"House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's ethics troubles threaten more than his own political future. They have the potential to create a much wider scandal over lobbying on the Indian gambling issue and to open a rift among socially conservative Republicans.

[T]he larger controversy lies beneath the surface. It involves a collision between the business interests of Republican lobbyists and the moral commitments of the party's large wing of social conservatives who strongly oppose the spread of gambling.

Perhaps the most bizarre example of this contradiction was detailed by Post reporter Susan Schmidt. When one Louisiana tribe, the Jena Band of Choctaws, won initial approval of a casino three years ago, another tribe, the Louisiana Coushattas, hired Abramoff to block the potential competition. Abramoff and an associate in turn paid $4 million to Ralph Reed, a Republican consultant and evangelical leader, to organize local anti-gambling sentiment against the Jenas. To get the job done, Reed worked with his fellow evangelical James Dobson."

Get the Story:
E. J. Dionne Jr.: Rolling the Dice on a GOP Rift (The Washington Post 3/15)
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