Pattycake oversight won't do, Mr. Van Hollen
I (and no doubt hundreds of other people) received an e-mail earlier this week from my Congressman, Chris Van Hollen (D-MD-8), on the subject of impeaching Dick Cheney. Cutting to the chase:

While I understand the sentiments of those calling for impeachment, I am concerned that impeachment proceedings would have the effect of consuming the attention of the whole Congress, and leave little room for us to pass positive reforms and fully address the business of the American people. [...] Should the House engage in impeachment hearings, it would inevitably divert time, resources, and attention from other efforts to pass meaningful legislation to address the many needs of the country.

(I've published the full text of the e-mail separately.) Regrettably, Congressman Van Hollen thus continues to espouse the idea that impeaching Dick Cheney (and presumably George Bush) would be a "diversion" based on "sentiments" -- rather than a constitutional duty he and other House members are bound by oath to perform.*

I was particularly struck by Van Hollen's rosy view of Congressional successes to date in reining in this executive branch. After averring that "Congress must conduct aggressive oversight and investigate the Vice President's and the Administration's actions," Van Hollen wrote:

I am pleased that the 110 th Congress is taking its responsibilities seriously. The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, of which I am a member, has already held hearings on waste and fraud in spending on the Iraq War, management of Homeland Security contracts, allegations of political interference with the work of government climate change scientists, political dealings at the General Services Administration, and the leak involving Valerie Plame. We have also issued a subpoena for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to come before the Committee and discuss the Administration's flawed justifications for the war in Iraq .

Additionally, the Judiciary Committee, under the leadership of Chairman John Conyers, examined Presidential signing statements in its first hearing. They are in the midst of ongoing investigations into the Attorney General's office and the Administration's practice of using Republican National Committee e-mail accounts for official government business. The House Select Committee on Intelligence is holding hearings into abuses of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and on issues with the classification of national security information.

He has got to be kidding me.

Frankly, my little girl, her 4th grade pals and I can conduct the kind of pattycake oversight this Congress has -- powerless, ineffectual, bordering on the ridiculous. Why, if I'm not mistaken we issued a subpoena just the other day for Condoleezza Rice to appear before us -- with results no worse than what Mr. Van Hollen's committee has achieved to date.

This e-mail arrived after last week's Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) rewrite debacle, not before. In the wake of that vote (which I should note that Van Hollen opposed, to his credit) it should not only be rank and file Democrats and constitutional patriots who should be disturbed -- it should be Van Hollen.

Recapping, Congress took away the FISA court's exclusive power to issue warrants for electronic eavesdropping "directed at" foreigners, and then gave it to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales -- after they'd conclusively established in both the House and the Senate that Gonzales lies roughly every time his lips are moving.

If that's "aggressive oversight," I'm a monkey's uncle. I will of course continue to listen to Mr. Van Hollen's views, and seek to understand them and discuss them. But I will not tolerate being taken for a fool.

And more to the point, neither should Mr. Van Hollen. Oversight isn't just about holding hearings. It needs to involve consequences when you find out the person you're overseeing is conducting the nation's business badly, and especially when you find you've been lied to. And when Congress finds its constitutional obligation to conduct this kind of oversight is essentially being reduced to farce, it should reach for stronger weapons -- like impeachment proceedings.


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* The notion that a Congress busy with impeachment hearings and politics can't meet its other responsibilities is plainly a canard. As pointed out at Takoma Park Impeach Bush and Cheney, the 93d Congress, while most remembered for the impeachment hearings in the House and the investigative hearings in the Senate, was also responsible for landmark legislation such as the Employment Retirement Income Security Act, the Congressional Budget Act, and the War Powers Act.

In what Wikipedia warns is only a "partial list of notable legislation" by the 93rd Congress, I also found such obscure achievements as the Endangered Species Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act, along with the Fair Labor Standards Amendment, the Comprehensive Employment and Training Act, the Amtrak Improvement Act, the Domestic Volunteer Services Act of 1973 (VISTA), the Hazardous Materials Transportation Act, the Research on Aging Act, the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1973, the Rehabilitation Act, the Legal Services Corporation Act, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, the National Mass Transportation Assistance Act, the Vietnam Era Veterans' Readjustment Assistance Act, the Privacy Act of 1974 (what were they thinking), the Trade Act of 1974, and the National Health Planning and Resources Development Act.

