Wednesday, June 20, 2012

The liberal case against Nancy Pelosi, in a nutshell

Nancy Pelosi responds to the subcommittee's citation of contempt against Eric Holder:
"I could have arrested Karl Rove on any given day," Pelosi said to laughter, during a sit-down with reporters. "I'm not kidding. There's a prison here in the Capitol ... If we had spotted him in the Capitol, we could have arrested him."

Rove was senior advisor and deputy chief of staff to former President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2007.

Asked on what grounds she could have arrested Rove, Pelosi replied, "Oh, any number. But there were some specific ones for his being in contempt of Congress. But we didn't."
Imagine what history would say of Harry Truman if he had bragged: "Oh, we could have tried the Nazis at Nuremburg. But we didn't." If the Dems had not been so afraid to wield power, they would not have lost the House in 2010.

By the way, if you want to know the specific charge on which Karl Rove could have been arrested, it's simple. In July of 2008, the House was investigating the allegations that Karl Rove had engineered state-level prosecutions of various Democrats. Rove was summoned to appear before the House Judiciary Committee on July 10; he refused to show up. He was cited for contempt. Nothing came of it.

13 comments:

Peter of Lone Tree said...

"Unfortunately, for decades, sincere leadership by our government, from Washington D.C. down to the good-old-boy networks of county politics, has all but been erased. Not even a trace of truth permeates the bedrock of our legal or bureaucratic structure anymore. The system has become so corrupt, so leprous and putrid, that it now actually influences originally honorable men and women to do great evil just to survive and to thrive. Our administrative structure encourages and even breeds thieves, murderers, and tyrants. It is a self-perpetuating monster machine." -- Brandon Smith

Mr. Mike said...

Were Nancy's parents out of town when they were dispensing the Stupid Vaccine and she missed her dose?

I knew there was no hope for the Democratic party when they made her House Minority leader after blowing their majority in 2010.

S Brennan said...

"I could have arrested Karl Rove on any given day," Pelosi said

File under: I let criminals run wild...now you should return the favor

Caro said...

And yet she passed a boatload of progressive legislation between 2008 and 2010 that couldn't get passed in the Senate, despite having 58 Democrats in that lowly body.

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com

Hoarseface said...

@ Mr. Mike,
If only there were such a vaccine.

I think we should try to draw distinctions between stupidity and crass political calculation and maneuvering. Even in our own thoughts and conversations with like-minded individuals, mistaking one for the other leads to sloppy thinking. It makes me think of the "OODA loop" - one cannot make appropriate decisions & actions without properly observing & orienting oneself first.

I do not for a second think Nancy Pelosi can accurately be described as "stupid." Nobody reaches her level of success being dumb. Even her GOP counterparts, who say some stupid things with regularity, are not stupid - they're just pretending to be for political gain... or, (as I suspect of much of the political & business class) they're at least semi-sociopathic, which would require it's own skill-set of intelligence to survive, much less flourish.

Setting the explanation of stupidity aside, you're left with an informed, considered decision. Isn't that even worse?

SWPAnnA said...

Pelosi wields clout by virtue of her fund-raising connections and little more. Let Elija Cummings figure out who's got a checkbook that hasn't been pried open and she'll be shoved aside as unceremoniously as were HRC and Maloney

Mr. Mike said...

HF, Nancy Pelosi like others of her ilk has a low cunning, she can get votes like a squirrel can get bird seed or a raccoon get into garbage cans behind a locked gate. When it comes to thinking outside the envelope ... not so much. Newt Gingrich is no Aristotle yet look how he outmaneuvered the Democrats with the House Banking scandal.

Carolyn, too bad comprehensive financial reform and a public option in the Health Insurance Company Bailout Reform bill missed the boat. But then why would Democrats bite the hand that feeds them?

Propertius said...

Carolyn,

Harry Reid's failures do not serve to justify Pelosi's. Or Obama's, for that matter.

S Brennan said...

"...she [Pelosi] passed a boatload of progressive legislation- Carolyn Kay


Where to start with a BIG lie like this? yeah like

FISA amendment of 2008, which legalized illegal data collection of innocent citizens.

