9-09Letter

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INSIDE STORIES

Crime and Gang Violence ........................................3

Our Brother in Black ..............................................5

Political Correctness ................................................6

Congressional Corruption ........................................7

(continued on page 2)

Volume 13Number 5

September - October 2009

Editors Comment

False Allegations of White Racism areWidespread While Black Racism is Tolerated:

Its Time to End the Double StandardThere was widespread hope that the

election of an African-American president,

which indicated that the vast majority

of Americans were prepared to judge a

candidate on his merits rather than on race,

would usher in what many referred to as a

post-racial society.

In recent days, however, we have seen

the issue of race injected into a debate in

which it is largely irrelevant, namely the

debate over President Obamas plan tooverhaul the nations health care system.

Former President Jimmy Carter declared

racism to be the subtext of many of the

attacks against the presidents health care

plan, and members of the Congressional

Black Caucus point to race as a driving

force behind the current level of animosity.

Mr. Carter declared that, An

overwhelming portion of the intensely

demonstrated animosity toward President

Barack Obama is based on the fact that heis a black man.

The fact that some Americans may still

harbor racist sentiments is certainly true.

And, in some rare instances, racist signs and

slogans have appeared at rallies opposing

the Obama health care plan. There is no

evidence, however, that the health care

debate is, in any way, motivated by race.

There are real disagreements about how

best to alter the health care delivery system.

Liberals and conservatives, Republicans

and Democrats, should be able to disagree

-- even with the use of sometimes heated

rhetoric -- without being accused of

racism.

Indeed, President Obama himself

says that he does not believe his race was

the cause of erce criticism aimed at hisadministration in the contentious national

debate over health care, but rather the cause

was a sense of suspicion and distrust many

Americans have in their government. Are

there people out there who dont like me

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Page 2 September - October 2009 LRLetter

Double Standard(continued from page 1)


because of race? Im sure there

are, Mr. Obama said. Thats not

the overriding issue here. Now

there are some who are, setting

aside the issue of race, actually I

think are more passionate about theidea of whether government can

do anything right. And I think that

thats probably the biggest driver of

some of the vitriol.

For some black politicians,

playing the race card has become

second nature. Consider New

York Governor David A. Patterson.

Late in August, he lashed out at

critics who say he should not runfor re-election and suggested that

he was being undermined by an

orchestrated, racially biased effort

by the media to force him to step

aside.

With Governor Pattersons

approval ratings remaining low,

some Democrats, including

President Obama himself, have

suggested publicly that he should

make way for the popular attorneygeneral, Andrew Cuomo, in the

governors race. Even among black

voters, his support is declining. A

Sienna College poll showed that

black voters, by a 46 to 38 per cent

margin, would prefer someone other

than Mr. Patterson as governor.

David Dinkins, New York Citys

rst black mayor, offered some

blunt advice to Governor Patterson:

Dont accuse your critics of racism.

Denitely, he should get off the

racist thing, Mr. Dinkins said.

While political charges of

white racism appear to be aimed at

phantoms, a real example of black

racism in American politics has

been largely ignored.

In Memphis, former Mayor

Willie Herenton, who is black, is

challenging Rep. Steve Cohen (D-

TN), who is white, in the Democratic

primary. The candidates are battling

to represent the Ninth Congressional

District, a low-income area that is

more than 60 per cent black. Thedistrict was redrawn and renumbered

in l973, increasing the percentage

of minority voters and for three

decades it elected the states only

black members of Congress since

Reconstruction.

In 2006, however, Mr. Cohen,

who had long represented the

district in the Tennessee State

Senate, defeated a divided eld ofblack candidates. He easily won

re-election last year against a black

corporate lawyer.

Mr. Cohen is a liberal Democrat

who considered joining the

Congressional Black Caucus, wrote

a national apology for slavery and

the Jim Crow laws and received an

A rating from the NAACP. I vote

like a 45-year-old black woman, he

said in an interview.Mr. Herenton and Rep. Cohen do

not disagree upon any major political

issues. Indeed, Mr. Herentons only

complaint against Rep. Cohen is

a racial one: he is white. This

seat was set aside for people who

look like me, said Mr. Herentons

campaign manager, Sidney Chism,

a black county commissioner. It

was set aside so that blacks could

have representation.

