If there’s one thing that will decisively push me away from voting for Obama (even after Palin’s great speech last night about which more later), it’s the thought that Obama and Biden have their sights set on criminal prosecutions of Bush Administration figures. Althouse blogged it today, and I’d tagged it this morning. Here’s the Guardian:
Democratic vice-presidential nominee Joe Biden said earlier this week that he and running mate Barack Obama could pursue criminal charges against the Bush administration if they are elected in November.
Biden’s comments, first reported by ABC news, attracted little notice on a day dominated by the drama surrounding his Republican counterpart, Alaska governor Sarah Palin.
But his statements represent the Democrats’ strongest vow so far this year to investigate alleged misdeeds committed during the Bush years.
That’s absolutely banana republic territory. Play to the Kossaks if you will, but I’ll be walking out the door right behind Ann.
Yes, as a Clinton supporter, I remember quite well how the President’s impeachment issues worked themselves into the background of the 9/11 report. Always the wrong lessons learned about these things.
Deal breaker for me.
AL-
What did you think of Sarah P. last night?????
I got a Chris Matthews “tingle up my leg.”
Team Obama throwing red meat to its true constituency, say it isn’t so. This is the bone they will use to dupe the nutroots into staying with them as they veer to the center during the next two months.
Transparent, pathetic, and totally expected.
Say what you want about GW Bush, his administration turned their eyes from the various ‘stains’ the Clinton’s left to a fault. They even downplayed the vandalism some of their more juvenile staff committed to the friggin White House. I know that sent a lot of the Clinton-haters into a tizzy, but in retrospect thats really the way these things should go.
#3 is correct. The nutroots are both a source of funding and of volunteer foot-power for house-to-house canvasing, etc. GOT to keep them in the game…And they are positively obsessed on the subject to the exclusion of almost anything and everything else.
There’s a line. I do not believe that being in office should provide immunity. If you can show serious misconduct, that is prosecutable, it should be considered. With the scales tipped strongly against, no matter which party is in power, precisely because of the examples presented by banana republics and by ancient Greece.
That’s why the whole Monica Lewinsky thing was worse than just b.s. It was corrosive in important ways, though in fairness it was merely the next logical increment in a bipartisan pattern.
The longer-term question is, what happens to the pattern? Does it reverse, or pick up steam?
The thing is, you have to have something other than “I hate this guy” as the grounds. And if you start witch-hunts, it’s a declaration of political war in ways that reach beyond the democratic process. There might be an argument with respect to certain hostile fringe parties, like Islamists, fascists, and communists – but the minute you make your target a major political party, you open a very different and much bigger can of worms.
The other thing banana republics are known for is civil wars. When you make everyday politics a game for all the marbles, without limits, people eventually take the concept to its logical conclusion.
Yeah, I’m against criminal charges too. *But* it does need to be clear exactly how this white house avoided and evaded the constitution whenever in it’s power. Administration officials have so far evaded questioning in a way that is disgusting, demeaning and damaging to the American constitution (I’m sorry, but I do not recall).
The Bush era of the white house does not have a definitive behind the scenes account, they should be responsible for detailing where they went off the rails.
_They even downplayed the vandalism some of their more juvenile staff committed to the friggin White House._
Mark: Have you ever seen these pictures? No? Do you know why? Because it’s not downplayed, it’s “BS”:http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2001/05/23/vandals/index2.html. A politically motivated Rovean ploy. There was minor damage to the white house, so small the GAO ended it’s survey early.
So please, stop waving that tired disproved fact out here.
