Oh Dear: Rep. Issa Already Retreating from Sestak Probe

A group of surgeons are sitting around shooting the shit. The first remarks that he's rather fond of operating on accountants: "You open 'em up and everything is so helpfully numbered." The second notes that electricians ain't bad either, "It's all color-coded." But a third pipes up that he prefers politicians. "Y'see," he said, "you get 'em open and there's no brains, no guts, no heart, and no goddamn spine."

Congressman Issa, who beat the Sestak bribe drum for nigh on a year, has decided he's not really that interested anymore.

Asked directly if he will investigate the Sestak case, Issa said, "No, we're not."

"Once we knew, as we discovered, that it turns out that Republicans and previous administrations thought it was OK — in spite of the absolute black and white letter of the law — it got bigger, it got bigger than President Obama."

Reminder: it's not just possible, but probable that the President committed a felony by offering Sestak a job in exchange for dropping out of the Pennsylvania primary. I walked through the applicable criminal statutes here. The White House stonewalled for months, eventually coming up with a bizarre job-offer-that-isn't-really-a-job-offer story that places Bill Clinton in the hot seat, rather than the President. Except, of course, for the part where the President authorized Clinton to make the offer.

But Congressman Spineless is now all wobbly. He says, and this is entirely contradictory, both that "It was wrong if it's done in the Bush administration; it's wrong in the Obama administration." but that he has no intention to investigate the Sestak case in particular.

I guess for Rep. Issa, two wrongs make it all right.

posted by Gabriel Malor at 03:05 PM

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