Thursday, November 29, 2007

Henry Hyde

Henry Hyde, the Illinois Congressman who, as Chair of the House Judiciary Committee during the Clinton Impeachment, sat in Judgment over Clinton's Oval Office BJ, has died.

A spokesman said, "Representative Hyde's death was nothing more than an aged indiscretion and should not be seen as an endorsement of death or dying. As we know from the Hyde Amendment, Rep. Hyde valued life greatly, and were he alive today he would be vigorously opposed to death and would surely work tirelessly to legislate against it."

3 comments:

moneymonk said...

here's a good question for you:

Why, when Rep. Dennis Hastert resigns in Illinois, there is a special election for a replacement, but when Senator Trent Lott resigns in Mississippi, the governor gets to appoint a new Senator? Is that a difference between the States, or the Senate and the House?

The Swan said...

It all has to do with how the state laws are written, but I also believe that there are differences between the House and the Senate. In the Senate, each state has only 2 Senators, so the loss of 1/2 their delegation is significant. In the house, a vacant district seat has less of an impact on the state as a whole.

Here's a good rundown of the laws Barbour is trying to skirt to avoid a special election that could possibly favor dems:

Unknown said...

In 1981, after leaving the House Banking Committee, Hyde went on the board of directors of Clyde Federal Savings and Loan, whose President was one of many of Hyde's banker contributors. The Congress deregulated S&L industry in 1982, and Clyde began taking part in loans for luxury residences in Texas and bought a bank in the Cayman Islands, a notorious financial exchange for laundering money. Since 1984, when Hyde left the board, it was clear to the directors from the reports that the establishment had failed, but Hyde and others on the board continued to give inappropriate financial loans to cronies and insiders and make it possible for the establishment to overcharge the government on student loans. In 1990, the federal government put Clyde in receivership, and finally paid $67 million to cover deposits. In 1993, the Resolution Trust Corporation sued Hyde and other directors for $17.2 million.

Hyde had an extramarital affair in the late 1960 and destroyed a family.

Hyde was 41, a state legislator, and the father of four sons when the affair began in 1965 with a
29-year-old Cherie Snodgrass, who had a son and two daughters between the ages of 7 and 9 at the time. The relationship lasted until at least 1969.

The Snodgrasses divorced because of the affair.


Shalom,

---Leland Milton Goldblatt, Ph.D.
Distinguished Professor