16 February 2021

Where Will You Find 5 Honest Republicans

I cannot get to that number unless I count dead Republicans, so Nancy Pelosi's proposal for a bipartisan commission to investigate the January 6 insurrection seems to be dead on arrival.

One need only to back to the 911 commission, where any idea of investigation of who f%$#ed it up, and holding those individuals accountable, was thrown out the window from the get-go.

It's not that you cannot find people in the Republican Party with enough animus directed toward Trump to call him out, but the job involves calling out the entire Republican Party establishment, and beyond the "QAnon Shaman", I cannot think of anyone else who might be inclined to do this:

There is no more terrifying a term in Washington for anyone who wants to know what actually happened than the phrase, “blue-ribbon commission.” It raises memories of past monsters like Simpson-Bowles, [Even though Simpson-Bowles was created and structured by Barack Obama specifically to facilitate the privatization of Social Security] and Tower (Iran-Contra), and 9/11—flashy public hearings followed by reports with all the sharp edges sanded off by internal politics, followed by leaks from dissatisfied staffers in which the staffers claim that they had The Answer, if only the commission members weren’t so a) corrupt, b) partisan, and c) starstruck. In a few years, everybody gets jobs on cable news shows so they can opine on the work of the special blue-ribbon commission looking into whatever the next catastrophe is. A Blue-Ribbon Commission is the living embodiment of the concept of Better Than Nothing. From the Washington Post:
Two days after former president Donald Trump was acquitted by the Senate of inciting the deadly attack, Pelosi (D-Calif.) signaled in a letter to Democratic colleagues that the House would soon consider legislation to form a commission to “investigate and report” on the attack and interference in election proceedings, as well as an appropriation to pay for enhanced security features on the Capitol grounds…

Supporters of the commission say such an initiative will have broader authority than those committees to pursue testimony from those in Trump’s orbit — voices that were not part of the impeachment inquiry. The commission will not be under the time constraints of those committee investigations as it produces its findings. Lawmakers in both parties speaking on Sunday news shows endorsed the idea for an independent investigation modeled after the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, established in 2002 by Congress and President George W. Bush, which published a report with recommendations to guard against future attacks.
The 9/11 Commission did a great job marshaling the facts in service to producing recommendations. It did not do a great job marshaling the facts in service of informing the nation about who had screwed the pooch throughout the summer and fall of 2001. And, as Pete Williams explained on MSNBC Tuesday Morning, this was an era in which bipartisanship was not entirely a curse upon the land. Co-chairs Lee Hamilton and Thomas Kean even agreed that they would only do joint appearances. And still, a substantial portion of the commission’s membership and staff fought over the still highly flammable issue of the Bush administration’s failures of responsibility. That was then. This is now. And, on Monday night, Joy Reid got her teeth down to the bone when she asked her guests which Republicans they would trust on a commission to examine the role of a Republican president* in inciting an insurrection for which their Senate brethren just this weekend largely gave him a pass. It’s a question worth asking before everybody agrees that this commission will be the final word on anything.

Bipartisan, schmipartisan.  You won't get sh%$ out of such a commission.

The Republicans will be determined to cover up for their fellow Republicans, and the Democrats will be determined to cover up for everyone.

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