Gebe Martinez finds another "moderate Republican" to denounce DeLay
Gebe Martinez, who is no doubt hard at work investigating Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee's congressional trips, manages to find time for another story on Majority Leader Tom DeLay:
A former Republican congressman who was a moderate ally of former President Bush is leading an effort to find a 2006 Republican primary election opponent for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.
Former Rep. Pete McCloskey, whose eight terms in Congress ended before DeLay arrived in 1984, said Friday that he will meet in Houston this month with perennial DeLay opponent Michael Fjetland and "any Republican who is willing to challenge Mr. DeLay."
"It takes guts to challenge him," said McCloskey, who was known as a party maverick and endorsed Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry in 2004.
But, he said, he and moderate allies are embarrassed by the controversies surrounding DeLay, R-Sugar Land, including three admonishments of him last year by the House Ethics Committee.
"The stench coming out of the DeLay operation" does not represent the GOP that he served with in Congress, McCloskey said.
He called his effort the "revolt of the elders."
McCloskey and nine other Republicans who are former House members complained in a letter delivered Friday to House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., that recent changes in House ethics rules were an obvious move to protect DeLay.
What Martinez fails to mention in the story is that the "moderate" McCloskey is actually a liberal "Republican" from California. He's about as conservative as Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). Wait -- now that I think about it, Sen. Feinstein may be more conservative than McCloskey.
Please.
UPDATE: I finally saw this Samantha Levine story about the the Houston-area delegation's travel history:
A review of travel records filed by Houston-area representatives, and by Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, reveals enough trips for a global travel guide.
Houston Democrats Sheila Jackson Lee and Gene Green took the most trips.
Between March 2004 and January 2005, Jackson Lee went on 12 privately financed trips to cities including Miami, Detroit and San Francisco, and countries such as Cuba and Brazil.
Well! Why isn't that in big giant headlines?
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/16/05 08:26 AM | Print |
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