BBQ Tips For Grilled Weasel!

In case you thought the issue of illegal domestic spying would finally be the slap in the face that spurred Senate Republicans to stop running interference for the Bush Administration, think again! Apparently the entire party is so deep in denial, deception or doo doo that they have no option but to keep piling lies upon lies upon more lies, in the hope that they can find a way to weasel out of the mess they have allowed to develop on their watch.

After pronouncing Bush’s domestic spying program “illegal,” Arlen Specter started off the “testimony” of Alberto Gonzales with the decision to allow him to forego being questioned under oath, essentially giving the Attorney General a “get out of the truth card” before he had to answer his first question! Clearly, the game plan for the Republicans was to coax Gonzales through the proceeding by eliciting carefully planned answers that will warrant no more than a slight hand slap for the President, while showing just enough concern for civil liberties to claim they care about ordinary citizens.

Fortunately, the Democrats had other ideas, seeming considerably tougher than during the Alito hearings. Russ Feingold, in particular, was brilliant with his rapid fire peppering of AG, getting him to admit, contrary to conservative claims that Bush was only doing what other presidents had done, that no other president had ignored the FISA laws since its inception in 1978. Charles Schumer also was able to cut through the shucking and jiving by getting AG to specifically decline comment on whether any US citizens had their homes bugged, or whether Bush’s political enemies had been under surveillance. This was a nice contrast to AG’s repeated qualifier that his answers referred to “the program that we are discussing today.” Certainly make you wonder what “programs” we haven’t found out about yet!

Perhaps I missed it, as I was trying to listen in while I worked, but I definitely would have liked to have heard more emphasis on the fact that the program was undertaken despite internal questions about constitutionality. By deliberately avoiding the FISA warrants, the Bush administration may have further jeopardized national security by creating a loophole that would torpedo prosecution of any terrorists they happened to catch with the program!

When it was all said and done, however, the day ended with the clear indication that the majority Republicans are going to do everything they can to “stage manage” the hearings to minimize political harm at the expense of our democracy. Unless the people rise up in November and express their outrage by voting them out of the majority, these Republicans are going to stick to their game plan of using 9/11 as a political tool to manipulate the American people until the very end!