Ever sit to yourself and wonder: "hmm...I wonder why the republicans think that just because Nancy Pelosi knew about waterboarding (assuming that's true)...that it would change anyone's mind on the torture debate"
Well I sure have. I mean, really, would it change anyone's stance on my culpability in a murder if I told someone else I was going to do it first? Does that person I told, magically assume my blame in the murder?
But then it dawned on me. The Republicans are trying to exploit an American illness called bipartisanshp.
Merck's Medical Manual defines the disease as follows:
(bi-part-is-an-ship): The irrational belief that the process of bipartisanship as a process, makes the result desirable.
So you see, if Pelosi knew about torture, well then it's not a stretch to say that the decision to torture was bipartisan--perhaps republicans don't even have to say it.
And as we all know, once something becomes "bi-partisan" the result no longer matters--bipartisanship is the desired end. So just as the stimulus bill was watered down to all hell, rendering it objectively worse, and potentially ineffective, that's fine! Getting the votes of Snowe and conservative democrats, making it "bi-partisan" somehow made it magically OK.
And so too will torture become OK in America's eyes as long as it was a product of both parties.
GREGORY: I think -- this is another example of why the administration doesn't want to go down this road. Doesn't want to get this debate. I spoke to somebody yesterday that said the problem is that nobody comes away cleanly from this debate. Not a Republican and not a Democrat. And now the House Speaker is ensnared in these questions about why she didn't push back harder and when she actually knew about the techniques. So here we are in a position where Pelosi is blaming the CIA, accusing the CIA, misleading her. and you have other Republicans who are in these briefings saying wait a minute. We were all told what was going on. We all knew what was going on. Now calls for the release of the briefing in full. And this is not where the White House wants to be. This is not the debate that it wants to have. And it just goes back to a more fundamental point which is that the more you debate this, the more you realize the politics of the time are incredibly difficult. And as many people who oppose these techniques now have to acknowledge that in 2002, there were not Democrats who were willing to stand up to the White House and say no. We are not going down this road. This is wrong for America. That debate came later. A lot of the beliefs came later because of the time nobody really wanted to get in the middle or stand in the way of techniques that might prevent another terror attack.
You see, both parties agreed--therefore it's OK. I'm glad Gregory cleared that up. As a side note, perhaps analysis like this explain his plummeting ratings?