DeLay at large

Brattleboro Reformer - Editorials: "Patriotic Americans hoping to live long enough to tune in CNN for a perp walk by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay will have to watch their cholesterol. The ethically challenged Texas Republican dodged another legal bullet this month when the Federal Election Commission announced that a political action committee he runs broke election law during the 2002 campaign but the infraction was not criminal. The FEC may or may not fine Armpac, Americans for a Republican Majority, and the chances are that since the GOP now controls this election-law watchdog, it won't.

Democrats claim that the $203,000 misuse of soft money for Armpac administrative expenses was way too much cash for the inadvertent bookkeeping error the PAC claims it was. The Democrats are probably right, but who's going to do anything about it?

Mr. DeLay has helpful pals on both the FEC and the House Ethics Committee, but he is still under the scrutiny of a less sympathetic and pliable body, a grand jury in Texas that has already indicted three of his PAC cronies for illegally funneling corporate money to Texas legislative races. Mr. DeLay said he was shocked, shocked to hear of these goings-on -- if they happened at all -- but he would never knowingly violate the law himself. That investigation is ongoing."