The Eternal Infernal Campaign

Rove may be the architect of the neo-con dream but DeLay is its genetically inbred, snarling, salvering pit bull who keeps the minions in line. WaPo reports he's embarked on a rabid political campaign in lieu of a respectable defense. Not surprising I guess. There is no defense to the depths of corruption and thievery he's sunk to.

He is beginning to look a mite mad, simultaneously trying to beat the charges against him, save his threatened seat in the House and salvage his weakening power within the House hierarchy. He's running attack ads against the prosecutor and threatening his fellow Congressman in order to prevent them from permanently removing him as majority leader. (Let the business of the public be damned while he attempts to extricate himself from the quicksand of corruption that now threatens to engulf him.) But there's a method to his madness.

To coordinate communications, DeLay's legal team has hired Barbara Comstock, a spokeswoman for former attorney general John D. Ashcroft, who gained experience conducting political inquiries of the Clinton White House as a House investigator.

Comstock has compiled a long list of reporters, think tank experts, DeLay supporters and House members who receive talking points, legal motions, judicial transcripts and research on the records of the players in DeLay's legal fight. Of special interest, she said, are conservative talk show hosts who are exhorted to keep chattering about the case.

You would think his peers in Congress would not be so easily cowed but his legal defense fund would dissuade you from that notion.

All of that is financed by a legal expense trust that has raised $1.4 million since July 2000 from a donors list that reads like a who's who of House Republicans, corporate interests and GOP luminaries. From July to September, more than $318,000 flowed into the fund, by far the best quarter so far.

You have to almost admire the commitment he has to his depravity. I mean what honest person collects a legal defense fund that large and so far in advance, in anticipation of being caught in their own frauds? But according to those in the know, it's not admiration that drives his defenders.

"It's been very effective," Rep. Ray LaHood said of DeLay's campaign. "People are still afraid of him."

Apparently so, but then who isn't afraid of rabid dog?