Given that Bush apparently did not issue broad pardons for unknown acts of criminal behavior my druthers would be for criminal prosecutions of any illegal activities by members of the prior Administration. Certainly a House or Senate hearing has some role in developing legislation or oversight of future acts….but they have to be very careful not to disclose information that might make prosecution impossible or difficult…particular of those who may have systematically committed and ordered felonies. Find enough to put a fire under a recalcitrant DOJ and President who want to look away, perhaps.

“Nobody is above the law” and “but I want to move into the future” are mutually contradictory concepts. If it applied across the board then NO criminal behavior would ever be tried. And if one says that politicians or other government officials are exempt from prosecution then no one can be EQUAL before the law.

One can legally show mercy to those who committed an act under duress, or ignorance, or because an act actually did save peoples lives (this is the “speeding to the hospital to save the life of a sick person” argument). But the flip side of hat is the fact that government officials are supposed to never commit a crime or cover one up under color of authority. It’s actually WORSE. It’s Misprision of felony.

I suppose the question to ask is what do you want the end result to be?

Do you want a few high profile criminal trials, with only that evidence that is properly linked to the charges, and appropriate under the rules of evidence brought into the public view, with the possibility that one or several mid to higher level Bushies might go to jail? or….

Do you want wide ranging evidence under oath, but not constrained by the rules of trial evidence so that eventually there emerges a sworn master narrative as to what the Bushie’s were up to in those 8 years? …I think you have to make a choice, and at least ask the question, what perhaps is best for the country.

Frankly, I don’t favor trials except for those who stonewall a congressionally mandated process. If Karl Rove won’t show up, swear, tell the truth and all — yep, quickie court trial and take him behind the barn, horse whip him first, and then shoot him. But most of all, I think the country needs a master narrative with tested evidence right now, and where necessary the Legislative Branch must be pressured to embed necessary reforms in statute law.

While the wiretapping, and the torture profoundly bothers me — I don’t get the sense that right now that is what the general public finds bothersome about the Bush Era, and thus what can be built upon with something like an Ervin or Church style Special Committee. They are concerned about the lying about Iraq Intelligence prior to authorizing the invasion, about the huge costs of that war with no obvious result worth the blood of the troops, the levels of incompetence (perhaps intentional) in so much of what Bush did — in war and in other things. They want to know why the economy collapsed as it has. Wiretapping and torture are subset tactics in all of this — they are not the main act.

Watching Barak Obama over the last couple of weeks has been so enjoyable, because this guy is a master Politician, and knows what he is doing on the large stage. I really don’t want him burdened with dealing with the Bushies and all their sins — because simply by using his gifts and skills he is finally showing Americans what a Born Politician is all about, and that it is not a negative. If what I am seeing is right — he is driving the Republicans so deep into their ideological cave, they may eventually find themselves in the same cavern with bin Laden on the other side of the world. He’s a community organizer — has the wit of some street fighters about him — and moreover I think he actually enjoys the contest. Yes, he has to clean up Bush’s messes, but more to the point I think he understands it is more critical to kill and bury the ideology that allowed for Bush in the first place. I don’t think tying that to putting a few people in jail would accomplish this — but I think six months of watching a Master Pol work within the rules of the game will.

Another thought…I got to thinking the other night about Leon Panetta, the likely CIA Director. Remembered that when Panetta was first elected to Congress he was a progressive Republican — and then it hit me why he switched parties. He was mad as hell at Rumsfeld and Cheney’s high handed way of closing down OEO in the first years of the Nixon Administration, mad enough that he converted to the Democratic Party. (Young folk — OEO was Office of Economic Opportunity, the HQ of Johnson’s War on Poverty.) I remembered it all and laughed my head off — there is no one more likely to do in what remains of Dick Cheney, and with style, than Leon Panetta.