This is a class blog for the students of POLSCI 426: Congressional Politics at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee.
Just like a Broadway play, congressional hearings have many acts.
We all know agenda's are abound and seemingly important things are discussed in congressional hearings, but this article shows just how monotonous and sometimes trivial they can be. The whole process of a congressional hearing appears to be organized chaos, with all committee members rarely present at the same time and some senators attending multiple hearings at once.
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1 comment:
The Senate Judiciary Committee is definitely a place where hearings can turn the tide of public opinion depending on the magnitude of any scandal that is exposed and explained there. In this case, Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) made a strong showing for the Democratic crusade for accountability by grilling former CIA agent Valeria Plame about her competency in her role, or by implication her honesty about what she kept secret and what she knowingly disclosed. In particular, Plame’s response that she was “not told” of her protection by federal law making it a felony to disclose the identity of a covert agent when asked by Leahy is a textbook example of the whistle-blowing fire-fighting response method of enforcing regulations. Plame’s superiors should have informed her of all the laws pertaining to her covert status, and if they gave her a manual containing that information, Plame should have been required o pass a recall examination of the material.
In addition, Leahy’s war of words with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales ended up with Gonzales placing blame back into Congress’ lap for its passage of the Patriot Act, which in Gonzales’ opinion authorized the Defense Department to overstep its former boundaries and take on some of the FBI’s former domestic work, particularly obtaining consumer information from businesses via “security letters,” or executive subpoenas issued without a court warrant but nonetheless enforceable in a court of law. All in all, Leahy’s lambasting of players in the Bush administration serves both his district constituent interests and his national party interests. Talk about multitasking!
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