In the last election, his opponent

ran a much-vilied advertisement

that tried to link Rep. Cohen, who

is Jewish, to the Ku Klux Klan. It

juxtaposed Cohen with an image of

a hooded Klansman.

In a radio interview, Herenton

declared: This congressional race,

you know what its going to be

about? Its going to be about race

representation and power.

By Mr. Herentons standard -

that black constituents can only be

represented by a black congressman

-- how would he justify Presiden

Obama, or Massachusetts Governo

Deval Patrick, or New York

Governor David Patterson -- black

leaders who have largely whit

constituencies?

Racism should be objectionable

to all Americans of good wil

no matter who expresses such

sentiments. But for many years

view has been expressed that onlywhites can be guilty of racism

Twenty years ago, Rep. Gus Savage

(D-IL) declared that, Racism

constitutes actions or thoughts o

expression by white American

against Afro-Americans ... racism

is an attempt by powerful people

to oppress less powerful people

... blacks dont have the power to

oppress white people. Racism i

white. There is no black racism.Racism, sadly, is hardly a unique

phenomenon among whites. Men

and women throughout the world

have persecuted others on the basi

of race, religion and ethnic origin

The partition of British India into

India and Pakistan in l947 wa

accomplished by the slaughte

of more than one million Hindu

and Moslems. In Malaysia, the

political and economic power o

ethnic Chinese has been curbed

by law and practice. In Thailand

second generation and even third

generation ethnic Vietnamese ar

denied citizenship rights. Idi Amin

of Uganda expelled his country

entire Indian minority. We are al

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LINCOLN REVIEW Letter

is published by The Lincoln Institutefor Research and Education

Post Ofce Box 254

10315 Georgetown PikeGreat Falls, Virginia 22066-2415

A 501c(3) organization.The Lincoln Institute was founded in 1978

to promote individual economic

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national defense and limited government.LINCOLN REVIEW & The Lincoln Institute

for Research and Education, Inc.,

are duly registered trademarks

J.A. (Jay) Parker, Editor & PublisherASSOCIATE EDITORS

Allan C. BrownfeldJohn Fulton Lewis (1922-2006)

Darin J. WatersISSN Number 0192-5083

Subscription: $12.00 Per Year

PHONE: (703) 759-4278

www.LincolnReview.com



Crime and Gang Violence in Black America: Examiningthe Real and Largely Ignored Causes

Double Standard(continued from page 2)

too aware of genocide based on

race or religion in Nazi Germany,

Cambodia and Rwanda.

Those who condemn white

racism must also condemn black

racism -- and racism of every variety.

The use of the term white racism

as an epithet for those who simply

disagree with President Obamas

agenda cheapens that term. It is

like the boys false cry of Wolf,

which, when a real wolf appears,

will be discounted. Americans of

all races deserve better than this.

On September 24, l6-year-old Darrion Albert was beaten to death in Chicago as he headed for a bus stop

near Christian Fenger Academy High School where a melee broke out between feuding factions. In the beating

captured in a cellphone video, one teenager swung a plank, knocking Albert down. Others hit him as he struggled

to get away. Four youths stand charged with murder.

We know of this case because of the video which captured the violence which is all too typical of Chicago,and other urban inner-city schools. More than l25 people 25 and younger have been killed in Chicago this year

Chicago Public School ofcials say that 298 students enrolled in the nations third largest school system have

been shot since September 2008.

Because of the attention the video produced, Attorney General Eric Holder, Jr., joined by Education Secretary

Arne Duncan, former head of the Chicago Public Schools, traveled to Chicago and met with public school

students and elected ofcials.

Mr. Duncan defended his own actions in Chicago which, critics argue, led to his closing dozens of Chicago

public schools and reassigning thousands of students to campuses outside their neighborhoods -- and often across

gang lines. This has led to a spike in violence that has turned increasingly deadly, according to many activists

parents and students.

Before the 2006 school year, an average of l0 to l5 public school students were fatally shot each year. Thatsoared to 24 deadly shootings in the 2006-07 school year, and 34 deaths and 290 shootings last school year.

