Musings: We Can Handle the Truth

A light rain, dripping from the eaves, greeted Koko and me this morning, causing us to linger in the realm of drowse, delaying our walk, which is why we were out in the height of the mad-dash-to-work traffic and thus forced to stay in the wet grass alongside the road to avoid being flattened.

Would it be too much to expect that before folks get a driver’s license, they have to walk along a narrow road so as to know how it feels to have a truck with big tires fly within inches of their body?

Still, I took comfort in the gold-streaked pillars that rose above the Sleeping Giant, and found peace in the misty pink crown worn by Makaleha, the moss-green slopes of Waialeale dappled with cloud shadows.

And could anything be sweeter than last night’s sliver moon hanging cuplike beneath brilliant Venus?

Not so sweet is the muck that keeps oozing out of the legacy of the Bush Administration. Though it was forgotten, briefly, in the sheer relief of Bush's departure and giddy elation of having a capable, competent, caring man assume the Presidency, the slime just keeps slithering out from under the rugs and the doors of closed closets.

Now it’s front and center, with House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers again issuing a subpoena to former White House adviser Karl Rove. Conyers wants Rove, whose previous “absolute immunity” subpoena-skirting position was supported by Bush, to testify next week about the Bush administration’s firing of nine US attorneys and the prosecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman.

And then there’s the issue of releasing the secret Justice Department memos on Bush-era policies regarding detention, interrogation, surveillance and prosecution in the so-called "War on Terror."

In a report yesterday on Democracy Now! Siegelman made a strong case for why it’s important to start digging into the wrongdoings of the past eight years, even though many would prefer to ignore them in the interest of healing partisan wounds and focusing on other issues:

But what—this is more important than my case. As you well know, this effort of bringing Karl Rove before the Judiciary Committee is just a start to get at the truth, the truth of not only about who hijacked the Department of Justice and used it as a political tool to win elections, but it’s also a start to find out why we got into the war in Iraq. Was it for oil, or was it for weapons of mass destruction? Who authorized torture? Who authorized the wiretaps? Who was involved in stealing elections? But this is far more important than my case or Karl Rove. This is about restoring justice and preserving our democracy. And, you know, Dennis Kucinich is talking about a truth and reconciliation commission, but we need an accountability and a responsibility commission, as well. We need to make sure that those people who were involved in these nefarious activities are held accountable and are punished, so that these things are less likely to happen again in the future.”

Many people I’ve talked to would like to see these things brought into light. It rankles them to think Bush and his crew may literally get away with murder, theft and other serious crimes. So yeah, we want justice and we can handle the truth.

If Obama is to right the ship, so to speak, it seems he needs to throw off some of that moldy old baggage that threatens to rot away the hull, clear out the crap in cargo that’s causing the nation to list badly.

It goes deep to the issues of accountability and personal responsibility — virtues that we common folks are now being admonished to adopt.

As Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders observed:

I think Bush will go down in history as certainly the worst president in modern American history, if not in the entire history of our country. The damage that he did to the United States and to the world, in so many areas, will take us decades to recover from.

Of course, he didn’t do this damage alone. So let’s get Rove on the stand and start holding those where the buck stopped accountable and responsible for their despicable actions.