Thursday, July 26, 2007
A Frog In Slowly Boiling Water
Like the frog in the proverbial slowly boiling pot of hot water, America seems to be immune to great transgressions of the law. Who could have imagined democratic and republican Senators accusing an attorney general to his face of lying to them, and it being treated as just another news item? Or a President tolerating such behavior?
What continually amazes is the lack of amazement. Bush last week signed an executive order eliminating the fifth amendment rights of anybody who he deems to be a terrorist sympathizer. Did the national news networks even cover that one?
That same day, it was leaked that the Justice department would not honor contempt of congress charges against White House members.
This week we also learned that FEMA didn't test trailers in the Gulf because if the test proved they were as unhealthy as expected, FEMA would have to do something about it.
Harriet Miers, a woman who at one time was a nominee for the supreme court, refused to even show up to a hearing for which she had received a subpoena. She is allowed to not answer questions that relate to executive privilege (to be litigated in the courts), but she just blew off the hearing all together.
Every single republican on the judiciary committee also voted, all seventeen of them, against citing her for contempt. It is as if a person was headed to court, were going to plead the fifth, and just decided not to attend because they weren't going to talk anyways.
This is just part of one week's worth of news. We go on as if it's routine. Sadly, we are correct.
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