At the Chicago meeting, Attorney General Holder declared that

Youth violence is not a Chicago problem any more than it is a black

problem, a white problem or a Hispanic problem. It is something tha

effects communities big and small and people of all races and colors. It is

an American problem.

In fact, the situation is more complex. Almost all of the teen-age

victims in Chicago -- and almost all of the perpetrators were African-

Americans. The same is true in other urban inner-city school districts. We

ignore reality at a high price, for if we do not recognize the real problemswe face, we are unlikely to resolve them.

THE WASHINGTON POST, in its report about the Chicago violence

quotes Mieshe Houston, 28, who grew up near the latest murder scene

She declared: Its going to take a lot more than policies and police. Its

poverty, drugs, rap music, the media. There are a lot of single-paren

homes and parents on drugs, so kids dont want to be home. And when

they go outside, theres trouble.

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Crime and Gang Violence(continued from page 3)

The dilemma of an enduring

underclass in our urban areas has

rarely been confronted. LINCOLN

REVIEW LETTER editors J.A.

Parker and Allan C. Brownfeldrst addressed the issue of black-

on black crime in their l974 book,

What The Negro Can Do About

Crime (Arlington House). Sadly,

things have not improved since that

time.

According to the National

Center for Health Statistics, in

2004, 69.2 per cent of black children

were born to unwed mothers. That

contrasts with 24.5 per cent forwhite children and approximately

45 per cent for Hispanic children.

Within the larger black

community, progress has been

dramatic. Today, half of all black

families are middle-class, earning

at least twice as much as the poverty

line. Only one per cent of black

families made that claim in l940.

Rates of college graduation haveskyrocketed. In l940, the out-of-

wedlock birth rate for blacks was

l9 per cent. In fact, at the start of

the 20th century black people had

higher marriage rates than whites.

Yet, while progress has been

dramatic for the black middle class,

for an underclass which largely

lives in our inner cities, out-of-

wedlock birth has become a way of

life, as has involvement with drugsand lack of respect for education.

Only 50 per cent of black

students who enter the ninth grade

later graduate with a regular high

school diploma. A 2004 study by

the Civil Rights Project at Harvard

University and the Urban Institute

found that the black high school

graduation rate was even lower

than the 53 per cent rate of Hispanic

students, many of them recentimmigrants who face a language

barrier. Within the 50 per cent

graduation rate for black students

is an even lower graduation rate

for black males. Only 43 per cent

of black boys graduate from high

school with a regular diploma.

In his book Enough, the

respected black author and

journalist Juan Williams notes that,

Ofcial graduation rates for blackshave not signicantly changed

since l982. Something terrible

has happened, and school ofcials

have been hiding this festering rot

behind imsy claims that 84 per

cent of black students get some

version of a high school certicate.

The fact is that many of these high

school degrees are worthless in

a competitive global economy.According to federal data, the

average black American twelfth

grader scores worse on basic skills

than 80 per cent of white twelfth

graders. There is a serious gap. It

is a mortal threat to the race.

The gap between black and white

students already exists when the

children are entering kindergarten.

According to the National Center

for Education Statistics, half ofblack children starting kindergarten

scored in the bottom quarter on

general knowledge.

Juan Williams laments that,

Very few leading black voices in

the pulpit or on the political stage

are focused on having black people

take personal responsibility for

the exorbitant amount of crime

committed by black people against

other black people. Todays blackleaders sing like a choir when

they raise their voices against

police brutality and the increasing

number of black people in jail. But

any mention of black Americas

responsibility for committing the

crimes, big and small, that lead so

many to prison is barely mumbled

or mentioned at all.

Charles H. Ramsey, former

police commissioner in Washington,D.C. (now Philadelphias top cop),

who is black, declared: Behavior

has to change. Responsibility for

your own behavior has to change.

We have people who just let TV

and video games and music raise

their kids and instill values ... and

then we wonder why we have a

problem.

It is unfortunate that anaccidental video of inner-city teen-

age violence is needed to focus

attention on a continuing problem.

It is ironic that when Attorney

General Holder and Education

Secretary Duncan travel to Chicago

to address the situation, they tend to

generalize the problem rather than

focusing attention on the inner-

city underclass, an increasingly

intractable problem that is largelyignored. Misdiagnosing a problem

is the best way to see it perpetuated.

