The end of the Bug-Killing Dwarf King of the Neocon Death Cult's Legislative Pig-Pack

(Thanks to Marc Maron for dubbing Tom DeLay with that moniker, oh so long ago)

You can't fire him, he quits:

It's been quite a fall for Tom DeLay, R-Texas, the House majority leader who formally stepped down today as he awaits trial on charges of conspiracy and money laundering. He retains his seat in Congress but reliquishes his leadership role.

In addition to his own legal troubles, which include charges that he laundered campaign money used in state legislature races, DeLay's association with lobbyist Jack Abramoff has further hurt his reputation. Abramoff pleaded guilty Tuesday to federal charges of conspiracy, fraud and tax evasion in a corruption probe that has linked him with lawmakers from both parties.

[snip]

Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., has served as acting majority leader and has indicated he'd like the post permanently, although Kline said he supports Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, who is chair of the House Education and Workforce Committee. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., is reported to be vying for consideration, and more candidates are sure to come forward.

This should get interesting. Roy Blunt is up to his elbows in filth too:

Last fall, the grand jury indicted three close associates of the DeLay-Blunt leadership team. One of those men, Jim Ellis, was indicted for money laundering. Ellis, who ran ARMPAC, DeLay's federal political arm, once ran a political laundromat for Roy Blunt called the ROYB Fund.

In 1999 and 2000, when Ellis ran both DeLay's ARMPAC and Blunt's ROYB Fund, ARMPAC made contributions to Blunt's committee totalling $150,000. In return, Blunt made a series of payments to the Alexander Strategy Group (ASG), a firm controlled by former DeLay staffers, that also happened to employ DeLay's wife at the time. Over the course of a two-year period, Blunt's payments to ASG totalled $150,000. For a detailed schedule of the payments, click here.

In the same quarter in 2000 that Blunt received a contribution from DeLay for $100,000, Blunt made a contribution to the mysterious DeLay Foundation for $10,000. Blunt's PAC also paid rent to the U.S. Family Network, yet another DeLay controlled entity.

The so-called U.S. Family Network is similarly steeped in Abramoff dung:

The U.S. Family Network, a public advocacy group that operated in the 1990s with close ties to Rep. Tom DeLay and claimed to be a nationwide grass-roots organization, was funded almost entirely by corporations linked to embattled lobbyist Jack Abramoff, according to tax records and former associates of the group.

During its five-year existence, the U.S. Family Network raised $2.5 million but kept its donor list secret. The list, obtained by The Washington Post, shows that $1 million of its revenue came in a single 1998 check from a now-defunct London law firm whose former partners would not identify the money's origins.

Two former associates of Edwin A. Buckham, the congressman's former chief of staff and the organizer of the U.S. Family Network, said Buckham told them the funds came from Russian oil and gas executives. Abramoff had been working closely with two such Russian energy executives on their Washington agenda, and the lobbyist and Buckham had helped organize a 1997 Moscow visit by DeLay (R-Tex.).

The former president of the U.S. Family Network said Buckham told him that Russians contributed $1 million to the group in 1998 specifically to influence DeLay's vote on legislation the International Monetary Fund needed to finance a bailout of the collapsing Russian economy.

John Boehner doesn't seem to have taken any illegal contributions directly from Jack Abramoff, but his voting record is 95% in lockstep with Tom DeLay's, voted to weaken ethics rules solely to help Tom DeLay, then when the Republicans ran that up the flagpole and no one saluted, he flip-flopped back again. So if you want to parse the definition of "is", he "is" "clean", but only to the extent that a man not be judged by the company he keeps.

Meanwhile, Dennis Hastert is separated from Abramoff only by Abramoff's Washington DC restaurant, Signatures:

Signatures restaurant, the expense-account haven owned by super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, has hosted at least 60 GOP fund-raisers since it opened on Washington's Pennsylvania Ave. NW in early 2002. But the June 3, 2003, lunchtime gathering was special: The guest of honor was House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), and the event was a relatively intimate gathering dominated by lobbyists from Greenberg Traurig, the law and lobbying firm where Abramoff then worked.

The problem? Nobody paid for the lunch -- or reported it in disclosure documents as an in-kind contribution -- as federal election law requires, BusinessWeek Online has learned. The tab -- which Hastert's office would not disclose -- was paid only this month, around the time that BusinessWeek Online began to investigate fund-raisers for Republican politicos held at Signatures. Hastert's office says his staffers uncovered the oversight.

The bottom line, folks, is that the entire Republican party is pwned (sic) by Jack Abramoff, lock, stock and barrel.