In today’s Tim Dickinson interview with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in Rolling Stone, it sure seems like she’s leaning towards accountability for the criminals in the Bush Administration. Many of her words sound like the correct ones, even if she’s a bit too enamored of Leahy’s “Truth and Reconciliation Committee” proposal, which, among other “shameful” things, would likely results in a whole bunch of immunity, to a whole bunch of folks who deserve no such thing.
But she says she supports what Conyers is doing in the Judiciary Committee, in continuing to pursue Rove, Bolten and Miers. She says she can foresee a scenario in which senior members of the Administration are actually prosecuted. She says “The American people do not want wrongdoing to go unaddressed.” She even said similar words to Fox “News” two days before the Inauguration.
So why does it always feel like she’s still sitting on a fence? And, if she really believes these words she says, as House Speaker, can’t she do more to make them happen?
Here’s the snippets of note from Dickinson’s interview. You tell us what the inscrutable Speaker really means. Or does she even know herself?…
I support what Mr. Conyers is doing. I look at it from the standpoint of a separation of powers. We believe there was a politicizing of the Justice Department under President Bush, that conversations took place at the White House that supported that activity. We asked for those documents, but we did not receive them. We asked for those people to testify, but they did not come. That, for us, is a violation of the Constitution. So what we’re talking about is bigger than any specific activity. We’re talking about contempt of Congress — Article One, the legislative branch.
I also support what President Obama has said: “My approach is to look forward, recognizing that no one is above the law.” Both of those approaches are correct. It is also correct for us, as the first branch of government, to say, “The White House, no matter who is in it, cannot violate the Constitution by not being accountable to the Congress.” And we will continue to pursue our contempt-of-Congress charges against these people for what we believe has been the politicizing of the Justice Department.
But Conyers is asking for more than that. He wants subpoena power to investigate potential abuses of war powers, to force people to testify about torture and find out what was done at Guantánamo and the CIA’s black sites. Do you foresee a scenario in which senior members of the Bush administration are actually prosecuted?
I think so. The American people deserve answers. Where we are now, in terms of prosecution of White House staff, is that we have charged them with contempt of Congress. We’re talking about Harriet Miers, Josh Bolten and Karl Rove. The natural course of events from here is that the speaker will determine what charge we’re going to pursue, because there are more than one. Under Bush, the Justice Department told the U.S. attorney not to prosecute the case. So the beat goes on — it just gets worse. We don’t know what will happen, because they’ve delayed it a long time.
I’m talking more about the level of a Donald Rumsfeld — people who authorized torture and greenlighted the kidnapping and rendition of innocent people.
I didn’t like their policies, which is why we needed to win the election — to get them out of power. But I don’t know what the evidence is against them on any specific charge. When you have a truth-and-reconciliation commission . . . look, I’m still fighting the bombing of Cambodia. I still have my gripes with the administration that bombed Cambodia before you were born, so I think it’s important to bring these things out. If you have a case against someone, you bring a case.
With all due respect, we’ve had elections before that tossed people out, but then the same people returned to power later just as Dick Cheney did after leaving the Nixon administration. If we turn the page without full examination and prosecution, aren’t we in danger of seeing this again?
We should have full examination, I’m not denying that. You asked me a specific question: “Should they be charged?” I think that further information might take us to that place, but what we want to do is unify the American people. The American people do not want wrongdoing to go unaddressed. We don’t want any Democratic or Republican administration to abuse power, and that’s what they tried to do with wiretapping, that’s what they did with politicizing the Justice Department, that’s what they did in many more ways that we could see almost on a daily basis. And yes, that should be stopped.
What Mr. Leahy is putting forward, in terms of a truth-and-reconciliation committee, has always been helpful. It was helpful in South Africa, it was helpful in Rwanda, and they were talking about doing it in places like Lebanon. Ultimately, only the Congress can be responsible for preserving our constitutional prerogatives — that we get information from the executive branch when we ask for it, that members of the administration appear before us when they are called to the Congress.
“…I don’t know what the evidence is against them on any specific charge.”
knowing the truth & proving the truth are two entirely different matters. (especially if memos keep getting lost & planes keep crashing…)
The DJIA is at 7333. Obama is sending more people to war. Gitmo is still open. No withdraw from Iraq. And you people are attacking Bush. LOL HES NOT PRESIDENT AND THE COUNTRY IS TANKING HARD. YOU LIBS ARE DOING A GREAT JOB LMAO.
Smithy:
Bush got a free pass for allowing 9/11 to happen because he had only been president for 9 months.
Obama hasn’t even been president 1 month and you’re effectively blaming our current situation on him? Don’t you think the prior 8 years had a big influence in how we got to where we are at this moment?
And no, I didn’t vote for Obama.
Convicted RNC Phone jammer (James Tobin) off the hook.
Hey Smithy how are we supposed to put an already lit and raging super forest fire (symbolic of the problems left over from the last couple of administrations) out with a dull axe, and leaky garden hose (symbolic of the tools we have?) Or were you laughing your ass off because you took your money and left the US? That’s what I call the 2009 derogatory term “lefty”, where the banksters and so called (fake) patriots have packed up and said see ya.
Most of us here are not like that. Some of us are not even democrats. We’ll be staying and dealing with this mess dumped on us. We’ll be stronger in the long run. If only we could get the fucking TOOLS we need to provide oversight and accountability. It will happen, the markets WILL correct themselves, regardless of what Timmy and the rest of the clowns do. We will eventually outlaw electronic vote tabulation devices. We will restore the US Constitution. And we will come to realize we can’t win a war where men are making guns with their bare hands. Gitmo is a place where angry spirits live, eventually we will learn it’s a dead building.