I hope Mr. Van Hollen will be as impressed and inspired as I was at this record of achievement by a Congress whose attention was allegedly "consumed" by impeachment -- and that he'll no longer argue Congress must choose between impeachment and serving the American people in other ways. posted by Thomas Nephew at 11:33:00 PM -- |    

 
Discuss



I mean it. Please discuss. I'm pretty blue about this, so I may say things I'd regret later on -- say in September/October 2008. But maybe that's the problem. Meanwhile: Military Commissions Act; Iraq supplemental; now this. In or out: Dems cave -- White House applauds. Like I say, please discuss, in whatever tone you like.

Some pertinent links:

• "Protect America Act of 2007" (.PDF file) -- submitted and passed in 4 days
  
• Helpful FISA Posts -- Marty Lederman ("Balkinization")
• House roll call: 227-183 (41 Democrats voted "Aye")
  
• Senate roll call: 60-28 (15 Democrats voted "Aye")

• The Party of Fear, the Party Without A Spine, and the National Surveillance State -- Jack Balkin ("Balkinization")
  
• There is something fundamentally wrong here-- Kagro X ("Daily Kos")
• Stop Me if You Think That You've Heard This One Before -- IOZ ("Who is IOZ?")
• Yearly KOS, the Anti-War Movement, and the Cooptation of the Netroots -- Big Tent Democrat ("TalkLeft")
• My Two Cents: FISA Myths Continue After New Senate Bill Passes -- KathyInBlacksburg ("Raising Kaine")
  
  
• Statements by Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) and Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) on their "Aye" votes. Feinstein:
  

  “I spoke with Admiral Mike McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence, at length this evening. He believes the United States is vulnerable, and that we need to move quickly to change the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
  
  The intelligence community is deeply concerned that chatter among suspected terrorist networks is up. I am concerned as well. We are living in a period of heightened vulnerability, and must give the intelligence community the tools they need to protect America.
  
  This legislation is a temporary fix. It is not permanent and it expires in six months. It immediately addresses critical gaps in our intelligence-collection efforts – while preserving a role for FISA court review.
  
  I voted for both bills because one needed 60 votes to pass. It is vital that we act now. We cannot leave the nation unprotected in this post-9/11 period.”

• Urine stain removal tips
• Statement by Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) on his "Aye" vote
• Nell Lancaster's rebuttals (1, 2) at "Raising Kaine"
  

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NOTE: image by Jason Zanon ( "Democracy in Action"). Via Jonathan Schwarz ("A Tiny Revolution")
UPDATE, 8/7: Lots of very worthwhile discussion! See also posts by discussants about this, including ones by eRobin, altHippo , and the Talking Dog on their blogs, as well as one from last week by Nell Lancaster (nice title -- "Profiles in learned helplessness"). See also recent posts by commenter Mick Arran suggesting it's not cowardice or miscalculation -- (some) Democrats want those authoritarian powers for themselves, and are willing to buck contrary election results (where Dems prevailed "despite" voting for civil liberties) to get them. The hypothesis can't be dismissed out of hand -- please re-review the diagram above. Arran's latter post reanalyzes facts and arguments presented in a couple of posts by Glenn Greenwald -- Democrats' responsibility for Bush Radicalism, and Attention Democrats: GOP fear mongering does not work. Unless you're in Congress, that is. Elsewhere, fellow Marylander Stephanie Dray is disappointed with Senator Mikulski -- "she didn't have to vote this way."
posted by Thomas Nephew at 9:14:00 PM -- |    

 
Pelosi 's Choice
The weekend closes with me still processing a couple of articles reporting on Speaker Nancy Pelosi's statements on Tuesday about impeachment. As first reported by the Nation's Ari Berman:

"The question of impeachment is something that would divide the country," Pelosi said this morning during a wide-ranging discussion in the ornate Speaker's office.* Her top priorities are ending the war in Iraq, expanding health care, creating jobs and preserving the environment. "I know what our success can be on those issues. I don't know what our success can be on impeaching the president." Democratic Party leaders do not have the votes to pass an impeachment resolution. And Democrats could be judged harshly for partisan gridlock, just as the American people turned on Congressional Republicans in the 90s for pursuing the impeachment of President Clinton.

