Could He Be Anymore of a Cliche?

Congressman William Jefferson (D-La.) has been implicated in a scandal involving the misallocation of rescue efforts as he used a National Guard truck and crew to retrieve personal belongings from his house.

Military sources tells ABC News that Jefferson, an eight-term Democratic congressman, asked the National Guard that night to take him on a tour of the flooded portions of his congressional district. A 5-ton military truck and a half dozen military police were dispatched.

Now that doesn't sound so bad. Sounds pretty innocent, a Congressman wanting to see what he could do to help. And it's rough out there, lots of shootings, he needs an escort most likely. Until...

Lt. Col. Pete Schneider of the Louisiana National Guard tells ABC News that during the tour, Jefferson asked that the truck take him to his home on Marengo Street, in the affluent uptown neighborhood in his congressional district. According to Schneider, this was not part of Jefferson's initial request.

The water reached to the third step of Jefferson's house, a military source familiar with the incident told ABC News, and the vehicle pulled up onto Jefferson's front lawn so he wouldn't have to walk in the water. Jefferson went into the house alone, the source says, while the soldiers waited on the porch for about an hour.

Whoa, we gotta stop where? So valuable Guard assets that could have been rescuing someone are stuck outside some Congressman's house for an hour while he collects his goodies. Nice. Now we've reached scandalous proportions. But wait, there's more!

Finally, according to the source, Jefferson emerged with a laptop computer, three suitcases, and a box about the size of a small refrigerator, which the enlisted men loaded up into the truck.

Jefferson said the trip was entirely appropriate. It took only a few minutes to retrieve his belongings, he said, and the truck stayed at his house for an hour in part to assist neighbors.

Oh come on now, we're getting into t he realm of the outrageous. He's bringing out a refrigerator-sized box? Maybe it's only like a dorm mini fridge. And a laptop? They don't have computers in Washington? And three suitcases, apparently his wardrobe has thinned out in DC as well. What a schmuck. And the 'only a few minutes' line is priceless. You got all that packed and ready in 'only a few minutes'. Nice.

"This wasn't about me going to my house. It was about me going to my district," he said.

Pay attention folks, it takes a Congressman to lie so convincingly to the world when caught that red-handed.

Oh, but that's not the end of this story, not even close...

The Louisiana National Guard tells ABC News the truck became stuck as it waited for Jefferson to retrieve his belongings. Two weeks later, the vehicle's tire tracks were still visible on the lawn.

The soldiers signaled to helicopters in the air for aid. Military sources say a Coast Guard helicopter pilot saw the signal and flew to Jefferson's home. The chopper was already carrying four rescued New Orleans residents at the time.

A rescue diver descended from the helicopter, but the congressman decided against going up in the helicopter, sources say. The pilot sent the diver down again, but Jefferson again declined to go up the helicopter.

After spending approximately 45 minutes with Jefferson, the helicopter went on to rescue three additional New Orleans residents before it ran low on fuel and was forced to end its mission.

So now he's got a helicopter and rescue diver, assets arguably more valuable than the truck and MP's, tied up trying to get the Congressman, but he won't leave because the National Guard has his luggage. And that's a matched alligator set, by the way, can't just leave those with scruffy working class. So how many people suffered because of this bs, because those assets weren't available to help elsewhere?

The Louisiana National Guard then sent a second 5-ton truck to rescue the first truck, and Jefferson and his personal items were returned to the Superdome.

So now we have two trucks, a coast guard helicopter and a rescue diver. If we get a rabbi and a Catholic priest, we've got a good bar joke in the works. This shameless jerk hasn't even felt an iota of shame from what I can see for what he did. And best of all, you won't see this story stay national. He's a Democrat. Most media outlets do the See No Evil, Hear No Evil when this happens.

Jefferson insisted the expedition did not distract from rescue efforts.

"They actually picked up a lot of people while we were there," he said. "The young soldier said, 'It's a good thing we came up here because a lot of people would not have been rescued had we not been in the neighborhood.'"

Yeah, the Congressman is still kind of bummed about that, if they hadn't had to rescue other Orleaners, he could have fit his plasma TV in the truck. It's for the good of the country, though. Everyone who should be blamed for making this worse of course has not been. The Mayor, whose primary job it was to oversee disaster relief (has there been one comparison between Nagin and Giuliani in the MSM?), the Governor for delaying her assistance for over 24 hours, or a corrupt Congressman for interrupting rescue ops for personal mission. should all be taking some blame as a useless bureaucracy that only hindered instead of helped. The left and MSM are only interested in blaming the President, because that's what they do.

With stories like these, one has to remember that there's a whole big bureaucracy out there that your tax dollars pay for, but that in moments like these doesn't do squat. They look out for themselves by and large, and everything is a political game, again played with other peoples' money. Just another thought to make you feel all warm and fuzzy when you go to the election booth in November on every even year.