No freakin' way.

As horrifying as the crimes themselves are, the real master stroke here was the Bush administration's baiting the hook with the Dems' own fears that they would be cast as weak on national security, watching them bite, and keeping them on that hook with the knowledge that any investigation of Bush would reveal their own complicity and guilt.

After seeing how Bu$h Incorporated transferred trillions of taxpayer dollars into corporate accounts, re-invigorated the "spoils" system of Pres. A. Jackson by circumventing civil service, & seized incredible executive as well as administrative power, Democrats will exploit the opportunity & change the beneficiaries of this largesse.

Dem-favored corporations will get the transfers of payments, Dem-affiliated serfs & peasants will get the bureaucratic staff appointments, & the Chicago-based Dems will run the system.

I wonder if the Judiciary Committee hearing yesterday wasn't the beginning of an attempt to obtain bi-partisan support for such a Truth Commission.  It was certainly promoted by  Schwartz from the Brennan Center.    What I saw in that hearing were some awfully committed Democrats.  They attended a 4 hour meeting on a summer Friday.  Some had to reschedule air travel to stick around.  And the Republicans were not as obstructionist as they have been in some hearings.  They were definitely grumpy and definitely had their agenda (to promote the idea that impeachment is only for abuse of power for personal gain).  But I think that some of them could be persuaded to support a Truth Commission.  Liz Holtzman was good in pointing out the lack of bipartisan support at the beginning of the Nixon inquiry and how the process itself help build the support.

Carter* 2.0. Yay.

The last one finally bit the dust with the recent FISA vote!

The Salon article linked to in this post indicates that NOT ONE legislator has spoken up for this idea...not one.  They know better than to waste their time.

The FISA vote and Obama's support ends that discussion, I'd say.

Of course you're right about Sunstein but since he's already 'in the parlor' having tea and sandwiches with Obama, it's a slam dunk that any civil libertarians are screwed with that crowd.

I'm with MarkL.

either bush will issue pre-emptive pardons to everyone who ever worked for his administration, or the democrats will be afraid to actually pursue any case, or both.

in either event, it would serve merely as a waste of time.

all necessary, but first and foremost is to UNDO THE DAMAGE: rescind the Military Commissions Act and the recent FISA revision, close Guantanamo and get the captives there to speedy trials. Then you can go about the business of encoding that which should not be needed because the bush criminality is already clear as bell ILLEGAL.

In high school, and for some in college, we see a certain group, often a clique, of people who seek out all of the elected offices--ASB prez, v-p, sec-treas, activities v-p, yearbook editor, etc.  For some reason, almost all the rest of us "humor" them, probably because we want those tasks done (maybe?) with very little effort on our part.  So we elect them.

At some point, any moderately observant "normal" person learns to recognize those seekers & may even form some generalizations about their needs.  All of our politicians are of that ilk, or lot, or tribe, or profile . . . !

That particular ilk has a few focused objectives & 2 goals--election & re-election.  A 3rd goal will sometimes come into play, the step up to higher office.  Thus, every senator & governor in the USA sees a future president in the mirror.

As per Big Tent (& any commenter with a lick of sense), pols will be pols.

Extremely rarely, a social reformer will arrive on the scene who sees political action as a means to IMPOSE a new order.  These individuals are almost never former ASB presidents; that's not the path to revolution.  There have been very few successful reformers in the USA--only ML King & civil rights in my lifetime.

On occasions, a politician will perceive that it may be useful to create a narrative that "reform" is the actual, real, true, genuine goal of his or her campaign(s).  There is no such thing in the USA.  It's always a political wolf hiding in reformer sheep's clothing.

And somebody had to be "skinned" in order to come up with the sheep's hide.

Even the hope that some reformer is in "congress assembled" or that a reform candidate will arrive & do something about anything is a faint wish for a doomed cause.

So I have the skeptical (cynical?) opinion that our 535 pols & their 2 campaigning potential leaders accurately perceive all the Bu$hInc "high crimes and misdemeanors" as a large box of very sharp tools ready at hand for their use when they acquire power.

John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton, KCVO (10 Jan 1834 to 19 Jun 1902): letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton, dated April 1887, Acton's pronouncement:

"I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men with a favourable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption, it is the other way, against the holders of power, increasing as the power increases. Historic responsibility has to make up for the want of legal responsibility. Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men."