Last week, President-elect Barack Obama said he was open to “good ideas” from anyone, even from the New York Times’ Paul Krugman. (Video here.)
“If Paul Krugman has a good idea…then we’re gonna do it,” said Obama. He was speaking about “good ideas” for his economic stimulus package at the time, but we’d written that we hoped the sentiments might extend to good ideas on any important issue that his administration might face, including some good ideas of our own that we’d offered to his transition team, who had consulted with us, as they are working on review of the dreadfully-failed U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC).
Well, as it turns out, the New York Times’ Paul Krugman does have some very good ideas, as noted in an op-ed yesterday, this time on why the Obama administration must bring accountability for the crimes of the Bush Era. The must-read column, headlined “Forgive and Forget?” begins this way…
I’m sorry, but if we don’t have an inquest into what happened during the Bush years – and nearly everyone has taken Mr. Obama’s remarks to mean that we won’t – this means that those who hold power are indeed above the law because they don’t face any consequences if they abuse their power.
Let’s be clear what we’re talking about here. It’s not just torture and illegal wiretapping, whose perpetrators claim, however implausibly, that they were patriots acting to defend the nation’s security. The fact is that the Bush administration’s abuses extended from environmental policy to voting rights. And most of the abuses involved using the power of government to reward political friends and punish political enemies.
Krugman goes on to detail, among other things, the bastardization and politicization of the Bush DoJ’s Civil Rights division, as we detailed, most recently, earlier this week following the DoJ Inspector General’s stunning report on Bush tool Bradley Schlozman’s violations of federal law in hiring practices at the Department and his subsequent lies to Congress about them.
Attorney General nominee Eric Holder said, during confirmation hearings this week, that he’d review the Bush US Attorney’s decision to not prosecute Schlozman for breaking the law and lying about it to Congress, and then later added, further encouragingly, that he believed waterboarding was torture, and that torture was illegal. Thus, our friend David Swanson argued, he was now “locked in” to prosecution of those Bush crimes.
Krugman notes in his op-ed that “at least six important government agencies experienced major scandals over the past eight years – in most cases, scandals that were never properly investigated. And then there was the biggest scandal of all: Does anyone seriously doubt that the Bush administration deliberately misled the nation into invading Iraq?”
Finally then, Krugman gets to the heart of his argument: that, in fact, Obama doesn’t have the right to not invesigate and hold the former administration accountable, if he is to keep his oath of office.
The entire last section of his column is worth quoting (and reading!):
One answer you hear is that pursuing the truth would be divisive, that it would exacerbate partisanship. But if partisanship is so terrible, shouldn’t there be some penalty for the Bush administration’s politicization of every aspect of government?
Alternatively, we’re told that we don’t have to dwell on past abuses, because we won’t repeat them. But no important figure in the Bush administration, or among that administration’s political allies, has expressed remorse for breaking the law. What makes anyone think that they or their political heirs won’t do it all over again, given the chance?
In fact, we’ve already seen this movie. During the Reagan years, the Iran-contra conspirators violated the Constitution in the name of national security. But the first President Bush pardoned the major malefactors, and when the White House finally changed hands the political and media establishment gave Bill Clinton the same advice it’s giving Mr. Obama: let sleeping scandals lie. Sure enough, the second Bush administration picked up right where the Iran-contra conspirators left off – which isn’t too surprising when you bear in mind that Mr. Bush actually hired some of those conspirators.
Now, it’s true that a serious investigation of Bush-era abuses would make Washington an uncomfortable place, both for those who abused power and those who acted as their enablers or apologists. And these people have a lot of friends. But the price of protecting their comfort would be high: If we whitewash the abuses of the past eight years, we’ll guarantee that they will happen again.
Meanwhile, about Mr. Obama: while it’s probably in his short-term political interests to forgive and forget, next week he’s going to swear to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.” That’s not a conditional oath to be honored only when it’s convenient.
And to protect and defend the Constitution, a president must do more than obey the Constitution himself; he must hold those who violate the Constitution accountable. So Mr. Obama should reconsider his apparent decision to let the previous administration get away with crime. Consequences aside, that’s not a decision he has the right to make.
Hear, hear.
THis promises to be the first really BIG ‘Disappointment” of the President Febreez administration. There is absolutely NO WAY Obam will attempt to prosecute the Busheviks, especially if he is serious about courting the Rightards, or values his own peace/quiiet after he’s no longer in office (which could be as soon as 4 years, if the Pukes obstruct the recovery, as they clearly plan to do).
there is absolutely NO precedent for prosecuting presidentiaql mal- or misfeasance AFTER they have departed. I cannot imagine anyone as cautious as Pres-El Febreez would upset the applecart…
I hope that Obama will prosecute members of the Bush Administration. It might be a destructive circus to prosecute Bush, but everyone else is more than fair game. While he is at it, he should launch a full-scale investigation into election fraud by the Republicans.
