[Vision2020] A Government That Can't Remember Anything

[Tom Hansen]

>From Bob Schieffer's commentary on today's (March 18, 2007) Face the Nation
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A Government That Can't remember Anything
By Bob Schieffer

I have a travel advisory for visitors from outer space. 

If you've been following the news lately, you can be excused for believing
that government service is harder on human memory than Alzheimer's. 

As the recent trial of Scooter Libby showed, White House work left him
unable to remember anything. 

But his problem was nothing compared to the epidemic of memory loss at the
Justice Department, where federal prosecutors got fired. The Attorney
General couldn't remember talking to his own staff about the reasons why,
where as lower officials couldn't remember whose idea it was. And nobody at
the White House could remember anything except they didn't do it. 

Among the prosecutors who got fired was one who sent a Republican
congressman to jail on corruption charges, another who did not push
corruption charges against Democrats fast enough - at least not fast enough
to please the Republican senator who complained. 

Pressuring federal prosecutors to play political games is serious business.
The president says he's not happy about it, and the attorney general says
mistakes were made. Well, of course they were. But confirming the obvious is
not enough. From the top down, the word must go out this will not be
tolerated, and those responsible must be held accountable. 

Even an alien from outer space can see that or smell it, because this one
stinks to high heaven.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho


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"Sins can be committed in ignorance, and the fact that they were committed
in ignorance doesn't cause the sin to just disappear . . . "

- Princess Sushitushi (September 10, 2006)

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