Congress must do its job

The congressional elections are still six months away. But polls showing that two-thirds of voters believe the country is on the "wrong track" have prompted speculation on what a Democratic victory might portend. Republicans are warning their party faithful that a Democratic Congress would launch impeachment proceedings against President Bush. And some Democratic activists frankly wish for that. Who says Republicans and Democrats lack a common vision? Stipulating that a lot can happen before Election Day, let's indulge this parlor game. Suppose Democrats do
gain control of the House, or the Senate, or both. What then?

A Democratic victory would reflect voter disgust with a Republican Congress that has acted as a rubber stamp for President Bush. In the months after 9/11, giving the president whatever he wanted could be explained as an exercise in national unity during a crisis. But that unquestioning deference should have ended long ago. Instead, this attitude has eroded Congress into what Sen. Arlen Specter (R., Pa.) accurately terms an "inert" branch of government. Congress is supposed to act as a check and balance on the executive branch. Recently, lawmakers have seemed more interested in obtaining checks from lobbyist Jack Abramoff to boost their account balances.

If they want to avoid being buried under a November avalanche, Republican lawmakers might want to rouse themselves from their passive partisan slumber. The Senate Intelligence Committee, for example, still hasn't completed a probe it promised two years ago into whether the White House manipulated intelligence on Iraqi WMD. Is it asking too much to do this probe before, say, the Bush team hypes "incriminating" satellite photos of Iran? Is it asking too much for Congress to insist on real answers about the scope of the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance? If Democrats do win in November, they should definitely revive Congress' constitutional oversight role. But that need not translate - as some Democrats now argue - into a push for impeachment.

As the nation learned during Bill Clinton's impeachment, obsessive revenge against a president is not governing. Seeking to expose misguided policies and to correct them is good. Indulging in vendettas to vent years of pent-up frustration is not. Here's one somewhat encouraging sign that Democratic leaders grasp the difference: U.S. Rep. John Conyers (D., Mich.), who would be chair of the Judiciary Committee in a Democratic House, said in an op-ed piece in the Washington Post yesterday that he would not support any rush to impeach. Only a bipartisan consensus about possible presidential wrongdoing should kickstart proceedings, he said. And that would hinge on Congress' first performing the oversight role it has abandoend, and seeing where the facts lead. A sensible position.

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/editorial/14614603.htm

and they are doing it on less than 40 hours a week, or is it month... I lose track, oh bother.... anyway, someone should take your credit card away from them.

or the wrong one?

I truly hate that useless phrase: the right/wrong track. It's value-lite.