Who would have thought Salon might not be entirely forthcoming:
_The GAO report came down squarely in the middle, acknowledging damage and improper behavior but failing to uncover the widespread problems alleged by some Republicans._
_Bush aides told GAO investigators that outgoing Clinton staffers tucked pictures depicting Bush as a chimpanzee inside reams of printer paper, glued desk drawers shut, ripped phone lines from the walls, left messy offices and removed the “W” keys from numerous computer keyboards._
_There were also a few reported cases of theft, including that of a $350 presidential seal. The Secret Service took fingerprints, but investigators couldn’t determine who was responsible._
_”Incidents such as the removal of keys from computer keyboards; the theft of various items; the leaving of certain voice mail messages, signs, and written messages; and the placing of glue on desk drawers clearly were intentional acts,” concludes the 215-page report by the investigative arm of Congress. “However, it was unknown whether other observations, such as broken furniture, were the result of intentional acts, when and how they occurred, or who may have been responsible for them.”_
“usatoday”http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2002/06/11/white-house-vandalism.htm
Bush aides *told* GAO investigators…
Exactly, GAO investigators never saw the damage. They heard about it secondhand.
“May 18, 2001”:http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/t/trashingthewhitehouse.htm the General Accounting Office issued a three-page letter that said that it was unable confirm the damage largely to a lack of records from the White House. The letter also said that the condition of the White House offices was “…consistent with what we would expect to encounter when tenants vacate office space after an extended occupancy.”
Mmm… coincidentally, Jack Stanley, former CEO of KBR just yesterday pled guilty, to among other things, arranging the payment of about $180 million (yeah, that’s $180,000,000) towards bribes for various and sundry Nigerians between 1995 and 2004. As near as I can tell, Stanley would have answered to the CEO of the parent company, Haliburton, who from 1995 to 2000 would have been. . . get ready for it. . . Dick Cheney.
Really, AL, you don’t think there just _might_ be indictable criminal wrongdoing floating around there in the upper reaches of the GWB second term somewhere? Just POSSIBLY?
. . . but yeah, those Clinton staffers, they sure messed up those desks, and took those W keys. Clearly “evil-doers”…
Careful with your sources. That quote was from a letter from the acting administrator of the GSA, NOT a GAO conclusion. I’ll chalk that up to carelessness.
Here’s the “GAO report”:http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02360.pdf firsthand:
_”Conclusions Damage, theft, vandalism, and pranks occurred in the White House complex during the 2001 presidential transition. Incidents such as the removal of keys from computer keyboards; the theft of various items; the leaving of certain voice ail messages, signs, and written messages; and the placing of glue on desk drawers clearly were intentional acts.”_
That’s some pretty heavy stuff you got there Mark. Sorry, I will now back away from this tangent and return to your regular scheduled posting. Or you can delete this whole argument if you want Nort.
bq. AL, you don’t think there just might be indictable criminal wrongdoing floating around there in the upper reaches of the GWB second term somewhere? Just POSSIBLY?
Then let them bring that up now, *before* the election. Does not Obama’s party have a majority in both Houses of Congress? Bringing it afterwards is spite, not governance. It’s just like the complaints about having to vote on the authorization for the invasion of Iraq before the election, when in fact that’s the best time to have such a vote.
bq. But it does need to be clear exactly how this white house avoided and evaded the constitution whenever in it’s power.
Yes, clearly the Bush Administration has done a very thorough job of keeping any of that out of the public eye and our media. I am sure Scooter Libby is grateful that there have been no attempted criminal prosecutions so far.
Non-sarcastically, Alchemist, could you detail how this goal of yours would be better or more possible with Obama and Biden in the White House than it is now? Should the investigation of Nixon and his crew have waited until 1976?
Apology accepted.
I know it’s red meat to Biden’s base, but it still scares me witless. It’s one of the three roads I know of to a civil war in the US:
1. Criminal prosecution for policy decisions
2. Effectively banning essentially all guns (other than maybe in major cities)
3. Canceling a national election or otherwise attempting to remain in power unconstitutionally
So I’d rather that politicians not even go down any of those roads just to take a peek, thanks.
“Play to the Kossaks if you will, but I’ll be walking out the door right behind Ann.”
That door swung behind me during the Reagan administration. It unlocked during the fantabulas Carter clusterf**k.
Want a Billybeer with that Hamm sandwich?
The Clinton vandalism thing was small beer (although the possibility of pardon selling was not), but prosecuting the out-of-power administration is a very bad idea. That will cause administrations to do all kinds of things not to not leave power.
It may not be the platonic ideal of justice, but it’s much better for the country.
