It’s rarely wise to jump to conclusions, but General Services Administration chief Lurita Alexis Doan certainly appears to have violated the Hatch Act. In fact, that’s what the Office of Special Counsel, headed by a Bush partisan, concluded after a thorough investigation.
In January, Karl Rove’s office conducted a highly partisan political presentation for GSA higher-ups, after which Doan asked GSA political appointees how they could “help ‘our candidates'” in the 2008 elections. After several credible GSA employees came forward to report this, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee called Doan to testify about politicizing her non-partisan government agency — and she failed (miserably) to explain her conduct.
Congressional Republicans are anxious to support Doan, but are having trouble defending her decisions. So, they’ve moved on to Plan B — accuse her critics of being misogynistic racists.
In a hearing Wednesday examining the findings that Bush appointee Lurita Doan of the General Services Administration appeared to violate the Hatch Act by politicking in a federal workplace, several Republican Congressmen played the race card. On a number of occasions, Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA), the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, led his colleagues in accusing their Democratic counterparts of targeting Doan because she was a black woman and a Republican.
“You’re an African-American Republican so you’ve got a big bull’s eye on you,” Davis, the former chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said to Administrator Doan at one stage. […]
Davis wasn’t the only Republican member in the House hearing to make such an allegation. “You’re a Republican, a minority, and a woman, a GOP contributor, and they’ve targeted you, they’re circling you to come after you,” said Rep. John Mica (R-FL), who objected to the hearing at various occasions.
Rep. Chris Shays (R-CT) also said, “I find that when an African-American is a Republican, somehow, she is treated differently by Congress.”
My dismay for Republican-style politics is generally a daily occurrence, but this is uniquely offensive.
There has to be a way to conduct political affairs in a more honorable way than with these truly pathetic accusations. In yesterday’s hearing, we had white men accusing black women of targeting Doan because of her race and gender. Even by the low standards of the House GOP caucus, this is a special kind of stupid.
In a way, it’s a tacit admission that Republicans have nothing of any substance to offer Doan in terms of a meaningful defense. She violated the Hatch Act and got caught. But instead of dealing with this reality, several GOP lawmakers decided to question the motives of those who dared to point out the problem. To criticize Doan, they suggested, is to harbor some kind of prejudice.
Should Dems hold Republicans to this standard? Is every attack on Hillary Clinton evidence of sexism? Is every criticism of Barack Obama evidence of racism? Is every negative critique of John Kerry proof of anti-Catholic bigotry? Is every attack on John Edwards evidence of an anti-southern bias?
Of course not. But that’s the road these Republicans were going down yesterday. Left with nothing else, they felt it necessary to introduce race and gender into the mix, hoping demagoguery would pick up where reason leaves off.
It’s a disgrace. Concern about fairly obvious wrongdoing, in some Republicans’ eyes, legitimizes charges of bigotry. It’s political discourse at its most painfully insipid.
