Rumors have it that the State Ethics Commission, which is being run by the same Democrat holdover from both the Zell Miller and Roy Barnes' administrations (i.e., C. Theodore Lee), continues to blatantly push forward cases that are against Republicans while tucking cases against Democrats in the "let's handle this much later" file.

Case in point: Bill Simon, a notorious political activist filed an ethics complaint against Labor Commissioner Michael Thurmond (D) back in September of 2002.

Simon faxed us a recent letter signed by Teddy Lee that informed him that his complaint is now scheduled to be heard on June 21, 2004 at 10:00 am in Room 450 of the State Capitol.

Simon's complaint alleged that Thurmond committed two classes of violations: 1) he accepted $8500 from eight different contributors during legislative sessions, and 2) he failed to disclose $82,070 of significant liabilities owed to NationsBank stemming from a judgement against him from a failed business venture.

In any case, the point we have is that Simon had filed his case back in September of 2002. Yet, when the Democrats set-up a website and attacked Majority Leader Bill Stephens back in June 2003 and accused him of repaying himself more than he loaned the campaign, Teddy Lee just jumped right on that case immediately, and opened an investigation WITHOUT a complaint actually being filed.

The usual procedure for the Commission opening investigations is for someone to have to actually file a complaint by signing it. It is rare that the Ethics Commission opens an investigation by themselves...unless it happens to be a case against any Republican.

A few years back, Teddy Lee decided to open a full investigation against State Senator David Shafer. Shafer appeared to have committed the equivalent of a homicide in Teddy's eyes: He filed his disclosure a few days late and paid a late fee. That wasn't good enough for Lee. He opened-up a full investigation on something that amounted to nothing more than a library book being returned late.

Back to the case at hand. The complaint against Democrat Thurmond had been filed in 2002. The allegations against Republican Senator Stephens (now, fully cleared, by the way), were made in June 2003. Why was the Stephens case pushed ahead of the Thurmond case?

PV Paints The Case By Numbers: This isn't the only piece of evidence of Teddy Lee's partisan management of an office that is not supposed to be partisan in its enforcement of the law. It is high time that our State Inspector General open an investigation into the goings-ons of the State Ethics Commission.

Not only does Lee play the partisan card in which cases get heard first, but, he doesn't apply the Rules of Law as equally to the Dems as he does unequally to the Republicans. It would be quite the simple matter to take cases that have been resolved where the defendants were accused of the same violations, yet the Democrat, in 95% of the cases, got off with something that amounted to a promise not to ever do it again and a tap on the forehead, while the Republican defendant had to write exhaustive orders admitting his guilt and paying exhorbitant fines.

It is high time this Ethics Commission had some oversight, and it is high time Teddy Lee received a cattle prod shoved into his rear-end in the form of an examination of his own partisan "ethics."