Public
moralizers fail to see how morality applies to them
By Cynthia TuckerSat Jan 7, 8:12 PM ET
Back when he was House majority leader -- before he lost that post to
indictment in a Texas political scandal -- Tom DeLay was among the
chief moralizers of American politics. He was a grand high potentate of
the "culture of life" crowd that championed intervening in the tragic
case of Terri Schiavo. He vigorously opposed abortion. He could be
counted on to whip up a frenzy against gay marriage.
Yet DeLay's sense of morality was never troubled by the business
practices of one of his "closest and dearest friends," Jack Abramoff,
who bilked Indian tribes, set up sham enterprises and bought the votes
of powerful congressmen. Indeed, DeLay was among those on whom
Abramoff, a highly paid Capitol Hill lobbyist, lavished expensive
gifts. As just one example, Abramoff paid for a pricey golf excursion
for DeLay and his wife to Scotland.
Nor was morality any brake for political consultant Ralph Reed, former
cherub-in-chief for the Christian Coalition, now a candidate for
lieutenant governor in Georgia. Reed has a longstanding public record
of conservative religious views, and he used that record to promote his
consulting practice to conservative religious groups. But that didn't
stop him from working with Abramoff to promote gambling interests,
including pushing for an online gaming company.
Politics has always been a dirty business, prone to a disproportionate
share of hypocrisy, back-stabbing and dissembling -- even more than can
be commonly found in corporate boardrooms. Still, the level of
hypocrisy exposed by the Abramoff scandal is hall of fame stuff -- the
sort of outsized arrogance and disregard for law and decency that make
it a benchmark against which other scandals will be measured for
decades to come. In a strictly amoral universe, Abramoff and his
cronies would deserve medals for sheer gall.
In a moral universe, the one Americans purport to inhabit, defrauding
Indian tribes and ripping off banks ought to be grounds for pariah-dom.
Yet the growing list of accusations against Abramoff drew barely a
whimper of complaint from Republicans, who were overwhelmingly the
recipients of his largesse, until he pleaded guilty.
(While a few Democrats were among those who received money from
Abramoff, most of it naturally went to Republicans, since they control
the White House and both houses of Congress. If you want to drive the
train, you go see the engineer, not the loser in the caboose.)
Last week, Abramoff pleaded guilty to several felony counts in a
sweeping federal corruption case. His admission prompted a race among
prominent officeholders to see who could give away the most
Abramoff-tainted money to charities. He has given millions in campaign
contributions to politicians, mostly Republicans, over the years.
Belatedly, the White House condemned him in harsh terms, calling his
practices "outrageous." Bush and DeLay, among others, gave away
campaign donations they had received from Abramoff. (DeLay remains in
Congress, awaiting his trial.)
But surely Abramoff's allies -- especially DeLay -- aren't just now
coming to suspect that he was up to no good. DeLay traveled with
Abramoff frequently, and former aides to DeLay went to work for
Abramoff. When published reports revealed months ago that Abramoff had
paid for DeLay's golf outing, DeLay claimed not to have known his
friend was footing the bill. You're at an expensive resort where the
tab has already been paid, and you don't ask who paid it?
Reed, meanwhile, worked with Abramoff to kill federal legislation that
would have banned several forms of Internet wagering. Reed,
implausibly, has claimed that he had no idea -- no idea -- the money he
received in payment came from an Internet gaming outfit called
eLottery. But that claim is undermined by an e-mail trail showing that
Reed cooperated in a scheme to obscure the source of the funds.
Reed and DeLay are the sort of men who believe the rules don't apply to
them, that the morality they preach to others is not meant to contain
their own grubby ambitions, that they are somehow exempt from the
common decency that ought to apply to all. In other words, theirs is
the sin of pride -- a human failing that doesn't merit as much
attention from today's public moralizers as it should.
Little wonder, since so many of them are guilty of it.
Cynthia Tucker is editorial page editor for The Atlanta
Journal-Constitution. She can be reached by e-mail: cynthia@ajc.com.