Pelosi Should Appoint Only One Democrat To Trey Gowdy's Witch Hunt Committee: Alan Grayson

When a tiny handful of slime ball conservaDems like Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Patrick Murphy (FL) and John Barrow (GA) conspired with the House Republicans to ramp up the politically and financially-motivated Benghazi witch hunt last week, I floated the idea of Pelosi doing the one thing better than boycotting it: just appointing a single Democrat to call out the GOP on their ugly partisan attacks. And who better than Oralndo truth teller Alan Grayson? Answer: no one. Yesterday, Ari Rabin-Havt made two cases, one for full Democratic participation in the GOP charade-- which I think is an awful mistake-- and the other, for Grayson to head the Democratic effort. That second part is the part that makes sense. Ari wants Grayson as the ranking member. I still want him as the only member.

The pugnacious former litigator has demonstrated the exact skill set needed to cut through the Republican mythology, the work ethic necessary to fully immerse himself in the issue, and the temperament to weather the blistering attacks sure to come from the conservative media.

In the aftermath of the Iraq War, Grayson’s courtroom prowess resulted in millions of dollars in judgments against war profiteers. This skill was on display in September when the congressman used his five minutes as a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee to dismantle conservative Benghazi mythology while questioning Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy:



Too often members of Congress waste their limited time in the committee room on questions that are nothing more than self-congratulatory statements. Grayson has never demonstrated the compunction for these sorts of  legislative prerogatives.

Even worse are when hearings denigrate into meandering soliloquies that never provide any relevant information. Grayson has a clear track record, demonstrated during his tenure Finance Committee, of asking questions designed to craft specific narratives and elicit from witnesses-- both friendly and hostile-- clear answers.

Trey Gowdy has cast himself as prosecutor, necessitating Democrats provide a countervailing force focused solely on the truth. It’s this talent Democrats need on the select committee on Benghazi-- one for which Grayson’s gift is well-proven.

Earlier today, Eli Lake broke a story at the Daily Beast about how many senior Republican congressional leaders have warned their deranged colleagues that the Benghazi clown show would backfire and blow up in their faces. It won't matter for districts filled with brain-dead Hate Talk Radio zombies in the Deep South (like Gowdy's) but for Republicans who depend on winning independent voters, the Benghazi hysteria could be a political death sentence. House intelligence committee chairman Mike Rogers warned it's a "rabbit hole" and a crackpot conspiracy theory. Buck McKeon and Darrell Issa agree.

Contrary to the caricature of Republicans, as singularly obsessed for political reasons with Benghazi, the reality is quite different. There is deep unease within the Republican leadership that the select committee, which has yet to announce a schedule of hearings, could backfire, and badly. Investigate and find nothing new, and the committee looks like a bunch of tin-hatted obsessives. Investigate and uncover previously-hidden secrets, and it makes all of the other Republican led panels that dug into Benghazi seem like Keystone Kops.

If-- and it's a big "if"-- the House Democrats were to sideline Steve Israel and put a competent leader in charge of the DCCC, there are a dozen otherwise safe Republicans, all of whom need independent voters for reelection, who could lose their seats because of Benghazi insanity. Israel is not making any effort to defeat any of these incumbents:

• Fred Upton (R-MI)
• David Reichert (R-WA)
• Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL)
• Sean Duffy (R-WI)
• Erik Paulsen (R-MN)
• Reid Ribble (R-WI)
• Patrick Meehan (R-PA)
• Charlie Dent (R-PA)
• Joe Pitts (R-PA)
• Scott Garrett (R-NJ)
• Peter King (R-NY)
• John Kline (R-MN)

UPDATE: FL-13… Something Else Pelosi Should Deal With

Just a few short months ago, when Bill Young died, the DCCC and DNC-- i.e., incompetent party hacks Steve Israel and Debbie Wasserman Schultz-- declared his district, FL-13 (Pinellas County), the number one target for a Red to Blue switch anywhere in America. The GOP nominated a slimy, unknown lobbyist, David Jolly, and the Democrats cleared the field for Alex Sink, who had won the district when she ran for governor against Rick Scott. It really did look like it was in the bag. Sink out-raised Jolly substantially and she was the favorite to win. But she didn't.

The corrupt profiteers at EMILY's List and the DCCC insisted she spend her money on expensive TV advertising-- from which they make a fortune in rake-offs-- and NOT spend money on field. Sink lost because of her lack of a credible field campaign-- as well as because she followed standard Steve Israel "mystery meat" strategy, refusing to embrace a strong progressive vision for America. She then refused to run for the seat in November. When local NAACP president Manuel Sykes declared he was running, Israel and Wasserman Schultz got a local cypher of theirs, Mark Hanisee, to badger and threaten Sykes out of the race so they could insert a Republican-turned-"Democrat," Ed Jany. Jany couldn't get on the Democratic ballot line but decided to run as an independent. Israel immediately tossed every Red-to-Blue qualification in the garbage and immediately placed Jany on the list and urged big Democratic donors to open their wallets. The African-American and progressive communities decided to boycott the election in November, jeopardizing the chances to defeat Rick Scott.

Then, over the weekend, it came out that Jany is a compulsive liar and made up stories about his educational achievements-- as though he had any. Yesterday he withdrew from the race. That leaves the Democrats with NO CANDIDATE in their number one target district, a district that hasn't voted for a Republican presidential candidate since Ronald Reagan.

So… after Pelosi appoints Grayson to Gowdy's committee as the sole Democratic member, she should fire Steve Israel as DCCC Chairman and clean out that nest of corrupt incompetents and try to salvage what they can of an election cycle that Israel has shaped into a catastrophe in the making.