"Joy and pleasure are as real as pain and sorrow and one must learn what they have to teach. . . ." -- Sean Russell, from Gatherer of Clouds

"If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right." -- Helyn D. Goldenberg

"I love you and I'm not afraid." -- Evanescence, "My Last Breath"

“If I hear ‘not allowed’ much oftener,” said Sam, “I’m going to get angry.” -- J.R.R. Tolkien, from Lord of the Rings

Wednesday, January 22, 2020

It's About Time

This, via Digby:

Elizabeth Warren says she’ll create a federal task force to investigate corruption during the Trump administration if she’s elected president.

The Massachusetts senator on Tuesday released a plan that her campaign says will “restore integrity and competence” to government after President Donald Trump. She said that an independent task force would operate within the Justice Department and hold the previous administration’s officials “accountable for illegal activity.”

Warren also plans to ask for the resignations of all Trump political appointees and void any federal contracts that “arose as the result of corruption.”

Good. It's way past time to bring some accountability back into the government. I think one of Obama's biggest mistakes was letting the Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal off the hook. Digby takes it back farther:

It’s time to play the blame-game. Letting these Republican miscreants off the hook from Nixon on is what brought us here.

Every Democrat must be asked if they will sign on to this pledge. Otherwise, I truly fear that Trump’s criminal and unethical behavior will be the new GOP baseline. Every time we let this stuff go in the past that’s exactly what happened.

I'm not sure what she means about Nixon being let off the hook, unless she thinks he should have been prosecuted, but given that Gerald Ford's first act on succeeding Nixon was a presidential pardon, I don't see how that could have happened.

And let me point out something that should be obvious: we're talking about Republican accountability here: the Republicans will make sure that Democrats are held accountable, whether they've done something wrong or not. Democrats, sadly, don't seem to be that lacking in mercy.

This is important:

Warren's campaign also notes, however, that the task force's authority would be limited in scope and that Justice Department personnel would have independent prosecuting authority, meaning the White House wouldn't be directing its work or conclusions.

It would be nice to go back to the Justice Department being semi-autonomous, instead of an appendage of the Trump re-election campaign.

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