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qwrrty is angry about the Libby commutation - as I think just about everyone has a right to be, and about which even many conservative libertarian types are pretty darned disapproving. Makes me angry, too. But then I already was angry at this administration - and this is a very small bit of straw to break the camel's back; more importantly, when there's 500lbs of crap on the camel, don't obsess about the straw. Even if it's the straw that breaks the back, it is just a straw compared to the 500lbs.
I think it's terrifying how quickly the press has almost forgotten to mention the actual big issues related to the administration in favor of the issue/story flavor of the day. I don't think Bush could have planned this one better - and maybe his coterie did plan for this effect. For every headline story on Libby, that's one more break in the drumbeat about all the other - some deeply pressing - issues. So, for example, holding US Citizens without habeas and without charges, wiretapping well beyond 4th Amendment provisions, and knowingly subjecting or submitting detainees to cruel and unusual punishment (torture-like methods) gets put by the wayside because some flunky gets caught out lying to investigators in an investigation that turns out to be moot.
Yes, Libby's case is important because it goes back to the rationales for invading Iraq, but... let's not call for impeachment over a (patently legal if morally wrong) commutation. Let's not scrabble in the dirt looking for reasons it might be impeachable, either. Bigger issues out there; limited time.
qwrrty calls the Pelosi crew gutless for taking impeachment off the table. And I think that is a fair characterization, but maybe "planless" is more like it. Where's the strategy to remake or even repair the America we had just 10 years ago, when Presidential calls for sweeping snoop powers (oh, yes, let's not give Mr. Clinton a free pass on chipping away at the 4th Amendment... please) got voted down, and that was the end of it? Back then, the reaction was not a "we'll do it anyway" disdain for the rule of law (to Clinton's credit). Now, instead I see a strategy to just burn through the next two years, crow about how munch money each candidate has raised to buy the Presidency, and try to get all three branches so a different set of special interests can have its time at the soda fountain.
You want to see what happens when a super-majority of seats gets grabbed by a giddy-to-be-in-power-again party that's not actually clean as a whistle, then please look at IL! We had a Republican party exposed as SO corrupt, and which was SO torn down by Fitzgerald, that in my district, the Repubs funded no opponent for US Congress, and none for most state seats either. And what did the Dems do once in office with a super-majority and governorship? They pass a few key items that could have been negotiated by a solid Dem front years ago, then go on an I'll-pass-yours-if-you'll-pass-mine, edge-issue legislation spree so crazy it boggles the mind (including mandating anti-bacterial scrub be used for all lunchtime handwashing by school children, put forward by a self-described germaphobe who is a compulsive handwasher... it passed, of course), thereby creating a backlash *within their own super-majority* from folks whose most controversial items didn't make it, thus undermining the party's ability to even get a simple majority together on no-brainer issues. Now they are unable to even pass a budget, despite TOTAL control of both houses and the governorship.
Gimme a leftie libertarian who knows how to ensure accountability for government funds or a conservative libertarian who thinks government should get out of people's minds, bedrooms and bodies. Those perfect people don't exist, but blend Howard Dean and Ron Paul and you might get someone like it. Get important stuff done, done efficiently, done well, and get it out of the game of nonsense minutia. Any idea how much time and how many bills are passed congratulating sports teams? Have a look. That's the work of a government pressed with weighty issues?
Scooter deserved the sentence; the Pres's commutation is patently legal and it even has precedent in circumstances akin to these (though about 80 years back), yet it was obviously self-serving, maybe payola, and really politically stupid. But it's over.
Warrantless wiretapping, the selective suspension of habeas, use of uncertain and very questionable interrogation techniques, and possibly extraordinary rendition continue. Today. Some of those are, or the actions supporting them are, if charges were brought, like as not to stand scrutiny as impeachable crimes.
