Abstract

Waxman: Democrats' Eliot Ness

The article focuses on U.S. Representative Henry Waxman. For decades, this Democrat from the Westside of Los Angeles has mounted high-profile investigations and hearings while churning out sharp-edged reports: on toxic emissions, the tobacco industry, pesticides in drinking water. But during George W. Bush's first term as President, Waxman, the senior Democrat on the Government Reform Committee, established himself as the Democrats' chief pursuer of purported wrongdoing within the Bush Administration. He has produced reports on secrecy in the Bush Administration, misleading prewar assertions made by Bush officials about Iraq's WMDs, Bush's politicization of science. Working with Representative John Dingell, he sicced the Government Accountability Office on Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force to get the names of the industry executives who helped cook up Cheney's energy plan. Waxman has been characterized by the right-wing media as a partisan hack only interested in nipping at Bush's heels. But with no opportunity to legislate, there's little alternative for him but to focus on oversight. While lamenting the decline of Congressional oversight and pondering the work to be done in Bush's second term, Waxman recalls a recent meeting he had with a member of the Israeli Knesset. The Israeli explained that in Israel the committee that oversees the national government is traditionally chaired by a member of the opposition. After recounting this conversation, Waxman pauses for a moment, then wistfully says, "It's an interesting idea."