Democrats and corruption

Not satisfied with two election cycles of near-supremacy at the ballot box, Democrats are now pushing to close the “corruption gap.”

The effort has already paid-off big in 2008, with the downfall of two high-flying Democratic governors, Eliot Spitzer from New York and Rod Blagojevich from Illinois.

One used a business trip to Washington to hook up with an illegal call-girl ring; the other allegedly tried to auction off a United States Senate seat.

Not bad, not bad. This latest scandal in Illinois even threatens to taint President-elect Barack Obama, a man Blagojevich charmingly refers to on the wiretap repordings as “that motherf*$#(*.”

And just to be sure there’s plenty of fine-print stuff for the wonks to mull over, we have the ethics probe into House Ways and Means committee chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY).

He’s accused of various misdeeds, including a failure to pay taxes, misuse of rent-controlled apartments, and doing favors for the operator of a school named after him.

Here’s the Wall Street Journal’s treatment:

The New York Democrat was chased down the hall by reporters demanding to know whether he was going to temporarily give up his chairmanship over ethics allegations.

“I don’t see what purpose that would serve,” Rep. Rangel said. “I don’t think reporters should be in the position to remove chairmen, not even temporarily, especially when the reporting is false.”

Okay, it’s not quite Abramoffian yet, but Democrats have proved that they’re fast learners.