TARP, Troubled Asset Relief Program, which gave ~800,000,000,000.00 USD to those who were deeply involved in the sale of fraudulent financial instruments. Regular folks got HAMP...which at best, could be describe as national fraud.

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 commonly referred to as the Stimulus, comprised mainly of tax cuts for those who were deeply involved in the sale of fraudulent financial instruments.

The In 2009 the US House approved funds to pay for President Barack Obama's Afghanistan troop increase...

..and the list of "progressive legislation"...just goes on and on.

People can't afford Health Insurance? No problem, we'll force them to buy a crappy stripped down version that'll still bankrupt 'em if they get seriously sick and will impoverish them if they don't.

Heads we win, tails you lose, Democrats have been giving the "progressive" finger to working people for 30 years. Every illegal activity Bush engaged in has been legalized under Obama and Pelosi made sure there was no congressional oversight...what a jerk.

Anonymous said...

There is a decent argument that Truman should not have agreed to the Nuremberg trials.

Quotes I know are true from independent sources, assembled by Wiki:

As Biddiss[58] noted "...the Nuremberg Trial continues to haunt us... It is a question also of the weaknesses and strengths of the proceedings themselves. The undoubted flaws rightly continue to trouble the thoughtful."[59][60]

Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court Harlan Fiske Stone called the Nuremberg trials a fraud. "(Chief U.S. prosecutor) Jackson is away conducting his high-grade lynching party in Nuremberg," he wrote. "I don't mind what he does to the Nazis, but I hate to see the pretense that he is running a court and proceeding according to common law. This is a little too sanctimonious a fraud to meet my old-fashioned ideas."[61]

Jackson, in a letter discussing the weaknesses of the trial, in October 1945 told U.S. President Harry S. Truman that the Allies themselves "have done or are doing some of the very things we are prosecuting the Germans for. The French are so violating the Geneva Convention in the treatment of prisoners of war that our command is taking back prisoners sent to them. We are prosecuting plunder and our Allies are practicing it. We say aggressive war is a crime and one of our allies asserts sovereignty over the Baltic States based on no title except conquest."[62][63]

Associate Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas charged that the Allies were guilty of "substituting power for principle" at Nuremberg. "I thought at the time and still think that the Nuremberg trials were unprincipled," he wrote. "Law was created ex post facto to suit the passion and clamor of the time."[64]

U.S. Deputy Chief Counsel Abraham Pomerantz resigned in protest at the low caliber of the judges assigned to try the industrial war criminals such as those at I.G. Farben.[65]


XI

Caro said...

>>"...she [Pelosi] passed a boatload of progressive legislation- Carolyn Kay

>>Where to start with a BIG lie like this?

How about here:

The Bills Left Behind
http://www.opencongress.org/articles/view/2044-The-Bills-Left-Behind

I'm not saying she's perfect, no one is. I'm just saying that she'd be responsible for a lot more good legislation if Reid and Obama hadn't been such wimps.

The fact that only the bad legislation got through says a lot about how Republicans fight for their issues while Democrats play beanbag.

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com

S Brennan said...

Okay, you think Pelosi has minor flaws, but she's swell on some things.

What was the moment you felt that way?

Was it when in 2006 she imperiously took "impeachment off the table" or was at it some other failure to fulfill her oath of office?

Anonymous said...

Pelosi may be good sometimes and not so good at other times...or she may have been and no longer is..the Pelosi she was.....

The key point here is: we -- the people need to rid ourselves of almost all of the Republican group in Congress...because they are a block vote of "middle class squeezers" and distroyers of our democratic goals. And democrats know that we have no where to go.....therefore we are in need of finding a key target to make an example of...of remind the Democrats that we are people...and refuse to be squashed.....we must be very careful not punish the democrats for transgressions against us..by going republican..or not voting...which is as good as going republican.....therefore, we must pick a key democratic target.....that has another liberal running perhaps on the green or hte WFP....in the 2012 elections..and put our energies on pushing through that candidate.

That would begin the process of rebalancing the beans of power that are swiftly moving to dislodge us from the democratic process......

so...what do you say guys...if you want to do more than complain......is this an workable idea that you would be willing to put your weight behind.