That, it seems, is where we are at

the present time.

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Our Brother in Black: His Freedom and His

Future -- A Classic from the 19th Century by aRespected Southern Author is Reprinted


Originally published in l88l,

and revised by the author in l889,

the book Our Brother In Black:

His Freedom And His Future, has

been reprinted by the International

Platform Association and DeWard

Publishing Company (P.O. Box

6259, Chillicothe, Ohio 4560l).

The books author is Atticus

C. Haygood, who was a bishop in

the Methodist Church and served

as president of Emory Universityfrom l875-l884, and an early leader

in civil rights in the South.

Not long after Shermans March

to the Sea, Haygood challenged

the common attitude toward the

role and place of black people in

the region, even though equality

among the races was unpopular

in the South of that era. Haygood

thanked providence that slavery

had been overthrown, extolled thevirtue of free labor over slave labor,

urged increased industrialization

and encouraged efforts to build a

New South.

In l88l, Haygood wrote Our

Brother In Black. This book

motivated a northern industrialist

to endow a charity with todays

equivalent of $30 million toward

the education of the newlyemancipated blacks. Haygood

became the executive director of

this philanthropy and was able to

establish and improve colleges

throughout the South.

In the preface to this new

edition, William Haygood Shaker,

great-grandson of Atticus Haygood,

writes that, Haygoods racial

philosophy draws its historical

meaning within the context of his

deeply held Christian values and

stressed the brotherhood of all

members of the human race in Jesus

Christ. His insistence that the basic

tenets of Christianity demanded

modication of existing patterns

of race relations -- helped sustain

future southern liberals in their

campaign for liberty and justice

for all. Our Brother In Black

also shows how one individual caninuence society for good while at

the same time putting the dimension

of time into perspective with regard

to major undertakings to help those

involved in such tasks avoid being

too discouraged.

Mr. Shaker notes that, A United

States election in which an African-

American could be elected President

of the United States may not have

even been dreamt by Haygood whenhe formally launched his campaign

for equality in l880, aimed at the

acceptance of all peoples as equals.

In Haygoods view humanity was a

single race. Our Brother In Black

has been cited as the rst signicant

example of white racial dissent

after Reconstruction, in which

Haygood applied the teaching of

Jesus Christ to race relations -- intodays vernacular -- called the

social gospel. Haygood used his

authority as president of Emory

College (now Emory University),

and a leading Methodist minister

to exhort the South to treat the

African-American more charitably.

Haygood envisioned an open and

limitless future for blacks...His

work -- indeed his personal funding

-- to establish Paine Institute, which

he described as an Emory in Ebony

(now Paine College) was just one

of his tangible commitments to new

possibilities for blacks.

In the original book, Haygood

sharply challenged those who

wanted to send blacks to Africa:

If it be supposed that negroes

could be persuaded to make a real

exodus, and go to Africa, or to any

of these places prepared for them,it is simply a mistake. If even one

man in the United States talks of

enforced colonization, he should

remember that free negroes, at

least, have many rights that white

men are bound to respect. The

right to live where it pleases them,

so long as they obey the laws, is one

of these rights.

At the core of Haygoods writing

and thinking is a belief that Godshand was in the events expanding

African slavery to American shores,

the cataclysmic Civil War, and the

ill-fated, short-circuited efforts

to usher former slaves across the

threshold to full citizenship. Central,

too, is Haygoods resolution that

all men of faith, regardless of skin

color, can share common rights and

responsibilities within a single freesociety, working for its progress and

defending its liberties.

The International Platform

Association was founded in l83l

by American statesman Daniel

Webster and Josiah Holbrook, a

pioneer educator. Since its creation,

IPA members have created one

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Our Brothers in Black(continued from page 5)


of Americas unique institutions,

serving as a gateway to the world

of ideas. We congratulate IPAs

current president, Mark Rhoads, an

old friend of the Lincoln Institute,

for his role in bringing this classic

to a new audience of Americans

(Information about the book is at

www.dewardpublishing.com.)

