Letters to the Editor

• Glenn

  [Read the article: Bush's magical shield from criminal prosecution]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  First, apologies if you've already addressed this in comments or articles you've recently written as I haven't had the time to read them all.

  But I'm just wondering what you think that congress should be doing, specifically, that it either isn't currently doing, or doing fast or well enough, that it has had the power and ability to do?

  For example, I am unclear as to your position on impeachment. Not if it's constitutionally warranted, as it clearly is, but whether one, it is likely to lead to conviction, and two, whether it's worth the risk if that can't be assured--and especially if it's unlikely?

  What else would you have congress do that it hasn't done yet? This is not a criticism, but a serious question. Because I myself cannot see what it could have done by now that could have meaningfully checked the administration's egregious abuses of and extraordinary assertions of power. More hearings? More subpoenas? Contempt citations? Impeachment proceedings?

  My take on congress's response to the adminstration since Dems took over is that while they've dropped the ball on any of a number of issues--especially the supplemental vote--and can be more aggressive with oversight and move things along faster, they haven't exactly been sitting around waiting for '08 and throwing the left base a bone or two to placate it (which, in any case, as anyone who reads the left-wing blogs knows, has hardly succeeded in that respect).

  Instead, what I see--and I admit that this is based as much on gut feeling and speculation as on hard evidence--is a party composed in part of a small group of people who approve of or at least don't mind the administration's policies, a small (but I believe somewhat larger) group of people who absolutely don't approve of or intend to allow these policies, and a large group of people who don't approve of these policies, to one degree or another, and are willing to take symbolic steps against them in the form of pretty speaches and meaningless votes, but are not willing to oppose them meaningfully if it requires risk and sacrifice.

  And it's been Reid and Pelosi's thankless and nearly imppossible job to somehow manage these herds of cats. And yet, despite the challenges, they've managed to make some inroads, however preliminary and as yet inconclusive. E.g. S.214, allowing oversight hearings to proceed unrestrained, the recent house vote to begin the withdrawal, and Reid's decision this week to force the Repubs to filibuster, and then to withdraw the defense authorization bill until Repubs are willing to allow a vote on the Levin-Reed amendment. No, it hasn't ended the war or Bush's usurpation of power and criminal policies. But to have done that by now would have been impossible. If I'm wrong, please show me how.

  I have come under a significant amount of personal attack recently, mostly on DailyKos but also elsewhere, including here, for mostly defending the strategy that Dems appear to have adopted, so let me lay it our here again briefly. Yes, I do think that they could be more aggressive in terms of what they do, how they do it, and how fast they do it. E.g. more hearings, more witnesses, tougher initial and followup questions, more subpeonas, issued with fewer delays, etc. And surrogate organizations should be running more ads denouncing the administration and its GOP supporters and asking people to support Dems' efforts to reign them in.

  But having said that, I think that in essense, the Dems have been persuing a smart strategy, because it's really the only viable strategy open to them under the circumstances, in which the constitution and congressional rules and longstanding custom place many limitations on congress's oversight abilities in terms of speed and aggressiveness, the GOP is almost lockstep united behind Bush, the Dems have a fractious caucus in which most either support the administration, or are too afraid and/or cynical to oppose it meaningfully, the DoJ is a political arm of the administration and GOP, the courts and media not that far behind, the public still quite clueless even if increasingly restive, a body of incrementally more dictatorial laws, executive orders, signing statements, declarations and precedents giving the administration immense de facto power, and the existance of multiple wars and threat of giving it a ready excuse to pull all sorts of even more dictatorial stunts should Dems move too fast or too hard. In light of all this, I'm amazed that there's been any oversight at all.

  (second half in next comment--exceeded 1000 words)

  Permalink Friday, July 20, 2007 03:55 PM