Will Republicans Clean House or Play Musical Chairs?

When the very corrupt Tom DeLay was forced to step down, there was a brief period of hope that Republicans would get their act together and clean up the corruption in the House that can be traced to any number of Republicans. There was even hope that Republicans would restore power to the House Ethics Committee. But no such thing happened. The "What me worry?" leadership of Dennis Hastert remained in place. Will Republicans clean house or just keep the corruption going among themselves but with just a little less noise to bother voters?

Dennis Hastert isn't resigning, at least yet, despite his inability to ever notice that his fellow Republicans aren't always acting in the best interests of the public. Here's an article by Carl Hulse and Jeff Zeleny of The New York Times:

Backed by measured words of support from President Bush, Speaker J. Dennis Hastert opened an intense drive on Tuesday to hold on to his post, but behind the scenes senior Republicans weighed whether he could survive the scandal surrounding former Representative Mark Foley.

Among the options being considered by senior Republicans is for Mr. Hastert to announce that he will stay on as speaker through this year but not seek re-election to the post assuming Republicans retain control of the House, said people on and off Capitol Hill who were involved in the discussions. They said the advantage of such a step would be to postpone a disruptive leadership fight until after Election Day.

(snip)

Though Mr. Bush stopped short of saying explicitly that he wanted Mr. Hastert to keep his job, White House officials said the president wanted to return the loyalty Mr. Hastert had shown the administration. But they said the White House was resigned to more political damage as the Foley case played out no matter what Mr. Bush and the House leadership might do or say.

Some would argue that Hastert has been far more loyal to Bush and the Republican Party than to the U.S. Constitution or to the American people. Certainly Bush is pleased that Congress politely allowed the president to do whatever he wanted as if Congress were not one of the three branches of our government. But to hang on the the speakership just to pick up a few votes? It's past time for Hastert and some of his friends to start accepting responsibility for their failures.