The Egolf has no clothes

Rep Brian Egolf is a committee chairman. With that assignment comes power and responsibilities.

Among his responsibilities; fairness. Committee members should have co-equal opportunity to exercise their right to participate, even by asking (inconvenient) questions.

Egolf didn't like having his "expert" witness' credentials being examined. So he ruled the examination out of order.

It wasn't "out of order" at all; not even close.

Republicans were given a choice;

• legitimize Egolf's supposed authority to rule legitimate but inconvenient questions "out of order", or
• de-legitimize it by denying him and his meeting a quorum.

They made the right call.

Egolf was out of order.

Which begs a question; Will Egolf take responsibility for his decision? Will he defend it?

My guess, having dealt with a number of people who think they have the authority to deny people an opportunity to ask legitimate questions, is that he will not.

He will not defend his misuse of rules of procedure to deny
another member's constitutionally protected human right
to ask a legitimate question.

How can he? His action is indefensible.

The only defense for an indefensible position is to hide it.

The next best defense, pretend that it is invisible and hope
everyone else goes along with it.

The emperor has no clothes folks.




photo Mark Bralley