I thought I was done here but I'll speak to this as I watched the Watergate hearings. The Democrats of course were eager to implicate Nixon; the GOP were just as hopeful to exonerate him. There was every bit as much give and take, back and forth, challenge to ALL testimony in those hearings as what we saw with the Benghazi hearings. In fact it was pretty much going Nixon's way until John Dean testified. The Republicans tried to impeach Dean's testimony but were unsuccessful in doing so. The DOJ had cut a deal with Dean for a light sentence if he turned state's evidence. When it was inevitable that 'all the President's men' would be indicted and found guilty, Nixon resigned to avoid a certain impeachment.
After his VP Gerald Ford was sworn in as President, he pardoned Nixon and that wasn't well received by Democrats or Republicans. (That probably cost Ford his re-election making him the first one in our history to serve as President without having ever being being elected as VP or President.)
The Watergate hearings I believe lasted two years or so. When I began watching I saw everyone on the committee, just trying to get to the truth about Nixon.... What did Nixon know, and when did he know it?
Do you think Jim Jordon could have been respectful like the Republican gentlemen committee members in watergate, and not bombastic as he usually is.....with sole goal of interference and chaos?
McCarthy lobbied against the first proposed, outside of congress, 9/11 commission type investigation, after he was first for it. He requested for Republicans to have equal number of investigators, Republicans vs Dems, Pelosi gave it to him, he lobbied for equal subpoena power, Pelosi gave it to him along with giving the leader his other two requests of equal power... Pelosi agreed to all of it.
McCarthy's assigned negotiators announced the repubs and democrats had a deal for the 1/6 commission.
Then McCarthy came back from his Mara Lago (kiss the ring) visit, he flip flopped... The house resolution passed with Republican support anyway...
But McCarthy spent the next week or two lobbying Republican Senators to not pass the resolution in the Senate. And they didn't.
WHY DID HE DO THAT foxy lady?
The only thing that comes to mind, is Trump didn't want any investigation and somehow, through blackmail or something, convinced McCarthy to do his bidding, when he visited him at Mara Lago.....?
Then, when Pelosi brought up a Select Committee to investigate and McCarthy could pick 5 for it, McCarthy intentionally sabotaged his picks, by putting Jordan and Banks on the committee, with 3 others.....KNOWING that Jordan was a conflict of interest with him being a potential witness, (and eventually was a witness called) and would be rejected by Pelosi. Yes, on House Select Committees, the Speaker has full authority over member picks, under the House rules on it, going back for a hundred years or so.
McCarthy counted on Jordan and maybe even Banks being rejected, So that McCarthy could have his excuse to pull all of his appointed members off of the committee, so he could then claim later on down the road, that the Select Committee on the 1/6 Capitol and electoral college attack, was partisan, or a hoax, or a witch hunt.... Trump's usual and tried and true, modus operandi.
And, that is exactly what he is now trying to claim. When we all know, he built this bed, that he sleeps in now.
Pelosi got Cheney and Kinzinger to be on the committee giving it, at least two Republicans, one who was recently the third most powerful person in the Republican House leadership.
Cheney is not a Rino either, she's as conservative as they come in DC.
Yes, it would have been great to have the 3 republican McCarthy picks that were accepted, who were all very vocal Trumpers too, on the committee....
and it would have been great if McCarthy had just picked two others to replace Jordan and Banks,
And it would have been great to have 5 additional republicans than what the committee ended up having, but it is disingenuous to complain now and blame democrats, when it was your side's CHOICE to have it this way....imo.
www.alternet.org