But you keep laughing. It’s your right to laugh, I just would laugh in front of the volunteer firefighters if I were you.
Pelosi translation: My payola better keep coming, Dick, or I may unchain my boy Conyers and give him his dentures back. Old boy’s still got some bite, owoo! Make checks payable to CASH.
Jim, Pelosi’s time will run out.
The question is are WE smart enough to exploit that opportunity for any real success? Or will time itself be used against her/us for running out the statue of limitations–AGAIN?
Yeah man, this is the crux of why I am pissed off at Pelosi. Drain the swamp indeed!
Smithy foolishly said: “you people are attacking Bush.”
So accountability is new “attacking”? Holding people accountable for the Rule of Law is “attacking”? Interesting definitions.
Who are you claiming are the “liberals” here again?? Those who believe the law and the Constitution should be sacrosanct? Or those who believe scofflaws and murderers and such should be set free, due to some liberal (and in this case, fantastical) reading of the law and the Constitution?
Don’t worry, Smithy, we’ll love your country for you, even if you won’t.
Smithy will never “get it”. He’s one of those that feels the ruling elite are allowed to do anything at any time to any one, so long as that ruling elite cares more about money than anything else. Care about people and you’re gonna get hung!
And Pelosi had her chance to go after the Shrub when it _really_ mattered, and she said it was “off the table”. She’s part of the problem in this country, and that she was re-elected is the other part of the problem.
Funny, though.. us “liberals” criticize our own as much as we criticize “them”, and all the right-wing can do it 100% bash on “liberals”. Seems the 3 year olds jumping up and down grabbing their penises and laughing just can’t step into the adult world of facts and accountability.
Shame.. it will destroy us all eventually.
I keep hearing a lot from Pelosi about what might or might not happen.
I want to see something happen. I will not believe anything she says until I actually see it happen.
If she is not competent enough to make anything happen,then I,at least,want to see her resign. I am assuming that she knows what resigning means and will do it even if she needs help and advice to carry it out.
Needless to say,this also applies to Harry Reid.
So…Monday is the 23rd. What’s the over/under of TurdBlossom showing up and testifying(under oath)? Is Vegas taking bets? Am I going to have to avoid public places this weekend?
This is the same Speaker of the House who said she had not seen any evidence to warrant so much as an impeachment inquiry. The real problem is allowing politicians to squelch meaningful criminal investigations. There are reams of material implicating Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld et al in the commission of war crimes, and in Cheney’s case, we have a public admission that he authorized waterboarding–a clear form of torture that is a crime both under international and U.S. laws. Is it too much to ask the Justice Department to enforce the law against anyone who committed a war crime irrespective of the level of public office previously held?
While Leahy’s truth commission idea is not the greatest concept for political accuntability, it is infinitely better than doing nothing. Those like ‘Smithy’ would prefer to let the international community attempt to hold his heroes responsible. Which of course could be used as fodder in the usual propaganda wars the American media so loves.
Do we really need to hear any more? She’s not going to do squat. Dennis Kucinich, where are you?
Pelosi is the biggest DO NOTHING. THE NEW ODOR bombed 3 WTT’s to get their planned changes into motion and attacked a side of the Pentagon to push through their wars and bushit policies. Don’t suppose the Madam Speaker who proudly claims to still be going after a dead president for his murderous bombings to a country that DID NOT pose a threat to the U.S. received any anthrax?
Didn’t think so.
New Odor is the NEW WORLD ORDOR.
NO GERMAN SHEPPARD IS REQUIRED TO SNIFF THEIR WORK?
THEY OWN PELOSI AND HER TABLE SHE TOOK IMPEACHMENT OFF OF NEEDS TO HAVE JET FUEL THROWN ON IT. Although jet fuel is a hydro carbon that burns well under 3000 degrees F, the temp required to melt the steel that was found at all 3 World Trade Center controlled demolition bombings, it can BE USED IN A CONGRESSIONAL BON FIRE WHERE FLAMES BURN OFF ALL THE LYING SELLOUT LOSER CRIMINALS ON THE TAKE.
I like comment #11. As I read the interview, (and I did like the word picture of her pearls…but do men’s clothing get scrutinized, in the same way? NO), I wondered: is there anything harder than interviewing a politician? Unless there’s a moment brain/tongue “slip”, answers are air bubbles.
NYCartist, I had swamp monster themed show once. ;o)
I hate this crap. The trying to be funny part is going away for me. It’s not funny. It’s deadly serious. They win every time. They have quad cores we have single cpus. They have EAC, we have PRINCETON. They have oversight ignoring their failures, we have examples of their failures.
WE NEED A NEW AGENCY OF COPS FOR US!!!
THE VOTERS!
Until electronics are outlawed, then we only need protection of our pollwatchers.
There will be no punishment of any kind or indictments toward the old adminstration.
Mrs. Pelosi will not indicte herself.
I AM GLAD PELOSI IS, AT LEAST CONSIDERING HOLDING BUSH, ACCOUNTABLE, HE MAKES MANY ANGRY, THAT HE CAN GO SCOTT FREE, AND MAKE MONEY, MAKING SPEECHES
Nancy Polosi – The Speaker of the House, when asked whether she was accusing the CIA of lying to her during a 2002 briefing on the use of so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques,” said: “Yes, misleading the Congress of the United States, misleading the Congress of the United States. I am.” Here is Nancy Polosi’s email contact form to let her know your thoughts on her position. http://pfx.me/BI