Rep. Charles B. Rangel, D-N.Y., said his resignation as chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee is only temporary.

Let's hope he's wrong.

Rangel should have given up the post a long time ago, as the Philadelphia Inquirer Editorial Board urged in September 2008. He has an arrogant habit of ignoring tax laws that he was responsible for writing.

His latest ethical problem didn't involve tax returns. The House ethics committee admonished Rangel for violating gift rules by taking two corporate-funded trips to conferences in the Caribbean.

He was ordered to repay the cost of the trips, as were other Democratic lawmakers who attended the meetings in Antigua and St. Maarten. (It's a tough job, but someone's got to do it).

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who pledged to drain the swamp of corruption in Congress, finally realized she had to deal with the congressman from New York. Fellow Democrats were calling for his head, worried that Rangel would add to their anticipated woes in the November elections.

The ethics committee isn't finished investigating Rangel. There still are probes into his personal finances, his alleged misuse of rent-controlled apartments, and the use of his office to seek donations for an education center named for him. He's been keeping the ethics panel busy for the past 18 months.

Instead of singling out Rangel, the ethics committee should have rebuked all the lawmakers who went on the trips with him. The committee's reasoning was that Rangel's staff knew the trips were funded by corporations, but it's hard to see how the others were not aware of it as well.

For example, Rep. Donald Payne, D-N.J., publicly thanked corporate sponsors. And there were banners at the conferences identifying the corporate donors, including Pfizer, AT&T, IBM, and American Airlines. Payne and the other Democrats had to repay the cost of the trips, but only Rangel was admonished.

They all should have been held to the same standard.

— The Philadelphia Inquirer