Political Correctness: A Growing Threat to Free SpeechFree speech is now under

widespread attack in the name of

political correctness.

In August, Yale University

Press announced that the book The

Cartoons That Shook The World,

should not include the l2 Danish

drawings that originally appeared

in September, 2005 and led toprotests by Moslems around the

world, including riots, burning and

vandalism of embassies. At least

200 people were killed.

Yale also decided to eliminate

other illustrations of the prophet

Muhammad that were to be included

in a childrens book. These included

an Ottoman print and a sketch by

the l9th century artist Gustave Dore

of Muhammad being tormentedin Hell, an episode from Dantes

Inferno that has been depicted by

Botticelli, Blake, Rodin and Dali.

This acquiescence to political

correctness has been widely

criticized. Reza Aslan, a religion

scholar and the author of No god

but God: The Origins, Evolution,

and Future of Islam, decided to

withdraw his supportive blurb fromthe book after Yale dropped the

pictures. The book is a denitive

account of the entire controversy,

he said, but to not include the actual

cartoon is, to me, frankly, idiotic.

Editorially, THE WASHING-

TON POST declared that, Yales

self-censorship establishes a

dangerous precedent. If one of the

worlds most respected scholarly

publishers cannot print these images

in context in an academic work,

who can? In effect, Yale University

Press is allowing violent extremists

to set the terms of free speech.

An academic press that embraces

the universitys motto of Lux et

Veritas, it should be ashamed.

Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian-born commentator who writes and

lectures on Arab and Muslim issues

and is a columnist for the Danish

newspaper POLITIKEN, argues

that, Yale University Press has

handed a victory to extremists. Both

Yale and the extremists distorting

this issue should be ashamed. I say

this as a Muslim who supported the

Danish newspaper JYLLANDS-

POSTENs right to publish thecartoons of the prophet Muhammad

in late 2005, and as someone who

also understands the offense taken

at those cartoons by many Muslims,

including my mother...

In Eltaways view, Yale has

sided with the various Muslim

dictators and radical groups that

used the cartoons to prove who

could best defend Muhammadagainst the Danes, and, by extension,

burnish their Islamic credentials.

These same dictators and radicals

who complained of the offense to

the prophets memory were blind to

the greater offense they committed

in disregard for human life. (Indeed,

some of those protestors even

held banners that said, Behead

those who offend the prophet.)

Unfortunately, those dictators and

radicals who want to speak for all

Muslims -- and yet care little for

Muslim life -- have found an ally in

Yale University Press.

The Yale University Press is

hardly alone in challenging the

First Amendment in the name of

political correctness.The Foundation for Individual

Rights in Education (FIRE),

which defends free-speech rights

of students and professors across

the political spectrum, shows

how censorship is now being

administered through college

and university speech codes,

which are sometimes incorporated

into codes of conduct. These

edicts ban expressions that mayoffend students by insulting or

harassing them on the basis of

race, religion, gender, transgender,

political afliations and views.

The University of Iowa, for

example, forbids sexual harassment

that occurs when somebody says

something sexually related that

you dont want them to say or do,

regardless of what it is. At JacksonState University, expressions by

students are banned that degrade,

insult, or taunt others as well as

the use of profanity and verbal

assaults based on ethnicity, gender,

and the known or presumed beliefs

of their fellow students.

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Political Correctness(continued from page 6)

FIRE reports that, 77 per cent

of public colleges and universities

maintain speech codes that fail

to pass constitutional muster

despite ten federal court decisions

unequivocally striking down campusspeech codes on First Amendment

grounds from l989 to 2008.

In August, THE NEW YORK

TIMES reported of the treatment

of the cartoonist Herg, the creator

of his adventurous reporter Tintin,

who will be featured in a Steven

Spielberg movie due out in 20ll.

According to THE TIMES, ...

if you go to the Brooklyn Public

Library seeking a copy of Tintin

au Congo, Hergs second book

in a series, prepare to make an

appointment and wait days to see

the book. Its not for the public, a

librarian in the childrens room said

when a patron asked to see it. The

book, published 79 years ago, was

moved in 2007 from the public area

of the library to a back room where

it is held under lock and key. Themove came after a patron objected,

as others have, to the way Africans

are depicted in the book.

