Democrats must boycott these BS Benghazi hearings

All that is plenty enough reason for the Democrats to take a pass, but there’s even more. Actually, there are two more things. First is the way Issa’s committee has behaved so far in its Benghazi proceedings. Issa and his staff have regularly concealed witnesses from the Democratic side until the final hours, even shielding one witness from Democratic staff entirely. They have withheld documents from their Democratic counterparts and generally kept them in the dark about what they were springing next.

Yes, but this would be a different committee, you say. Well, it would. But on what basis are we supposed to believe that Trey Gowdy, the two-termer from South Carolina, would be any more responsible than Issa has been? Gowdy, astonishingly, has been getting some decent press in the last two days because he is “a former prosecutor,” three words that bestow a kind of instant gravitas. He also probably benefits from looking a little like Owen Wilson, whom everybody likes.

Well, look past the face. Gowdy’s antics on Issa’s committee are legendary among Democratic Hill staffers. He’s as big a blowhard as sits on that committee. Read Simon Malloy’s Salon piece from Tuesday, which just destroys Gowdy and also ought to worry any sane American. He developed the habit during these recent hearings of posting his cross-examinations on YouTube. During an IRS “scandal” hearing in which he rebuked Lois Lerner, he even added some heroic background music. He also suggested to Greta Van Susteren that the Obama administration was withholding evidence from Congress, and when she asked him if we’d see it, said: “Yeah. Well, you know, I can’t prove to what I don’t know. I don’t know whether the documents have been destroyed.”