"Help Fire Tom DeLay" - Bad, bad, BAD Advice from MoveOn

My e-mail newsletter from MoveOn's Tom Matzzie arrived with a call to action:

It is time to fire Tom DeLay as House Majority Leader. Please sign our petition urging Congress to remove DeLay from his leader post at the link below.

This is advice almost as bad as that which urges Democratic lawmakers to offer their own plan for Social Security reform. We do not need to offer a Social Security plan right now because there is no crisis requiring immediate action. Similarly, we do not need to seek the ouster of Tom DeLay because the Republicans are doing it for us.

"Tom's conduct is hurting the Republican Party, is hurting this Republican majority and it is hurting any Republican who is up for re-election," Rep. Chris Shays, R-Conn., told The Associated Press in an interview, calling for DeLay to step down as majority leader.

DeLay, R-Texas, who was admonished by the House ethics committee last year, has been dogged in recent months by new reports about his overseas travel funded by special interests, campaign payments to family members and connections to a lobbyist who is under criminal investigation.

A moderate Republican from Connecticut who has battled with his party's leadership on a number of issues, Shays said efforts by the House GOP members to change ethics rules to protect DeLay only make the party look bad.

"My party is going to have to decide whether we are going to continue to make excuses for Tom to the detriment of Republicans seeking election," Shays said.

The fact is, we should hope that DeLay fights to his last breath this move to topple him from power. We should hope that it turns into an all-out war, the bloodier the better. And, we should hope that he wins. We want him to remain the Republican standard-bearer for the 2006 election cycle and beyond. He is the perfect political storm: damaged goods and too corrupt (or too stupid) to realize it.

DeLay, with his power-drunk arrogance, could finally expose and discredit the conservative movement. He and his cohorts in government are nurturing and encouraging the most extreme fringe of the right, the kind of nutcases who think that a bullet is an acceptable solution to political problems.

So, MoveOn, move on! Find another cause. There are many that could use your attention. Help fight Social Security privatization. Turn your attention to the looming Medicare crisis. Feed the hungry and clothe the naked. Something! Leave the Republicans to feed on their own.