It would gladden my heart tremendously if I heard and read the word criminal used in reference to "Republicans" more often. They have been the criminal party for a long, long time, but more intensely so since the stolen election of 2000.

Testify.

We're at a point where polemic screeds are actually factually true and not an exageration. Prosecuting the RNC under the RICO statutes is actually legally plausible.

Reagan and Bush I should have been impeached and removed for Iran-Contra. Instead, Bush I pardoned even the small fish that the Democrats had contented themselves to fry in their place. For whatever reason, Bill Clinton elected not to go after them.

America needs a truth and reconciliation commission with subpoena, search warrant, and declassification powers. All witenesses can have immunity if they want it. No criminal prosecutions, no retribution, just the truth about the last 20 years. Air it all, crimes by Democrats and Republicans.

Let all the current bastards steering the ship of state into the rocks ride out their lives in ignomity and irrelevance.

Also, an amendment to put limits on the president's pardon power is essential. A lot less Executive criminality would happen if President's couldn't take care of their henchmen.

When the republicans stop politicizing crime.

or as adlai put it: "If the republicans will agree to stop telling lies about us, we'll agree to stop telling the truth about them"

Atrios points out that the motive for telco immunity is not to protect the telcos, but to protect Bush from having what really happened come out in court (or forcing him into a full on defiance of a Federal Court Order - he can beat the legislative branch usually but so far he has not dared to openly defy the Judicial).

I'm certainly not one of those who claim Democrats are the same as Republicans and that they're "all" in on it, but I do think that the push for immunity from characters like Rockefeller is an indicator that some Senators feel like they'll be embarrassed by the possible in-court revelations about how much they knew and had tolerated the illegal domestic spying for years until the NYT revealed it.

Bush's culpability far exceeds theirs, but given that Senators traditionally have better access to classified info than the House, and Rockefeller was the senior Democrat on the SSCI for all that period, he too has much at stake if this comes out. Reid was part of the gang-of-8 too, which might explain his otherwise inexplicable choice of the SSCI bill while claiming to prefer the SJC bill. He wants the immunity to pass but wants as little responsibility for it.

In the House, Pelosi would have the same motives, but not Hoyer, Emmanuel, or the new House Intel Chair, Reyes, who were not part of any of those gang-of-8 briefings. So Pelosi may be more constrained in her ability to pass a bad bill with a wink and a nod like Reid was doing. Also the House Democratic caucus is far better than the Senate version, without question. Simple mathematics says that, there are maybe 20 "bush dogs" in the House with 233 Democrats and about the same number in the Senate with 51 Democrats. So we're talking about a House with ~8% terrible Bush Democrats and a Senate with 40%.

Pelosi herself is progressive and thus aside from self-interest to avoid bad truths from coming out has less ideological sympathy for the immunity case anyway.

I think this is more likely than that Rockefeller is just being "bought" off by all those telco donations. Under this scenario, he probably went to them and said "I'm going to cover your asses and I expect you to take care of me."

Of course it's all speculation but it makes more sense to me than the more banal explanation that he's just being bribed to support something so stupid and unpopular by campaign donations. He could probably find less controversial corporatist issues to pursue that would fly lower on the radar if all he needed was campaign cash.

It seems fair to guess he has personal motive for immunity, because it wouldn't be worth the flack he is getting otherwise.

Though I have trouble explaining the umpteen other democrats who voted for this along those lines. Jim Webb has no culpability for the TSP. Is he just that authoritarian on defense matters? Maybe. But then the umpteen are not all just being bought either.

Anyway, Rockefeller is leading this charge hard, and it's one thing for democrats who roll over and surrender to bad republican policies, but usually we don't have dems leading the charge so boldly.

I just want to make a point that rattles about in my head from time to time and that is that the United States Senate is, on the whole, a terrible institution and a stain on Democracy that far more often leads to terrible regressive policy than it acts a block for it.

Occasionally the Senate blocks some bad stuff the Republicans were doing under the House of Delay, but the historical record of the Senate is far more about blocking progress than regress.

As a Canadian I really hope the Senate Reform movement up here never ever succeeds and turns our Senate into a copy of the US one. I'd rather abolish Senates everywhere than see a US style-senate. No more aristocratic elitist bodies posing as democratic institutions please.