“I think I can! I think I can! I think I can!”, said The Little Scandal that Could.
“We’re not there yet,” one Democratic source on Capitol Hill said last week, when asked about the prospect for hearings on the Obama administration’s firing of AmeriCorps inspector general Gerald Walpin. Congressional investigators are still conducting interviews in the case, so the question of whether to “pull the trigger” on a full-blown inquiry — with subpoenas for witnesses to testify under oath at committee hearings — has yet to be decided.
The fact that both Democrats and Republicans are involved in investigating the Walpin dismissal is, however, highly significant. With Democrats controlling both houses of Congress, bipartisanship is absolutely necessary to getting the truth about the AmeriCorps case, as with the other cases in the smoldering “IG Gate” scandal.
The bipartisanship seems to be building, as Lieberman told the Washington Times he is “committed to conducting an independent review to make sure Mr. Walpin’s termination was not arbitrary, capricious, punitive, or political.” Lieberman is a graet many things, but a liar is certainly not one of them.
So, keep the faith, folks. We may well get that accountability and transparency Barack Obama promised us yet, no matter how hard he fights to break that promise.
It wouldn’t be fair to characterize all democrats as people who will defend other democrats to the grave of any wrongdoing. Granted, they can be quite the tight group, but there are honest folks among them.
The difficulty lies in finding them.