DARRELL ISSA’S COMMITTEE INVESTIGATIONS
- NOVEMBER 10, 2010
Mr. Issa’s Investigations
Oversight is harder than a TV interview.
Most Republicans have been suitably modest and restrained in the wake of their victories last week—then there’s Darrell Issa. The California Congressman is set to chair the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in January, and he’s wasting no time adjusting to the political limelight.
Mr. Issa told the Politico website this week that he wants each of his seven subcommittees to hold one or two hearings each week. “I want seven hearings a week times 40 weeks,” Mr. Issa said, adding that he wants to organize aggressive oversight beyond even his own committee. No doubt he’ll be at the other press conferences too.
House Republicans certainly should do aggressive oversight, not least to educate Americans about the costs of ObamaCare, the EPA’s carbon endangerment rule, and so on. But an eternal reality is that effective oversight is hard. It requires long investigation and careful preparation so that what Congress learns can’t be dismissed as grandstanding by Democrats and a media that will be hostile to GOP efforts. It won’t help Mr. Issa later if he develops a media reputation as the Republican Chuck Schumer who never met a camera he didn’t mug for.
Our advice would be that Mr. Issa start by finishing his committee’s probe of the Countrywide sweetheart loan program that Democrats tried to deep-six. Tell us which Members and staff of Congress, or officials at Fannie and Mae and Freddie Mac received easy mortgage terms as part of former Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo’s VIP program. If he lets the facts emerge on Republicans as well as Democrats, Mr. Issa will build credibility as a fair-minded investigator. Meanwhile, better to swear off the kleig lights until he has something important to tell the public.
