In the aftermath of last month's election, it's really important to focus on the powers of the House to check the executive, and, maybe more than that, to recall lessons from the past. With that in mind, and especially given the wave of love letters I've seen many of my friends penning to Speaker Pelosi, I'd like to recall the great reckoning of her last speakership.
So, just as a reminder, she was swept into the position in the 2006 midterm, shortly in reaction to a number of scandals then enveloping Bush the Younger. Just as a reminder, these included: The Abu Ghraib prisoner torture program, purveyed by the highest players in the administration; the Geneva Convention-flouting limitless detention program at Guantanamo Bay; the discovery of a sprawling warrantless wiretapping program, again OK'd and overseen by high level players in the administration; the unearthing of multiple private (and, naturally, government) military atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan; the exposure of multiple military insiders doing double duty as independent advisers to national cable media channels; the development of a sprawling, almost totally shrouded secret digital intelligence machine, and countless other horrors. These crimes were followed, naturally enough, by the largest economic crisis in modern history, replete with demonstrable financial crimes committed by our nation's largest banking and financial interests.
Those of us recalling this widespread constitutional crisis will recall well, having clawed their way back to power, the democrats systematically dismantled these abuses, launching investigations into Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib, ultimately filing criminal charges against key players like Jay Bybee and John Yoo, and canceling private military contracts. The abrupt reigning in of the wiretapping program and scuttling of the FISA courts. The Pecora Commission-style investigation into and ultimately criminal prosecution of the financial players who sent the world off a cliff into a financial apocalypse. The final withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and Iraq after canceling the AUMF. The final, hard-won battle to cancel the renewal of the USA PATRIOT Act and its elimination of posse comitatus. The strong response to the financial crisis, in which the House forced the Treasury to follow its own internal guidelines on dealing with insolvent banks, ultimately nationalizing the most malfeasant, and reorganizing them with new boards and management. And of course, providing a national jobs program to deal with the financial fallout, and perhaps best of all, placing a national moratorium on foreclosures to prevent scavenger hedge funders from capitalizing on the financial havoc wrought by the banks.
Wait, what? You don't remember any of that? Yeah, me neither. Because none of it happened. In virtually every case, precisely the opposite of every detail of that happened. And if we want to prevent past from being prologue, we simply must battle, first and foremost, with our own "leaders," to quit the long habit of capitulation with the worst ghouls of our society, and grow some fucking spine. I'm not going to hold my breath, but neither will I whitewash their really atrocious history. Pelosi may be the best we've got. But if that's true, the joke's on us, and the world will continue to pay the price in blood and treasure.
