JEFFERSON OUSTED….Thank God for this: “House Democrats met behind closed doors Thursday and voted to strip Rep. William Jefferson of his seat on the Ways and Means Committee.” However, Jefferson seems to think he was treated unfairly:
The objection was to the unprecedented nature of the move (stripping a member of a seat prior to an indictment), along with the fact that there didn’t seem to be any objective standard for removal. As Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) put it, her standard was “Anybody with $90,000 in the freezer ? you have a problem with this Caucus.”
I’m fine with that standard. Jefferson deserves his day in court, but tonight’s vote was a political statement, not a judicial one. The guy had bricks of hundred dollar bills wrapped in tin foil seized from his freezer by the FBI, and anybody with a lick of common sense knows that that’s a plenty high standard for stripping someone of a committee seat.
And the Congressional Black Caucus should be ashamed of itself. Their job is to represent black interests, not to mindlessly defend anyone with dark skin no matter how obvious the evidence that he’s a crook. Enough’s enough.
