All Right. Let Me Get This Straight

[ProfessorGAC]

The administration doesn't want its people testifying under oath. Some of them are talking about taking the fifth. Some of their supporters are saying this is a witch hunt and that there was no crime.

However. . . . .


When the phone taps and reading email things came along, we heard over, and over, and over, and over, "If you've got nothing to hide, you shouldn't mind the gov't looking into your affairs."

Well, that's what Congress is doing, right? They're looking into the affairs of the administration. With the power of the gov't behind them.

All of sudden, "If you've got nothing to hide. . ." has turned into "witch hunt". Isn't that what we were saying 2 years ago. Give the gov't that much power to intrude and it can turn into a witch hunt.

So, either the gov't shouldn't have these powers, or the Bush administration has something to hide.

By their own words and actions, this would appear to the be the clear binary choice.
The Professor

[helderheid]

1. I told a Freep exactly that this morning:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=511043&mesg_id=512757

[Virginia Dare]

2. Why do you hate America Professor?...n/t

[gatorboy]

3. YEAH! Back to Gilligan's Island wit' ya!

[ProfessorGAC]

8. I Only Hate 30% Of It

I'll let you surmise which 30%.
The Professor

[ClassWarrior]

9. WalMart?

:rofl:

NGU.

[ProfessorGAC]

14. Nah! They're Only About 2%

My fraction is a little more diverse. Not much though!
The Professor

[raccoon]

4. You said it, Professor! K&R nt

[raccoon]

5. Come on yall, 3 more puts this on Greatest. nt

[paparush]

6. Excellent point... n/t

[AndyA]

7. You're exactly right. Excuse me, GOP, but your hypocrisy is showing again!

Pleading the 5th to me says "we're a bunch of crooks." Sorry, but that is about all it's good for. If you haven't broken the law, it would not be necessary to plead the 5th. Period. So, it's an admission of guilt, basically.

But let's go with the "it's a witch hunt" cry. So be it. Let the Dems dig around, find nothing, then come out with egg on their faces. GOP 1, Dems 0.

But they can't do that, because crimes HAVE been committed. Laws have been broken. And I'll bet when all the pieces of this puzzle have been put together, this will be the biggest government scandal ever, bar none. I'll bet you that you can take Watergate, Iran Contra, Monica's BJ (the non-scandal), put them all together and they won't even come close to equaling the level of scandal we have with the * (mis)administration.

[ProfessorGAC]

10. Absolutely

THEY said "if you've got nothing to hide." Now, they're refusing to cooperate with the big bad government. Ergo: They've got something to hide.
The Professor

[Ganja Ninja]

11. Exactly! When it comes to your phone calls & your e-mails you

have nothing to hide and nothing to worry about. When it comes to the phone calls & e-mails of Bush's criminal gang it's "a little privacy please!" Sort of makes you feel like a second class citizen compared to them doesn't it?

[mrreowwr_kittty]

12. They think of themselves as super-citizens

They're following the dictates of their philosophical granddaddy, Leo Strauss. He told them that they are a ruling elite and not subject to the petty rules that the unwashed have to follow. And the elites must keep secrets from the rest of us. For our own good, you know.

No need to bother your pretty head about the important affairs of your betters, Professor. Look over there! There's important breaking news about Anna Nicole Smith's babydaddy! :sarcasm:

[ProfessorGAC]

16. Except They're Not My Betters

They just have more money. I've been better at everything than every one of them my whole life. Being better and being richer (or being born rich) isn't the same thing. Except in their tiny minds.
The Professor

[mrreowwr_kittty]

22. Deep in their hearts, they know that

That's why they cling so tenaciously to their illgotten power and unearned privilege.

[Alcibiades]

13. They are being consistent!

If only the guilty want to avoid testifying under oath, having their phones tapped and their records subpoenaed, then they are clearly guilty. We all know they are guilty, anyway. There's only a double standard here if they are innocent, which no one is even arguing.

[Iwasthere]

15. They also CANNOT plead the 5th

At this stage.

[Alcibiades]

25. They can

But it means they are guilty, which we knew already.

[ProfessorGAC]

19. That's Not The Contradiction, Though

My point is that the same people who supported the goverment's right to invade the privacy of private citizens, is now saying the gov't doesn't have the right to invade the privacy of its own employees, while on the taxpayers' dime.

It's not being consistent at all. They want to give the gov't power to investigate everyone even if a crime isn't being committed or planned, but want to give a pass to paid employees unless it's absolutely proven a crime was committed. That's wholly inconsistent.
The Professor

[Alcibiades]

26. It is a contradiction

Just apparently not the one you were concerned with. I had thought we were on the "only the guilty have something to hide" angle.

These same people don't believe in evolution, and therefore modern biology, but take advantage of modern medicine. Go figure.

[progressoid]

17. Ya but this is different cause...umm....well...

Oh man, I just about had an aneurysm just trying to think like a freep.

[ProfessorGAC]

20. Oh, That'll Happen!

I found that if i hold my breath as long as i can, and just as that weird tunnel vision thing starts i can just begin to think like a conservative. Not quite that oblivious, but close. Then i pass out.
The Professor

[mopinko]

18. .

[ProfessorGAC]

21. What Mo, Said

The Professor

[mopinko]

27. hiya prof

:hi: :hi:
we are so overdue for a meetup, eh??

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

23. According to this administration...

...Congress doesn't have oversight of the Executive branch, Cheney is some kind of magical 4th branch of government, and the President gets to refuse to implement any law he doesn't like. Don't expect them to start making any sense now.

[ProfessorGAC]

24. You're Right. And I'm Not

But, i do expect Congress to "explain things to them". Taking no for an answer is not an option. They must be held to account. They aren't the Sith.
The Professor

[Straight Shooter]

28. I thought that Monica G. taking the Fifth was "political grandstanding."

The Dems have been accused of that, too. Heh. :P

[yardwork]

29. I posted this on a local board this morning and suddenly

the right-wing remembered their Constitutional freedoms! Golly gee whiz!

[helderheid]

30. LOL! funny how that works :P

[yardwork]

31. Yeah, I thought they were clueless there for a while.

Turns out that I was right all along - most Republicans are selfish and greedy.

[CGowen]

32. Here is what Tony Snow said on March 22

MR. SNOW: Well, wait a minute. The 9/11 Commission, number one, was authorized by Congress and signed by the President and supported by the administration. What we were trying to do was, again, to avoid the kind of precedent that we’re talking about now, which is to bring senior aides up under oath. So what you ended up having were, in fact — I think they were categorized as briefings. They used that particular — they used that formulation for precisely the same reasons I’m talking about now.

So I don’t think this is a matter of transparency. This is a matter of trying to have — what do you mean? Condoleezza Rice was on there and she was facing tough questioning from Richard BenVeniste —

Q But certain people — the Vice President and the President would not testify under oath. You had “conversations” at that time. And there’s a —

MR. SNOW: Yes. That’s perfectly appropriate.

Q You used the word “avoid.” There is an avoidance, it seems, of this administration to sit down and talk on the record, under oath, about critical issues.

MR. SNOW: What you’re saying is that every time somebody wants to try to mount a charge you ought to be able to get hauled up and testify under oath, with a presumption of criminality, rather than a presumption of goodwill. I’m not going to buy that.


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