(GOP Rep. Darrell) Issa has eye on subpoena team

[sabra]

Source: Politico

HERSHEY, Pa.— Rep. Darrell Issa, the conservative firebrand whose specialty is lobbing corruption allegations at the Obama White House, is making plans to hire dozens of subpoena-wielding investigators if Republicans win the House this fall.

The California Republican’s daily denunciations draw cheers from partisans and bookings from cable TV producers. He even bought his own earphone for live shots. But his bombastic style and attention-seeking investigations draw eye rolls from other quarters. Now, he’s making clear he won’t be so easy to shrug off if he becomes chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in 2011.

Issa has told Republican leadership that if he becomes chairman, he wants to roughly double his staff from 40 to between 70 and 80. And he is not subtle about what that means for President Barack Obama.

At a recent speech to Pennsylvania Republicans here, he boasted about what would happen if the GOP wins 39 seats, and he gets the power to subpoena.

“That will make all the difference in the world,” he told 400 applauding party members during a dinner at the chocolate-themed Hershey Lodge. “I won’t use it to have corporate America live in fear that we’re going to subpoena everything. I will use it to get the very information that today the White House is either shredding or not producing.”

In other words, Issa wants to be to the Obama administration what Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.) was to the Clinton administration — a subpoena machine in search of White House scandals.




Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0610/38697.html

[bluestateguy]

1. And everything will be declared executive privilege. The End.

Precedents cited will all be from the Bush Administration.

[Frances]

2. But precedents won't stop Issa

By the way, Issa was successful in recalling Grey Davis who had done absolutely nothing remotely illegal as governor of California. The people of California took out their anger over the Cheney-engineered electricity problems.

We replaced Davis with the Governator who promised to get rid of waste and solve our financial problems. Right. California is in dire straights and the Governator is busy protecting his super wealthy friends from paying their fair share of taxes.

[Bandit]

31. They own the Extreme Court so No it is not The End.

:shrug:

[tom_paine]

32. Exactly. The is no "Rule of Law" in our Empire these days, not for the Aristocracy

Mostly it is simply about a power struggle.

And of course the Bush Court will make sure that previous rulings protecting Loyal Bushies DO NOT apply to Outgroups.

This will all be pulled off with the sure and certain knowledge that the American Subject Populace will not notice, and the few who do can be taken care of in the usual way, not with bullets to the back of the head as in totalitarianisms past, but in the new Inverted Totalitarian style, using the Corporate M$M/RW Lie Machine fusion to make it disappear.

It will work, too.

[EXneoCON]

3. When will we ever learn...

...that the GOOBers play hard ball. They are not interested in bi-partisanship; they could care less about conciliatory actions; they only know power and the use of power. Some Dems need to realize that a seismic shift in consciousness does not happen overnight (or in our lifetime, or perhaps generations.) They continue to hope that the Right will realize the folly of their actions and come around. Well, we may not have the luxury of waiting patiently for that to occur.

[glinda]

4. Agreed! K & R

[CBHagman]

22. They'll spend our money on investigations.

Eight years of the Clinton administration, with six of them under a GOP-controlled Congress, was proof enough that the default Republican position is that Democrats are the enemy and must be gotten for something, anything, at any expenditure of time and money.

Frankly, given the howling, squealing, sign-waving racists, thugs, birthers, and other ignoramuses in the latest incarnation of the right wing, I think a GOP House and/or Senate would mount attacks and investigations that would make the Clinton years, in retrospect, look like a Sunday school picnic.

[Dawson Leery]

24. As you said.

[pinboy3niner]

5. He wants to roughly double his staff? An anti-big government Republican?

Hypocrisy, thy name is GOP...

[pinboy3niner]

9. LOLOL! Issa quote: Take out Republicans who vote for bigger government

Title: Fox News Channel "The Glenn Beck Program" Interview - Transcript
Date: 06/26/2009


And look, I'm not telling people to vote against Democrats. I'm saying that your listeners should vote against Republicans or Democrats if they're continuing to vote for this big government. And hopefully, if a few Democrats gets taken out in the primary, and if there's any Republicans left foolish enough to vote for bigger government, take them out! Take both of them out, and we will have a better America.


http://www.votesmart.org/speech_detail.php?sc_id=476524

[yurbud]

6. this is the thanks Democrats get for looking the other way on the biggest Bush & Reagan scandals

eight years of Republicans trying to get in Bill Clinton's pants, and now two years of trying to prove Obama is a Kenyan Muslim Communist Nazi.

Democrats are playing croquet and Republicans are playing death match with chainsaws.

It's not hard to figure out who will win in that equation.

[Andy823]

10. I agree.

If democrats don't get some balls and stop being spineless, we will be looking at a republican led congress, even though the republicans are cutting their own throats, the democrats need to be playing hardball, right now, and from this day on! Stop acting like weenies and do what is right for the people of this country not the damned corporations!

[yurbud]

19. If DLC & Obama had any interest in defending middle class...

they could have used their corporate boot-licking skills to divide and conquer corporate America.