The decision to get rid of a

book or restrict access to it goes to

the very heart of a public library.

Policies should not unjustly

exclude materials and resources

even if they are offensive to the

librarian and the user, says the

Web site of the American Library

Association, which adds, Toleration

is meaningless without tolerance

for what some may considerdetestable.

Nat Hentoff, a senior fellow

at the Cato Institute and one of

the countrys leading advocates of

the First Amendment, reports an

incident at Brandeis University in

which Professor Donald Hindley,

on the faculty for 48 years, teaches

a course on Latin American politics.

In the Fall of 2007, he described

how Mexican immigrants to the U.S.

used to be discriminatorily called

wetbacks. An anonymous student

complained to the administration

accusing Hindley of using prejudicial

language. It was the rst complaint

against him in 48 years.

After an investigation, during

which Hindley was not told the

nature of the complaint, Brandeis

Provost Marty Krauss informedHindley that, The university will

not tolerate inappropriate, racial and

discriminatory conduct by members

of the faculty. Threatened with

termination, Hindley was ordered

to take a sensitivity training class.

Hentoff notes that Justice Louis

Brandeis, after whom the University

is named, would not be pleased. A

passionate protector of freedom

of expression, Brandeis wrote in

Whitney vs. California that, Those

who won independence believed ..

that freedom to think as you willand to speak as you think are ..

indispensable to the discovery and

spread of political truth.

Do Americans any longer care

about free speech and the Firs

Amendment? In the 2008 annual

State of the First Amendment

survey by the First Amendment

Center in Nashville, it was found

that, 4 in l0 Americans are not able

to name any First Amendment rights

whatsoever, the highest gure in the

ll-year history of the survey.

James Madison declared that

I believe there are more instances

of the abridgement of the freedom

of the people by gradual and

silent encroachments of those in

power than by violent and sudden

usurpations.

These gradual and silentencroachments upon free speech

are now under way. They deserve

the resistance and opposition tha

all assaults upon freedom merit

but, unfortunately, do not always

receive.

The $90,000 in Rep. Jeffersons Freezer is Only the Tip

of the Iceberg of Congressional CorruptionEarly in August, former Rep.

William J. Jefferson (D-LA) was

convicted of corruption charges in a

case made famous by the $90,000 in

bribe money stuffed into his freezer.

Federal jurors found Jefferson guilty

of using his congressional ofce

as a criminal enterprise to enrich

himself, soliciting and accepting

hundreds of thousands of dollars

in bribes to support his business

ventures in Africa.

In making his closing argument

before the jury, defense attorney

Robert Trout attempted to put all

of Washington on trial. We all

occupy the gray area -- its just par

of our human nature, he explained

Were going to make mistakes ..

we may do reckless things.

To illustrate his analogy, Trout

displayed a graphic for the jurors

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Congressional Corruption(continued from page 7)


On one side of a yellow line, in red

letters, was the word CRIME.

On the other side of the yellow

line were the words recklessness,

negligence, and mistakes ---

and a headless man in jacket and tie

raising his hands in a shrug.

The point here is what members

of Congress are expected to do in

their jobs, said Trout. If seeking

political help was a crime, you

could lock up half of metropolitan

Washington, D.C.

Trout compared Jeffersons

work to promote companies in

which his family members hadstakes to constituent casework,

something to be expected of our

members of Congress. Trying to

persuade foreign governments to do

business with these companies, he

said, was part of a congressmans

customary use of his ofce. It is

clearly a matter of settled practice

for congressmen to pitch products

of American companies.

WASHINGTON POSTcolumnist Dana Milbank, who

attended the trial, noted that, It

was a bit of a stretch to suggest

that Jefferson -- caught on tape

demanding nancial payouts and

caught on lm taking $l00,000 from

an FBI informant -- was just doing

what other lawmakers do.

While the Jefferson case is

admittedly an extreme example

of congressional corruption, his

attorneys defense that, in effect,

everyone does it is not as far-

fetched as it may appear. Other

members of Congress may not have

$90,000 in their freezers, but too

many are guilty of questionable

activities -- making the very term

congressional ethics something

of an oxymoron.

