Mollohan's Culture of Corruption

This is typical for a late Friday afternoon -- the perfect time to put out embarrassing news.
Alan B. Mollohan is stepping aside.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The top Democrat on the House ethics committee, Alan Mollohan, will leave the panel — at least temporarily — while he defends his own financial conduct, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said Friday.

...While Mollohan's troubles threaten to become a major campaign problem for Democrats, Pelosi, of California, said in a statement that Mollohan decided on his own to step down and that she accepted his decision.

From the New York Times, April 8, 2006:

[O]ne lawmaker has used his powerful perch on the House Appropriations Committee to funnel $250 million into five nonprofit organizations that he set up.

Those actions have prompted a complaint to federal prosecutors that questions whether any of that taxpayer money helped fuel a parallel growth in his personal fortune.

The most ambitious effort by the congressman, Alan B. Mollohan, is a glistening glass-and-steel structure with a swimming pool, sauna and spa rising in a former cow pasture in Fairmont, W.Va., thanks to $103 million of taxpayer money he garnered through special spending allocations known as earmarks.

The headquarters building is likely to sit largely empty upon completion this summer, because the Mollohan-created organization that it was built for, the Institute for Scientific Research, is in disarray, its chief executive having resigned under a cloud of criticism over his $500,000 annual compensation, also paid by earmarked federal money.

The five organizations have diverse missions but form a cozy, cross-pollinated network in the forlorn former coal capitals of north-central West Virginia. Mr. Mollohan has recruited many of their top employees and board members, including longtime friends or former aides, who in turn provide him with steady campaign contributions and positive publicity in their newsletters.

In previous interviews, Mr. Mollohan acknowledged that he had failed to pay 2004 taxes on income from rental properties in Washington and North Carolina, resulting in a state lien of $8,948.28 being filed on Dec. 1. He said the case was resolved by final payments of all taxes, interest and penalties by January.

I speculated that Pelosi and the Dems didn't want the corrupt Mollohan to step aside in disgrace.

That wouldn't fit their presentation of Dems being lily-white and Republicans being the embodiment of all that is unethical and dishonest.
The fact is no political party has a monopoly on corruption.
It's a failed strategy for the Dems to set themselves up as ethically superior to Republicans when they are not, not even close.
Pelosi is trying to spin the allegations against Mollohan as a mean-spirited Republican attack.

AP has more from Pelosi:

"The allegations against Congressman Mollohan originate from the National Legal and Policy Center, which engages in highly partisan attacks on Democrats," Pelosi said.

"The attacks are an attempt to deflect attention from the long list of Republican criminal investigations, indictments, plea agreements and resignations which have resulted from the reported long-term and extensive criminal enterprise run out of House Republican leadership offices," she said.

Using a phrase that has become a Democratic refrain, Pelosi said, "The Republican culture of corruption has been ignored by the ethics committee for a year and a half following the decision of the Republican leadership to fire their own chairman and committee members for doing their job."

Does Pelosi realize how ridiculous she looks for attempting to deflect attention away from Mollohan's misdeeds?

This isn't a "vast right-wing conspiracy."

Defending the indefensible is pathetic.

Poor, poor pitiful Pelosi and her band of corrupt Dems.