Darrell Issa wants Barack Obama’s travel expenses investigated

  When Democrats gained control of congress in 2006 they pushed for an investigation into President Bush’s travel expenses, claiming that he used the Office of Political Affairs to  “elect Republican candidates to Congress,” this was considered a “gross abuse of the public trust” according to Henry Waxman.

its deep and systematic reach into the federal agencies are unprecedented.” In the runup to the 2006 midterm election, the office sent cabinet secretaries to campaign for vulnerable Republican candidates, targeted grant announcements to key districts and provided political briefings for agency heads, the report found. 

“Under the Bush administration, the Office of Political Affairs ran a full-fledged political operation that enlisted agency heads across government in a coordinated effort to elect Republican candidates to Congress,” the report stated. “Officials were directed to make hundreds of trips — most at taxpayer expense — for the purpose of increasing the electability of Republicans. This is a gross abuse of the public trust.”
 

  Many people– who actually believed that Barack Obama would end “politics as usual”– were disappointed to learn that Barack Obama was going to keep the Office of Political Affairs open.

  With the election and inauguration of Barack Obama suddenly people like Henry Waxman have grown silent on this issue, making it seem as if it wasn’t how the Bush administration was using the office, but rather who was using this office. There is the very real chance that Barack Obama is using the Office of Political Affairs in the same manner that President Bush was– with the only difference being that Barack Obama is using it to help elect Democrats. We need to know how Barack Obama is using this office, yet people like Henry Waxman don’t seem to have a problem with how the office is being used any more.

  Darrell Issa has noticed the difference, and is asking the Obama regime to disclose their activities within the Office of Political Affairs; basically claiming that it doesn’t matter who the president is if this office is being abused.

President Obama’s campaign promise to change politics as usual in Washington has been undermined by the continuing political campaign this White  House has run through the White House Office of Political Affairs,” Issa said in a statement to POLITICO. “During the previous administration, there was plenty of bipartisan criticism about the Office of Political Affairs as an institution, but many leading Democratic critics in Congress immediately went silent after the 2008 election

The change of administrations certainly hasn’t resolved concerns that this office is being used by the Obama administration to improperly coordinate with and help political campaigns rather than advancing specific policy initiatives being pushed by the president

  He has hit the nail on the head. If the Bush administration was using this office as an extension to help Republican candidates win re-election, and the office is being used in the same manner by the Obama regime, shouldn’t those people like– Henry Waxman– who had issues with the Bush administration have those very same issues with the Obama regime? Why then have they suddenly gone silent on this issue?

  When the White House was asked about Darrell Issa’s request that the documents related to the Office of Political Affairs under the Obama regime be released, this is what the White House had to say:

  Nothing!

  All we are asking for is a little consistency here. Barack Obama promised to end “politics as usual,” he ran as the Washington outsider who would bring change to Washington, but it is becoming more clear every day that Washington has changed Barack Obama. (Or maybe he wasn’t the outsider that he claimed to be in the first place.)

  Darrell Issa is right; if the left contends that President Bush was misusing the Office of Political Affairs, the investigation should not be stalled simply because Barack Obama is now in charge of that organization. Barack Obama should not be allowed free reign to use this office in the same manner as did President Bush– if indeed he is doing so– just because people like Henry Waxman may like the outcome with Barack Obama as president.

  All that Darrell Issa is asking for is a continuation of the investigation that the left wanted to persue on President Bush, and that seems to make perfect sense to me. Democrats opened this can of worms when it was politically expedient for them to do so, they cannot simply put the lid back on the can and expect the American people to think that this can does not stink just because there is a nice, new, shiny label on the can.