I have no idea what … woody, tokin librul means by calling Obama “Febreez”. What a set of puzzling statements.
O walks a fine line, being the first black pres. and there is a long standing tradition of the incoming pres. not provoking animus on his predecessor, so it is really up to con-gress to do the dirty work.
So nothing will happen because most of them were enablers.
The End.
Maybe Obama ought to start by carefully reading all of Kucinich’s articles of impeachment for Cheney and for Bush.
There is every posibility that the GOP will sucessfully pin the failing economy on Obama, and without the incredible margin of victory that the Obama organization provided in 2008, the GOP/private/secret control of our election system will be back front and center in 2012, which is to say they may steal 2012, and sucessfully put an end to any further reclamation of our democracy.
We must investigate and prosecute or risk all.
Watch the vanishing hope for justice with a dawning realization that the role of US president is like a suit that controls the wearer.
Tuesday will be a great day for symbolism… in reality it will be better than it was… just hardly everything that we hoped for.
I have a dream…. but so it still is just a dream.
What frightens me most is the 34% of people who think what Bush did was the right thing… and the fact that Obama is also listening to them when he does his action planning.
It is not necessarily a matter of prosecuting “Shrub” himself, or Cheney — it is, rather, a matter of conducting criminal investigations into the conduct of their minions, followed by criminal prosecutions of all who appear have committed crimes against the United States or any of the various States. This must be done, and the process begun soon, for all the reasons already stated here. The point will by any and all such successful prosecutions be amply made about Bush and, I presume, Cheney. Further, even though Bush and Cheney be not themselves prosecuted, the graft and corruption charted and displayed and proven — if any! — will cause them and their families life-long endless shame, and that as well as the criminal prosecutions will at last serve as the potential deterrents we need. But as important is at long last learning the lesson against the “free market” ideology that allowed all this, during and after the gutting of meaningful economic regulation by both federal and State governments.
[ed note: Ack! Bill, I’m sorry. We are suffering from an overactive spam filter gland around here and somehow they get by me once in a while. Sorry. –99]
Obama says he is the president of change. If enough Americans can audibly support him in being that, he should indeed begin the prosecution, etc of all those involved, and it goes way beyond Bush/Cheney/Rice, Halliburton,Rove, Rumsfield, etc.
This country has little integrity or solid basis for the future if we dont demand there be more than lip service to enforcing our constitution and laws. and if there isnt a law for this, lets make one! next, how to get Obama the support he needs to do this and survive, literally and politically.
Likely as not Obama will play “not to lose” He would not want to irritate any of those right wing supporters …not of his… in hoping to somehow gain their support through his other actions. Several of the comments that precede mine offer a similar tact.
Unless Obama directs the mechanisms of government… the congress et al to strangle the life out of the snake by instilling fear in the next wave from the right then what awaits us will be ever more furious and intense than that which we most recently experienced x 8 years.
Media and true election reform are fundamental tenets of “CHANGE!” Without change here including eliminating the lobbyist conduit of CORPORATE cash to elected officials and “approved” candidates we the people will continue to suffer decline.
Watch what the economy does over the next couple months… DEEpression politics are going to come front and center. J R
“we’re told that we don’t have to dwell on past abuses, because we won’t repeat them”
Having just returned from Rwanda, what I learned about the horrors of what occurred before, during and since the genocide is ringing very loud in my ears . One hears people all over that beautiful country repeat the words”never again”. In fact after every incomprehensible act in human history those two words are repeated…..never again. Looking through history, we see that similar and worse atrocities happen again and again; generally with little reprisal on the perpetrators. The conflict of Rwanda has just been moved across the border since some of the perpetrators are still at it.
This may seem like a harsh comparison with what has happened with the Bush administration, until you take into account all of the lives lost in the war that never should have happened. Until you look at the irreparable damage done to the environment and to the economy.
If blatant and unconscionable acts happen again and again, what makes anyone think the abuses of the past eight years won’t happen again. The rest of the world looks at Bush and Cheney as war criminals. They need to be prosecuted along with all their minions and enablers.
Mr. Krugman is right, Preident Obama doesn’t have the RIGHT OR THE LUXURY to not prosecute the leaders of the past administration.