Keeping 'em honest

Remember when Harry Reid and the Senate Democrats took the Senate into closed door session? For those who don't remember, the Democrats forced the Senate into closed door session in order (in part) to demand that the long-awaited Phase 2 of the Senate investigation into pre-war intelligence failures actually commence.

(You will recall that part of the complaint was that Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts had postponed phase 2 of the investigation over a year earlier for partisan reasons, due to the impending election. At the time of the Senate maneuver by Ried, it had been a year since the election with no movement on the second phase).

In response, Senator Roberts and others poo-poo'd the action, claiming the second phase of the report was under way, and if Reid had just asked, he would have known that it was just a couple of weeks from completion.

Really?

That was November 1, 2005. It's now been over two and a half months, and unless the media and all of the various political blogs I read all just happened to fail to cover it, no such report has been released.

This is why we can't have single party rule in this country. The Senate's job is to oversee the President, to make sure he actions are lawful and Constitutional. It is their job to look into warrantless wire tapping to determine its legality. It is their job to look into the outing of Valerie Plame. It is their job to look into the various indications (such as the three so-called "Downing Street minutes" memos) that the Administration may have lied in order to get us into war in Iraq.

It is their job to be a check and balance on the President, not a rubber stamp. You may agree with the President. You may do the investigation and determine that you don't believe he did anything wrong. But DO the investigation, don't merely brush the allegations under the carpet and refuse to let them see the light of day.

This is why it is vital that the Republican party lose control of the Senate and House in November, and do not regain it until a Democrat takes the White House. We need to do the investigations, even if the end result is that everything is fine in our national governance.

Otherwise, how can we really know?

Liam.