White House Puts Limits on Queries From Democrats (via Dr.Menlo)
I suppose this is one way of dealing with those annoying and potentially embarrassing questions that you really would rather ignore. Hey, go ahead and ignore them, and then tell your adversaries to kiss your collective ass. End of problem, eh?? Indeed.
The Bush White House, irritated by pesky questions from congressional Democrats about how the administration is using taxpayer money, has developed an efficient solution: It will not entertain any more questions from opposition lawmakers.
The decision -- one that Democrats and scholars said is highly unusual -- was announced in an e-mail sent Wednesday to the staff of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees. House committee Democrats had just asked for information about how much the White House spent making and installing the "Mission Accomplished" banner for President Bush's May 1 speech aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln.
The director of the White House Office of Administration, Timothy A. Campen, sent an e-mail titled "congressional questions" to majority and minority staff on the House and Senate Appropriations panels. Expressing "the need to add a bit of structure to the Q&A process," he wrote: "Given the increase in the number and types of requests we are beginning to receive from the House and Senate, and in deference to the various committee chairmen and our desire to better coordinate these requests, I am asking that all requests for information and materials be coordinated through the committee chairmen and be put in writing from the committee."
He said this would limit "duplicate requests" and help answer questions "in a timely fashion."
It would also do another thing: prevent Democrats from getting questions answered without the blessing of the GOP committee chairmen.
"It's saying we're not going to allow the opposition party to ask questions about the way we use tax money," said R. Scott Lilly, Democratic staff director for the House committee. "As far as I know, this is without modern precedent."
Norman Ornstein, a congressional specialist at the American Enterprise Institute, agreed. "I have not heard of anything like that happening before," he said. "This is obviously an excuse to avoid providing information about some of the things the Democrats are asking for."
I suppose Republicans will be referring to this as the "If you ask too many questions, the terrorists will win" policy. Welcome to yet another example of the Imperial Presidency, where Republicans and the White House figure that since they know best, they will spill the beans when and or if the see anything that they figure we need to know. In the meantime, any true American patriot will recognize the wisdom of this policy and not let the terrorist win by asking uncomfortable and inconvenient questions. So, shut the hell up, already....
This IS a democracy, right?? Or did I miss a memo somewhere along the line??
