Why Bush, Republicans can block all inquiries

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-08-12-special-interest-law_x.htm

WASHINGTON — The urge to investigate defined the capital during the Clinton years. But no more.
For nearly a decade, special counsel inquiries and adversarial congressional hearings dominated the headlines, etched bitter partisan lines, led to the impeachment of a president and made the nation's political debates resemble hand-to-hand combat.

Now, some things have changed. The law that provided for special counsels has expired. President Bush's fellow Republicans control both houses of Congress. The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, has stepped back from challenging the White House after losing a court case that sought to open the records of Vice President Cheney's energy task force. snip

"When the Republicans ran the Congress and Clinton was in the White House, there was no accusation too small for them to pursue," says California Rep. Henry Waxman, the senior Democrat on the House Government Reform Committee. "Now that President Bush is in power, there's no scandal so large that they have any interest in examining it."

He says he'd like to have hearings on the no-bid contract awarded to Halliburton, Cheney's former company, to rebuild oilfields in Iraq, for example.

But White House spokesman Scott McClellan says Bush has delivered on his campaign promise to "change the tone" in Washington.

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[robbedvoter]

1. Clinton didn't have the smarts to say: I moved on, enough already"

Nor dod he make the "reporters' giggle like little girls....His fault fer sure.

[ferg]

2. Huh. Something seems to be missing from that analysis

Say, a Republican press which attacked Clinton and coddles Bush.

Seems kinda surprising that they wouldn't notice that.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

6. because it's not the major factor

which is the congress being in Bush's pocket as Waxman says.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

3. Yes he changed the tone to

FUCK YOU I'M THE KING!!!

[TacticalPeek]

4. Typical media shortsightedness, with blinders.

Sure the GAO gave up; then Larry Klayman showed them up for the punks they were.

All it takes to modulate the usatoday tune and pour napalm on these embers is:

- 5 or 6 Representatives

- 2 or 3 Senators

- 1 Judge

[zekeson]

5. Props to Norm Coleman, Bush's boy from Minnesota

aka, the senator chair of the House subcommittee on investigations. Proving that he is a self-starter and his own man he didn't do the easy thing and investigate the scandal-a-day * Whitehouse. Nosiree-Bob, he headed straight to the tuff stuff and went after the RIAA to make sure they weren't being too hard on the users of Morpheus, etc.
/sarcasm and bitterness.

[sandnsea]

7. Letter from my Senator - they're trying

"On July 16, I supported an amendment to the fiscal year 2004 Defense Appropriations bill that would have established an independent commission to investigate pre-war intelligence on Iraq. However, this amendment was rejected by a vote of 45 to 51. I also supported an amendment that would have withheld $50 million from the intelligence budget until the President submitted a report to Congress on how the White House used intelligence to justify the war. This amendment was also rejected by a vote of 34 to 62.

Although these efforts failed, the Select Committee on Intelligence, of which I am a member, recently began reviewing the intelligence regarding WMD's within Iraq. More specifically, the Committee will be reviewing documents and will evaluate the pre-war assessments of the existence of WMD's, the validity of those assessments, and finally the accuracy of those assessments based on the present search of WMD's."

Senator Wyden voted against the war and should be able to be somewhat helpful; although he is up for election next year which could influence his participation. I hope not, but you just never know. Hopefully when they get back in session, we can all put the pressure on again and get something moving forward.