Post by onelasttime on Jan 11, 2023 19:48:40 GMT
Yes I changed the title. The entire quote/title is āconspiracies, grievances, whataboutism, and lies from official, high-profile platforms.ā.
This is from an article written by Jill Lawrence about what the next two years with a House majority will be like. And sheās right.
When I read the part above I thought wow this really does describe what the Republicans plan on doing for the next two years. Apparently they see this as a way to win the White House and majorities in The House and Senate. They are showing absolutely no interest in governing.
I take that back, the only thing they want to do is cut taxes for the big corporations and the rich. And to justify these tax cuts they want to make government smaller by cutting safety programs, entitlements and agencies like the EPA that hold businesses accountable for the crap they put in the air, water & ground.
I will post the entire article if anyone is interested in reading it.
As destructive as trump was to this country the current majority in the House could prove to be even more destructive to the country. Hence the catch all thread for them.
First up is this article from MSNBC..
āJim Jordanās newest project wonāt take us to Churchā
āThe House GOP is launching a new investigation supposedly modeled after the Church Committee of the 1970s. But is it really?
In the mid-1970s, the landmark Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities ā known colloquially as the Church Committee, for its chair, Sen. Frank Church ā exposed myriad law enforcement and intelligence abuses.
And since last week, itās been widely reported Kevin McCarthy, in his tumultuous bid for House speaker, negotiated a concessions package with his Freedom Caucus detractors that included the creation of a āChurch Committeeā-like subcommittee. The panel, housed within the House Judiciary Committee, would focus on uncovering the purported partisan bias of federal investigators, notably the FBI, toward Trump and others.
On Tuesday, the bill to create that new subcommittee ā the so-called Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, passed by a vote of 221 to 211. All Democrats opposed.
Some, including Rachel on her show Monday night, have expressed concern about the subcommitteeās mandate, which starts with studying the executive branchās power to ācollect information on or otherwise investigate citizens of the United States, including ongoing criminal investigations.ā
Enabling Congress to interfere with pending criminal matters is alarming, especially given that at least one potential member of the subcommittee is believed to be under investigation by Department of Justice. And while the DOJ can be expected to push back, any showdown between two coequal branches of government that begs for resolution by the third ā a federal judiciary transformed in former President Donald Trump's wake ā is itself frightening.
But thereās another, more fundamental problem. This retributive project of the ultra-right seems to bear little resemblance to the committee itās invoking as a model. For starters, the subcommittee, which House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan will lead, would have 15 members (including Jordan and Jerry Nadler, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee), no more than six of whom could be Democrats and all of whom have to be approved by McCarthy, the GOPās speaker-by-a-squeaker. š I like that name, Iāll have to remember it.
Jordan has never been known for smoothing the waters; he even explained a near-brawl on the House floor last week as the sort of conflict the founders intended. By contrast, the Church Committee was almost evenly divided with six Democrats to five Republicans. And to the extent Church, a Democrat from Idaho, was criticized for partisan leanings, it was for catering too much to his committee's Republicans in his quest for unanimity.
More significantly, the Church Committee used a wide lens to examine intelligence failures and lawlessness. It reviewed multiple agencies on a timeframe spanning multiple presidencies of both parties. And it did so, despite Churchās own dreams of higher office, without any personal or partisan fixations. That sounds worlds away from the āradical leftā and āBiden Crime Familyā blame-and-shame game Jordan and House Republicans have in mind.
Indeed, as Nadler reflected earlier this week, the new Jordan effort is ālikely to be more similar to the notorious House Un-American Activities Committee of the mid-20th century.ā Or as Rep. Jim McGovern said even more pointedly Tuesday, "I call it the McCarthy Committee, and I'm not talking about Kevin."
So what are the most glaring differences between the Church Committee and the GOP's new subcommittee?
First, the Church Committee was itself an outgrowth of the Senate Watergate Committee. That earlier investigation produced evidence that President Richard Nixon was using intelligence agencies to conduct āconstitutionally questionableā domestic surveillance. In other words, the Church Committee followed up on the considerable proof amassed during an earlier committeeās investigation of a constitutional crisis. (Sound familiar?) It wasnāt designed, as this new effort was, to distract from, rebuke or offer a counter-narrative to inconvenient truths.
Second, the creation of the Church Committee was overwhelmingly supported in the Senate by an 82-4 vote. The resolution authorizing this newest subcommittee, however, was approved by a narrow margin and zero Democratic support.
