Making government more effective AND embarrassing the administration

As reported by this Boston Globe expose, the Government Oversight and Reform Committee did little reform and no oversight. In fact, Chairman Tom Davis went so far as to remove the word "oversight" from the committee name.

Now that Henry Waxman is the Chair, according to today's Politico, "already, GOP aides have begun circulating opposition research on him, trying to paint him as an overzealous liberal whose investigations are little more than a partisan scheme."

I'll acknowledge some credit to Tom Davis (any time he deserves it, but so far just this once): "Over the years, [Waxman] worked closely with Rep. Tom Davis when the Virginia Republican was the committee's chairman. And Davis, now the committee's ranking member, has refrained from publicly criticizing Waxman since Democrats took power."

However, Davis does take a snide shot trying to undermine Waxman's catch up on years of neglect. His spokesman David Marin states:

"The overriding question will be: Is this about making government more effective, or is this about embarrassing the administration?"

Do we have to choose? As champions of the self-proclaimed Party of Individual Responsibility, members of the administration should be embarrassed. Or did they lose their individual responsibility when they became Bushies?

The next hearing is on the lies surrounding Pat Tillman's death by friendly fire. According to the uniformed services, they reported the truth about his tragic loss all the way up to the White House. When did the story change? Karl? Rummy?