The great things about extremists is that they always go too far. They alienate the moderates that they need to further their cause.
When Al-Qaeda in Iraq was attacking US troops, many regular Muslims tacitly approved. When they started killing Iraqi civilians, the Iraqis turned against Al-Qaeda, and now the War in Iraq is won, in our favor.
I see exactly the same thing happening with the hard left. In their zeal, they are going to alienate Jacksonian Democrats, Independents, Hillary supporters, Asians, Jews, etc. These groups will turn on and punish the hard left.
The parallel between Al-Qaeda in Iraq and the nutroots is uncanny, and the latter is well on track to receiving the same defeat as the former.
“”Play to the Kossaks if you will, but I’ll be walking out the door right behind Ann.”
This WILL happen someday. AL is just too different from those who control the Democrat Party today, what with his pro-US/pro-gun ownership/pro-military/well-mannered nature.
The internal dialogue required for this shift takes years, and AL is just 30-50% along this path at the moment. But eventually, he will realize that he is a ‘Lieberman’, and will change from Democrat to Independent.
What are your reasons AL?
If there has been lawbreaking by Bush officials – and we know that Scooter Libby broke the law – why are you in favor of being an accessory after the fact?
Agreed with Jeff #16, such a move would be the first step to a hot civil war. One essential of a republic is that the defeated party walks out of office peacefully, even given their frustration and humiliation. If they know the defeat also means criminal prosecution and being hounded for the rest of their lives, they might just not go peacefully – I don’t care which party is in question.
You can pull the stunt once, if nothing else due to the inherent conservatism of almost all Americans when it comes to their governmental framework, but there is likely no second time once the lesson has been learned. I’d rather not have even one tick on that clock.
Biden is being grossly irresponsible and gambling with our Constitution. He deserves censure for that, and some consideration as to just why and who is backing this kind of brinksmanship.
Tim,
You ignore the other reality though – if there is no penalty for lawbreaking by a commander in chief – what’s the accountability on their power?
If we, as a nation, in the service of not creating a “civil war”, don’t enforce the law on the executive players, this ALSO creates a precedent, that future executives can get away with what they want.
And, this guy hasn’t gotten away with a lot. It’s mind-snapping to be praising McCain to the skies for bearing up under torture, when the exact same practices were utlized for a couple of years there, and enabled by executive order.
Basically, what was done to McCain was done in our – the U.S.’s name.
You think that’s ok?
McCain didn’t, and said so, came out strongly AGAINST what was happening – because it happened to him.
That didn’t get written well. What was done to prisoners of the U.S., were some of the same things that were done to McCain, back in Vietnam as a prisoner.
People should go over to “Althouse’s”:http://althouse.blogspot.com/2008/09/biden-says-president-obama-might-pursue.html website and watch the video of the crazy man asking Biden the question. He talks of Constitutional restoration, like a crazy right-winger who thinks some obscure Supreme Court decision written by cryto-Marxists in the late nineteenth century ended the Republic.
But Biden seems to move away from the questioner’s framing, so its not clear to me what Biden is saying (surprise!)
But no, putting the Bush administration on trial is bat-sh#t crazy stuff.
I agree very strongly with 16, 18, and 22:
I accept as given that all American politicians playing at the Executive level have a desire for personal power and authority far stronger than I am ever likely to have. (And I have some soaring aspirations myself.)
Opening the field up to the notion of prosecuting past Presidents for what are, at root, policy disagreements and disagreements over the use of their authority, seems to me to be corrosively dangerous, permanently dangerous, in that it directly transforms the desire for personal power into a drive for personal survival. That way lies the banana republic.
But I also very strongly with 6 and 23:
I cannot accept as given that the bearer of Executive power has any type of immunity. I simply cannot. That way, too, lies the banana republic. (Apparently, the banana republic is quite large.)
It seems to me that we have a system which, while not perfect, certainly functions. We have term limits, for instance. We have a formalized procedure for prosecution of lower level functionaries, lawsuits for branch against branch politics, and impeachment for higher officials, which has even been invoked without leading to the ruin of the Republic. And we have that Executive pardon function.
