Pelosi's House Hits Rock Bottom
Pelosi's House Hits Rock Bottom
The January 6th show trial would make Josef Stalin proud. What a contrast to past congressional investigations. The House desperately needs new management.
As an 18-year-old high school graduate a couple of weeks from starting college, I remember holding the microphone from my cassette recorder to my parent’s stereo in our small Oklahoma town to record President Richard Nixon’s August 8, 1974 resignation address to the nation.
Afterward, I stepped outside our home’s front door, gazing upward towards the cloudless blue sky on a beautiful summer evening to let the history of that moment settle in. I still have that cassette tape. I can still quote key phrases from the speech from memory. I had just made my first trip to Washington a month earlier, on my way to Canada as part of an International Air Cadet Exchange Program. I’d seen how the final throes of Watergate had gripped the nation’s capital. Tumultuous times.
For two years, America would slowly become gripped in the drama that began with a “third rate burglary” at Washington’s Watergate complex into dramatic Senate hearings led by Democrat Sam Ervin (D-NC), along with ranking Republican Howard Baker (R-TN). Lead counsels Sam Dash (Democrat) and Fred Thompson (Republican) became household names. One later became a famous actor and US Senator. I recall watching the House Judiciary Committee’s dramatic roll call vote on three articles of impeachment. A future boss, then-freshman Rep. Trent Lott (R-MS), voted no on all three articles. Nixon, of course, chose to resign instead of facing certain votes for impeachment and conviction. He, again, spared the nation a prolonged crisis.
I also remember 1997, watching then-House Judiciary Chair Henry Hyde (R-IL) and colleagues present articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton to my immediate successor as Secretary of the Senate, Gary Sisco. I admit to being a little envious.
Whether you believe Nixon and Clinton were guilty or not of their transgressions, the congressional investigations and hearings were a modicum of gravity and due process.
Fast forward to January 6th. You know the story. Perhaps not the real one, however. For that, you should consult Julie Kelly at American Greatness. Instead of a serious, bipartisan, exhaustive investigation into all aspects of what happened on that horrific day, we are getting something different. It is best described by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
I served 20 years in the House — 16 in the minority and four as speaker of the House.
Before I was elected, I watched the Watergate hearings about former President Richard Nixon.
As speaker, I authorized the investigation and trial of former President Bill Clinton.
What I saw on Thursday night was a show trial worthy of Josef Stalin. As the leader of the Soviet Union, Stalin would try people in public (with the verdict predetermined). All testimony would be distorted to provide the conviction. As his secret police chief, Lavrentiy Beria, once said, “Show me the man and I will show you the crime.”
Thursday’s Stalinist show trial proved that the Nancy Pelosi Democrats and their Republican co-conspirators have completely lost touch with the American people.
There is a sense of fairness and due process that is central to American freedom and independence. The Jan. 6 committee has violated every aspect of due process, the presumption of innocence and the impartial search for truth.
And it’s not just the violation of due process that makes this a Stalinist show trial, but the manipulation of evidence and the refusal to investigate the Capitol Police’s planning and actions before and during January 6th.
Due process violations are highlighted by a House Speaker’s historic refusal to allow the minority to choose their members and staff of the Special “J6” Committee. That makes it a kangaroo court (with apologies to kangaroos) and, by definition, illegitimate. In January, we will determine how future Speaker Kevin McCarthy chooses whether and how to continue that horrific precedent. Revenge, indeed, is a dish best served cold. Several Democrats may find themselves deplatformed from certain committees. Russia collusion hoaxer, J6 Committee member, and US Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) comes to mind.
The J6 Committee has refused to interview the now-departed Sergeants at Arms for the House and Senate from January 6th. Both reportedly declined offers from the Trump Administration, which authorized up to 20,000 National Guard troops on January 4th. Reportedly, 1,000 guardsmen were ready for deployment at DC’s National Guard Armory, a little more than a mile from the Capitol, on January 6. Was Speaker Pelosi consulted about the offer for troops to help reinforce the Capitol? We don’t know because the J6 Committee has declared Pelosi’s office and records “off-limits.”
Instead, we were feted with some 25,000 mostly unarmed National Guard troops and three square miles of fencing and concertina wire for several months afterward. The Capitol is just now slowly reopening to visitors.
