I’m watching Dan Abrams’ show, and Michael Waldman just said that in past presidencies, being seen as hiding something or obstructing justice was enough to cause people to agree to testify to Congress. I wonder what’s changed.
Ernie Fletcher. This has been another edition of Simple Answers to Simple Questions.
cleek
that, and IOKIYAR
El Cid
Oh, I thought it was because major media figures considered it impressive, if not inspiringly manly, when right wingers loudly announced that they didn’t care what the dang liberals thought, they wuz gonna do whut they thought was right whether they liked it or not! Isn’t that how Ollie North became a minor national hero, by saying, yeah, ‘I lied for my Commie-fightin’ Preznit, and I’d do it again!’?
The laws & stuff will matter again when Democrats are in charge. In fact the past nearly 8 years of not caring about Republican lawbreaking will simply vanish, and Republicans and media figures will act like in the whole history of everything no one has cared more about law, regulation, and open government than they, and it has always been like this.
Dug Jay
That probably made sense during, say, the Clinton Administration. But given how the congressional Democrats have politicized virtually every action/decision of the current administration, there’s really no longer any legitimate reason to expect those kinds of actions, i.e., testifying before a group of pond scum, chaired by an asshole like, say, Vermont Senator Leahy or the “Pig Man,” otherwise known as Henry Waxman.
MarkusB
But given how the congressional Democrats have politicized virtually every action/decision of the current administration
Wasn’t public discourse swell before the Democrats invented politicizing everything?
That is sarcasm, for those in the class who aren’t sure.
Tim F.
I can see your point, Doug. When you make following the law a partisan issue people who believe in the law certainly will look like partisans.
Somewhere Buddha is smiling at these brave conservative activists fighting for an unrestrained executive branch, wiretapping, belligerent foreign war and detentions without trial.
Dug Jay
Way to go, Tim. That’s the fighting spirit. We could have used your brave spirit back in the 1990’s when there were real abuses of laws, regulations, etc. For example, instead of firing a mere 8 Federal Attorneys, the then President fired nearly a hundred in one week.
Xenos
Honky, please.
That lame rationalization by way of false analogy was disproved 18 months ago. You really must try harder than that.
Tim F.
Are you feeling ok, Dug? Usually you troll at a higher level than this.
Keep swinging, Casey.
Kevin
DigDug has to work with the arguments he has, as opposed to the ones he wish he has.
slippy hussein toad
It’s amazing to watch how furiously conservatives are polishing the turd of their fantasy wet-dream Administration as it shudders to a halt like a catastrophic, billion-cab trainwreck now deprived of the relentless momentum that propelled it for the last eight years.
Keep working, Dug Jay. At the rate your movement is going, saying “I’m a proud conservative” will deprive you of your credibility faster than slapping on a swastika.
Zifnab
Seriously, the word “pardon” is half the reason we should have impeached Bush’s ass exactly two minutes after Pelosi took the gavel.
The root problem is that most of the old-guard Democrats aren’t any more interested than their Republican counterparts in following the law. Democrats – by virtue of their ability to not completely fuck up the country inside 12 years – will be re-inheriting the national government come next January. And the Republicans have set them up with a really sweet deal. Zero accountability. Laughable oversight. Unrestrained power. Ethical standards so low Genghis Khan would feel dirty. This is the Congress that happily walked through The Bridge to Nowhere, Medicare Plan D, and half a trillion dollars in war funding for a war 70% of the country doesn’t want to be in anymore.
This is a fucking sweet deal. Congress, the President, they can do whatever they fucking want. The new guys don’t quite get what that implies. The old guys… they know. Steny Hoyer? Nancy Pelosi? Harry Reid? Hillary Clinton? They’ve got their eyes on the prize. Every minute spent prosecuting the Bush gang is a minute they can’t spend raiding the Treasury for their own people. And they get the run of the town until the GOP finally convinces the public that the Democrats are worse again. And so the slow spiral of shame and despair that is the decline of the American Empire will continue. :-p
/optimism
Dug Jay
March, 1993 NYT:
justme
Ah, yes. The good old days. Back when the concept of the Appearance of Impropriety used to mean something. Now, not only do you need actual impropriety, but the inability to diffuse it in a Friday news dump or a claim of Executive Privilege.