For example, they could have made a very good case to every other kind of business that the health insurance industry and the oil industry cost them too much. If the government nationalized both or at least put a tight regulatory choke chain on them, other businesses would prosper more.

But to play that kind of Machiavellian chess, you have to see protecting the middle class as winning.

Rahm and the DLC's idea of winning is winning over as many of the Republicans corporate donors as possible by proving that they can carry their water as effectively while convincing the rest of us that it's raining when corporations piss on us.

[TomCADem]

23. Bull - The U.S. Chamber Is Spending Millions To Attack Obama and The Oil Industry...

...is contributing money to Republicans by a two to one ratio because President Obama is their best friend? Please. The U.S. Chamber has opposed health care reform, financial reform and cap and trade. Also, do you seriously think that Fox News is launching 24/7 attacks on Obama because it cares about the middle class?

Oh wait, I know what you are going to say. The fact that they oppose him, means that they really support him?

Up is down?

This type of rhetoric is designed to silence the left, as the corporate media and Republicans make another run at impeaching a Democratic President.

Do you seriously think that Darrell Issa is doing this to protect the middle class? No. He was the person who brought down Gray Davis, and left us with Arnold Schwarznegger and an insolvent state.

[yurbud]

25. you're setting up a false dichotomy. Either we have to support Obama 100% or we want Republicans

The GOP wants to destroy the middle class, and I protested outside Schwarzenegger's campaign headquarters during the recall scam.

You know full well what I mean--Obama has not put enough daylight between his policies and the Republicans, which in most cases, is not only bad policy, but bad politics. If voters don't see the difference between the two parties, they will stay home on election day.

[TomCADem]

26. Not true - I support Obama about 85 percent of the time roughly, which is higher than Bill Clinton..

With Bill Clinton, I was mostly disappointed in how he let personal issues undermine his Presidency, and gave Republicans an easy target with respect to his personal issues. Yet, in my opinion, the Right Wing media has grown in power and influence since Bill Clinton such that Rush Limbaugh is just one of many right wing talking heads who has been eclipsed by the growth of Fox News.

The problem is that FNC drives the narrative with its made up stories. The Tea Party is entirely a Fox News creation that would not exist without Fox News providing the equivalent of millions of in-kind contributions.

Worse, the only way a progressive gets any day light in today's media is if you bash on Obama. You are a non-person if you support an Obama initiative, but if you come out swinging and you are a liberal, you are featured on the Sunday news. Look at Paul Krugman who has actually been mostly supportive of many Obama initiatives. BUT, if he attacks, suddenly he is gracing the covers of magazines.

You raise the point of dichotomy, which is a good point. How is it that we can have folks on the left denouncing Obama as a corporatist, and folks on the right, with millions of viewers, denouncing him as a socialist? The corporate media is playing us all out. Even liberals, because the only way you get a soap box is if you rip the Obama administration a new one. Then, you get the kicks on any message board even if you say the exactly opposite factual assertion.

People are living in entirely different realities now that are shaped by a media that is paid for by the very same corporate sponsors. Watch the Sunday news this weekend. I don't even know who the guests are this weekend, but you will get a Republican right winger and a conservadem to represent the "left," and both will caution Obama from going to liberal. BUT, you may get a progressive only if they are willing to open up a can of whoop ass on the President, which is why Fox News once had Jane Hamscher of all people as a guest.

Heck, look at this Board. Maddow and Olberman have been mostly supportive of President Obama and critical of Republicans. Yet, what stories are getting kicked and rec'd. The ones were Maddow and Olbermann are critical of Obama. Try it for yourself. Post a link to one of many videos in which Maddow or Olberman are supportive of Obama or critical of Republicans, and it will often drop to the bottom of the page. But, if you pick a link with them being critical, then watch it get kicked and re-kicked with a bunch of one line (eom) posts with little actual discussion.

This is the new media game. The cable and network media are corporate owned, and the internet gets trolled to death with flame bait designed to undermine support among the left.

And, in a post-Citizens United world, it will not get any better. Heck, in California, PG&E and Mercury Insurance just narrowly lost getting propositions passed by the public that would give them a sweet heart deal after spending millions against less than $100,000 in opposition.

:rant:

[yurbud]

28. I agree with most of your analysis, but Obama set himself up for distrust of progressives...

with the choice of Rahm as chief of staff and them filling his cabinet with all but one DLCer (or those farther right), which essentially said progressive ideas are not welcome.

When you set up your base as outsiders instead of insiders, you lose a lot of trust, so that compromises that might be regrettable but unavoidable look more like sell outs.

In the case of Krugman and some other critics, it would nice to see them in the cabinet instead of the Wall Street insiders and enablers who helped create the economic collapse like Geithner, Summers, and Rubin. Giving those guys any control over the economy is like giving a drunk driver a job as a school bus driver on a mountain road. The outcome is not hard to predict.

