AS THE WORLD TURNS... TOM DELAY'S LITTLE ETHICS STOOGE, "DOC" HASTINGS, MAKES ONE TOO MANY MISSTEPS

When Tom DeLay picked Washington rubber stamp nonentity Richard Norman Hastings (AKA- "Doc") to take over the House Ethics Committee-- after Republicans on it voted to give DeLay a gentle wrist slap-- he knew exactly what he was doing. DeLay simply picked someone who is inherently dishonest, someone with no scruples whatsoever and someone so utterly and inexorably compromised that nothing would ever make him forget his main job: protecting DeLay's and Blunt's carefully constructed Republican Culture of Corruption.

"Doc" is a slippery character and he's managed to evade the long arm of the law for quite some time, thanks in large part to a complacent, if not collaborative media. Many people know about Doolittle's and Pombo's and DeLay's role in the Marianas Islands scandal. Far fewer know of "Doc's" equally execrable participation. The wheels, however, may be starting to come off ole Doc's Pasco corruptionmobile now.

Last week CREW filed a complaint against "Doc," (as well as against Senator "Sneaky Pete" Domenici and Heather Wilson).

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) asked the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to investigate whether Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA) and his former chief of staff, Ed Cassidy, violated House rules by improperly contacting a sitting U.S. Attorney.

The U.S. Attorney in Seattle, Washington, John McKay, testified before the Senate that, in 2004, during a series of vote recounts in which a Democrat was narrowly elected governor of Washington, Rep. Hasting’s then-Chief of Staff Ed Cassidy called, informing him that “the purpose of the call was to inquire on behalf of Congressman Hastings” about the status of the ongoing investigation to inquire about the status of a federal investigation into voter fraud. Mr. McKay was “concerned and dismayed by the call,” believing the conversation might constitute obstruction of justice.

When asked about the call, Rep. Hastings claimed that Mr. Cassidy’s call to Mr. McKay was “entirely appropriate,” and that the call was “a simple inquiry and nothing more.” Mr. Cassidy claimed that his conversation with Mr. McKay “was a routine effort to determine whether allegations of voter fraud in the 2004 gubernatorial election were, or were not, being investigated by federal authorities.”

Mr. Cassidy’s call to Mr. McKay -- at Rep. Hastings’ behest -- violates chapter 7 of the House ethics manual, which prohibits members from contacting executive or agency officials regarding the merits of matters under their formal consideration. House rules also state that if a member wants to affect the outcome of a matter in litigation, the member can file a brief with the court, make a floor statement, or insert a statement into the Congressional Record. Directly calling officials to influence an on-going enforcement matter is not an option.

Moreover, the rules state that a member may not claim he or she was merely requesting “background information” or a “status report” because the House has recognized that such requests “may in effect be an indirect or subtle effort to influence the substantive outcome of the proceedings.”

The conduct of Rep. Hastings and Mr. Cassidy may also violate the requirement that members conduct themselves in a manner that “reflects creditably on the House.” In a precedent cited by the House ethics committee when it admonished former Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX), the House has held that members are prohibited from asking an executive branch employee to engage in an activity having an impermissible political purpose.

CREW’s complaint alleges that Mr. Cassidy contacted Mr. McKay to discuss an ongoing investigative matter for the impermissible political purpose of impacting the Washington gubernatorial election.

Yesterday the Ellen Tauscher of Washington state, Congressman Adam Smith, said he "absolutely" supports an ethics investigation of Hastings. OK, Congressman Smith are you going to refer your "absolutely" to the committee? Unless some member of Congress does, "Doc" gets to slither away... again.