In theory, Google C.E.O. Sundar Pichai could have faced a daunting array of complex financial and ethical questions when he was summoned to testify before Congress. Google, the hyper-profitable core of multi-national conglomerate Alphabet Inc., has been accused of abusing its monopoly power, of failing to contain rampant “fake news,” and of steamrolling dissent in its recent efforts to launch a Communist Party-approved search engine in China. But when Pichai appeared before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, dressed in a smart navy blue suit and burgundy tie, lawmakers appeared more interested in performing for the cluster of news cameras in the back of the room. Rep. Steve King theatrically held up his iPhone and asked why his 7-year-old granddaughter was able to view unflattering news coverage about him. (“Congressman, iPhone is made by a different company,” Pichai explained.)

Other Republicans appeared confused as to why it was so hard to find positive coverage of their bills online. (“You had to go deep into the search results,” complained Rep. Steve Chabot.) Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren, attempting to set the record straight, suggested that Pichai explain why a Google search for the word “idiot” would turn up pictures of Donald Trump. Pichai responded gamely, offering a technical digression on how the company ranks Web pages, but Lofgren was simply waiting to deliver her punch line. “So it’s not some little man sitting behind the curtain figuring out what we’re going to show the user?”

It was, in other words, an exercise in futility. At a time when Google and other massive tech companies are engaged in questionable business decisions with global impacts, Congress mostly whiffed another plum opportunity to hold Silicon Valley to account. Part of the problem is that lawmakers have frighteningly little technical knowledge of the issues shaping their communities and the U.S. economy. When Texas Republican Ted Poe held up his own iPhone (again, wrong company) and asked whether Google could be tracking him, his heart was in the right place. Just yesterday, The New York Times reported on the ways in which companies like Google use apps to track user location data, which can then be sold to advertisers. Instead, Poe just seemed confused. Pichai easily countered, explaining that the answer was more nuanced—that it depends on his settings and on whether an app like Google Maps was open on his phone. It was an artful dodge, made easier by Poe’s ignorance on the subject. The congressman failed to understand why that would be relevant, and grew more frustrated, continuing to ask Pichai for a yes or no response. (There does exist a more salient version of Poe’s question, about the default location permission of Google’s iOS apps, but that wasn’t what Poe asked.)

While technophobia is bipartisan, the Republican obsession with “bias” in Silicon Valley goes a long way toward explaining why Washington hasn’t done more to regulate Big Tech. House Democrats, led by Bay Area congressman Ro Khanna, have proposed an “Internet Bill of Rights” that would crack down on tech in a way that resembles both Obama-era net-neutrality guidelines and G.D.P.R., the new European consumer-protection laws that went into effect this year. But the Republican fixation on the industry’s alleged left-wing prejudices are all-consuming—to the detriment of legislation that would serve voters of both parties. On Tuesday, for instance, multiple conservative lawmakers pressed Pichai on a largely debunked study from PJ Media that claimed 96 percent of Google search results come from left-wing outlets. (The study presumes that outlets like The New York Times and The Washington Post are far left.) Chabot fumed that he couldn’t find flattering coverage of his Obamacare repeal bill “until you got to the third or fourth page.” Rep Darrell Issa, in a particularly confounding soliloquy, asserted that what Google should really do is analyze whether search results are equally favorable to both parties in proportion to the number of registered Democratic and Republican voters. (Democratic Rep. Ted Lieu shot back: “If you want positive search results, do positive things.”)