If There Is No Effective Oversight, We All Lose-- Get Ready

Who needs any damn oversight anyway?

Under Republicans there was no oversight of the excesses-- and downright blatant criminality-- of the Bush Regime. None. Whatsoever. After the 2006 midterms, Bush still got a pass from the contemptible shills known as the United States Senate, the Democrats having put Lieberman, a Bush ally-- thoroughly indebted to the Regime for his re-election-- in charge of oversight. There was none. But in the House, Henry Waxman took over and did a spectacular job, which, thanks to Nancy Pelosi's "off the table" diktat, led precisely... nowhere.

Now, if you were the Democratic Establishment and had just won control of the White House and Congress, one thing you are absolutely certain of is that oversight is something you neither want nor need. So let's ease Waxman into a "better" job where he can't do any harm, and let's find the stupidest, laziest most inconsequential member of Congress to take over House oversight, and leave the Senate just as it is, just so long as Lieberman knows who he owes his position to now. No one would make a better oversight chairman than Edolphus Towns-- if the purpose is to make sure there's no oversight. And Wednesday the unscrupulous hypocrites in the House Democratic caucus elected him.

The selection formally puts to bed weeks of speculation about who would lead the committee in the next Congress. Waxman’s departure to head the Energy and Commerce Committee set off a brief, largely behind-the-scenes struggle for the gavel....

Towns was next in seniority, but was not seen as the top choice of Democratic leaders. They worked quietly to arrange for someone else to replace Waxman until it became clear that Towns was intent on taking over as chairman.

Sure they did-- because if there's one thing Rahm Emanuel wants now, it's tough oversight for the Executive Branch!

On the other hand, one of the most pusillanimous Republicans serving in Congress, the execrably hypocritical Pete Hoekstra-- who should be dragged before the War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague along with Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld for the stunning non-job he did at Intelligence Oversight-- just declared that the "relationship between Congress and the executive must change." Yes, this morning the ranking Republican on the Intelligence Committee, who wants to run for Michigan governor, suddenly woke up, as if out of an eight-year snooze, and wants to keep the country safe. Republicans, he said, will "conduct aggressive oversight of the Obama administration’s intelligence efforts and encourage our Democratic colleagues to do the same.” He said it with a straight face.

Well, at least there's a solid bipartisan effort to hold the Bush Regime's feet to the oversight fire when it comes to the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, right? No, not right. Texas' worst far right extremist, Republican lunatic fringe maniac Jeb Hensarling, claims the oversight is not serious and is trying to politicize the efforts and threatening to quit the committee.

Elizabeth Warren, the panel's chairwoman, told the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday that bailout panel members would investigate how banks are spending the money they have received from the program, known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, and whether it was helping the "real economy."

The mission of the four-member panel was outlined in a report it issued Wednesday, which Mr. Hensarling voted against. In an interview after the hearing, Ms. Warren appeared to be surprised by Mr. Hensarling's opposition – in part because "he never objected to a single word in the draft," she said.

"I asked for his comments repeatedly and received none," said Ms. Warren, a Harvard professor who was appointed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Ms. Warren also said Mr. Hensarling had not personally attended meetings with other TARP watchdogs, including the Treasury Department inspector general and the Government Accountability Office. Instead, Mr. Hensarling sent representatives to some, she said.

When told of Ms. Warren's comments, Mr. Hensarling chafed at what he said wasn't a serious attempt to incorporate Republican ideas into the panel's work.

Yep, that's Republican Party oversight melded with Republican Party bipartisanship: give all the money to the banksters, cut their taxes and leave them alone and watch the magic of the free markets keep the Bush Economic Miracle alive. And if the loathsome Hensarling does resign, the panel will have no Republicans. The other GOP appointee, wingnut Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH), resigned last week, citing his busy legislative workload, and not mentioning that he's the Republican senator most likely to lose his job in 2010.


FOOTNOTE: ELIZABETH WARREN IS
A GREAT GUEST WITH RACHEL MADDOW

by Ken

Rachel asked Ms. Warren about the astoundingly basic questions her oversight panel is asking, like is there a plan for this bailout? And what might that plan be? Incredibly basic they may be, but they are also the questions that somebody's got to be asking. Ms. Warren pointed out that she's only recently been appointed to chair the oversight committee, but she spoke about the bailout issues with clarity, confidence, and force -- to the point where Rachel expressed the hope that she would be appearing widely to explain these issues, and hoped she would be back on Rachel's show soon.

It would appear that Representative Hensarling's total possible contribution to the commission's work is zero, and the panel will get a lot more accomplished without him. Of course it won't be "bipartisan" anymore. But while we have a president-elect who seems serious in his attachment to "bipartisanship," we also still have a Republican Party that defines the concept, "You're welcome to agree with our ultra-right-wing ideology, as long as you don't attempt to alter it in any way. Otherwise it will be our pleasure to launch crusades of lying smears against you and everyone you've ever come in contact with."

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