Third, when Church and his vice chair, Republican Sen. John Tower, sought buy-in from the executive branch, then-President Gerald Ford promised that the White House and agencies would cooperate with their investigation. That promise was both selective and non-committal, but it was nonetheless partially fulfilled. While the Ford White House assumed control over what was provided to the committee by the CIA and others, the committee ultimately āuncovered shocking facts and intelligence operations that had been unknown to both Congress and the public.ā
As the Senate Historical Office details in its summary of the Church Committee's work:
āThough staff did not always receive documents in a timely fashion, they enjoyed unprecedented access to materials that had never before been made public. Perhaps the most well-known of these internal reports, the CIAās so- called āFamily Jewels,ā outlined the agencyās misdeeds dating back to President Dwight Eisenhowerās administration. This report, as well as those found in other agencies, provided road maps that staff investigators used to piece together complicated histories of domestic, foreign, and military intelligence programs during the Cold War era.ā
As a result, the committeeās multi-volume final report details intelligence abuses going back to the FDR era, concluding that those abuses were ānot the āproduct of any single party, administration or man,ā but had developed as America rose to become a superpower during a global Cold War.ā Here, on the other hand, Jordan seems uninterested in excavating any abuse more than a couple of years old ā and certainly none that would have occurred on Trump or any Republicanās watch.
Months ago, New York magazine saw this moment coming and highlighted that the Church Committeeās primary concern āwas lack of control of the agencies by responsible political authorities, who often had their own agendas.ā But, as writer Ed Kilgore explained in his piece, McCarthyās version would have one, nakedly partisan aim: to restore Trump, who arguably weaponized multiple agencies in service of his image and thirst for power, to the presidency. And whether one sees the Church Committee as a success or a missed opportunity, thereās nothing Church-like about Jordan's goals. ā
Highlighted in the article was this..
āJordan seems uninterested in excavating any abuse more than a couple of years old ā and certainly none that would have occurred on Trump or any Republicanās watch.ā
I read where Kevin McCarthy has said he wants to hold hearings on why did the exit from Afghanistan become so chaotic. But he is only interested in examining what was done the last 90 days and not the time when trump was president.
Which will exclude the trumpās agreement with a terrorist group while excluding the legally elected government of Afghanistan from the negotiations. And what if anything this agreement had to do with extremely fast collapse of the American trained Afghan military when the United States started to pull out of the country.
So while Jordan claims they are investigating the weaponization of the FBI and DOJ they are in fact using this hearing and other hearings that are coming as weapons against their perceived enemies the Democrats. The Republicans in the House have absolutely no interest in getting the truth about anything unless they can use it against the Democrats.
This is from an article written by Jill Lawrence about what the next two years with a House majority will be like. And sheās right.
When I read the part above I thought wow this really does describe what the Republicans plan on doing for the next two years. Apparently they see this as a way to win the White House and majorities in The House and Senate. They are showing absolutely no interest in governing.
I take that back, the only thing they want to do is cut taxes for the big corporations and the rich. And to justify these tax cuts they want to make government smaller by cutting safety programs, entitlements and agencies like the EPA that hold businesses accountable for the crap they put in the air, water & ground.
I will post the entire article if anyone is interested in reading it.
As destructive as trump was to this country the current majority in the House could prove to be even more destructive to the country. Hence the catch all thread for them.
First up is this article from MSNBC..
āJim Jordanās newest project wonāt take us to Churchā
āThe House GOP is launching a new investigation supposedly modeled after the Church Committee of the 1970s. But is it really?
In the mid-1970s, the landmark Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities ā known colloquially as the Church Committee, for its chair, Sen. Frank Church ā exposed myriad law enforcement and intelligence abuses.
And since last week, itās been widely reported Kevin McCarthy, in his tumultuous bid for House speaker, negotiated a concessions package with his Freedom Caucus detractors that included the creation of a āChurch Committeeā-like subcommittee. The panel, housed within the House Judiciary Committee, would focus on uncovering the purported partisan bias of federal investigators, notably the FBI, toward Trump and others.
On Tuesday, the bill to create that new subcommittee ā the so-called Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, passed by a vote of 221 to 211. All Democrats opposed.
Some, including Rachel on her show Monday night, have expressed concern about the subcommitteeās mandate, which starts with studying the executive branchās power to ācollect information on or otherwise investigate citizens of the United States, including ongoing criminal investigations.ā
Enabling Congress to interfere with pending criminal matters is alarming, especially given that at least one potential member of the subcommittee is believed to be under investigation by Department of Justice. And while the DOJ can be expected to push back, any showdown between two coequal branches of government that begs for resolution by the third ā a federal judiciary transformed in former President Donald Trump's wake ā is itself frightening.
