Man Has Baby–That Alone Would Be News

National Journal’s Ron Fournier, the inventor of “accountability journalism,” bravely speaks truth to power in a profile of Rep. Scott Rigell, a Virginia Republican:

I didn’t know it at the time but I had happened to catch Rigell at his career’s most important hour, precisely as he sought to extricate himself from a political vise. On the federal budget and guns, Rigell stayed true to his conservative roots but had the uncommon audacity to insist upon facts, reason, and common sense.

And for that, he was punished.

This column is not just about Rigell. This one House member’s tale is sadly emblematic of what ails Washington today: hyper-partisanship in politics and new media; powerful and unaccountable interest groups; vast amounts of undocumented money; and a Congress corrupted by the system. . . .

Rigell holds a quaint view that, until the recent past, was universally accepted in Washington. “He is,” Rigell said, “my president.” . . .

“I cannot serve nor can I lead by fear,” Rigell told me this week. “At some point, I will be making my last ride home from Washington. I don’t know when that will be, but I have got to know that I’ve done all I could to get this country on the right path.” This is the modest goal of a modest man stuck in a system that punishes common sense.

We just hope Fournier was outdoors when he wrote this article. Otherwise, it’s such a puff piece it surely would have violated the District of Columbia’s smoking ban.