You’re going to hear a lot about ethics and corruption and oversight of the Bush Administration coming from Nancy Pelosi and her vulture-circle of minions in the coming weeks.
For all their screaming about Tom DeLay, Bob Ney, and other crooks to resign before their indictments and/or convictions, a litmus test for the Democrats on the subject of corruption and criminals in public office will be the outcome of the Louisiana 2 race.
Outgoing Speaker Dennis Hastert did the country no favors by screaming that the FBI had no right to raid William Jefferson’s offices. (Unless, of course, Dennis Hastert has his own freezer full of cash to hide and he orders National Guardsmen to help transport his personal belongings in the aftermath of a disaster. I, on the other hand, thinks he just keeps fetal stem cells in there to snack upon between sessions.)
Jefferson doesn’t just stink of corruption and criminal activity… Jefferson downright reeks of it.
You’d think that Rove would have engineered an October or November surprise against him as an attempt to balance the Ney conviction/resignation, but the game’s over for Rove at this point. It’s now up to the Democrats to take their own medicine and police their own.
If they don’t, well, then they’re no better than the Republicans they’ve been accusing of corruption since… well, the Whigs went away.

But then we already knew that.
Another test of the Pelosi/Reid Regimes will be the number of days Congress spends in session.
Congress has become, for all intents and purposes, a part-time job of legislation and a full-time job of fundraising. The number of days/hours that Congress spends in session has declined over the past few decades, and if Pelosi and her regime are serious about “going to work for the people” then I fully expect to see a Pelosi/Reid agreement to call sessions Monday-Friday and even keep the Congress in session over a few weekends to hammer out deals.
Even if it is to the Donks’ advantage to keep Republicans off of the campaign and fundraising trail, it’s not going to happen. If there’s anything Pelosi/Reid will do with that extra time, it’s going to be an endless inquisition against the Bush Administration, with subpoenas stacking up on Andy Card’s desk like cocktail napkins stacking up on Senator Kennedy’s desk.
As God as my witness, they’ll need a CSPAN-3, CSPAN-4, and CSPAN-5 just to fit all of the screaming sessions in (with HDTV 16×9 to fit Kennedy in when he’s stonewalling John Paul Stevens’ replacement at Judiciary).
If there’s any bright spot to all of this, it’s that the constant flurry of subpoenas and threatened prosecutions will keep Condi “NeoDhimmi” Rice back in DC under the spotlight instead of flying around the world trying to preserve “Bush’s Legacy” with every Lame Duck’s Dream. (translation: Screwing Israel to make the Saudis happy and to let the CIA ship more crates of guns to the Pallies under the deranged assumption that Pali cops aren’t just terrorists moonlighting as cops.)
This massive snowob is going to make the circus surrounding MonicaGate look like… well… a meaningless blowjob.
But then we already knew that.