By Scott Wright

Last week, a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Va., indicted Louisiana congressman William Jefferson, a Democrat, on 16 counts of bribery, obstruction of justice, money laundering and racketeering.

The indictment charges that Jefferson received more than $500,000 in bribes and sought millions more in separate schemes to enrich himself through illegal deals with businesses based in Africa. Add to that the fact that the FBI found $90,000 hidden in his freezer a couple years ago.

Even though he's been indicted, not convicted, the Democratic leadership should tell Jefferson to clean out his office and hit the bricks. After all, he's a U.S. congressman, trusted with our tax money and knocking down $162,000 a year. Any question of his integrity should mean a one-way ticket back to Louisiana.

In other words, don't let the door hit you on the ass, Billy.

Though a bit more tactfully, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, the second-ranked Democrat in the House of Representatives, last week expressed the same sentiment.

“Members are held to a higher standard than the public,” Hoyer said Tuesday. He added that if the charges are proven true, Jefferson should be expelled from Congress.

Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo., seconded Hoyer. “I would suggest that (Jefferson) do justice to himself, prepare his defense, and that his district have someone else.”

Republican Minority Leader John Boehner very quickly agreed with the Democrats' assessment of the situation. A little too quickly, in fact. Less than 24 hours after the charges against Jefferson were announced, Boehner sought to have members pass a resolution requiring the House ethics committee to review the indictment and seek Jefferson's immediate expulsion.

Keep in mind that House rules do not require Jefferson to step down from his post at this point. Only if Jefferson is convicted can he rightly be stripped of his voting privileges. But rarely ever has the House expelled a member before he was convicted of a crime.

As Washington Post reporter Mark Kane pointed out in the Thursday edition, “Such a quick vote on potentially expelling a member of Congress under indictment -- without having been proven guilty -- would run against recent history.”

I'm not sure why Boehner suddenly became so concerned about the appearance of impropriety within Congress, because he and his Republican cohorts certainly didn't seem to mind underhanded dealings and parlor tricks during the years they were charged with policing the prestidigitators among them.

For example, when California Republican Duke Cunningham was exposed for taking bribes, House Republicans defended him until the end. When Texas sleazeball Tom DeLay was indicted on federal charges of money laundering and conspiracy, Republicans actually tried to change their own rules in order to allow that crook to remain in charge of Congress. And when Rep. Bob Ney was investigated for accepting bribes from DeLay bagman Jack Abramoff, Republicans stood by him until he resigned a few weeks before last November's election.

There are several other Republicans who have either pleaded guilty, been convicted, or been indicted over the last couple of years, including former Deputy Sec. of Interior J. Steven Griles (obstructing justice), former CIA executive director Kyle “Dusty” Foggo (various improprieties), former FDA commissioner Lester Crawford (conflict of interest and other charges), and former White House procurement official David H. Safavian (obstructing justice).

And let's not forget about former vice presidential chief of staff Lewis “Scooter” Libby. The same Republicans who are screaming to see Jefferson run out of town on a rail are hopping mad that George W. Bush hasn't already pardoned Libby, despite his CONVICTION for obstructing justice and making false statements to the FBI.

I think the word you're looking for is “hypocrite.” That type of attitude seems to be a theme with Republicans in Congress, as I've declared in this column before.

These are the same rubes who failed, from Day One of the Bush administration, to perform their constitutional duty of overseeing the executive branch. The blind eyes of John Boehner and his Republican brothers didn't become quite so keen until a majority of the American people reminded them last November that there are consequences for dereliction of duty and widespread criminal behavior -- and until Jefferson gave them the opportunity to score a few cheap political points.

Not that the electorate's demotion of the GOP has had the effect of putting an immediate halt to all of their illegal activity. Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens, he of the $200 million “bridge to nowhere,” is apparently one of several targets in an ongoing FBI corruption investigation involving mysterious campaign donations from an Alaskan oil company. California Rep. John Doolittle is under FBI investigation for his dealings with Abramoff, as are California representative Jerry Lewis (who reportedly will not seek re-election) and former Sen. Conrad Burns of Montana. A couple of Republicans from New Mexico -- Sen. Pete Dominici and Rep. Heather Wilson -- are also the subject of preliminary investigations related to their unethical involvement in the ongoing U.S. attorney hiring scandal.

Here's one more you probably haven't heard about -- not yet. The New York Times broke the story Thursday that another Republican from Alaska, Rep. Don Young, recently earmarked $10 million to build an interchange in Florida that would connect a small thruway known as Cocount Road to Interstate 75, thereby multiplying the value of 4,000 acres between I-75 and the Gulf of Mexico. The land is owned by Daniel J. Aronoff, identified by the Times as a real estate developer who raised $40,000 for Rep. Young just a few days before the road project was funded.

Even a local Republican county commissioner smelled the stench.

“It would appear that Don Young was doing a favor for a major contributor,” said Ray Judah of Lee County, Fla.

When environmentalists and the Lee County Metropolitan Planning Organization twice put the kibosh on the interchange, they based their decisions on studies by the Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency which warned that the proposed interchange could damage wetlands.

That wasn't going to work for Young, even though the district he represents is thousands of miles from Coconut Road. So he began threatening local officials.

“Young was evidently determined to see the interchange move forward,” the Times reported. “In a Jan. 23, 2006 letter to the chairman of the planning agency, Young warned that his committee would draft another bill taking away the $10 million if it was not used on the interchange.” (Young was the chairman of the Transportation Committee before Democrats took over control of the House.)

The Times reported that the planning commission “subsequently reversed itself and approved an initial study of the proposed interchange.” But the most recent local election put more environmentally-conscious Floridians on the county commission, the story reported, and “next month, county planners will again take up the question of what to do about Coconut Road.”

When approached on the floor of the U.S. House by a Times reporter seeking comment about the I-75 interchange, the $10 million and the threatening letter to the planning agency, Young reportedly extended his middle finger.

Right back at you, Republicans. You had your chance to run the country and you took us subterranean in practically every category imaginable. Five years from now, after the Democrats have been in charge for a while, maybe we'll be digging ourselves out of the hole they'll have gotten us into. But right now, only a few months into their latest stint as the majority party, the Democrats are at least tying to do right by their constituents and clean up the mess one of their members has apparently made.

At least we can all be grateful that the Democrats have the newly-recalibrated ethical bearings of Republicans like John Boehner to help ensure that any future legal entanglements involving members of Congress get mopped up instead of swept under the rug -- a political flip-flop if ever there was one.