Kudos to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) for admitting publicly what has become painfully obvious.
Several senior Republicans and Democrats say Congress has failed to carry out its critical role in overseeing the vast federal bureaucracy, falling particularly short since Republicans captured the White House in 2000.
The members say the problem of congressional neglect extends far beyond the latest revelations of national intelligence failures and prison abuse in Iraq, and touches virtually every federal function — from education programs to government contractors.
“We Republicans have never quite reached the level of competent oversight that the Democrats developed over their 40 years that they controlled Congress,” said Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the Senate Finance Committee chairman and one of the few Republicans to pepper the administration regularly with inquiries. “We tried to emphasize legislating, and we’ve delegated so much authority to the executive branch of government, and we ought to devote more time to oversight than we do.”
Thank you, Grassley. I was afraid no one in the GOP caucus was noticing. Bush, from the moment he took office, has effectively treated Congress as an inconvenient afterthought, better ignored than engaged. Congressional Republicans have hardly hesitated to give up nearly all of their authority. It’s about time a respected member of the caucus spoke out against it.
In reaction to the Grassley comments, some of his colleagues tried to defend the existing “arrangement.” It wasn’t persuasive.
When your party controls Congress and the White House, “You get less oversight,” said Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.), who chairs the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee. “That’s the way it goes.”
That’s not true at all. When the Dems ran all three under Carter, the tension and animosity was still very high. Congress didn’t just give up power because a Dem was in the White House; if anything, Dem leaders fought for more control.
Even in the first two years of Clinton’s presidency, Congress didn’t trade oversight for partisan loyalty.
Powerful Democratic committee chairmen pursued a series of investigations into Clinton administration policies when they controlled Congress for the first two years of Clinton’s term. There were tense hearings on Whitewater and on Clinton’s controversial “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy on gays in the military.
Clinton “got clobbered by his Democratic members,” said a Democratic leadership aide. “Clinton couldn’t even get a health bill up for a vote, for Christ’s sake. It was his number-one priority.”
It’s not that Republicans are bad at oversight; it’s that they don’t believe in it at all — at least with an ally in the White House.
When Clinton was president and the GOP enjoyed majorities, Republicans embraced oversight to the extreme. Every squabble or media flap generated contentious hearings, subpoenas, and congressional investigations.
[Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.)] said that when Republicans ran Congress and Democrats had the White House, “There was no allegation too small for them to issue subpoenas.” Now, he said, there is no scandal so big it won’t get overlooked.
That’s true, but it’s not just the scandals. Congress, under the GOP’s lead, ignores oversight of policy, too. Dem requests for hearings and/or subpoenas on the Medicare cost estimates, Bush’s education policy, funding for the war(s), and administration energy policy all are summarily dismissed, as if lawmakers don’t even want to know what the White House is up to.
No wonder Congress no longer feels it necessary to show up for work. Lawmakers wouldn’t have much to do anyway.