There’s a big pointless pissing match going on between Pelosi and “The Squad” (AOC, Omar, Tlaib and Pressley). Here’s their side of the story and here’s Pelosi’s. You’ll have to read the whole thing to get the full flavor of what’s going on, but the short story is that Pelosi seems miffed that these four did not support the border deal, and they’re upset about how tough Pelosi is sounding towards them. Also, there doesn’t seem to be much of a personal relationship between these four and Pelosi, but I doubt that there’s much of a relationship between Pelosi and other first-year members.
Nobody wins a mudfight like this, and everyone gets dirty. Why this is happening while the House is dragging its feet on impeachment–or even any deep, ongoing investigation of Trump–is beyond me. The Judiciary Committee just issued subpoenas for Kushner, Sessions and a bunch of other unindicted co-conspirators, as part of an investigation of obstruction of justice, months after it’s obvious that justice was obstructed and Jared and the littlest KKK gnome knew about it. The Intelligence Committee, in its own sweet time, will probably issue a few more for some other aspect of the massive number of crimes and misdemeanors committed by the Trump Administration. Our investigative effort is slow and piecemeal, it appears weak, and it is being thwarted.
If I want to make an excuse for Pelosi in general, it is that she is smart enough to count votes, and the weaklings in her caucus don’t know how to do anything but run away from difficult votes and man the phones to raise money. Perhaps they are justified by being in tough districts, but perhaps they’re also used to dodging anything tough and getting away with it. But what I don’t understand is why there’s no House Select Committee on Criminal Activity in the Executive Branch, led by some hard hitter (sorry, not Jerry Nadler), staffed with some of the smartest attorneys in the US, and containing members who can ask tough, incisive questions (AOC would be on my list, if not on Pelosi’s). The Senate Watergate Committee was where the action was when Nixon was dragged under, not the House Judiciary Committee. We need another, similar committee today.