Harry Reid has been caught red-handed trying to kill a regulatory case against a doctor charged with Medicare fraud and bribery, all to protect his buddy, Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey.

According to the Daily Caller:

Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid personally asked the Obama administration to help a Florida eye doctor who was accused of paying Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes, according to the Department of Justice.

The senator asked Reid in November 2011 to pressure the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services to drop its ruling against Dr. Solomon Melgen, wherein the agency claimed the eye doctor over-billed Medicaid for $8.9 million, Bloomberg reports.

The Daily Caller goes on to report that Menendez and the doctor, Solomon Melgen, are set to go before the judge early this month, and their defense lawyers are kicking up a fuss about the latest news about Reid, calling it "new, irrelevant and inflammatory facts."

But that's exactly the opposite of the case.  What's being described here with Reid's involvement isn't just a standard thievery case, but a political conspiracy that reached as far as the top of the Senate, where Reid was the majority leader, and the White House itself, which took Reid's call.  Why wouldn't this be relevant, given that it was all about protecting the doctor's ill gotten gains and Menendez's emoluments in the form of campaign contributions, which the doctor handed out?

It may or may not be accepted as relevant to the case, and either way, it looks like both the doctor and Menendez will probably go down, given the facts.  Even if it is dismissed as relevant, it remains a stain on Reid's record, and not just a distant one.

The fact remains that Reid tried to exert improper influence in the interest of obstructing justice, exerting political muscle and benefiting a crook.  Why shouldn't he be charged and, if found guilty, go to jail for that?  Anyone else who did that would.

It's time for lawmen to get cracking on this egregious abuse of power by someone who'd gotten away with it for way too long.  Bust him.