Sam Stein
Washington was abuzz with talk of investigating the past administration but Congress and the White House were at odds. Executive branch officials were worried about the partisan fracas that would ensue. The former wanted a probe, confident that old White House hands, only recently removed from office, had engaged in a rash of criminal activity.
"We need to look at to make sure exactly what happened is known to the public and to deter any future president from doing like behavior, if it was wrong," said one well-respected member of Congress. "In that regard, if we can do it in a bipartisan fashion, I think that's what we should do. Every American benefits when you can control X abuse of power. If this was an abuse of power, then we need to know about it."
It was February 2001 not April 2009. The topic was Bill Clinton's controversial pardon of Marc Rich not the use of torture techniques on detainees. And the above quote was attributed to then-Rep. Lindsey Graham not, say, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
It is hardly rare for a politician to argue two sides of same issue during the course of a career in Washington. But as the current Congress contemplates investigating the use of harsh, even illegal interrogation techniques by Bush administration officials, the readjustments in political sensibilities is somewhat remarkable. Once hell-bent on looking into the slightest hint of malfeasance during the Clinton years, Republicans inside and out of government are now responding with disgust to suggestions that even an independent commission be set up to look into the authorization and use of torture.
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