Evidently weary of hearing Democrats claim they’d heard no evil, seen no evil and done no evil, last week the CIA released documents showing several democrats in Congress, including Nancy Pelosi, had been fully briefed on water boarding and made aware that lawyers in the Bush Administration had approved this “Enhanced Interrogation Technique.”
For months Nancy Pelosi has been saying she knew nothing about water boarding. After the CIA documents were released, her spokesperson issued a carefully worded statement stating that while Pelosi had indeed been briefed about waterboarding by the CIA in 2002, the CIA had not told her it had been, was or might be used.
Imagine the Speaker of the House in August, 1945 saying that he knew we had the Atomic bomb, knew its use had been approved, knew we were at war, but never dreamed the President would actually use it against the enemy.
Pelosi is doing what any politician does when caught in a prickly patch of prevarication. She bobs. She weaves. Parses words, splits hairs and threads the needle. And although she will eventually weather the storm, the damage has been done. Republicans have been given a blunt 2 by 4 with which to bludgeon the democratic leaders in Congress, including Jay Rockefeller, who were also briefed about water boarding and never raised a hand of protest or uttered a word of objection.
Which leads to how Pelosi, et al, got trapped in this snare. For that they can thank President Obama, and some not so wise advisors at the White House who are showing a remarkable talent for not thinking before they act.
The first mistake was Obama’s announcement that he would close GITMO. Thank you, now says Congress, but you don’t get the money to close it until you tell us where those 240 terrorists living there are going to be moved. In mid-April, it was the attempt to embarrass a few Bush lawyers by releasing documents they had authored justifying the use of water boarding. Someone at the White House should have first dared to ask how many democrats on the Hill knew, and by their silence had given tacit consent to what the CIA was doing.
Politics is a game of chess. If you can’t think five or six moves out, you don’t belong at the table.