Writing for the Washington Post, Harold Meyerson reports:

Pelosi understands the gravity of the damage that the administration has done to the Constitution and why that has impelled some of her colleagues to advocate impeachment. "If I were not the speaker and I were not in Congress," she said, very quietly, as she concluded her answer, "I would probably be advocating for impeachment." But the consequences she foresees from stopping the nation's business for an unwinnable fight outweighs those considerations.

Berman:

She is greatly disturbed by the lawlessness of this Administration and its contempt for checks and balances. "I take an oath to defend and protect the Constitution, so it is a top priority for me and my colleagues to uphold that." She notes the vigorous oversight hearings held by committee chairman like John Conyers and Henry Waxman.

But Pelosi sees impeaching Gonzales and his superiors as a distraction from the ambitious agenda she has crafted for the House. ... "If I can just hold my caucus together," she says, "I can take them to this progressive place."

Pelosi's remarks can be confirmed in the transcript of Pelosi's remarks and the embedded recording to the upper right*; little about the questions posed or the broader context of Pelosi's remarks changes what is, at least to my mind, a very strange message. To recap:

1. Pelosi acknowledges she has taken "an oath to defend and protect the Constitution, so it is...
2. ...a top priority" for her and her colleagues to uphold that.
3. But because she "doesn't know what her success on impeachment could be" and because...
4. "the question of impeachment would divide the country" she opposes impeachment even though...
5. ...if she were not the Speaker and in Congress she'd probably be advocating for impeachment herself. Meanwhile...
   
6. ...if she can just hold her caucus together she can lead us to "this progressive place."
   

In response, I suppose I think

Dear Nancy,

1. I'm glad you acknowledge the oath you took, but...
   
2. ...that oath makes defending the Constitution more than "a priority," it makes it an inescapable responsibility...
3. ...whether or not you know you can succeed, and...
4. ...whether or not it would "divide the country." Here's a late breaking news flash: everything divides the country. Impeachment is a chance for you to stick up for your side of the debate and do what's right, all at the same time.
   
5. But until then, please don't ever say again that you'd advocate impeachment as a private citizen. You utterly devalue and demean that goal so many of us are working for by saying it's suddenly out of the question and off the table once you're in power. You can't have this cake and eat it, too.
   
6. Finally, wherever this "progressive place" that you're talking about is located, if it's a place where you let the Constitution burn in order to (probably not even) pass an SCHIP bill into law, I think it's frankly a stupid place to want to be.**
   

There's no doubt that Pelosi and other leadership Democrats feel they face a stark choice in the days and weeks and months ahead; do they sacrifice their principles, or do they sacrifice their policy goals?

Let me suggest that things are really simpler than that. It's clear that Democrats will not achieve more than a very small fraction of their policy goals anyway. The Senate Republicans have gotten away with making everything require a supermajority of 60 votes to pass, and what little gets past that hurdle faces a Bush veto -- even if the bill is about insuring uninsured children.

In truth, just like Sophie in the book, Nancy doesn't really have much of a choice -- but it seems a good deal clearer which choice she should make. Given her apparent lack of power in pushing her domestic and Iraq policy agendas, she is a private citizen to all intents and purposes -- but one with an oath to uphold and an office to do it from.

If it were me, I'd try to save the Constitution. That is, I'd try to save it for at least a little while, before this president or one down the road finishes it off altogether -- no doubt with this Speaker or another one wringing her hands and saying to defend it would divide the country.


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* Available via the "Maria Leavey Breakfast Series" in memory of Maria Leavey.
** And Harold Meyerson is a git for using one of the few soapboxes permitted to liberals and progressives to repeatedly insist otherwise. posted by Thomas Nephew at 3:30:00 PM -- |