A Bad Day for Tom DeLay

A bad day for Tom DeLay: that's the subject of this evening's "Talking Points Memo."

The House majority leader stepped down from that position today after a Texas Grand Jury indicted him, and two other men, for illegal campaign finance activities.

Congressman DeLay is charged with criminal conspiracy—a felony punishable by up to two years in a Texas state prison.

The case is essentially about money going into political action committees controlled by DeLay and going out to Texas politicians. — That's against the law.

DeLay says he's not guilty, the prosecutor is an ardent Democrat, but anything can happen in a court of law.

Eight other corporations are also under indictment in the case charged with giving illegal contributions.

So this is one big mess.

Now I have been critical of DeLay's fund raising tactics before. Four years ago, I debated Steve Schmidt from the National Republican Congressional Committee, about Tom DeLay's White House promises:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O'REILLY: But the pitch is, if you give us money, this is DeLay's pitch, if you give

us money you'll meet with top Bush administration officials. Who are these

officials, anyway? Colin Powell? Condoleezza Rice? Who's going to meet

with these people?

STEVE SCHMIDT:Well, Bill, I tell you, I don't know who has agreed yet to come. I think we're still working that out to see if there are administration officials that'll be participating...

O'REILLY: This doesn't look good, though.

SCHMIDT: ... at the...

O'REILLY: Mr. Schmidt, come on.

SCHMIDT: ... at the tax relief forum.

O'REILLY: This doesn't look good. This doesn't look good. This looks like the same stuff that the Clinton administration was doing, the more money you give, the higher up we'll go on the food chain. That's what it looks like.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

Of course Tom DeLay, like every other American, is innocent until proven guilty. And the prosecutor Ronnie Earle (search ) does bear some looking into as well. -- We'll get into that.

So that's where we stand. Not a great day for Tom DeLay.

And that's "The Memo."

The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day

Japanese scientists have captured the legendary giant squid on film for the first time. This is perhaps the world's most mysterious creature and it lives deep in the Pacific Ocean. The scientists say they tracked the 26-foot squid to a remote island and a robot camera shot it. Sounds like Godzilla has some competition! But hey, calamari is not a bad thing. Ridiculous? only if the squid attacks Tokyo...