[TomCADem]

29. Regardless of What Obama Did Or Does, The Corporate Media Strategy Is The Same

You mention Geithner, Summers, and Rubin, yet the consumer agency that liberals are trying to keep in the bill was proposed by the Administration! The limit on bank's ability to engage high risk investment activities is named the Volker rule! Jared Bernstein, a liberal economist, is also Chief Economist and Economic Policy Adviser to Vice President Joseph Biden. Finally, lost in the spins and narratives is the fact that the Obama administration is generally to the left of both houses of Congress. Yes, there are more liberal members of Congress, but as a whole, the Obama administration is further to the left on most issues than Congress as an institution.

Finally, you reference Obama's base. Well, Obama's base is censored to the extent they support any initiatives. Many environmentalists strongly support the passage of a comprehensive energy policy. Yet, you simply do not hear them on the news. However, watch what happens:

1. Progressives are ignored by media as bill is negotiated, and only conservatives are given a voice.

2. Do to the disparate media attention, the conservatives have more momentum as the bill is negotiated.

3. A draft bill emerges that represents a compromise.

4. Progressives than are given a stage to attack the bill and the Obama administration from the left.

These steps are always followed. Progressives are muzzled during the initial run-up, but then are given voice only after a bill has emerged.

Right now, we really need some coverage over the fact that fossil fuels are harmful and they represent a dwindling asset. President Obama has made reference to this in his speeches, but the media pundits simply ignore these facts in favor of portraying a narrative of a Presidency in trouble.

Republicans get to simultaneously complain that Obama is not taking strong action, but when he does as is the case with the $20 billion escrow account, the Republicans raise cries of tyranny and socialism without the media calling them on their hypocrisy. This corporatization and concentration of the media represents the greatest direct threat to our democracy.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

20. Someone send this thread to Nancy Pelosi

She needs to "get it".

[Capitalocracy]

7. Just yesterday I was listening to a recording of Michael Savage from 2009

He was talking about how we need to impeach Obama before he ruins the country with his Communism. But during the entire 10-minute diatribe, in which he told his listeners that he wants to see them call their representatives and wants to see millions of people with Impeach Obama bumper stickers causing fights on the street, he NOT ONCE mentioned what grounds there were for impeachment.

The name for what they're attempting to pull off is a coup d'etat. Or another good way to describe it, and something we in the U.S. have a lot of experience causing in other countries, is a "golpe de estado". Like the one they tried and failed under Clinton, and like the successful one in 2000 that we never recovered from as a society because of the Democrats' policy of impunity.

I've been little more than disappointed in Obama, and I wouldn't even mind seeing him impeached for doing the same things Bush did as long as we actually put Bush and Cheney in jail first, but if these people ever get a majority, well I don't know what they'll come up with but it's going to be ridiculous.

[DFW]

8. It set the stage for Bush to get in. They figure it will work again

Fool us twice, shame on us.

I'd turn Eric Holder loose on the lot of them. Tomorrow.

[fatbuckel]

11. The GOP will destroy everything just to prove it`s the right.

[yellowcanine]

12. Lot of chicken counting going on. Maybe those eggs won't hatch.

[EXneoCON]

13. Let's hope not, Yellowcanine....

....but it can look bleak when the fox is doing the counting! ;-)

[ck4829]

14. "I won’t use it to have corporate America live in fear"

Hey, Democratic leaders, I'd run with this phrase.

[Historic NY]

15. another GOP asshole willing to spend 30+ million on a witch hunt.

[Submariner]

16. Punk car thief is feeling his Wheaties

whiny little coward.

[scubadude]

17. If this doesn't move Obama to the right I don't know what will...

:sarcasm:

[SILVER__FOX52]

18. Someone needs to put this rabid dog down.

Gezzzz, I hate these nuts.

[aquart]

21. Second Amendment solution?

[defendandprotect]

27. Any Democrat -- including Obama -- could be the next ex Gov. Don Siegelman--!!!

Why Democrats don't give that much thought, I don't know!

IMO, Repugs are going to get hysterical if Dems hold onto seats because there's

too much they have to keep covered up -- so imagine if Obama/Holder were actually

investigating anything now how nutsy the Repugs would be!!

[no_more_yesterdays]

30. We have 115 days for us to make the change.

Good evening,

We're mounting the campaign to elect Howard Katz for the 49th Congressional seat and replace Darrell Issa.

I got personally motivated to volunteer as Finance Director after I could no longer just sit around and seethe in anger at what I'm seeing.

My one vote isn't enough.

Don't make me angry. You won't like my vote when I'm angry!

Howard's website is <http://www.hkatzforcongress.com />

As you can probably tell, I'm not that experienced.

But I do know I'm extremely passionate about making the change to help get things done.

Any help, suggestions, donations, volunteering,.... anything at all, please help us take Issa out of that role.

On behalf of Howard and the 49th District, thanks in advance.

Scott Thompson
<http://www.hkatzforcongress.com />

[livetohike]

33. Welcome to DU!

I lived in the 49th from 2001-2007 and worked on Mike Byron's campaign to rid us of Issa in 2004. Wish I was there to help unseat Issa this time around.

:hi: