Darrell Issa

WASHINGTON - Minutes after Greg Hicks learned that the perimeter of the U.S. mission in Benghazi had been breached by men with guns, he punched a cellphone number to reach Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, his immediate boss, who was at the scene. "Greg, we're under attack," Stevens told Hicks, the deputy chief of the mission, Hicks testified to Congress on Wednesday. Then the connection was lost. Hicks never spoke to his boss again. Stevens died soon afterward, as the Benghazi mission went up in flames around him. Members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee were universal in their praise of the gripping, soft-spoken, minute-by-minute account they heard Wednesday from Hicks, the first public testimony from a government official who was in Libya during the assault that killed four Americans in September.

WASHINGTON - A defiant President Obama dismissed as a "sideshow" the controversy over his administration's handling of last year's armed assault in Benghazi, Libya, accusing critics of trying to make political hay from the deaths of four Americans. "We dishonor them when we turn things like this into a political circus," Obama told reporters Monday. Obama's angry remarks were his first since House hearings last week about the September 2012 attack on the U.S. facility in Benghazi, and his first public reaction to fresh evidence indicating the White House weighed political calculations as it released information in the days that followed.

Re "A lone wolf at nuclear agency," Column, April 29 Michael Hiltzik highlights what's wrong with nuclear power regulation, and it has nothing to do with Rep. Darrell Issa's (R-Vista) investigation ofU.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Greg Jaczko. Issa chooses to investigate trivia rather than substance. Rational businesspeople weigh risks and benefits and always consider potential consequences. The unpredictability of nature, design, equipment failure, terrorism and human error all add to the risk posed by nuclear power plants.

Re "Lawmakers hear official's account of Benghazi events," May 8 After failing to connect President Obama to any real scandals, Republicans have resurrected the 8-month-old attack in Benghazi, Libya. This, while also taking a shot at Hillary Rodham Clinton, a potential presidential candidate. Conservatives claim their outrage stems from the fact that four Americans died in the attack. Yet they cannot muster similar outrage over the nearly 4,500 dead U.S. servicemen and women in Iraq or the 3,000 dead from the 9/11 attacks.

Did [GOP Senate candidate] Darrell Issa say something worth noticing (April 8)? If he did, I couldn't hear it--my neighbor's car alarm went off again! MATTHEW B. TEPPER Los Angeles

WASHINGTON - The Internal Revenue Service improperly singled out conservative groups for extra scrutiny of their applications for nonprofit status, a top agency official said Friday, setting off calls for investigations into an organization already under fire for its handling of secret political spending by nonprofits. Employees at the agency's Cincinnati nonprofits office, while screening a flood of applications from so-called social welfare groups last year, set aside about 75 containing the words "tea party" and "patriot" for more detailed review, said Lois Lerner, IRS director of exempt organizations.

When Rep. Darrell Issa, the California Republican who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, convened a hearing Thursday on religious freedom and the mandate that health insurers cover contraception, he ignited a firestorm of protest before he even started. The first of two panels he assembled was all male - something that a Democratic congresswoman on the committee noted immediately and not favorably, given thatwomen's healthwas at the heart of what was being discussed.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), chairman of the House Oversight Committee, said that he plans to launch an investigation into government loan programs, in response to the implosion of solar equipment maker Solyndra, which got a $535-million federal loan guarantee in 2009. Solyndra was the first recipient of a loan guarantee under a program authorized by the Bush administration in 2005 and beefed up under President Obama's stimulus act.  But in the last few weeks, the company has shuttered its operations, laid off nearly all of its 1,100 workers and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The brouhaha over Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. and the contempt of Congress charge brought by U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista) are providing new evidence that the lunatics are running the Republican asylum. Issa, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, would have us believe President Obama's assertion of executive privilege in the dispute -- “an eleventh-hour stunt,” he called it on Fox News -- is part of a White House cover up of something much more sinister.

Click here to download TV listings for the week of Oct. 7 - Oct. 13 in PDF format This week's TV Movies     CBS This Morning Author Nelson DeMille; director Paul Thomas Anderson. (N) 7 a.m. KCBS Today Donald Trump; Anthony Bourdain; Christy Vega Fowler; Marcia Cross; Halloween; Jackie Evancho. (N) 7 a.m. KNBC Good Morning America Henry Winkler; Kevin James; Drew Lachey; Anna Trebunskaya. (N) 7 a.m. KABC Live With Kelly and Michael Salma Hayek; Kyle MacLachlan.

