If DeLay is guilty, what about the Dems doing the same?

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was tongue-tied to the maximum last Sunday morning when ABC-TV George Stephanopoulos interviewed her about Pelosi’s own slip-ups regarding ethics reporting.

At one point, she stuttered and explained her ineptitude in verbalization by biding time with "I’m trying to find just the right word here. . ." When pressed for a clear answer to the question about ethics reporting, she never did provide a clear answer. Not providing clear answers was basically the mode she maintained throughout the Stephanopoulos-Pelosi back-and-forth.

Now today, according to Charles Hurt of The Washington Times, Pelosi has been called on the carpet by House Republicans who won’t let the tit-for-tat slip off the charts. If DeLay is guilty, why not charge the Dems? The ethics questions focus on travel charges.

"’She demanded an investigation into [Majority Leader] Tom DeLay, but hasn't said a word about these Democrats who have done the same thing,’ said Rep. Patrick T. McHenry, North Carolina Republican. ‘If she doesn't call for investigations into her fellow Democrats, then it's clear she's being a hypocrite.’"

There you have it. I wondered why it took so long. I would have thought the House Republicans would have jumped on this last week. But at least they finally got to it via the press.

The Dems in question are Reps. Norm Dicks, Bennie Thompson, James Clyburn and Neil Abercrombie. All these personages’ ethics doings have raised eyebrows regarding "accepting travel paid for by lobbyists."

House Republicans charge that Pelosi is more concerned about riling up political nerves than actually laying bare real facts. By her last Sunday morning TV verbal tangle, she surely is not the high intelligence politician her cliché-ridden news slips have attempted to make her out to be. She’s exceptionally airy. She’s not focused in on astutely answering questions. She’s adept at pointing the index finger at the interviewer, like a crotchety school marm disciplining an urchin in the back row.

"’As we expressed in earlier letters, Madame Leader, it appears more and more that your repeated calls for an investigation of Mr. DeLay are more driven by politics than by any real concern for the House rules,’ Mr. McHenry, with two other Republicans, wrote in a letter to Mrs. Pelosi yesterday."

In her exchange with George Stephanopoulos, Pelosi practically shouted at the man with: "Do not fall into a Republican trap of equating technicalities on reporting, timing of reporting with not upholding an ethical standard of the House."

Her lack of making sense plus her dramatic verbalizations brought, at one point, a slight smile to Stephanopoulos’ face. Then the smile turned to a look that said, "If you continue on with this lady, I just might have to cut you off at the pass."

Republicans are claiming that the playing field is not level as Pelosi charges forth.

In fact, National Republican Congressional Committee representative complained that "’what is a "technicality" for her requires a full-scale investigation for others.’"

True.

With that, stay tuned.