"Obama: Rangel Should End His Career With Dignity"

[Clio the Leo]

Obama: Rangel Should End His Career With Dignity

By LAURIE KELLMAN
Updated 8:15 PM EDT, Fri, Jul 30, 2010

President Barack Obama on Friday called ethics charges against Democratic Rep. Charlie Rangel "very troubling" and said he hopes the longtime lawmaker can end his career with dignity. Several House Democrats went further, flat-out urging the New York congressman to resign.
"He's somebody who's at the end of his career," Obama said in an interview that aired Friday on "CBS Evening News with Katie Couric." ''I'm sure that what he wants is to be able to end his career with dignity. And my hope is that it happens."
Obama, speaking on the issue for the first time, praised the 20-term Rangel for serving his constituents well but called the more than one-dozen tax and disclosure charges against him "very troubling."
It was hardly an endorsement for the veteran lawmaker, but fell well short of the calls for resignation Rangel received on the eve of the House's August recess. As House Democrats headed home, they wrestled with how to handle the matter in their districts ahead of the midterm elections.

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House rules and credibility — not criminality — were the reasons cited by more than a half dozen House Democrats known to have called for Rangel's resignation by late afternoon Friday.

A House panel on Thursday made public for the first time 13 charges of misusing his office and tax and disclosure violations against Rangel, 80, as it opened the trial phase of the ethics proceedings against him. If

Rangel and the ethics committee do not settle the case, it goes to a public trial this fall, at the height of an election season in which every member of the House, 36 in the Senate and the Democratic majorities of both chambers are on the line.

Either conditionally or outright, Democrats calling for Rangel's resignation included Rep. Walter Minnick of Idaho, Betty Sutton of Ohio, John Yarmuth of Kentucky, Zack Space of Ohio, Ann Kirkpatrick of Arizona and Mary Jo Kilroy of Ohio.

"Too many politicians, both Democrats and Republicans, have fallen victim to the idea that they are 'different' than regular folks and nothing could be further from the truth," Kirkpatrick said in a statement.

"It is our job as members of Congress to hold each other accountable to a higher standard regardless of party," she added. "If the serious charges against (Rangel) are accurate, he needs to resign."

http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local-beat/Obama-Rangel-Should-End-His-Career-With-Dignity-99667264.html