It's Not About Nancy (Silver | North Star)

[struggle4progress]

Stephen Silver

... First of all, we still don't know exactly what happened. What Pelosi was told in that briefing remains in dispute. Sen. Bob Graham, who was also there, backs up Pelosi's account, as does Congressman-turned-CIA Director Porter Goss. No one in the room was allowed to take notes, and besides – this was seven years ago. People on either side of the dispute may very well have forgotten key details.

Secondly, even if she was told about waterboarding at the time, what exactly should Pelosi have done? Come out with classified information implicating administration officials, and possibly face prosecution? Pelosi was House Minority Leader at the time. She couldn't have stopped the policy from being implemented, simply because she lacked the power to do so. I'm reminded of the core GOP belief that Barney Frank, who was the ranking committee member of the minority party at the time, is singlehandedly to blame for the entire financial crisis.

Thirdly, are we supposed to be outraged that Pelosi insulted the integrity of the CIA? The Bush-Cheney folks did that regularly for eight years, with their talk of an "anti-Bush cabal" in Langley. And I think a dispute over who said what in a meeting is considerably less of an outrage than, say, the dispute over whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

But the most ridiculous part of this story is the idea that what Pelosi did is somehow a bigger story, and a bigger outrage, than the approval and use of torture itself. It isn't – not even close. I don't see how being briefed about a policy, if she was, gives her as much culpability as having ordered the policy ...

http://www.northstarwriters.com/ss158.htm