What a Surprise- Obama's Team Wants to Investigate Bush

It's another one of those rainy mornings and, according to Obama's website, one of the top issues for his administration could be to investigate the Bush Administration for crimes. I find this interesting as it has already been reported Obama's website selects the questions and actively practices censorship. In addition, with Obama and his staff's recent Blago encounters, along with allegations of Emanuel's shortcomings in following laws, this proposed investigation of Bush is a smokescreen. The question is for what.

Here is the story:

Bush Special Prosecutor is Top Question on Obama's Change.gov, Notes After Downing Street

/PRNewswire/ -- For the second time now, President-elect Obama has asked his new constituents, the whole of the American people, to come to his web site at Change.gov to ask and vote for questions, to help set the priorities for his administration.

After five days of citizen voting more than 60,000 questions have been submitted this time in eight categories ... and the current top vote-getter across all topic categories is this one, under the topic "Additional Issues":

"Will you appoint a Special Prosecutor - ideally Patrick Fitzgerald - to independently investigate the gravest crimes of the Bush Administration, including torture and warrantless wiretapping?"

-- Bob Fertik, New York City

As noted by Ari Melber, of The Nation magazine, the same question also ranked high in the first round of voting at the Obama site. But Melber writes, "Now that Vice President Cheney confessed his support for waterboarding on national television, flouting the rule of law, the issue is even more urgent."

http://tinyurl.com/7ylmmn

According to Bob Fertik of Democrats.com, "Besides Vice President Cheney's admissions of torture, President Bush himself has admitted to illegal spying. If these actions are not prosecuted we will be sanctioning open criminality. Moreover, the Geneva Conventions require the United States to prosecute war crimes. We can stand for the rule of law or against it; the choice cannot be avoided and the question must not be."

President-Elect Obama has promised to answer the top questions on his site. In this case it would be the first time since the Pennsylvania primary, and only the second time ever, he has had to address the issue of prosecuting the crimes of the Bush-Cheney administration. On April 14 he said, "if I found out that there were high officials who knowingly, consciously broke existing laws, engaged in cover-ups of those crimes with knowledge forefront, then I think a basic principle of our Constitution is nobody above the law."

At the same time, there has been increasing speculation that President Bush, who has been relatively stingy about granting other pardons, will pardon not only Vice President Cheney, but perhaps even himself in the final minutes of his term. "If George Bush pardons Dick Cheney and himself for their crimes, the American people will be outraged," Fertik said. "Under our Constitution, Presidents swear to uphold the Constitution, not to subvert it. If a President can deliberately authorize crimes and then abuse his pardon power to protect those who commit them, we live in a dictatorship - not a democracy."

Melber believes citizen engagement is key. "With so few journalists directly asking the President-Elect about these issues, however, it is up to the rest of us to put accountability and the rule of law on the agenda."

Blagojevich Statement Less Believable Than Michael Vick...More Believable Than Drew Peterson

/PRNewswire/ -- A new national study conducted among 313 self-reported Democrats, Republicans and Independents revealed that Governor Rod Blagojevich's speech on December 19 was slightly effective in gaining support from all parties, yet viewers were still uncertain of his believability.

Prior to viewing the speech, 66% of respondents reported that Blagojevich was guilty of the allegations regarding his office. The percentage dropped slightly (55%) after viewing Blagojevich's denial speech. In addition, prior to viewing the speech, 70% of respondents indicated that Blagojevich should step down from office, compared to 54% after viewing the speech.

Although viewers slightly increased their support for Blagojevich, when asked to rate him on scales of likeability, believability and sincerity, his believability scored significantly lower than the other categories.

The study was conducted by HCD Research on December 22 to obtain Americans' perceptions of a speech by Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, on December 19, in which he denies guilt and vows to fight charges regarding his alleged scheme to sell President-elect Barack Obama's Senate seat. To view believability curves and detailed results go to: www.mediacurves.com.

While viewing the video clip, participants indicated their levels of believability by moving their mouse from left to right on a continuum. The responses were recorded in quarter-second intervals and reported in the form of curves. The participants were also asked pre and post-viewing questions.

The believability curves that were generated for Blagojevich's denial speech were compared to believability curves from previous studies conducted by HCD Research, which focused on statements from prominent figures in the media who were accused of or connected to alleged criminal activity. Below is a comparison of how Blagojevich ranks among other subjects of past studies (the higher the number, the more believable they were):

Believability Scores


Andy Petitte 61.6
Gov Spitzer 51.2
Michael Vick 47.8
Senator Craig 47.7
Gov Blagojevich 44.3
Drew Peterson 42.6
Paris Hilton 39.2


Governor Blagojevich, with a believability score of 44.3, was considered more believable than Drew Peterson and Paris Hilton and less believable than Andy Petitte, Governor Elliot Spitzer, Michael Vick and Senator Larry Craig.

Among the findings:

"Do you think Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich is guilty of the crimes he is being accused of?"

BEFORE Watching Speech

Total Democrats Republicans Independents
Yes 66% 67% 63% 68%
No 3% 1% 4% 3%
Not sure 32% 32% 34% 29%


AFTER Watching Speech

Total Democrats Republicans Independents
Yes 55% 53% 54% 58%
No 5% 5% 6% 5%
Not sure 40% 42% 40% 37%


"Do you think Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich should step down from office?"

BEFORE Watching Speech

Total Democrats Republicans Independents
Yes 70% 69% 71% 69%
No 7% 7% 6% 8%
Not sure 24% 25% 23% 23%


AFTER Watching Speech

Total Democrats Republicans Independents
Yes 54% 53% 54% 56%
No 16% 19% 15% 14%
Not sure 30% 28% 31% 30%


"Do you think the public should withhold judgment of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich until he is proven guilty or innocent of these crimes?"

BEFORE Watching Speech

Total Democrats Republicans Independents
Yes 52% 55% 56% 47%
No 27% 24% 26% 32%
Not sure 20% 22% 18% 21%


AFTER Watching Speech

Total Democrats Republicans Independents
Yes 61% 68% 61% 54%
No 23% 18% 22% 29%
Not sure 16% 14% 17% 17%

Jesse Jackson Jr. on Video with Blagojevich in August 2008

Jesse Jackson Jr. “I haven’t Met With Rod Blagojevich in 4 years”… Problem is, this video shows otherwise…
Posted: 11 Dec 2008 02:30 PM CST
The cookie continues to crumble… Barack Obama has chosen to surround himself with crooks and liars.

It was just yesterday that Jesse Jackson Jr. soberly exclaimed that he had not met Rod Blagojevich in 4 years…

I mean, that sounds odd considering the fact that Jesse is a member of the Illiniois delegation to the House of Reps, and Rod is the State governor and both come from the same party…

Anyway, here’s a video taken in Denver (thanks Ace) during the Democratic National Convention in August which shows the two men not only being in the same vicinity, but also embracing each other…

Incidentally, it wasn’t just a random hug, but a hug fest which Jesse orchestrated:
An emotional U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. called on warring Democrats to unite Wednesday at their national convention and said he wouldn’t be satisfied unless Gov. Rod Blagojevich and House Speaker Michael Madigan hugged....