DeLay's day of reckoning?

• Author: Dubose, Lou

FOR YEARS, TEXAS CONGRESSMAN Tom DeLay has been a negative campaign ad waiting to happen. Wait no longer.

A thirty-second TV spot running in the 22nd District opened this winter with six actors using the word "integrity" six times in ten seconds. DeLay's name was never mentioned. It didn't have to be. A newspaper ad complemented the spot by describing DeLay's close ties to disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. That ad noted how DeLay enjoyed riding on Abramoff's corporate jet to the world's finest golf courses.

The coordinated ads came not from a Democrat but from the Tom Campbell campaign. Campbell challenged DeLay in the Republican primary. In a perfect world, Campbell would have retired DeLay to the golf course behind his Sugar Land home. A devout Mormon, married with children, Campbell is a partner in a corporate law firm in Houston. Ronald Reagan appointed him to the Republican National Committee in the mid-1980s. In 1989, George H. W. Bush appointed him chief counsel to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He was the lead negotiator in settlement talks when the Exxon Valdez dumped millions of gallons of crude oil into a pristine body of water in Alaska. He's confident, agile, and good on TV. And he's never been indicted. A near-perfect candidate for this Republican district. Campbell had some financial support, but DeLay has more money than the Exxon Valdez had oil.

If Campbell had an earlier start and $1 million to spend, rather than $250,000, the race might have turned out differently. As it was, DeLay won handily.

There is, however, a challenger with big money and Congressional credentials. Nick Lampson is a former Democratic member of Congress, a terrifically nice guy, an effective personal campaigner, and, of late, a very hot fundraiser. He's a practicing Catholic, which softens his pro-choice position in a district dominated by evangelicals.

Lampson lost the House seat he had held for eight years after his district lines were redrawn by the Texas Legislature in 2003. It's an understatement to say that DeLay is responsible for Lampson's 2004 defeat. Before redistricting in 2003, DeLay set up a PAC, raised $1.5 million, and used it to put a Republican majority in the Texas House. Then he pressured the Speaker of the House and the governor to redraw Congressional district maps, which had been drawn by a three-judge federal panel in 2001 after the legislature deadlocked on redistricting. DeLay personally presided over...