Senate Majority Kills Bid for Katrina Commission (Straight Down Party Lines)

Along completely top to bottom partisan lines every single Republican in Congressional attendance yesterday voted against an independent investigation into Katrina response. This is why Bush accepted "responsibility" so suddenly and inappropriately... so that nobody could investigate, learn from mistakes and improve response. They just don't want to know. They just don't want to know!!! Unbelievable.

Senate kills bid for Katrina Commission
Associated Press
9/14/2005, 2:36 p.m. CT
By LARA JAKES JORDAN
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans on Wednesday scuttled an attempt by Sen. Hillary Clinton to establish an independent, bipartisan panel patterned after the 9/11 Commission to investigate what went wrong with federal, state and local governments' response to Hurricane Katrina.

The New York Democrat's bid to establish the panel — which would have also made recommendations on how to improve the government's disaster response apparatus — failed to win the two-thirds majority needed to overcome procedural hurdles. Clinton got only 44 votes, all from Democrats and independent Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont. Fifty-four Republicans all voted no.

"Just as with 9/11, we did not get to the point where we believed we understood what happened until an independent investigation was conducted," Clinton said.

Luckily there's still hope. We still got the invaluable 9/11 investigation even after Republican and White(wash) House stonewalling.

The Senate vote is hardly likely to be the last word on whether to create an independent commission or as an alternative a special congressional committee to investigate Katrina. The 9/11 Commission was established in 2002 after resistance from Republicans and the White House, and opinion polls show the public strongly supports the idea. In a CNN/USA Today Gallup poll taken Sept. 8-11, 70 percent of those surveyed supported an independent panel to investigate the government's response to Katrina. Only 29 percent were opposed.

All it takes is public support for the truth. Don't let some bogus "apology" stand in the way of your right to know. Demand accountability, review, punishment of wrongdoing, and improved response for the future.

Half the truth will not cut it either with criminal revelations merely being rewarded with medals and pardons in the fashion of the GOP co-opted Iran Contra committee.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has rebuffed a bid by House and Senate GOP leaders to create a committee patterned after the 1987 Iran-Contra panel that would have a GOP majority — reflecting their dominance of Congress.

Reid has instead vowed that any bid by Republican leaders to establish a special bipartisan committee involving lawmakers from both House and Senate will go forward only if Democrats have equal representation.

There is no progress without a place at the table for all. If an investigation isn't bi-partisan, it's just partisan.

ATSNN Coverage


[edit on 15-9-2005 by RANT]