All together, these create a system whose implicit, visceral message (for those who only function at the visceral level) is this: You have eight years. Get to the end of your term without being impeached, and you are home free…. but after that, you’re done, and can cause no more mischief.
Seeking to open prosecutions after the term, for things done during the term seems like a directly motivated end-run around those principles… un-principled though they may seem.
That is dangerous.
I resent that we Dems have to settle for second-best, instead of the Republican system of constant criminal investigations while an opposing Administration is in office. (Cisneros and his mistress, Ron Brown, a zillion Clinton investigations that turned up nothing related to their original purpose, and who knows how much else.)
“I resent that we Dems have to settle for second-best, instead of the Republican system of constant criminal investigations while an opposing Administration is in office. ”
Except that Bush didn’t actually break any laws. The religious tenets of leftism are not US laws (thank God).
The invasion of Iraq was in accordance with both UN Resolution 1441 and the US Senate authorizing it in a 77-23 vote.
I resent that we Dems have to settle for second-best, instead of the Republican system of constant criminal investigations while an opposing Administration is in office.
I actually think you have a point. I sometimes think that perhaps when a new President is sworn into office, an independent prosecutor ought to be sworn in along side. A total pain in the ass, but the legislative branch is too politically fickle to be a good check on potential malfeasance. It might be better for the President to simply know that someone is always investigating everything he (or she) does rather than have them assume they can rely on their party influence to squelch an investigation, or alternately having the other party to gin up every little thing for political gain.
That said, GWB’s adminsitration hasn’t been entirely immune to independent prosecutorial fishing expeditions. Does the name Valerie Plame ring a bell?
Andrew (#27), are you seriously insinuating that the Congress and (in at least one case) special prosecutors have not gone after the Bush administration hammer and tongs? Moreover, given that there was less cause (the disagreements with the Bush administration are largely political, while it was not the Clintons’ political shenanigans but their financial shenanigans that tended to get investigated) to investigate the Bush administration legally, you would expect fewer legal investigations and more political investigations. And that’s pretty much what there’s been: fewer special prosecutors and more Congressional inquiries.
RGL, I’m noting that no one proposed investigating the Clintons for Pardongate – which certainly, if ever anything they ever did, called for such an investigation.
I absolutely believe that no one in the Executive should be immune from prosecution. But I also believe that this is a sanction that ought to be used rarely – and in my view, primarily where they have used executive power to tamper with elections, or in areas where they have committed clearly corrupt actions. What’s being proposed in FISA, waterboarding, et al is the criminalization of policy difference, or in the case of Scooter, the criminalization of something done every damn day in Washington – the bartering of information.
I think that that path leads to the destruction of the Republic. And as much as I may prefer Obama and liberal domestic policies, I value the Republic more.
A.L.
“And as much as I may prefer Obama and liberal domestic policies, I value the Republic more.”
Another gaping chasm between AL and the leftists who dominate the Democratic party and call themselves ‘liberals’.
Go to an Obama/DNC campaign or fundraising event, and utter the above sentence, and then see if the people there are still friendly with you.
_I resent that we Dems have to settle for second-best, instead of the Republican system of constant criminal investigations while an opposing Administration is in office._
I resent as an Indepedenent to have my choices infected with the partisan back-and-forth- of the parties.
He did it first!
No, he did it!
He did it worst!
No he did.
Well he did it too!
You did it more!
Yeah, I think people need to grow up. On both sides.
Listening to Biden though, I have to say: He’s kicking the repsonsibility to the Congress. He mentions estoppel. It’s like magic fairy dust to confuse the (bitter) rubes, but if you follow it through, he seems to be talking about Congressional investigation. Congressional authority is impeachment. Time is running out. Congress is not estopped though. Ask your lawyer what estoppel means.
Will Obama, I would like this authority when I’m President, risk precedent? He will leave office, no? There is a strong line of executive power protection that is bi-partian.
What’s that behind your ear? Just angel dust.
#23: If we, as a nation, in the service of not creating a “civil war”, don’t enforce the law on the executive players, this ALSO creates a precedent, that future executives can get away with what they want.
