This is getting more involved. Sargent:
“He has seen documents that would clarify exactly what the Speaker was briefed on,” Ware tells me, “including whether she was briefed on all enhanced interrogation techniques that had been used.”
Asked if those techniques included waterboarding, Ware replied: “Yes.”
We should all reserve judgment on the specifics at this point, I suppose. But the emergence of the possibility of Pelosi's and Rockefeller's enmeshment in the torture program could have, to my mind, a salutary effect on the debate.
Responsibility for creating and perpetuating the torture program lies with Bush and Cheney - but if they brought in senior Democrats who did not complain or do all they could to stop it, then those Democrats bear some responsibility as well.
And that perhaps helps the case for accountability.
If the investigation includes the current Democratic speaker as a potential target, it can hardly be dismissed as partisan. And it isn't partisan. God knows I would prefer it if the president I supported in 2000 had not committed war crimes. God knows I wish people I respect had not found a way to ignore, defend or even praise thesm. But the truth is as it is. And we need to know all of it, in context, with time, with the chips falling as they may.