Charlie, Go Home

Here's hoping that Rep. Charles Rangel's days as chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee may be numbered. In recent days, editorials in the New York Times and the Washington Post have called on Rangel to step down because of the growing list of scandals being associated with the longtime Harlem congressman.

The latest allegation is that Rangel opposed closing a tax loophole for an oil and gas drilling company whose CEO pledged $1 million to the Charles B. Rangel School of Public Service, a pet pork project. Rangel said the timing of the donation was coincidental, but frankly there is no reason anyone should believe him when you consider all the other ethical and legal lapses that have surfaced. In the past few months, Rangel has been accused of paying below-market rents on four apartments, using one of those apartments illegally as a campaign office, ducking tens of thousands of dollars on vacation property, and using congressional resources to solicit donations to his beloved policy school.

This is a sneak peek from the December 5, 2008 edition of the Patriot Post Friday Digest, the Conservative Journal of Record