No politician in US history has exploited his power for personal gain with more unbridled pride and joy than Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY). And none has been more successful. For not even investment guru Warren Buffet could have amassed the fortune Rangel has by doing it the Smith Barney way; i.e., by earning it.
His holdings include four apartments in a luxury building in New York City and a luxury home in the Dominican Republic. Not to mention untold sums in bank accounts that are being discovered everyday like another Tiger Woods mistress.
But you’d think Rangel would’ve become a little more discreet and circumspect in his flouting of ethics rules after assuming chairmanship in 2007 of the high-profile House Ways and Means Committee, which is responsible for writing all tax laws and overseeing all revenue-raising measures. Instead, he became the poster boy for the presumption that rules do not apply to the powerful men who write them.
Accordingly, it wasn’t long before reports surfaced that Rangel was making a mockery of his chairmanship by failing to report or disclose income on his tax forms; using his congressional stationary to solicit funds for a school bearing his name; granting special tax breaks to his most-favored donors; and partaking of potpourri of boondoggles that are treated as ordinary congressional perks.
This finally compelled the House Ethics Committee to announce last October that it was expanding its probe of Rangel’s alleged misdeeds, which it began in December 2008, to include an investigation into “all Financial Disclosure Statements and all amendments filed in the calendar year 2009.”
This was when everyone in Washington knew he was a dead man walking – as far as his chairmanship was concerned. Yet, for a time, Rangel scoffed at all calls for him to resign; which was not surprising considering that he lived a charmed life as a politician-virtually free of professional censure, let alone public ridicule.
Ironically, it was precisely because of his imperious ego that being dogged by reporters asking about his personal business became too insolent and untenable for him to tolerate. And it was this humiliation that finally compelled him to make the following concession speech a week ago today:
My chairmanship is bringing so much attention to the press, and in order to avoid my colleagues having to defend me during their elections, I have this morning sent a letter asking to be granted a leave of absence until such time as the ethics committee completes its work.
Still, his pride was such that he could not bring himself to announce the resignation this statement clearly represented. The adage, pride goes before the fall, seems appropriate here.
And, if convicted on ethics charges, what a spectacular fall from grace that would be for this man who was always so fond of bragging “I haven’t had a bad day since” being elected to Congress 40 years ago.
Sorry Charlie…
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