The Culture of Corruption

This will make it hard to gain a political advantage out of the Abramoff situation.

A special prosecutor's long-delayed report charges that a coverup at senior levels of the Clinton administration killed a tax fraud case against ex-cabinet member Henry Cisneros, the Daily News has learned.

David Barrett's 11-year, $23 million probe, which will be released tomorrow, states in stinging terms that this Clinton coverup succeeded.

Cisneros was forced to admit in 1999 that he had made secret payments to a mistress before serving as Clinton's secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

Barrett investigated tax fraud charges stemming from those under-the-table payments.

Then-IRS Commissioner Peggy Richardson, a close friend of Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), was involved in efforts to quash the probe, a source close to the case alleged.

Here's a no-brainer prediction: No one on the left will describe any of this as a "culture of corruption," despite the fact that it includes the executive branch, the IRS, and the Justice Department. In fact, I'd bet Hillary drops the phrase altogether, since she is deeply implicated in this scandal.

The Yammers will, of course, pretend this report was never issued. But then, that is why they are the Yammers.

UPDATE: Wow, just like that, a new tone is struck.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on Thursday apologized to 33 Republican senators singled out for ethics criticism in a report from his office titled "Republican Abuse of Power."

"The document released by my office yesterday went too far and I want to convey to you my personal regrets," Reid said in a letter.

"I am writing to apologize for the tone of this document and the decision to single out individual senators for criticism in it."

Of course, Reid's newly discovered humility might have nothing to do with today's revelation of deep corruption in the Clinton White House. But you had to make it to paragraph 16 to find that out.

Reid has come under fire for his own ties to Abramoff, including accepting money from Abramoff's tribal clients.

The Dem's are caught in their own trap...again. How utterly unsurprising. Meanwhile, the Republicans are actually addressing the problem of corruption, and taking a new tact. An open process that involves constituents.