Just as Jeffersons trial began,

we learned of Senator John Ensigns

(R-NV) affair with an aide and

the subsequent payments to her

family by his parents. The Senate

Ethics Committee has been taking

testimony on sweetheart mortgage

deals given to Senators Christopher

Dodd (D-CT) and Kent Conrad (D-

ND).

And consider the case of

Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY),

the chairman of the House Ways

and Means Committee. He is

now the subject of several ethics

investigations over matters rangingfrom his occupying four apartments

at below market rents in a Harlem

building owned by a prominent real

estate developer, and his admission

that he had neglected to pay some

taxes by failing to report $75,000

in rental income earned from a

beachfront villa in the Dominican

Republic. In June, the House Ethics

Committee launched a probe into

trips taken by Rangel and otherlawmakers to the Caribbean.

Discussing Rangels support

for raising taxes while hesitating to

pay his own, THE WALL STREET

JOURNAL editorially declared:

Ever notice that those who endorse

high taxes and those who actually

pay them arent the same people?

Consider the curious case of Ways

and Means Chairman CharlieRangel who is leading the charge for

a new 5.4 percentage point income

tax surcharge and recently called

it the moral thing to do. About

his own tax liability he seems less,

well, fervent. Mr. Rangel promised

last fall to amend his tax returns,

to pay what is due and correct the

information on his annual nancial

disclosure form. But the deadline

for the 2008 ling was May l5 and as

of last week (July 27) he still had no

led. His press spokesman declined

to answer questions about anything

related to his ethics problems.

It is difcult to catalogue all o

the charges against Rangel. The

National Legal and Policy Center, for

example, says it has conrmed tha

Rangel owned a home in Washington

from l97l-2000 and during that time

claimed a homestead exemption

only applied a principal residence

and the Washington home could no

have qualied as such since Rangel

rent-stabilized apartments in NewYork gave the same requirement.

During the trial of William

Jefferson, defense attorney Trou

held the Louisiana congressman up

as a better man than many of his

former colleagues on Capitol Hill

Jefferson never offered or promised

any earmark, he said, reminding

jurors of former Senator T

Stevens (R-Alaska) and his Bridge

to Nowhere. Neither, he said, didJefferson propose any legislation to

aid his business interests. That

how Jack Abramoff got himself into

trouble -- theyre not doing that, he

said.

Whether the Congress is able

to monitor its own ethical behavio

is a question which is being asked

more and more. Members of the

House Ethics Committee who areinvestigating a pattern of lawmakers

steering federal funds to generou

defense contractors, for example

have just had their own pet military

projects approved by the same

committee whose activities they are

probing.

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9/9


Congressional Corruption(continued from page 8)

The l0 committee members

sponsored 29 earmarks -- $59 million

in federal funding for projects

they requested in their districts or

states -- under a military spending

bill that passed the House late in

July. The bill was approved by

the House Appropriations defense

subcommittee, whose practice of

steering earmarks to clients of a

well-connected lobbying rm close

to the chairman, Rep. John Murtha

(D-PA) is the subject of the ethics

committees investigation.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA),

chairman of the ethics committee,would receive three earmarks under

Murthas bill. In June, Lofgrens

committee announced it was

investigating ties between members

of Congress and PMA Group, a

lobbying rm run by one of Murthas

close friends. Murtha and fellow

committee members Peter Visclosky

(D-IND) and James Moran (D-VA)

have longtime ties to PMA and have

orchestrated hundreds of millions

of dollars in earmarks to PMA

clients in recent years. The PMA

group closed after an FBI raid last

year and Viscloskys congressional

records were subpoenaed in May by

a grand jury investigating defense

contracts.Rep. Jeffersons $90,000 in the

freezer may be a bit extreme -- and

clearly illegal -- but earmarks in

return for campaign contributions is

simply a different form of bribery

although made legal by the very

Congress which participates in the

practice.

Congress appears unable

to properly enforce any kind of

realistic ethical standards. As long

as members of Congress have power

to inuence virtually every aspect of

our society, many special interests

will continue to have a stake in

purchasing favorable decision

The money in Rep. Jeffersons

freezer, in reality, is only the tip ofthe iceberg.

Documents

9-09Letter