Live from the Nuke Free Zone

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A new judge was selected to preside over Rep. Tom DeLay’s conspiracy and money laundering trial Thursday, after another judge became the second to step away from involvement in the case because of political contributions he has made.

Administrative Judge B.B. Schraub, a Republican who was to have selected the judge for the case, withdrew after Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle filed a request to have him removed. Two days earlier, District Judge Bob Perkins was removed from the case at DeLay’s request because of his contributions to Democrats.

It appears that Earle’s purpose for this recusal request was to play up the appalling stupidity of DeLay’s original request: Earle wrote that Schraub appeared to be ”completely fair and impartial, with a sterling reputation of honesty and integrity … unfortunately no longer the standard in our state for the judiciary.”

As any idiot can imagine, finding a judge that has never made a campaign contribution could be a bit of a task. The third choice now appears to have shared an employee from his election campaign, a treasurer, with DeLay’s PAC (the one that he’s charged with illegally manipulating). The judge doing the choosing, the Chief Justice of the Texas Supreme Court, is Republican; one wonders if he intends to pick a string of such obviously unsuitable candidates with the intent of forcing Earle to file for multiple recusals and somehow embarassing him or minimizing DeLay’s initial audacity.

My recommendation for both sides would be to agree to bring back the original judge and get on with the trial. DeLay should be motivated to do so because the longer the affair drags on the more bad press he’s getting, and Earle would be happy to have his regular judge back.