Changing House Ethics

Dear editor:

News Item: House Republicans moved to seize the initiative for ethics reform Tuesday with a comprehensive package of changes, including the banning of privately sponsored travel.

Isn’t that wonderful? Republicans who have had absolute control of the House are coming up with a plan to improve the ethics of that body. These are the same people that have been involved with lobbyists such as Jack Abramoff, involved with and encouraged the “K Street” crowd, have lost their majority leader due to questionable dealings with money and a lobbyist, had an ethics committee that has done nothing for over a year, changed the chairperson of that committee after Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX) was three times sighted for improper ethics, and Rep. Robert Ney (R-OH), chairman of the House Administration Committee, has resigned due to possible connections to admitted felon Abramoff.

Isn’t that wonderful? They are going to clean things up all by themselves. The inmates are running the asylum, and a Band-aid is going to be applied to a wide open, bleeding wound that really needs a complete operation. The sad part? It will change nothing.