Why Single Party Rule Is Bad

The Stakeholder has got some inside dope:

Today, in the House Judiciary Committee and the House Armed Services Committee, John Conyers and Ike Skelton offered amendments allowing the minority party to initiate full hearings, including subpoena power - which is the crucial element lacking in "rump hearings" the likes of which Democrats have held by themselves on issues such as Halliburton and which Senate Leader Reid has promised during this cycle. The refusal of the committees to investigate issues such as Administration legal and ethical lapses in cases like the improper payments from the Department of Education to conservative commentator Armstrong Williams has left a vacuum of accountability that Democrats cannot address without the ability to hold full hearings. This is needed because the Administration has show a complete inability and unwillingness to look into their own legal failings - such as Cheney's involvement with Halliburton no-bid contracts - and the Republican House and Senate have been totally AWOL when it comes to wrongdoing by their own. If we are to have any chance of getting to the bottom of scandal like that involving Armstrong Williams, the under the table payments revealed today to columnist Maggie Gallagher to push Bush's pro-family initiatives, or the fact that more than $88 million of taxpayer funds were expended on Republican propaganda last year, the Democrats must have subpoena power!

So not surprisingly, when Ranking Democrat John Conyers offered this modest proposal in the Judiciary Committee, the Republicans rejected it based on a red herring. Chairman Sensenbrenner claimed it wasn't necessary because Democrats could bring resolutions of inquiry requesting information from the Administration. Yet, when Democrats and Conyers did introduce these resolutions - for example in the wake of the Abu Ghraib torture scandal - the Republicans rejected them as unnecessary. Then, when a motion was presented to the House to initiate an independent inquiry, not a single Republican voted for it, and the search for accountability was squelched - even today, we have not had anything close to a full accounting of that scandal. The Republicans on the Armed Services Committee also rejected a similar amendment offered today by Ranking Democrat Ike Skelton.

Memo to the GOP: 'democracy' doesn't mean the majority gets to completely trample the minority.  That's called 'mob rule'.

ntodd