I know this will come as quite a shock, but the current U.S. Congress is the least productive in almost a hundred years. Not since the first years of the Great Depression under Herbert Hoover has the legislative branch been so ineffectual. This may seem surprising considering that the Republican majority has dominated the news from the moment its members took the oath of office last January, but it has barely managed to do the one thing it's supposed to do, which is pass any legislation. They certainly have been busy though.
They started with an epic battle for the speaker's office that ended even before the year was up with the dramatic defenestration of that same speaker for committing the cardinal sin of compromising with the Democratic Senate and White House to keep the government running. That took weeks of effort leaving little time for anything else. Then they had to hold "oversight" hearings to yell at administration figures and provoke fights with witnesses. There was also the huge issue of the Senate dress code. And they needed to get to the bottom of that UFO thing, and it's vitally important that they obtain Jeffrey Epstein's flight logs. They've got a lot on their plates.
But nothing has been more important than the investigation into Joe Biden's son Hunter and the alleged corruption that supposedly took place among Biden family members when Biden was vice president and out of office. Today is the big day. They plan to vote for an official impeachment inquiry into these charges. Then they plan to recess and go home for the holidays. They're all worn out.
The impeachment was inevitable. The leader of the GOP, Donald Trump, demanded it and when he says jump they all start running around in circles and leapfrogging over each other. And it's put the new speaker in what should be an extremely uncomfortable position, although it won't be, because he's totally shameless. Having even just recently been reported to have said that he didn't think impeachment should be on the agenda, he has completely reversed course and has authorized this vote to launch a formal inquiry. That is in glaring contradiction with many statements he made arguing against the impeachments of Donald Trump:
When confronted with his blatant hypocrisy by Fox's Bret Baier, Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., explained that this is totally different because that was a sham and this totally isn't. Except, of course, it totally is.
There's not been even one shred of evidence that ties Joe Biden into any corruption. In fact, it's gotten so ludicrous that Oversight Committee Chair James Comer has been out there waving around copies of checks from Hunter and Biden's brother James that he says proves Biden was on the take when in reality they were loan repayments. Hunter's supposedly nefarious checks were in the amount of $1380 a month for a car payment reimbursement. It's become that absurd.
Tim Burchett, R-TN., appeared on CNN earlier this week to spread the salacious details that were included in the recent felony indictment of Hunter Biden for paying his taxes late and insisted that one of the proofs of his corruption was the fact that his only qualifications for the jobs he held were "hookers and crack cocaine" saying "the guy is bad news." (Hunter Biden was much more qualified than either Ivanka Trump or Jared Kushner, who worked in the White House and then cashed in immediately to the tune of billions of dollars from foreign governments the minute they left the White House.)
I won't go into all the reasons why the Ukraine business is completely nonsensical again. It's ridiculous and even the Republicans must know it since they're focusing more on silly things like Hunter paying back his father for covering his car payments for a few months. And while it looked for a while as if the so-called moderates were prepared to vote against the inquiry, the fact that the White House is not rushing to help the Republicans with this bogus inquiry has provided them with the lame excuse they've been looking for to appease the rabid MAGA horde so Speaker Johnson says that he's pretty sure he has the votes. We'll see later today if he is right. And we'll also see whether those Republican House members who came from districts Biden won are as self-destructive as they appear to be.
Today, the House is voting to formally open an impeachment inquiry into President Biden.
— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) December 13, 2023
The facts don’t lie.
It’s time to get the American people answers. pic.twitter.com/O0Jtxx9J2u
Even Fox News isn't all in on this one.
“The House Oversight Committee has been at this for years, and they have so far not been able to provide any concrete evidence that Joe Biden personally profited from his son Hunter’s overseas business, but they are going to try again with this impeachment inquiry set to start next week,” White House reporter Peter Doocy recently told the Fox News audience.
After a year of investigating President Joe Biden, Chairman Comer has turned up zero evidence of presidential wrongdoing.
— Oversight Committee Democrats (@OversightDems) December 13, 2023
Even Fox News, which fell for Trump’s Big Lie and paid for it, isn’t falling for his lies, distortions, and deceptions:https://t.co/rkoYuAwI7a
That might explain why the Oversight chair has said he no longer wants to appear on the network.
The GOP's Biden impeachment is not popular. According to a new Morning Consult poll support for it has collapsed among Independents. (Needless to say, the vast majority of Democrats oppose it and a similar number of Republicans support it.) Apparently aware of this, Speaker Johnson has been careful to hedge his bets saying, "We’re not going to prejudge the outcome of this because we can’t because again it’s not a political calculation."
Nobody believes that. Certainly nobody should believe it after Republicans have already admitted this is merely a political ploy and power play:
Usually, when you're trying to smear someone, you never admit you're doing it. That's why it's called a 'whisper campaign'
— Neil Lowenthal (@NeilLowenthal1) December 9, 2023
Jim Jordan didn't get the memo
Here he is last summer openly saying they'll investigate Biden to try to help Trump win
Thank god these people are so inept pic.twitter.com/JiJd8ghYod
That's the kind of public comments that cost former Speaker Kevin McCarthy his first shot at the job back in 2015. But these days, Republicans announcing they are using the tools of government to attack their enemies is considered smart politics among their voters so announcing it isn't a problem.
Here's the Chairman of the Oversight Committee, the man who is quarterbacking this impeachment "inquiry" admitting that he had his mind made up months ago:
The man in charge of the House GOP impeachment, James Comer, told Newsmax “I would vote to impeach right now.”
— Ian Sams (@IanSams46) December 12, 2023
*** IN AUGUST ***
These claims should be laughed out of the room by the Capitol Hill press corps. https://t.co/8f4lWyy87G pic.twitter.com/X8t4RTSDWF
“I would vote to impeach right now," Comer told Newsmax months ago.
Some Democrats aren't afraid to tell it like it is with these people. Jasmine Crockett of Texas had the Republicans calling for the smelling salts when she appeared on the Charlamagne The God podcast (you know how delicate they are) and told it like it is:
You know, when I sit there, the Oversight Committee is where all the drama is. This is where the impeachment inquiry is. And, you know, it’s insulting that we have idiots like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Paul Gosar, Jim Jordan. I mean, you just name all of the nonsense Republicans.
And they sit on this committee, and they sit there so high and mighty. And they talk noise constantly and they’re like, “Oh, the Biden crime family.” And I’m like, “I’m sorry. Have you met the Trumps?!”
It's insulting to the American people that these kooks have hijacked the American government with a tiny majority and instead of negotiating in good faith to fund the government or provide needed aid to Ukraine and other priorities, they're about to put on another of their embarrassing little freak shows for the entertainment of the Fox News audience and Donald Trump. "Nonsense Republicans" is right.