WASHINGTON - The Internal Revenue Service improperly singled out conservative groups for extra scrutiny of their applications for nonprofit status, a top agency official said Friday, setting off calls for investigations into an organization already under fire for its handling of secret political spending by nonprofits. Employees at the agency's Cincinnati nonprofits office, while screening a flood of applications from so-called social welfare groups last year, set aside about 75 containing the words "tea party" and "patriot" for more detailed review, said Lois Lerner, IRS director of exempt organizations.

WASHINGTON - Minutes after Greg Hicks learned that the perimeter of the U.S. mission in Benghazi had been breached by men with guns, he punched a cellphone number to reach Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, his immediate boss, who was at the scene. "Greg, we're under attack," Stevens told Hicks, the deputy chief of the mission, Hicks testified to Congress on Wednesday. Then the connection was lost. Hicks never spoke to his boss again. Stevens died soon afterward, as the Benghazi mission went up in flames around him. Members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee were universal in their praise of the gripping, soft-spoken, minute-by-minute account they heard Wednesday from Hicks, the first public testimony from a government official who was in Libya during the assault that killed four Americans in September.

WASHINGTON - Top executives from failed hybrid car maker Fisker Automotive Inc. denied claims in Congress that the company had used political connections to secure $192 million in government loans to finance a flawed business plan. The executives appeared Wednesday before Congress for the first time since the Department of Energy seized $21 million Fisker had remaining in an account April 11. The Anaheim company was approved for a $529-million loan in 2010 and received $192 million before getting cut off. Fisker laid off most of its workers this month and is expected to file for bankruptcy.

Aaron Swartz may change the Internet yet again, even in death, with the help of lawmakers who have expressed a fondness for breaking the law. At a Washington, D.C., memorial Monday night, members of Congress and loved ones gathered to remember Swartz, who committed suicide on Jan. 11 while facing years in prison for mass-downloading scholarly articles. Swartz had already reshaped the Web experiences of millions by co-creating Reddit and the information-distribution service RSS. By turns, speakers at the Cannon House Office Building compared Swartz to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Apple founder Steve Jobs, and 20th century British programmer Alan Turing -- with Swartz as yet another cybergenius whose ambitions carried him to the law's edge.

WASHINGTON - Assistant U.S. Atty. Gen. Lanny A. Breuer, who made his mark ramping up the prosecution of white-collar crime and overseeing the government's Gulf of Mexico oil spill investigation, announced he is soon leaving his post as one of the longest serving heads of the Justice Department's Criminal Division. While Breuer, 54, had been expected to depart after serving four years in President Obama's first term, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, noted that Breuer, who was formally admonished in the Fast and Furious scandal, has now become the third top Justice official to step down after the department's blistering inspector general's report into the flawed gun-tracking operation.

WASHINGTON - Despite last week's election, House Republicans kept up their attack on the Obama administration's 2010 healthcare law Wednesday, as the House Ways and Means Committee subpoenaed Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius for information about the administration's efforts to promote the Affordable Care Act. Republicans have complained for years that the administration's multimillion-dollar public relations campaign touting...

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), who runs the House committee charged with weeding out government abuses, fired his press spokesman Tuesday after it was revealed that the aide had been sharing private correspondence from reporters with a New York Times writer. The swift-moving drama marked the end of a colorful pairing between the press-savvy Issa, chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and his outspoken front man, Kurt Bardella, who was known in some Washington circles as "Mini-me.

WASHINGTON -- Just days after the election, California House members are campaigning again, this time for committee leadership posts that could offset some of the state delegation's loss of influence on Capitol Hill with the departure of a number of its senior members. Reps. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) and Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) are seeking the chairmanships of the Foreign Affairs and the Science, Space and Technology committees, respectively.  Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks)

Click here to download TV listings for the week of Oct. 7 - Oct. 13 in PDF format This week's TV Movies     CBS This Morning Author Nelson DeMille; director Paul Thomas Anderson. (N) 7 a.m. KCBS Today Donald Trump; Anthony Bourdain; Christy Vega Fowler; Marcia Cross; Halloween; Jackie Evancho. (N) 7 a.m. KNBC Good Morning America Henry Winkler; Kevin James; Drew Lachey; Anna Trebunskaya. (N) 7 a.m. KABC Live With Kelly and Michael Salma Hayek; Kyle MacLachlan.