WP: No Decision On Ethics Chairman

[Pirate Smile]

As House Republicans met privately yesterday beneath a huge banner saying "Fulfilling America's Promise," a clerk read the slate of committee chairmen for the new Congress with one conspicuous exception -- the head of the ethics committee.

Aides said that is because Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) is hunting for a new chairman to replace Rep. Joel Hefley (R-Colo.). Hefley has fallen out of favor with GOP leaders and is not trusted by them to handle ethics cases that Democrats might bring against Republican lawmakers, according to aides.

One Republican official called Hefley's ouster "a defense measure." Aides said they did not know when the new chairman would be announced. By midweek, Hastert's staff had compiled a list of about 40 candidates.

Another committee chairman who lost his job is Rep. Christopher H. Smith (R-N.J.), who had become friendly with veterans and did not always adhere to party dictums on spending. He was replaced by Rep. Steve Buyer (R-Ind.), a veteran of the Persian Gulf War who is a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54554-2005Jan6.html

A head of the veterans committee who became friendly with veterans?

OMG, that cannot stand. You're FIRED!

In this House of Representatives NEVER forget your loyalty is to the Republican Party not your dumb-ass constituents or groups your committee is responsible for helping.