Two Simple Questions Democrats Don't Ask Is Why We Lose Elections

I haven’t been able to follow that much of either the Intelligence Committee hearings or the Gorsuch confirmation hearings and, of course, that was part of the Republican plan for having both occur at the same time. But there are two things that I haven’t heard from either hearing which show why Democrats continue to have problems confronting the anti-democratic nature of the current Republican party and winning elections.

There are only two questions I would like to see at least one Democrat ask, one for Comey and one for their fellow GOP members on the Judiciary Committee at the Gorsuch hearings. Comey opened his remarks by finally confirming that “I have been authorized by the Department of Justice to confirm that the FBI, as part of our counter-intelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election. And that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts.” He only confirmed this investigation because, “in unusual circumstances, where it is in the public interest, it may be appropriate to do so, as Justice Department policies recognize.” Subsequent questioning also revealed that the FBI had been investigating links between the Trump campaign and Russia for three months prior to the election. The obvious question for some Democrat, any Democrat, to ask is why the investigation of the Trump campaign’s links to Russia was not worthy of confirmation before the election while the discovery of a new batch of emails which Comey had no idea whether or not they were relevant to his Clinton email investigation was worthy of public confirmation. And a follow-up question should obviously be why he ignored Justice Department guidelines about announcements during the election for Clinton but stayed silent on the investigation of the Trump campaign. Lastly, who decides what guidelines to follow at the DOJ. Let’s see Comey squirm his way around those question.

Over in the Senate, I would like to see just one Democratic Senator simply ask the question of “why are we here?”. The answer, of course, is the unconstitutional denial of a sitting President’s right to have his Supreme Court nominee actually considered by the Republican controlled Senate. Gorsuch is the physical embodiment of the theft of a Supreme Court seat and, as such, he should and will be held to a higher standard than usual.

Yes, all this may be water under the bridge and nothing can be done to change it. But at least feed a little meat to the base rather than just moving on in a pragmatic way. Letting Comey’s outrageous actions before the election just pass without at least some constant rebuke just shows weakness. It shouldn’t matter that we now need Comey to be vigorously investigating Trump. Letting Gorsuch hearings go by without at least some rebuke to Republicans for their unconstitutional power grab just shows weakness. It shouldn’t matter that Democrats want to save the SCOTUS filibuster in case a liberal Court member retires or dies. At some point you have to stand up for you principles and your party. And it is this kind of weakness that turns off Democratic voters, makes independents question what you really stand for, and makes it harder to win elections.