While the rest of the blogosphere seems alight with the gang beating of Senator Obama in last night's debate, the rest of the political world did not stop turning.
CNNis reporting that Karl Rove has been asked by congress to testify on his invlovlement in the Governor Siegelman affair. Many of us (myself included) instinctively react to this as if it's a good thing, and it is. However, it occurs to me that perhaps now is not the time.
After the jump I'll explain why.
I'm sure we would all act with glee to seing Karl Rove go down in flames before our very eyes, and probably take the Bush administration with him, but let's face it. That's not going to happen.
First, because Bush and Co. will find some excuse to claim executive privilidge and so Karl Rove weill never spend a moment on the congressional hot seat. And of course we already know that the spineless wimps in congress who wouldn't stand up to Bush on anything, certainly won't use the constitutionally provided tools they have (House and Senate Sgts at arms, Capitol Police, etc.) to enforce the subpoena. Second, even if Rove did deign to plop his fat ass onto the congressional witness stand, and everything could somehow miraculously play out before the remaining 9 months of this administration are completed, Bush would just pardon him and everyone else involved anyway.
But...If we wait until Obama wins the presidency (and make no mistake, he will be our next president) then there will be nobody to claim executive privilidge and no one to pardon Rove or any of the other clowns who have been wrecking our country.
Now, I know there are some who would say that going after these guys after the fact like this is just petty and vindictive. But that argument should be limited to whatever buffoons from the neo-con disaster remain in their congressional seats after January. By then, that group will have been relegated to the status of a fringe organization. They will have been rendered impotent and discredited in the eyes of the American public.
As long as we keep the matter in perspective, it will be worthwhile. And the perspective is a virtual laundry list of treasonous and illegal acts. Even the list of the various genres of crimes is an extensive one:
War Crims
Subversion of the constitution
Election tampering and fraud
Prosecutorial Misconduct
Coverups galore
Treason
Dereliction of duty
That's just my personal short list, I'm sure we could expand this substancially. But the point is simply, that there is SO MUCH there, that in order to redeem our nation's image in the eyes of the world (to say nothing of the eyes our own citizenry) congress will have a defacto obligation to pursue these matters.
If they don't, our nation will remain forevor tarnished on the world stage. We will never be considered a credible negotiator nor a reliable partner by any other nation. We will always be suspect. Our long term national survival on the world stage may well depend on it.
So, while I was among those who were absolutely furious last year when Congress failed to compell testimony of several of the various criminal actors involved in these many and varied political dramas, at this point it seems to me at least, that for now we will have to keep our powder dry.