"HOW WOULD YOU LIKE YOUR LIBERAL GRILLED, SIR?"
Come this January, if the presumptive new head of the House Oversight Committee, Republican Darrell Issa, has his way, it will be "well done".
Issa recently made no secret of his intent to skewer the recently-repudiated and oft-obfuscating "Swamp People" on the left in Congress once he commandeers the gavel of the powerful committee. "I want seven hearings a week, times forty weeks," said Issa.
In an interview with POLITICO, Issa revealed that he will require each of his seven subcommittees to hold "one or two hearings each week."
Yikes! Ousted House Speaker and dethroned Swamp Queen, Nancy Pelosi, and her boggy ilk surely must be quaking in their designer hip waders.
Issa also wants to broaden his oversight inquiries beyond his immediate purview with plans to refer investigations to other sister House panels, ostensibly drawing a giant bulls-eye on President Obama's executive branch.
With congressional gridlock an almost certainty until 2012, the California Congressman will make the most of that time by shining a giant spotlight on what was huckstered to the American public as being the "most transparent administration in history".
Issa won't have a shortage of potential targets on which to set his sights. The failed Stimu-less bill, the Barney Frank-induced housing meltdown, the Chris Dodd sweetheart Countrywide deals, the suspiciously-timed Toyota slapdown, the dubious Climategate memos and the pay-for-play Wall Street bailouts are just to name a few.
Resumes from eager staffers and lawyers are already inundating Issa's office like Christmas letters to Santa Claus.
With the aide of a willing army of investigators, Issa says he's also interested in getting to the bottom of the large wads of cash controlled by the White House.
"We really want to study presidential earmarks and the grant-making process: How do we take all this discretionary money and see what is necessary, Issa said. "The debate on how to shrink the federal government is at the core of our problem of government not doing its job."
Issa was quick to differentiate the potential work his committee will be doing as opposed to the frivolous witch-hunts of his predecessor, where Henry Waxman (D-CA) wasted millions of taxpayer dollars trying to entrap future Hall of Fame baseball players into lying concerning steroid use.
"This is important, in contrast to hearings on steroids in baseball, where I felt that it was inherently wrong to get Roger Clemens to lie to Congress," Issa said. "The American people really want us to shrink government."
Ironic, isn't it, that freewheeling Democrats were so gleeful to harass professional athletes, but couldn't find a minute's time to hold disciplinary hearings on the insane Maxine Waters (D-espicable) and the "forgetful" Charlie Rangel (D-ishonest)? Priorities, right?
Another certain Issa target is the Democrats' cap-and-trade voodoo legislation that passed in the House earlier this year and would become the mother-of-all-job-killers if allowed to be signed into law. And with the lame duck session of Congress looming large, Issa plans to quickly aim his .44 magnum gavel at the left's carbon regulating scheme before Democrats can circumvent Congress. It has been widely speculated that Obama and his abettors at the EPA will attempt an end run of Congress at some point, thanks to a 2007 Supreme Court ruling granting the agency wide latitude in regulating carbon emissions as a "dangerous gas".
That's right, folks, the Police's famous song "Every Breath You Take" will become the official theme song of the Obama EPA, as they attempt to regulate your every exhalation.
But Issa and Frank Lucas, the ranking GOP member of the House Agricultural Committee, seek to rip the stylus right off of that vinyl 45 before it ever plays a single note. Their ambitious plan calls for the hauling of EPA czaress, Lisa Jackson, before their respective committees at least once a week. "It will diminish her free time, shall we say," one former energy staffer told POLITICO.
Of course, the great white elephant in Issa's crosshairs is the Obamacare behemoth. Congressman Joe Barton, who is slated to become the House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman when the 112th Congress is sworn in, vows to make life miserable for the key culprits and Democratic defenders of the healthcare overhaul law.
Barton plans to drag Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Medicare chief, and secret Obama appointee, Donald "Socialized Medicine" Berwick to Capitol Hill for regular grillings. "Oversight of the existing law will build a case for full repeal," said Barton. "We have to aggressively work to repeal the entire bill. As part of the process, we'll have very aggressive oversight."
In addition, Barton says he'll investigate why Sebelius "issued a gag order to insurers when they began to talk about the possibility of Obamacare forcing rate increases".
Also high on his agenda is investigating why Medicare's chief actuary, Richard Foster "has concluded that the president's healthcare law will not rein in rising costs and federal spending" as was speciously promised by Obama himself, as well as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other prevaricating Democrats.
And that's just the beginning. Barton has a list of seven problems he intends to spotlight, including how he thinks that the Obama administration covered up cost estimates of the law before it was enacted, silenced insurers from warning customers about what they thought would be rate increases and money spent on brochures touting "improvements" to the Medicare Advantage program, even though funding was being systematically reduced.
Also awaiting Issa's white-hot grill is Attorney General Eric Holder at the corrupt Department of Justice, who suddenly and without explanation quashed an investigation into the 2008 voter intimidation charges leveled against two baton-wielding New Black Panther Party members at a polling place in Philadelphia. And who can forget the litany of lawsuits filed by Holder's office viciously attacking the state of Arizona for simply attempting to enforce federal immigration statutes -- statutes that the Obama administration strictly ordered other federal agencies (Homeland Security and I.C.E.) not to enforce?
Issa, et al, will definitely find their plates overflowing with one Obama scandal after another when they take over the key congressional chairs come 2011. But with a country reeling from a one-two punch to the groin from a cadre of rogue, overly ambitious progressive ideologues, the newly seated Republican House will need to show they are battle-tested tough while pursuing the malcontents and miscreants who foisted this destructive agenda on America and its citizenry.
With all the corruption that this current administration has perpetrated on the American people, January 3, 2011 should be a great day for "Chef" Issa and the Republicans in Congress to begin a two-year-long barbecue.
Does anyone else smell something burning?
