Politics & Power Quote by Darrell Issa

Issa’s line reads like a prosecutor trying a case in the court of public fatigue. He opens with “It’s very simple,” a classic politician’s move: flatten a messy ecosystem of patronage, appointments, and incentives into a moral binary that feels obvious to anyone already irritated with Washington. The simplicity is strategic. It doesn’t clarify; it recruits.

The key phrase is “if it’s not a crime - and I believe it is - it certainly is business as usual.” That pivot lets Issa have it both ways. He stakes out the hardest accusation (“crime”) while keeping an escape hatch (“business as usual”) that still condemns the behavior even if the legal argument doesn’t stick. It’s less about proving a statute than about framing a norm: appointments as currency, governance as transaction.

The subtext is aimed at two audiences. To the public, it’s an appeal to disgust: you may not follow the details, but you understand “clear fields” and “save your party money” as insider gamesmanship. To insiders and partisans, it’s a warning shot: the practice is common, and that’s precisely why it should be politically radioactive. He’s not merely alleging wrongdoing; he’s trying to shift what counts as acceptable politics.

Contextually, Issa made a career of oversight and anti-corruption theater, especially in the Obama era, when “corruption” became a versatile weapon: not always a charge you win in court, often a story you win on cable news. The rhetoric works because it converts ambiguity into suspicion and treats normal incentives as evidence of rot, daring opponents to defend the indefensible.