at his downtown Washington restaurant last week, Jack Abramoff -- the once Washington superlobbyist who is now the target of a Justice Department criminal probe -- lashed out in frustration and was noticeably caustic about House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, reports Investigative Correspondent Michael Isikoff in the April 18 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands Monday, April 11). "Everybody is lying," Abramoff told a former colleague. "Those S.O.B.s," Abramoff said about DeLay and his staffers, according to his luncheon companion. "DeLay knew everything. He knew all the details." There are e-mails and records that will implicate others, Abramoff said.

For years, Abramoff raised hundreds of thousands for DeLay's political causes and hired DeLay's aides, or kicked them business, when they left his employ. Newsweek

"I think he has to come forward and lay out what he did and why he did it and let the people then judge for themselves," Santorum told ABC's "This Week." "But from everything I've heard, again, from the comments and responding to those, is everything he's done was according to the law.


"Now you may not like some of the things he's done," said Santorum, who is up for re-election next year in Pennsylvania. "That's for the people of his district to decide, whether they want to approve that kind of behavior or not."

Yahoo news link

Y'all seem to be missing something Santorum also said. I'm sure it's just an oversight by the non-partisan crowd here. What Santorum actually told ABC News this week was the following......

The Beltway wisdom is right. Mr. DeLay does have odor issues. Increasingly, he smells just like the Beltway itself.
<snip>
Taken separately, and on present evidence, none of the latest charges directly touch Mr. DeLay; at worst, they paint a picture of a man who makes enemies by playing political hardball and loses admirers by resorting to politics-as-usual.

The problem, rather, is that Mr. DeLay, who rode to power in 1994 on a wave of revulsion at the everyday ways of big government, has become the living exemplar of some of its worst habits. Mr. DeLay's ties to Mr. Abramoff might be innocent, in a strictly legal sense, but it strains credulity to believe that Mr. DeLay found nothing strange with being included in Mr. Abramoff's lavish junkets. WSJ

Democrats, who often ignored Rep. Tom DeLay's Republican-leaning district, see a political opening in 2006 now that the House Majority leader faces ethics questions and dismay over his intervention in the Terri Schiavo case.
<snip>
This week, a Houston Chronicle poll in the district found that 49 percent said they would vote for someone else. That number has sparked the most interest in a Democratic primary in the district in years.  Boston Herald

Meanwhile, people here are long on rhetoric, but nobody really seems to want to lay the actual case against DeLay out here.  If it turns out he actually did something illegal, ok, kick him to the curb.  Being "an embarrassment to the party" may provide entertainment for liberals during a slow news weekend, but it's hardly a crime.  If it was, Chris Shays would have been in jail a long time ago.....

So, my offer still stands.  What did DeLay do to break the law?  Lay it out and we can talk about it.

Your seeming naivete regarding DeLay reveals the high level of your own partisan bent, Aquilla. You can ignore the obvious distance the President, Vice-President, Senate Majority Leader, Senator Santorum and Representative Shays are putting between themselves and DeLay, but I'd bet they're only saying out loud what a lot of other Republicans are thinking or saying off the record. No, I'm not going to try and give you chapter and verse as to why DeLay is in deep doo-doo, but only the most partisan of partisans could say he's having a wonderful spring.

My problem isn't so much with what the Democrats are doing, hell the Republicans did the same thing when they were the minority party in Congress with Newt leading the way.  My problem is with what the Republicans are doing because they are doing exactly the same thing the Democrats did back then.  Cowering in the shadows, distancing themselves and jumping into the water with the sharks.  Hoping against hope that the sharks' hunger will be satisified once they devour DeLay. 

Memo to the GOP Rats - It won't be.....

So, being the highly influential Republican that I am, invitee to the PNAC weekend picnics and mid-week hay rides and sing-a-longs, I am simply offering them some advice.  Fight back and lead.  We as a party asked the American people for the chance to lead and it's about damn time we started doing that.

Of course, what those rats don't seem to realize is that they're jumping into the water where the sharks are.

Tom DeLay decided that state politics needed his special touch.

<snip>

In the year after the census, the lege was unable to come up with a plan that was fair, or even coherent, and after a big wrangle and various suits, a three-judge panel took over the task of drawing up lines that, whines from the Republicans notwithstanding, were generally agreed to be fair to both parties. Mind you, Republicans think anything that is fair to both parties is terribly unfair to them, so loud Republican whining was just their way of agreeing that it was fair.

<snip>

But Tom DeLay, who is not a member of the Texas legislature, had other ideas.

<snip>

Bug Spray DeLay wants to be the next Speaker of the House. Right now it’s Dennis Hastert, who is widely viewed as being a sock puppet for DeLay, but DeLay isn’t a behind-the-curtains kind of guy. He envisions himself as being more the big scary wall mask with the fires behind the eye holes and dry ice smoke roiling around kind of guy. He doesn’t like being inconspicuous.

<snip>

So DeLay sat down with party strategists and drew up a redistricting map that would enhance Republican chances of gaining seats in the state Congressional delegation. Indeed, the DeLay plan would give the GOP an extra seven seats going in on the next election, assuming voting patterns were the same as they were in 2002.

WASHINGTON -- On March 24, former Congressman Bob Livingston was sent an e-mail by a New York Times editorial page staffer suggesting he write an op-ed essay. Would Livingston, who in 1998 gave up certain elevation to be House speaker because of a sexual affair, write about how Majority Leader Tom DeLay should now act under fire? In a subsequent conversation, it was made clear the Times wanted the prominent Republican to say DeLay should step aside for the good of the party.

Livingston in effect declined by responding that if he wrote anything for the Times, it would be pro-DeLay. But this remarkable case of that august newspaper fishing for an op-ed piece makes it appear part of a calculated campaign to bring down the single most powerful Republican in Congress. The Democratic establishment and left-wing activists have targeted DeLay as the way to end a decade of Republican control of the House.

Ironically, this campaign's intensity may protect DeLay from Republicans who in their secret hearts would like to see the sometimes-overbearing Texan fall. No GOP politician wants to be the handmaiden of DeLay's Democratic detractors. Last Wednesday's closed-door caucus of House Republicans gave DeLay a standing ovation. Contrary to claims on leftist websites, no Republican member has called for the majority leader's resignation.

So far, the charges I have seen boil down to the fact that Delay is a Washington politician. That, in and of itself, is a crime. I'm not sure it's the kind of crime that gets one booted from Washington...

I find it curious to see Bush backing away from delay. Bush is generally loyal to a fault.

I think--my humble opinion of course--that Bush dislikes Delay for the simple reason that he is such a slimeball.

You could be right. My reply was not intended to be definitive or all inclusive.

Bush is not known for forgiving slights. Perhaps somewhere along the line Bush thinks DeLay slighted him.

I personally think there's much more to dig up on DeLay. Perhaps letting the brew age might be a good tactic for Democrats. I have a feeling it just ain't gonna get much better for poor Tom.

There is not much more that can be added in this discussion about DeLay.  There have been some interesting quotes from the Republican senators and congressmen that have been presented in this thread.