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House defeats GOP bid to censure Dem Rep. Rangel

Devlin Barrett | Washington, DC | July 31

AP - House Democrats voted down a public reprimand Thursday that Republicans sought against influential Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., over a questionable housing arrangement that he insists violated no laws.

A measure offered by House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Rangel "has dishonored himself and brought discredit to the House and merits the censure of the House for same."Before the House debate, Boehner said in a statement that "instead of keeping their promise to 'drain the swamp' of corruption in Washington, House Democrats are sinking in it."

Rangel tried to pre-empt the GOP effort by telling colleagues he would support the measure if they deleted the charge that he had discredited Congress and deserved censure.

The censure measure was voted down 254-138; two dozen Republicans voting with the Democrats.
 

This attempt to censure, an example of the National Republican strategy, is examined in depth by Ben Pershing of the Washington Post, linked in the first comment.


nymole July 31, 2008 - 4:06pm
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( categories: News | USA: Campaign 2008 | USA: Congress: House | USA: Domestic Issues )

Washington Post has good background on this sham

see especially references to the NYT in the failed censure motion- could be that NYT was fed this info, or perhaps not:-)

Effort to Censure Rangel Fails

Ben Pershing

Washington Post - Just hours after a prominent Senate Republican pleaded not guilty to federal charges, House GOP leaders tried to shift the ethics focus across the aisle today by offering a motion to censure House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.).

The censure motion, which was "tabled" (or shelved) on a mostly party-line vote, 254-138, came barely a week after Rangel himself took the highly unusual step of asking the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to determine whether he violated any ethics rules in two separate cases -- one related to his use of four rent-controlled apartments and one related to his use of congressional stationery to arrange meetings with potential donors to an educational center that bears his name.

Before House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) could offer the censure resolution, which focused only on Rangel's New York apartments, Rangel went to the well of the House and attempted to head off the action by asking the minority to join him instead in asking the ethics panel to investigate his activities.


"The mythical John McCain is an affable, straight-talking, moderately conservative war hero who is an expert on foreign policy" - Bob Herbert

nymole July 31, 2008 - 4:23pm
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Interesting.

Twenty-five Republicans joined nearly all Democrats in voting to table the measure, and 29 more Republicans voted "present."

You've got to bet this was pressed for - hard - in advance, but that makes a total of 54 Republicans who refused to go along with it.

"The best-informed man is not necessarily the wisest. Indeed there is a danger that precisely in the multiplicity of his knowledge he will lose sight of what is essential."

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Escher Sketch July 31, 2008 - 5:38pm
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Rangel is not without friends, or info. on fellow pols:-)

Rangel was a Clinton supporter almost till the end. His mixed gentrified/poor multiracial district went for Clinton and contains Bill's office . There is considerable animosity at this point from older residents on blacks and black businesses being pushed out for a new , white, Harlem, so it's an interesting district to watch.


"The mythical John McCain is an affable, straight-talking, moderately conservative war hero who is an expert on foreign policy" - Bob Herbert

nymole July 31, 2008 - 7:31pm
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