Changing Of The Guard On Oversight Panels

Changing Of The Guard On Oversight Panels
The National Memo
By Tim Starks, CQ-Roll Call (TNS)

Congress lost several of its titans of aggressive, bipartisan oversight and investigation at the end of last year: the likes of Carl Levin, Tom Coburn and George Miller. Analysts say this continues a trend that, with the loss of tough questioners such as Henry A. Waxman and John D. Dingell, amounts to a brain drain for an art that has been on the decline since the 1970s.

It is not, they predict, a trend likely to turn around in a congressional term where the presidency will be up for grabs, with a GOP-controlled House and Senate and a Democratic incumbent as commander-in-chief.

“If you like oversight, you’re going to get it, but it might not be the oversight you like,” said David C.W. Parker, a Montana State University political science professor who co-authored a 2013 study of congressional oversight.

Yet while that particular brand of muscular oversight that’s light on politics might be in shorter supply until after 2016, it isn’t necessarily without hope.

More:
http://www.nationalmemo.com/changing-guard-oversight-panels/

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