Henry Waxman succeeded in torpedoing John Dingell for his chair on the Energy and Commerce Committee for the 111th Congress.  Waxman beat Dingell in a caucus vote by only 15 votes.  Who voted for Waxman?  Unlike in American workplaces if Waxman and his allies get their way, you’ll never know:

In a major win for environmentalists, Democrats in the House of Representatives voted Thursday to put Rep. Henry Waxman of California in charge of a key panel that will have oversight over global warming issues in the new Congress.

He’ll head the House Energy and Commerce Committee, bumping Michigan Democratic Rep. John Dingell, 82, the most senior member in the House.

Thursday’s Democratic caucus secret ballot, 137-122 in favor of Waxman, mirrored a decision a day earlier by the Steering and Policy Committee to replace Dingell, who’s been the top Democrat on the panel for 28 years.

Gee, another secret ballot?  The Senate caucus resolved their dispute with Joe Lieberman the same way this week, after Democrats in the upper chamber decided that having their identities known by the netroots would be dangerous to their political health.  Too bad Waxman, Dingell, and other Democrats support Card Check and don’t seem inclined to give American workers the protection of the secret ballot that they have enjoyed on two occasions this week.

The replacement of Dingell will have significant impact on the entire auto-bailout mess.  Although a liberal, Dingell resisted efforts to impose even more draconian mandates on automakers for global-warming policy.  Waxman explicitly campaigned for Energy and Commerce in order to enable more liberal legislation, which means that the automakers will have yet more mandates to burden their businesses — just when they’re already choking on the mandates Dingell couldn’t block before now.

Previous posts on Card Check:

• Video: Meet Union Boss Bill
• USA Today: Stop Card Check …
• Video: McGovern on Card Check
• George McGovern to fight Card Check in debate ad
• Video: What if Congress passed Card Check for all elections?
• FRC Action Summit: Barbara Comstock on EFCA
• George McGovern: Stop Card Check
• Where did the SEIU get $150 million for politics?
• Right Online Conference: John Fund
• Maybe this is why they need Card Check?
• Video: “I Hate Heroes”
• Johnny Sac takes on the unions