Yes, that's what I thought about Gates. The ones we thought were intolerably evil turn out to have been so much better than their replacements. As noted, they are at least sane.we made that trade a generation ago - look where it got us - it's not about 'satisfaction'
Apparently, the big battle now looming is between the Cheney faction (and the first domino there has already fallen) and the Bush I faction, who, if given the chance, will sweep the WH clean of the Cheney group and Rove (Bush I and Rove do not get along). If Cheney loses out, expect him to be thrown to the dogs in exchange for a de facto Congressional pardon for the Resident. With the greatest of luck, Bush II, tail between his legs, will slink back to the Democratic majority and avoid the certain Constitutional crisis that will ensue if he displays a Cheney-led stonewall of Congressional investigations. No matter how much we desire a real accounting of all the High Crimes and Misdemeanors of this Maladministration, the old American way of finding a scapegoat might serve the nation best in the short run. For example, Cheney could be forced to resign over his ties to Halliburton, for example, and a "respected" Republican Senator--not McCain, but more likely someone like Specter or Warner--could be named to replace him in exchange for letting the Fraudulent off the hook.
I say, "in the short run" because that will not bring any long-term accounting to the political process, and it will allow the "victimized right" narrative to fester and at some later time once more boil to the surface.
On the other hand, if Bush were to sign off on legislation rolling back his authoritarian power grab and laws governing campaign contributions in order to stave off revelation of his crimes, the Republic would then have peacefully resolved the greatest threat to its continued existence in a century and a half.
That might be worth the trade, no matter how much we desire satisfaction.
slowly boiling frongs and all that.
5 comments:
I do agree, and my political heart is righteously angry (because we're not talking about petty corruption or politics as usual), but even impeachment and conviction of Bush and Cheney will still leave the same lingering resentment among the wingers as Nixon's resignation.
And I really wasn't advocating a position as much as trying to raise the issue.
I really feel that Bush is actually the prime instigator, and Cheney is more like his enforcer: I don't buy the idea that Cheney is the Rasputin to Bush's Trilby. The more apt comparison: Bush=Hitler; Cheney=Goering; Rove=Goebbels; Rumsfeld=Himmler. Seems that sociopathic personalities have a way of finding each other in the political process.
It's another thought of mine that we have two basic types of people in this process: the sociopaths (the above + Perle, Feith, Kristol, Wolfowitz, etc.) and the authoritarians (Hadley, Mehlman, Rice, Hughes, Yoo, Alito, Gonzales, etc.). The authoritarians are drawn to the apparent strength of the sociopaths and will follow them off a cliff.
I don't know how to combat this, though. From my experience, narrow and limited points of view inevitably win out over open-mindedness.
Back to my original scenario (I feel like a jazz musician who has improvised way too far from the original and doesn't know how to work his way back): letting Bush escape the criminal net won't satisfy justice, but it might keep the martyr complex of the right at bay. And it might lead to restoration of the system of checks and balances--and to some progressive social legislation.
In any case, investigations will proceed under the leadership of some people who dislike Bush and the rest of this Maladministration as least as much as we do.
I know exactly what you are talking about concerning the "martyr complex of the right."
IMO, one main problem is that the equation isn't really "them (Repubs) vs. us (Dems). Meaning, I differentiate between the Dems in office vs. the Dem base. The elected Dems are much more willing to preserve this corrupt system...even if that means that the extent of corruption isn't unearthed by full blown oversight. Whereas much of the Dem base wants a full accounting (9/11, run up to Iraq, occupation policy, torture, NSA, war profiteering, Katrina response, etc).
The best way to get the authoritarians in the GOP (elected officials + their base) to stop with their self righteous BS ("How dare you question whether we acted in good faith!") is to uncover all the corruption.
Which means elected Dems have a conflict of interest...they are part of the system that has tolerated grotesque abuses of power by the GOP for the past six years.
I guess the hope is that once the process gets rolling, it will be unstoppable...impossible to contain the fallout.
Part of that reads badly. This might make more sense:
The elected Dems are much more willing to preserve this corrupt system. That means the prospect of full blown oversight might be wishful thinking.
Just wanted to add:
Whatever the Dems do, I hope they make sure Lee Hamilton IS NOT included!
We can hope that the group led by Waxman, Conyers, Rangel, etc., get us so far into the corruption and lawbreaking that the rest of the party have to go along. One of the jobs of the nets is to pressure the corrupt(ible) Dems (the ones who want their turn at the lobby trough) by warning them that they will face serious primary challenges next time around if they don't act right and fly straight from now on.
thnx.
yeah - let's hope that the momentum mojo rises. with any luck the first investigation will lead to a 'wowsers - if they did THAT, what else did they do???" moment. that train will be difficult to stop.
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