Norm Ornstein Quotations

I don't expect a lot that are forced by the president.

What makes this different is it's not just a few bad apples. It's that people at the top decided to build in a kind of systemic corrupt process. That is different from what we had before.

I think he's going to fall back on what he didn't want to do, what he swore he wouldn't do, but almost all second-term presidents do, which is being in a kind of caretaker status.

We now have a situation where billions of dollars of federal funds are allocated not on the basis of where it is most needed and can be spent most effectively, but according to who's sloshing the (campaign contribution) money around so they can get the earmarks.

We're not talking about Mother Teresa here who gets caught for turning right on a red light in a state that doesnt allow such a thing, ... The history of Tom DeLay in Congress is that he's pushed every envelope. It is often the case that powerful people get their comeuppance because of something that a lot of people would see as a technicality.

This week, I think, makes our case ... that Congress is not the deliberative body it is supposed to be.

The spectacle of a mayor and a governor throwing mud at each other while the city and the area were floundering was not a pretty one. That's another area where it's going to take some time and some historians to figure out whether he was let down by the government or not. On the other hand, his anger at those with a higher place on the hierarchy is an understandable one.

After 40 years, the verdict is still out.

Any spate of news stories from now on about corruption in contracts, etc., will hurt - people will resist a major taxpayers' commitment if they think much of it will be wasted or lining the pockets of miscreants, ... That perception, unfortunately, has been reinforced by the delegation request, which editorials have called 'Louisiana looting.' The delegation needs to change its tone and strategy when it comes to getting aid. The other danger is that over time, as other disasters occur, aid becomes zero sum.

It's not in the backs of their minds about Jim Wright, it's in the front of their minds, ... They see the parallel here and they want to be sure this doesn't happen.

It's not what you really want at a time when the public is not very happy with you.

It turns out to be more important than we thought, ... We're at a stage now in the modern media where everything is so fragmented that the only things that bring us together in the public square are tragedies or disasters .. We look for someone to reassure us of a common purpose.

They are very much afraid that if DeLay comes back in the leadership and then this stuff explodes all around them, the shrapnel is going to hit all of them. Even those who admire his leadership ... they are going to want to pull out.

They want a group of people on the House Ethics Committee who are going to go to extraordinary lengths to keep Tom DeLay from going down or being embarrassed yet again, which embarrasses them all, they believe, with whats been going on down in Texas.

I'm happy to place the lion's share of the blame for this on FEMA and the feds. But I think a substantial dollop of the blame goes to the state and local level, and he deserves his share of that.

Before election night or the next morning, I would have said the chances for a rematch are zero, that the loser would be quickly forgotten. But we're in a different world now.

He's putting a marker down that an awful lot of his colleagues have been unwilling to do.

You've got a lot of people who privately view DeLay as so radioactive. It's not just the Texas stuff, in some ways the Texas stuff is the least of it.