The past several weeks have seen the nation's political class gripped with a bizarre problem. Republicans charge that if Democrats gain control of the House of Representatives, the opposition will pursue an overly vigorous, overly partisan program of oversight. The perpetually high-minded faction of the punditocracy agrees that the charge -- though clearly hypocritical, offered in bad faith, and backed by nothing more than the say-so of GOP campaign operatives -- deserves to be taken seriously. The timid souls of the progressive movement are already preparing to trim their sails pre-emptively.
This is, simply put, not even a remotely hard question. There's nothing wrong with partisan investigations. If politicians could be counted on to reliably act out of high motives, then there would be no need for oversight at all, nothing to investigate.
Our country, happily, isn't set up on the presumption that politicians can be trusted to behave uprightly. Rather, it has institutional mechanisms in place so that actual human beings with actual human flaws and motives -- greed, jealously, vainglory, love of power -- can run the government and still serve the public interest. It assumes that the executive branch, insofar as it is permitted, will seek its own aggrandizement and that public officials, if allowed to behave corruptly, will do so.
One of the major checks on this lamentable state of affairs is the institution of congressional oversight. The overseers, in turn, are not simply assumed to be high-minded, disinterested parties. If such individuals were on hand, they would simply be put in charge of the executive branch and checks and balances could be done away with. Rather, the assumption is that for their own low reasons members of Congress will do their best to suss out wrongdoing. If they can't find any, or if they find themselves making mountains out of molehills, they'll look foolish. But if they do find some, and seek to punish the wrongdoers, they'll advance their own interests and the public interest at the same time. A partisan Congress checking a partisan White House would simply be the American government working as designed, not something to sob in our tea over.
If you're looking for something noteworthy at the intersection of partisanship and oversight, you might want to ask the Republicans why they don't do any. Nobody expects a legislator to poke into the business of a President of his own party to the same extent he would a political opponent. But today's Republicans haven't done any oversight at all.
This is a truly remarkable thing. The American constitutional system is fundamentally a cynical one, but it's rather astounding that among the almost 300 Republican legislators you can't really find a single one who's chosen to act out of conscience even once and pursue a serious investigation.
Beyond conscience, however, one traditionally assumes that partisanship will not be the sole motivator of congressional behavior. The President is deeply unpopular, much less popular than most incumbents are with their own constituents. One would imagine that someone would decide a little distancing is in order. Senators can also usually be counted on to worry at least a little about the institutional prerogatives of the body, if only to enhance their own power and prestige. Simple hunger for fame can normally inspire someone to seek a peek underneath the presidential rug. But today's Republicans have rigorously and dogmatically, over a period of years, through times when President Bush was riding high in the polls to times when he's sunk to Nixonesque depths, refused to do their jobs.
Therein lies the trouble of relying on a bipartisan approach after the election. For whatever reason, the current crop of Republicans has made it utterly clear that they can't be trusted to demonstrate any seriousness about oversight on any level. It's always preferable to proceed with friends from across the aisle, but we know that if given a veto the GOP will use it. That's unacceptable, and Democrats should proceed with clear conscience in investigating as vigorously as they please. My only note of caution would be that one should try and pick a smallish number of issues and focus in on them, rather than adopting a kitchen-sink approach that will wind up clouding the issue.
As for the fall campaign, if Democrats don't feel comfortable laying all this out there, there's a simple solution: lie. Election-eve promises of bipartisan comity are as American as apple pie. Remember, “I'm a uniter, not a divider?” Making pleasing noises on this score does no harm. And if it turns out that some Republicans really are willing to cooperate after the election, then bipartisanship really should be welcomed. And if they aren't prepared to do so, then Democrats can just steam on ahead.
Matt Yglesias is a Prospect staff writer.
