Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Battlefield

They intend to lie. There is no other way to interpret Bush's challenge. After employing the usual tactic of burying investigators beneath a mountain of paperwork -- with the choice nuggets floating in a sea of irrelevancies -- Bush has announced that his staffers will not testify; they will be "interviewed" without being under oath. There is but one reason for this refusal to be sworn: They intend to lie.

More than that. They would not intend to lie about the prosecutor firings unless they had something dire to hide.

Congress' disgusting capitulations on Iran and Iraq war spending have dimmed public enthusiasm for a Democratic-controlled House and Senate. The Democratic leadership understands, I think, that they have to show some backbone here, or they all their hard-fought gains will be lost. And so it comes down to a fight.

On this issue.

Frankly, I'm surprised. There are so many other scandals -- why this one?

Well, there is nothing for it. In battle, chance may choose the field against the will of the commanders. Here is the field; here is the battle: Congress must scour those documents, find good reason to subpoena the President himself, offering no deals, no wriggle room. When he does not cooperate (and he will not): IMPEACH.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

snicker... sometimes you have to go to subpoenas with the hearing you got, not the one you want.

or something like that.

what i find interesting about THIS being the case that breaks the camel's back is that it is one all these politicians can agree on. because here is where the power of congress is at stake. there is some of that in all the other scandals, too, if they were to really look at it, but too many lobbyists hide their spectacles under piles of campaign money, so taking a stand on such money-laden issues as war are too controversial, not in the citizenry, but in the lobby groups.

and so it goes. this is the one that will expose the crimes because there are no lobbyists to fight with about it; no money is at stake, at least on the surface (clearly lam's prosecution of duke and his clan had some money involved, but the connections are esoteric enough to confuse ...well, everyone).

but i don't know, any noose will do, as far as i'm concerned.

Anonymous said...

No question that an unwillingness to testify under oath (they're not administering a lie detector test, after all) means that they have something to hide. And they intend to do it. Why should Bill Clinton have had to testify under oath about an extra-marital affair, but these clowns can't bother to testify under oath about matters of true import?

It wasn't long ago when several oil company execs were asked to testify before Congress. Republican leaders refused to swear them in. And the oil execs proceeded to lie, and records found after the fact corroberated that they had, indeed, lied to Congress.

Is it any wonder why the American public believes it cannot trust these people? They're cheats and liars and scoundrels. They're despicable!

DrewL

Anonymous said...

The doctor nails it. And maybe on some deep level even the lamebrains in Congress understand that if the judiciary is sold out, there's nothing left at all of the American they purport to represent. We'll see. Optimism is not my strong suit, but I have hope.

Anonymous said...

This is a great issue for Dems. Remember that paper that found USAGs went after Dems/Repubs in a ratio of 7 to 1. The USAGs who weren't fired are a threat to the 2008 election results. I'm looking forward to lawyers arguing that cases should be tossed for prosecutorial misconduct.