They Just Don't Have The Guts

The White House has defied subpoenas from the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, and demanded that its employees not answer subpoenas to testify to Congress. It's a fairly unprecedented, bold and brazen act. And they get away with it because the Democratic leadership keeps playing this "stop or I'll shoot, I swear I'll shoot!" game, when everybody on the planet knows that they'll eventually back down.

House Democrats have postponed a vote until December on contempt resolutions against White House chief of staff Josh Bolten and former White House counsel Harriet Miers, delaying for now any constitutional showdown with the White House over the president’s power to resist congressional subpoenas.

Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) has been pushing for the contempt vote, arguing that the White House must be held accountable for ignoring subpoenas issued by his panel as part of the U.S. attorney firing scandal. Other top Democrats, including Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), have argued that the House should put off that fight while debates over Iraq funding and electronic eavesdropping dominate the floor. The contempt vote had been tentatively scheduled for Friday before Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) informed his colleagues that it was being delayed.

“[Emanuel] has been saying that this week is not the time to do this, that it will step on our message on Iraq and FISA,” said a top House Democratic leadership aide.

I guess then they'll wait for a time when there's no pending legislation on the floor of the House. So we can all expect those contempt charges sometime around the 5th of never.

Conyers' committee authorized the contempt charges in JUNE. It's just unbelievably weak to wait five months before bringing it up for a vote. The body constituted in Article I of the Constitution is marginalizing themselves. They don't even need any help from the power-grabbing President.

The electorate learns through action. They see no action, they assume weakness and spinelessness. They're usually right.