Tag Archives: select committee

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GOP leader skulks away

By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

That’ll teach ’em, right, Kevin McCarthy?

The U.S. House Republican leader decided today to pull all GOP members from a select committee chosen by Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Pelosi objected to the presence of two men McCarthy had added to the panel, Reps. Jim Jordan and Jim Banks. They were included on a panel that aims to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection that sought to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

These men are big fans and supporters of the guy who lost that election and voted to deny President Biden certification that he was the winner. Pelosi would have none of that.

McCarthy decided, therefore, to yank all Republicans. The only GOP House member left on the panel is Liz Cheney, who voted to impeach the former president for his role in inciting the Jan. 6 riot. Cheney, though, doesn’t fit the profile of today’s Republican Party, which is to pledge total, blind and unyielding fealty to the disgraced, twice-impeached former POTUS.

Cheney’s loyalty is to the Constitution, which makes her among the more inspired choices that Pelosi made to the select committee.

Here, though, is what really makes me scratch my noggin: How does McCarthy justify abandoning this select committee selection process, leaving this Jan. 6 probe solely up to Democrats, which he contends only will produce a “partisan” finding of culpability by the ex-POTUS and his GOP pals in Congress?

He could have selected five GOP members who aren’t as fervid in their defense of the indefensible, but no-o-o-o. He turned to Jordan and Banks.

Now he has abandoned any pretext of cooperation with Democrats. McCarthy has chosen instead to level accusations of “partisanship” and “politics” at Pelosi who, I feel the need to remind everyone here, has chosen a Republican to serve on this select panel.

Kevin McCarthy, meanwhile, has left the field in a fit of petulance that doesn’t advance the search for the truth into what happened when the mob stormed the Capitol Building and sought to overturn the democratic process.

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The chasm widens

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By John Kanelis / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Nancy Pelosi has nixed the appointment of two Republican House members to a select committee she formed to examine the Jan. 6 insurrection on Capitol Hill.

The House speaker acted within her authority established under House rules. We clear so far?

OK, then House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy yanked all the rest of the Republicans he had chosen for the committee. He called Pelosi, a fellow Californian, a dictator who doesn’t give a damn about due process.

Here’s where I get a bit suspicious of it all.

Congressional Republicans had the chance to form an independent, bipartisan commission to conduct this examination. They chose to scuttle that idea. They knew what the result would be: that Speaker Pelosi would choose a select committee and would retain veto power over any GOP members selected to serve on the panel.

Why are they acting so outraged? Congressional Republicans are reaping what they have sown.