Pot wants to investigate kettle...

Okay, this is getting very interesting:

"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is under renewed fire after the Obama administration released documents that critics say contradict her claim that she was never told that U.S. detainees were being waterboarded.

Rep. Pete Hoekstra (Mich.), the top Republican on House Intelligence, in an interview Friday said the document proves that Pelosi knew waterboarding occurred but has denied is because of political pressure from the liberal base of her party.

“Clearly her left wing is outraged that waterboarding was used,” Hoekstra said. “The bottom line is she and her key staff, they all knew about it.”

<snip>

Now that these documents have been released, Hoekstra is calling for additional CIA documents to be made public including some that he has read that provide a more complete account of what was discussed in lawmaker briefings.

He is also considering calling for congressional hearings on what members knew and when they knew it."

Yes, let's investigate all members of Congress, not just Pelosi, but everyone. I am all for it. Right after we are done investigating the Bush administration - which is clearly trying to switch the focus.

In addition to investigating Pelosi and the impeachment is "off the table" stance, we should also investigate Rep. Hoekstra's meetings with an Iran Contra arms dealer. From my 2006 article:

"The Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Peter Hoekstra (R-MI), has recently held meetings in Paris with a front man working for Iranian arms dealer and Iran-Contra figure Manucher Ghorbanifar, US and foreign intelligence sources tell RAW STORY.

In July 2005, it was reported that Congressmen Hoekstra had traveled to Paris along with Congressman Curt Weldon (R-PA), the No. 2 Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, to meet with Ghorbanifar front man Fereidoun Mahdavi."

In fact, I have a whole list of Congressional members of both parties who should be investigated. But I do not think Rep. Hoekstra is in a position to conduct those investigations. We need a special prosecutor for that. More importantly, we first need to nail down the Bush administration officials involved in a number of serious crimes.

In short, we need an independent body to investigate both members of Congress (and of both parties) and the abuses and crimes of the Bush administration. Congress cannot and should not investigate itself, not with the lot of representatives we have in office and their varying degrees of corruption.