#26: It seems to me that we have a system which, while not perfect, certainly functions.
If a civil war breaks out because an executive is prosecuted after his term (or for any other cause), the system has by definition ceased to function, and there’s no telling whether it will return post-bellum. Revolution is always a roll of the dice, even if you win. America got lucky the first time around, to have a Washington at the helm as opposed to a Cromwell, Robespierre or Ulyanov. We may not be so lucky next time.
_If there’s one thing that will decisively push me away from voting for Obama (even after Palin’s great speech last night about which more later)_ . .
Oh come on, AL, it might as well be this as Palin’s speech about her family or anything else.
Storming out because of Biden’s remarks will play as well among the right-wing claque as whatever other reason you will come up with to _dramatically_ change your vote to McCain and make you a hero, guaranteeing an Instalanche.
The only question is the timing. When do you think you can gain maximum attention to your “switch?”
hey, metrico – bite me. That’s all the answer your insult deserves. It’s kinda funny – I get about a dozen emails a week from R’s who push me to come over to their side – they make arguments, suggestions, and at worst gently mock me. I get about as many from the D side – who want me to get the hell out of their party and make that desire really really clear.
I’m kind of reminded of the line from ‘High Fidelity’:
I always thought the goal was to grow the party and win elections by big margins, not purify it in the cleansing fire of our righteousness.
Obviously, metrico, we ought to belong to different parties. I suggest you leave.
A.L.
HR #23: It’s called impeachment. It’s in the Constitution, and there’s a reason it’s hard to do. Not just the reasons we’re talking about here, but the nasty reality that sometimes you need an SOB who’s willing to break the crockery and get something done, faster than full consensus would allow. Like suspending habeus corpus for instance. (Lincoln, if you might recall.) If it’s not so far off the wall as to call down sufficient outrage for an impeachment at the time, the system is rigged to let history render the verdict, not the courts. That’s why the prosecution of Clinton was stupid, and Biden’s blather is tampering with more than he’s likely to admit.
Torture? Cry me a river. The only thing I’ve heard substantial is waterboarding three terrorist detainees, including KSM, the designer of 9/11. None are US citizens, none have any Geneva rights whatsoever, all would take as many American lives as possible if released. I’d have gladly wielded the 9mm to put them down like dogs. It’s really interesting whose rights you seem to be interested in protecting.
Perverts generally find some excuse and WoC commenters are no exception.
Leaving aside the fact that there’s probably a lot more torture out there, as soon as we choose to look, I wonder if we would hold our enemies to this relaxed standard.
Incidentally, I have no problem with executing KSM (assuming he’s guilty as charged).
Palin’s speech, I should add, made clear that she and the current Republican Party have made their peace with torture. I could never figure out how Serbia, which after all was on the good side in WW2, descended into such barbarism in the 1990s. I’m starting to see.
Relative to the so-called Pardongate, the President’s pardon power is pretty much unreviewable. Absent a canceled check labeled “bribe”, it’s not easy to see what actual crime, as opposed to immoral act, Clinton committed. It’s also worth repeating the rumor that was current in Israel at that time. Marc Rich has been an Israeli intelligence asset, and since Clinton owed the Israeli intelligence services a favor for their work in going soft on Arafat leading up to the Taba Conference, he was pardoned as a thank you. Israel wanted Jonathan Pollard but American intelligence insisted he could not be released.
As far as the main thread, although I fantasize about a witch hunt against the Bush Administration, I think in real life we should restrict ourselves to a few areas. In terms of financial corruption, those investigations are already underway. In terms of the US Attorney firings, there are some investigations underway and they should get fast-tracked. The missing investigation is into war crimes. Torture is illegal, under US law, in all cases whatsoever. (The Geneva Conventions are not relevant; the Intl Convention Against Torture applies.) There is no KSM exception, and if the USA does not take this treaty seriously, it’s a safe guess it may as well be thrown in the garbage worldwide.
_”Jack Stanley, former CEO of KBR just yesterday pled guilty, to among other things, arranging the payment of about $180 million (yeah, that’s $180,000,000) towards bribes for various and sundry Nigerians between 1995 and 2004.”_
I hope he got a really big love tool out of that. Otherwise, he should ask for a refund.