Yet STOPPING those abuses is more important still. So in the end I agree with a comment inqwrrty's journal by qnetter - moving on means MOVING ON. We have to break the cycle of government run by moralistic urges executed by any means necessary. That includes when we think "our side" is right. No one gets a free pass on hypocrisy just because the other party was hypocritical or even evil, first.
qwrrty is angry about the Libby commutation - as I think just about everyone has a right to be, and about which even many conservative libertarian types are pretty darned disapproving. Makes me angry, too. But then I already was angry at this administration - and this is a very small bit of straw to break the camel's back; more importantly, when there's 500lbs of crap on the camel, don't obsess about the straw. Even if it's the straw that breaks the back, it is just a straw compared to the 500lbs.I think it's terrifying how quickly the press has almost forgotten to mention the actual big issues related to the administration in favor of the issue/story flavor of the day. I don't think Bush could have planned this one better - and maybe his coterie did plan for this effect. For every headline story on Libby, that's one more break in the drumbeat about all the other - some deeply pressing - issues. So, for example, holding US Citizens without habeas and without charges, wiretapping well beyond 4th Amendment provisions, and knowingly subjecting or submitting detainees to cruel and unusual punishment (torture-like methods) gets put by the wayside because some flunky gets caught out lying to investigators in an investigation that turns out to be moot.
Yes, Libby's case is important because it goes back to the rationales for invading Iraq, but... let's not call for impeachment over a (patently legal if morally wrong) commutation. Let's not scrabble in the dirt looking for reasons it might be impeachable, either. Bigger issues out there; limited time.
qwrrty calls the Pelosi crew gutless for taking impeachment off the table. And I think that is a fair characterization, but maybe "planless" is more like it. Where's the strategy to remake or even repair the America we had just 10 years ago, when Presidential calls for sweeping snoop powers (oh, yes, let's not give Mr. Clinton a free pass on chipping away at the 4th Amendment... please) got voted down, and that was the end of it? Back then, the reaction was not a "we'll do it anyway" disdain for the rule of law (to Clinton's credit). Now, instead I see a strategy to just burn through the next two years, crow about how munch money each candidate has raised to buy the Presidency, and try to get all three branches so a different set of special interests can have its time at the soda fountain. You want to see what happens when a super-majority of seats gets grabbed by a giddy-to-be-in-power-again party that's not actually clean as a whistle, then please look at IL! We had a Republican party exposed as SO corrupt, and which was SO torn down by Fitzgerald, that in my district, the Repubs funded no opponent for US Congress, and none for most state seats either. And what did the Dems do once in office with a super-majority and governorship? They pass a few key items that could have been negotiated by a solid Dem front years ago, then go on an I'll-pass-yours-if-you'll-pass-mine, edge-issue legislation spree so crazy it boggles the mind (including mandating anti-bacterial scrub be used for all lunchtime handwashing by school children, put forward by a self-described germaphobe who is a compulsive handwasher... it passed, of course), thereby creating a backlash *within their own super-majority* from folks whose most controversial items didn't make it, thus undermining the party's ability to even get a simple majority together on no-brainer issues. Now they are unable to even pass a budget, despite TOTAL control of both houses and the governorship.
Gimme a leftie libertarian who knows how to ensure accountability for government funds or a conservative libertarian who thinks government should get out of people's minds, bedrooms and bodies. Those perfect people don't exist, but blend Howard Dean and Ron Paul and you might get someone like it. Get important stuff done, done efficiently, done well, and get it out of the game of nonsense minutia. Any idea how much time and how many bills are passed congratulating sports teams? Have a look. That's the work of a government pressed with weighty issues?
Scooter deserved the sentence; the Pres's commutation is patently legal and it even has precedent in circumstances akin to these (though about 80 years back), yet it was obviously self-serving, maybe payola, and really politically stupid. But it's over.
Warrantless wiretapping, the selective suspension of habeas, use of uncertain and very questionable interrogation techniques, and possibly extraordinary rendition continue. Today. Some of those are, or the actions supporting them are, if charges were brought, like as not to stand scrutiny as impeachable crimes.
Yet STOPPING those abuses is more important still. So in the end I agree with a comment in
qwrrty's journal by qnetter - moving on means MOVING ON. We have to break the cycle of government run by moralistic urges executed by any means necessary. That includes when we think "our side" is right. No one gets a free pass on hypocrisy just because the other party was hypocritical or even evil, first.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-07-05 01:55 am (UTC)I am appalled and embarassed that our message to the world is "we don't care enough to have done anything about these guys, uh, sorry about all those deaths". Or worse, "Fuck yeah!".
(no subject)
Date: 2007-07-05 02:41 am (UTC)How about, as
Congress really does have limited time. Wish they'd use it for more than figuring out how to make the next election even sweeter for themselves. My respect for the few senators and reps who have managed to cross the aisle, actually compromise, and get good things done that the country needs... well, it continues to grow.