Nancy Is Very Bright But Doesn’t Apply Herself
Her latest excuse: Respect for appropriate legislative channels ate her homework. Politico:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi learned in early 2003 that the Bush administration was waterboarding terror detainees but didn’t protest directly out of respect for “appropriate” legislative channels, a person familiar with the situation said Monday.
The Pelosi camp’s version of events is intended to answer two key questions posed by her critics: When, precisely, did she first learn about waterboarding? And why didn’t she do more to stop it?
Pelosi has disputed a CIA document, released last week, that shows she was briefed in September 2002 on the “particular” interrogation techniques the United States had used on Al Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah. Pelosi has said she was told then only that the Bush administration was considering using certain techniques in the future — and that it had the legal authority to do so.
But there’s no dispute that on Feb. 4, 2003 — five months after Pelosi’s September meeting — CIA officials briefed Pelosi aide Michael Sheehy and Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), then the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, on the specific techniques that had been used on Zubaydah — including waterboarding.
Harman was so alarmed by what she had heard, she drafted a short letter to the CIA’s general counsel to express “profound” concerns with the tactic — going so far as to ask if waterboarding had been personally “approved by the president.”
According to the Pelosi confidant, Sheehy told Pelosi about the briefing — and later informed Pelosi, the newly elected minority leader, that Harman was drafting a protest letter. Pelosi told Sheehy to tell Harman that she agreed with the letter, the Pelosi insider said. But she did not ask to be listed as a signatory on the letter, the source said, and there is no reference to her in it.
Come on, Nancy, do you think teacher just fell off the turnip truck?
OK. Let’s say teacher accepts Nancy’s version of events. That means Nancy wasn’t paying attention in class in September 2002. And that regarding Jane doing her homework, and Nancy trying to claim it was her’s, too, Nancy is either gutless, or a big fat liar (liar, pants on fire).
Here’s a vote for gutless, from a top Dem’s aide:
Steve Elmendorf, who served as chief of staff to former Minority Leader Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.), said that coming so soon after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, it would have been difficult politically for Pelosi to do more to protest interrogation techniques the Bush administration was using.
Apparently some of the other kids might be in trouble, too, and are trying out the same line. Hey, if Nancy can do it:
An aide to former Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman John Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) took issue Monday with the entry for a Feb. 4, 2003, briefing in which a Rockefeller staffer was reportedly told “how the water board was used.”
“We are not in a position to vouch for the accuracy of the document,” a Rockefeller spokeswoman said. He “has repeatedly stated he was not told critical information that would have cast significant doubt on the program’s legality and effectiveness.”
Former Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee at the time Pelosi was briefed, told The Washington Post’s PlumLine blog that he wasn’t told of waterboarding then, either — despite a Sept. 27, 2002, briefing entry indicating he was given details of Zubaydah’s interrogation.
Here’s Iowahawk with a more plausible explanation.
But just a little more from Dem aides via Politico:
Democratic insiders acknowledge that Pelosi has not handled the media furor surrounding the interrogation briefings — and what she was told and when — in a timely or aggressive manner.
“I don’t know whether the story is overplayed or they’re misjudging it,” said a Democratic leadership aide. “I don’t know, maybe they haven’t been aggressive enough.”
This aide added: “I think they’re good at walking and chewing gum — that’s not the problem. I don’t think they recognized that this issue has the legs that it does.”
Like teacher said, Nancy is very bright but doesn’t apply herself.
Hot Air: Please, stop it.
Surber: As the Pelosi turns … wormishly, I’d say.
Malkin: There’s only one way to get the truth out of her …
Richard Cohen, Washington Post, “What If Cheney’s Right?” It’s a grudging, only moderately distorted look at a horrible possibility and its bleak consequences.
Cohen began with a “blogger alert,” and right on cue, his exercise in forbidden logic prompts friendly fire from FireDogLake … hey, what the heck is a FireDogLake, anyway? Smells like wet dog? … Balloon Juice hesitates to respond to Cohen’s “contemporary Beltway thinking” on saving thousands of American lives, but you know Balloon Juice can’t keep a cork in it. Tags it “Assholes,” which I’m beginning to think is the Balloon Juice staff’s earnest truth-in-advertising notice to readers. (Memo to BJ: See above, it actually isn’t contemporary Beltway thinking. Contemporary Beltway thinking is more along the lines of pander, accuse … and run!) Meanwhile, more cogently, Sadly No! makes a potty joke and an odd Holocaust comparison. Because imprisoning and interrogating terrorists responsible for the murder of thousands of Americans, Iraqis, Afghans and assoted other nationalities is exactly like exterminating six million Jews, I guess. OK, here’s Digby, with a plaintive whine, “The argument about torture is slipping away form us.”
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 7:55 am on Tuesday, May 12, 2009
4 Responses to “Nancy Is Very Bright But Doesn’t Apply Herself”
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May 12th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
“hey, what the heck is a FireDogLake, anyway? Smells like wet dog?”
Dog falls asleep by fire, dog’s fur catches on fire, dog leaps up howling and runs into lake. Smells like charred wet dog. Whimpers like dog in pain. Poor puppy.
May 12th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
“Very bright”?
Uh, no. Cunning does not equate to bright. Hence the term “low cunning”.
As to being a linguist, I have no opinion.
May 12th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
[...] one major reason the approval ratings for Democrats are dropping. Others in on this one include Jules Crittenden, Don Surber, NO QUARTER, The Sundries Shack, Michelle Malkin, Hot Air, and Pajamas [...]
May 12th, 2009 at 6:27 pm
Pelosi is desperately trying to justify her worm-turning to her San Francisco ultra-liberal base. But even they aren’t that stupid.