We also benefit from an internal Capitol Police “After-Action” report from Justthenews.com, which noted several sweeping security and intelligence failures by Capitol officials.
Remember the stories about pipe bombs being placed outside the headquarters of the Democratic and Republican National Committees on the night of January 5th? Julie Kelly:
The FBI also appears to have lost interest in the so-called “pipe bomber” who allegedly planted explosives outside the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee and Republican National Committee on the evening of January 5. News of the bombs prompted the first evacuation of adjacent House buildings and set off panic in the city and news media. The FBI claimed it would conduct an investigation and offered a reward for the bomber’s capture. Nearly 18 months later, not only has the suspect not been caught, the FBI refuses to release any information pertaining to an investigation. Further, the pipe bombs have not been mentioned by committee members or the focus of any public hearings.
FBI Director Christopher Wray has yet to testify before the J6 Committee and refused to respond to reports of FBI informants being among the protestors.
Meanwhile, we get propaganda and hypocrisy on steroids, from hiring a network news producer and continuing to claim falsely that the event was an “insurrection.” That is a legal term whose definition was not met that day when Trump spoke at his ill-advised “Stop the Steal” rally. No firearms were carried into the Capitol by protestors (who carries out an insurrection with no guns?).
Projection also seems to be high on the show trial’s agenda. While the Committee excoriates President Trump and a few around him for believing “debunked” conspiracy theories concerning the 2020 election, they are engaging in a few of their own. Even the Capitol Police Chief, J. Thomas Manger, slapped back at Chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) and co-chair Liz Cheney (R?-WY) at accusing US Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) of conducting a “reconnaissance mission” at the Capitol on January 5th. He was giving a tour to constituents and never entered the Capitol building. Cheney also accused colleagues, specifically US Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA), of seeking a pardon from Trump after the events of J6. Perry strongly denied and denounced the accusation. Cheney has yet to provide evidence.
Most of my professional career evolved within and around the US Capitol. It holds special meaning to my family, me, and many friends and former colleagues. My entire family has served there in some capacity, from House staff to Senate pages. January 6th was a horrific event, more than just a “dust-up.” It should not be minimized. A thorough bicameral and bipartisan investigation into events before and after that day was called for. There was bipartisan support for one. Instead, we continue to be fed a politically-motivated charade for purely partisan purposes—what a travesty.
As bad as the January 6th riot was for Congress and America, the Pelosi Democratic show trial is morally equivalent and possibly worse. Gingrich: “They have debased the House, undermined the Constitutional protections that guard Americans against their government’s power, and further increased public contempt for Washington politicians.” The worst members of the special committee are likely to call for an end to the Electoral College, which would require a Constitutional amendment—not happening and unserious.
We know what’s going on here. Pelosi and her caucus are working overtime to smear and castigate all Republicans as QAnon-linked insurrectionists and election deniers while distracting us from $5 gas, double-digit inflation, and a myriad of policy failures. And they’ve used everything from National Guard troops to millions in taxpayer money in their cause. But their shiny J6 object distracts no one who has filled up their car or truck with gas or diesel fuel lately. Meanwhile, we yearn for the days of serious legislators who understand their job isn’t just to get reelected and perpetuate political power for its own sake or grift off their narcissism. Or both.
Bob Dole, call your office.
Maybe Tuesday’s historic special congressional election in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, where Mayra Flores handily became the first Republican to flip an 85 percent Hispanic district, shows how even Democrats aren’t buying what Biden, Pelosi, Thompson, Cheney, and crew are peddling. And her opponent, Dan Sanchez, was a pro-life Democrat. He may qualify as an endangered species. Flores will be our first Mexican-born Member of Congress. My money is on her to survive a tough reelection campaign against an incumbent Democratic congressman now running in this new district for the general election, US Rep. Vicente Gonzalez.
Flores’ 34th District (the one she’s NOW running for) follows along Texas’ Gulf coast from Corpus Christi to the Rio Grande with a Partisan Vote Index (PVI) of D+10. Every Democratic incumbent running for reelection in a D+10 or narrower district looks increasingly vulnerable to the Big Red Wave in November. Since redistricting hasn't finished, there’s not a hard number of those districts yet. But there are a bunch.
The J6 show trial demonstrates nothing more than the House has finally hit rock bottom. It’s time for Americans to rescue The People’s House in November.
It’s important.