dave_w wrote:
What I've picked up so far, t suggests the weakness in the bipartisan committee was a reticence for either side to be very aggressive in their function, fearing retaliation. The outside group could look into something and then recommend to the committee. The rub was that anyone could accuse a congress critter of anything, anonymously, and suddenly they were under investigation with no idea form whence the charges came. I can certainly see where politicians would play dirty and have a third party initiate that kind of action against foes or even enemies in the same party. You have to read past the headline to get to the info, and does anything other then the headline(s) matter these days?
It's a little bit more than that. The OCE would launch an investigation regardless of the source and make the investigation public. Thus, a patently false anonymous tip could, and did, result in an investigation and a very public announcement that Congressman X was "under investigation." While the fact that an investigation was launched was made public, it was never made public when the allegation was summarily dismissed for lack of evidence. So, the person was condemned regardless of the merits of the complaint and there never was a public vindication. In addition, while the person certainly had the right to retain counsel, there was no "right" to counsel and counsel could not "obstruct" the process, which included speaking in the place of the Congressman. It also applied to Congressional aides and other assistants and was used to target certain individuals. The fact that all of this was made public was against privacy rights already in place for government employees who are not elected officials.
No one liked or agreed with the OCE. Team Donkey created it in 2008, then promptly attempted to defund it, but failed. It is a joke.
If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went. - Will Rogers
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