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To use a phrase from Archie Bunker, why won't Speaker Dennis Hastert just stifle himself?!?!? There he was again, yesterday on Fox News Sunday, moaning about the FBI search of Rep. William Jefferson's office. Every time he opens his mouth on the subject, he takes away a Republican advantage -- and he's also wrong, dead wrong, on the substance of the issue as well. Hastert said he might challenge a judge's order that allows a "filter team," which is separate from the actual prosecution team, to review records to determine if they were responsive to the items listed in a court warrant authorizing the search. Hastert apparently wants all records seized from Jefferson's office to STILL be off limits not only to prosecutors but even to this filter team whose entire point is to make sure the records used by the prosecution are not ones protected by constitutional provisions. His objections are inane.

Hastert must have thought he was being clever, by blasting Jefferson in the process, to try to make a distinction between supporting/defending Jefferson and supporting/defending House prerogatives. It remains a distinction that will be lost on most of the general public, who will merely see a political big shot trying to protect other apparently corrupt politicians, and who will therefore blame the incumbent party, the GOP, for all the corruption.

This is a fight that both on politics and substance is not worth fighting, and it again shows that Hastert has become utterly divorced from the public he purports to serve.

topics:
Constitution