But thereās another, more fundamental problem. This retributive project of the ultra-right seems to bear little resemblance to the committee itās invoking as a model. For starters, the subcommittee, which House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan will lead, would have 15 members (including Jordan and Jerry Nadler, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee), no more than six of whom could be Democrats and all of whom have to be approved by McCarthy, the GOPās speaker-by-a-squeaker. š I like that name, Iāll have to remember it.
Jordan has never been known for smoothing the waters; he even explained a near-brawl on the House floor last week as the sort of conflict the founders intended. By contrast, the Church Committee was almost evenly divided with six Democrats to five Republicans. And to the extent Church, a Democrat from Idaho, was criticized for partisan leanings, it was for catering too much to his committee's Republicans in his quest for unanimity.
More significantly, the Church Committee used a wide lens to examine intelligence failures and lawlessness. It reviewed multiple agencies on a timeframe spanning multiple presidencies of both parties. And it did so, despite Churchās own dreams of higher office, without any personal or partisan fixations. That sounds worlds away from the āradical leftā and āBiden Crime Familyā blame-and-shame game Jordan and House Republicans have in mind.
Indeed, as Nadler reflected earlier this week, the new Jordan effort is ālikely to be more similar to the notorious House Un-American Activities Committee of the mid-20th century.ā Or as Rep. Jim McGovern said even more pointedly Tuesday, "I call it the McCarthy Committee, and I'm not talking about Kevin."
So what are the most glaring differences between the Church Committee and the GOP's new subcommittee?
First, the Church Committee was itself an outgrowth of the Senate Watergate Committee. That earlier investigation produced evidence that President Richard Nixon was using intelligence agencies to conduct āconstitutionally questionableā domestic surveillance. In other words, the Church Committee followed up on the considerable proof amassed during an earlier committeeās investigation of a constitutional crisis. (Sound familiar?) It wasnāt designed, as this new effort was, to distract from, rebuke or offer a counter-narrative to inconvenient truths.
Second, the creation of the Church Committee was overwhelmingly supported in the Senate by an 82-4 vote. The resolution authorizing this newest subcommittee, however, was approved by a narrow margin and zero Democratic support.
Third, when Church and his vice chair, Republican Sen. John Tower, sought buy-in from the executive branch, then-President Gerald Ford promised that the White House and agencies would cooperate with their investigation. That promise was both selective and non-committal, but it was nonetheless partially fulfilled. While the Ford White House assumed control over what was provided to the committee by the CIA and others, the committee ultimately āuncovered shocking facts and intelligence operations that had been unknown to both Congress and the public.ā
As the Senate Historical Office details in its summary of the Church Committee's work:
āThough staff did not always receive documents in a timely fashion, they enjoyed unprecedented access to materials that had never before been made public. Perhaps the most well-known of these internal reports, the CIAās so- called āFamily Jewels,ā outlined the agencyās misdeeds dating back to President Dwight Eisenhowerās administration. This report, as well as those found in other agencies, provided road maps that staff investigators used to piece together complicated histories of domestic, foreign, and military intelligence programs during the Cold War era.ā
As a result, the committeeās multi-volume final report details intelligence abuses going back to the FDR era, concluding that those abuses were ānot the āproduct of any single party, administration or man,ā but had developed as America rose to become a superpower during a global Cold War.ā Here, on the other hand, Jordan seems uninterested in excavating any abuse more than a couple of years old ā and certainly none that would have occurred on Trump or any Republicanās watch.
Months ago, New York magazine saw this moment coming and highlighted that the Church Committeeās primary concern āwas lack of control of the agencies by responsible political authorities, who often had their own agendas.ā But, as writer Ed Kilgore explained in his piece, McCarthyās version would have one, nakedly partisan aim: to restore Trump, who arguably weaponized multiple agencies in service of his image and thirst for power, to the presidency. And whether one sees the Church Committee as a success or a missed opportunity, thereās nothing Church-like about Jordan's goals. ā
Highlighted in the article was this..
āJordan seems uninterested in excavating any abuse more than a couple of years old ā and certainly none that would have occurred on Trump or any Republicanās watch.ā
I read where Kevin McCarthy has said he wants to hold hearings on why did the exit from Afghanistan become so chaotic. But he is only interested in examining what was done the last 90 days and not the time when trump was president.
Which will exclude the trumpās agreement with a terrorist group while excluding the legally elected government of Afghanistan from the negotiations. And what if anything this agreement had to do with extremely fast collapse of the American trained Afghan military when the United States started to pull out of the country.
So while Jordan claims they are investigating the weaponization of the FBI and DOJ they are in fact using this hearing and other hearings that are coming as weapons against their perceived enemies the Democrats. The Republicans in the House have absolutely no interest in getting the truth about anything unless they can use it against the Democrats.