Zifnab, thanks for that little sprinkle of sunshine on my day. Unfortunately, I wholeheartedly agree.
Tim F.
Still whiffing, Dug. The Bush attorneys were due to be fired one way or the other. Don’t get me wrong, it’s amusing to watch you dismiss anything to do with your Leader and simultaneously tear your shirt over ordinary protocol when it has to do with the evil Klintons.
El Cid
So, March 1993 no longer counts as the beginning of Clinton’s term? Hell, that was a full month and a half in!
Yet, Bush Jr. was considered to have barely been in office a wee 8 months before his tender new administration’s propensity to blow off any warnings of terrorist attacks allowed 9/11 to take place so spectacularly.
handy
Pretty weak stuff coming from Dug, considering:
Oh wait, sorry Dug! I forgot that IOKIYAR. My bad.
Pb
You know who Clinton didn’t replace? Chertoff. You know when I pointed this out? A long damn time ago. Here’s a piece of lint, kid, get yourself a new troll.
w vincentz
Did the word “justice” get mentioned?
As I see it, nothing less than the events subsequent to the French Revolution will be sufficient.
Nothing.
Oh, and since someone also metioned Clinton, I’ll just say, without lying about it, yes, I DID have sex with that woman.
I had Monica before Billy did. Who do you think taught her?
Ask Monica.
Billy, you got sloppy seconds.
Bushies…your fate awaits.
Ahh justice!
So worth the wait.
bayville
Please make it stop!
The basis for this honor is…what, exactly?
Besides interviewing Yogi Berra and Don Zimmer a couple of times over the past 25 years, what is the connection between Russert, Meet The Press and Major League Baseball?
w vincentz
@ bayville,
Tim Russert was on the board of directors of the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.
He loved the game.
This passion is different from MTP.
Though I thought he was kinda crappy as a “journalist” during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, there’s no connect with what you posit.
Glocksman
I live in Evansville, Indiana.
If you look at a map, you’ll see that we’re hard up against the Kentucky border right across the city of Henderson, KY.
Being so close to Kentucky means that I get exposed to KY news (for some reason, that just doesn’t sound right. :) ) and that I work with a lot of Kentuckians.
That said, my opinion of Ernie Fletcher was that he was one crooked, hypocritical SOB even before I had my ‘crisis of faith’ and became a newly minted Democrat.
If I were a Kentucky resident I’d be pissed that Fletcher was my Governor, but as an Indiana resident I’m glad that Ben Chandler (D-KY) won Fletcher’s old seat in the US Congress.
God knows the last person we needed in Congress was yet another hypocritical so-called ‘fundamentalist Christian’ who thought he was doing God’s work by helping the wealthy as the expense of the rest of the nation.
Thomas Edward Theadore
Am I gay if the names “Duncan Black” and “Ernie Fletcher” make me tingle in my pants?
…
Oh dear, “Glocksman”… fuck, i am gay.
Thomas Edward Theadore of Man
Anyone else quietly screaming to themselves, “Lesbian! Lesbian!”?
I know these gentlemen, honourable citizens all. As are anyone with three names.
Thomas Edward Theadore
Dude, if you are the w vincentz i think you are, that wasn’t Billy slappin’ your ass.
Good times tho, eh?
TenguPhule
I look forward to the day when a Congress inquiry by Republicans is a laughed at like the joke it is.
TenguPhule
Indeed, Brave Sir Dug fought against torture, illegal imprisonment, illegal domestic spying, illegal invasions, illegal occupations as the Clintons watched New Orleans be destroyed.
Meanwhile on Planet Earth….
TR
Pwned.
Xenos
It feels nice to be back to defending the Clintons. Wingnuts can do funny things like that.
Rome Again
I expect to see a lot of Repubs testifying in congress once Dems are in office, over every little thing that happens after January 20th.
Downpuppy
To belabor the oblivious:
Until Mukasey, Cheney & Bush came along, subpoenas were not considered to be RSVPs. Once the Villagers had the new rules explained to them, what could they do but nod along?