Obama and Clinton cozy up to Bush

On the stump in Iowa, both Clinton and Obama have done lots of solemn nattering bout "bipartisan" cooperation, "reaching out," etc. Here Bob Parry, one of our best journalists, discusses Hillary's intention to send her husband and old Poppy Bush off n "a worldwide fence-mending tour"--a signal that the Busheviki don't have anything to fear once Hillary is president.

Parry puts this warm hint in the larger context of Bill Clinton's unforgivable decision, ack when he was first elected, not to mount inquiries into Iran-contra and Iraqgate remember that?) and whatever other high crimes Bush the Elder helped pull off. lthough Clinton had a rationale for it (and also may have struck some sort of deal with Bush), his failure to pursue those scandals was a major abdication of his duty to defend and protect the Constitution. It was also a strategic blunder that has ultimately put us all at risk, since that Bush should have gone to jail, in which case his appalling son would not now be, or seem to be, our president. (And if Clinton did cut such a deal with Bush, a fat lot of good it did him in the end.)

So here is Hillary blowing kisses at the Bushes; and, meanwhile, Barack Obama too keeps loftily pooh-poohing "partisan" behavior. In his big summary speech in Iowa the other day, while going on and on and on about the "change" that he eeps saying he represents, he said that "it's change that won't just come from ore anger at Washington, or turning up the heat on Republicans." With his aze, as ever, nobly fixed on some bright galaxy far, far away, he added: There's no shortage of anger and bluster and bitter partisanship out there. We don't need more heat. We need more light."

Now, I'm as keen on civilized relations as the next man; but if the next man
is a fascist, it would be foolish to expect him to reciprocate. And if that fascist
and his goons have broken laws, they should be prosecuted, not embraced.
We certainly do "need more light"--and we will not be getting it without
the sort of serious investigation(s) that the Clintons and Barack Obama have
ruled out. If that means "turning up the heat on Republicans," then we should efinitely bring it on.