Tim (#38),
I am actually not convinced that the rules on impeachment should be so difficult. They had to be initially, because the rules of Presidential election were sufficient to essentially guarantee that the Vice President would be opposing the President, and coup by legislative fiat was a real risk. But given that the President and Vice President are now guaranteed (since Amendment XII) to be the same party, such a risk is essentially non-existent. (It would require impeaching both the President and the Vice President in very quick succession.) Maybe that’s something that should be revisited.
As to Andrew’s wet dreams, consider this: never provide a power to your political ally that you would not provide to your fiercest political opponent. Because as surely as a putative President Obama could try President Bush for policy differences, the reincarnation of Richard Nixon could take a Democratic President apart. Think about that second scenario for a few minutes, and I think you’ll see why the rest of us are quite, quite determined to keep the US from going down that road.
Actually, let me put that a little differently: I am willing to take up arms against any politician of any party rather than let that come to pass, because the Republic could survive the loss of a leader where it cannot survive the loss of the principle that we are all, at the end of the day, part of the same polity.
Joe: You think maybe there’s some zero-sum connection with the “witches shrank my p*n*s” activity over there? Hmm.
#39, Andrew Lazarus:
Palin’s speech, I should add, made clear that she and the current Republican Party have made their peace with torture.
The line you’re referencing was, in my opinion, the single most troubling (to understate) line in the entire speech. Palin may want to paint Obama as someone who wants soldiers in Afghanistan carrying Miranda card with them into battle, but her speech lets her be credibly painted as someone who’ll carelessly take away my rights if the proper suspicion falls.
I think fair-minded, thoughtful people realize that this is a seriously difficult question to address, and one that we’ll still be working out the legal and practical details of, twenty years from now. Palin does no one any credit by snarking her way through it for political points in an attack speech. I thought that was unconscionable.
(The second worst line in the speech was the reference to the dreaded Death Tax. Use that phrase near me, and your perceived IQ drops by ten points. Each time.)
Is this the line?
_Al Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America … he’s worried that someone won’t read them their rights?_
I heard that as referring to the treatment of detainees at Gitmo. Obama’s supporters include people who want to give the detainees all the rights in the Constitution. Obama’s position on FISA is strong evidence that he does not believe that. But it would be nice to ask him what rights detainees should have.
Exagerating an opponent’s position prior to knocking it down is standard political trope I heard both weeks. The other old standard is to attribute to your opponent the views of his/her supporters. McCain’s position on torture being a good example.
That is certainly the line I was thinking of, yes.
And yes, you can hear the line that way, and that may be what Palin was thinking about. You can also hear it as a reference to, e.g., Jose Padilla. Now, I try to give even politicians some reasonable benefit of the doubt in their motives and intentions, even when I disagree with their policies. But that’s because I’m a thoughtful and intelligent human being. I’m not really obligated to bend over backward to interpret a politician in the best possible light on a subject of critical importance– my rights– in her introductory speech.
She wants my vote, not the other way around, and yes I am concerned about human rights in the prosecution of this fight. Mine, in particular.
Keeping on point.On the whole it is a dumb idea if you go after Cheney and Bush. But the new escape clause of locking up everything in the Presidential Library has its drawbacks too. The subpoena issue has to resolved and hopefully in the period after the election and Jan 20th
bq “The other thing banana republics are known for is civil wars. When you make everyday politics a game for all the marbles, without limits, people eventually take the concept to its logical conclusion.”
Seriously, this is not a road they want to go down, and it is *not* something you want to be running for office on. That sort of action is beyond the bounds of acting in good faith, which is required for our system of government.
I can certainly tell you that if I held high office and my opponents pledged to throw me in jail on some BS charges, that I would do anything in my power to prevent ending up locked in a cell. *Anything*.
bq. If there’s one thing that will decisively push me away from voting for Obama….
…and, what, vote for McCain, or just not vote at all for POTUS?
Vista – not worrying about that just yet…
A.L.