Weak Has a Face, and It's Pelosi's

If there was any doubt before, which there wasn't, it's gone now. Watching Nancy Pelosi on The View yesterday morning provided the final proof that the backbone of the House is only as strong as its speaker. Her body language said it all. There she sat in the center of the table, sandwiched between Elizabeth Hasselbeck and the "Is the world flat? I don't know" lady, looking anxious and devoid of stately confidence. She could barely look in the eyes of America's Favorite True Believer on her left, who immediately smelled fear and pounced on her prey. "If the violence in Iraq had gone up," she started in (I'm paraphrasing), "you would be insisting that the surge was a failure. Now that the reports say it's gone down drastically, aren't you willing to admit that the surge is a success?" So what does Pelosi do? Does she make like Bill Clinton versus Chris Wallace, lean into her face and retort "young lady, don't try that little conservative hit job on me. You obviously don't know fudged numbers when you see them"? No. Instead she looks somewhere in Hasselbeck's general direction and squeaks meekly, "But that's still a lot of deaths." (I'm not paraphrasing). She then quickly changes the subject as she spends the rest of the interview leaning away from Hasselbeck and focusing on the three women on her right, wishing to God they had sat her down beside Whoopi.

But that wouldn't have been any more comforting. Whoopi was on her ass, too, about how she and her fellow Dems had failed to stop President Bush's war effort or at least elevate the level of discourse and control the debate on, uh, anything. Pelosi was a nervous wreck by then, desperately trying to tape together an impression of some sort of goal Congress had reached, and offered nothing that had actually made its way into law.

Watching those uncomfortable minutes tick by, I couldn't help thinking, "Man, if this lady can't hold her own at a table full of gossiping hens who care more about the future of Britney's babies then that of their country, no wonder impeachment is off the goddamn table!"

Barbara Walters mercifully ended the proceedings, tidily wrapping up the interview with something like "Well, Democrat or Republican, it's not important. What matters is that you're the first woman speaker of the House, and that means a lot!"

Um, no it doesn't, sorry. It doesn't mean dick when we're gonna spend a generation cleaning up after a disastrous eight-year siege of our country that no one in power has the guts to end. Madame Speaker is no different than her Senate counterpart. Reid and Pelosi are two distinguished minority leaders promoted to their level of incompetence by a frustrated electorate. Neither of them is yet able to energize their parties into accomplishing anything they were elected to do, hence their dismal poll numbers and an unfazed president who will smirk and coast his way to blissful retirement.

Comments

[bean22]

I read thousands of posts on this site, The Nation and Daily Kos and I am amazed at the petulant naivety of so many posts.

Pelosi and Reid do not have the power to do what so many of us want. Their razor thin majorities make it impossible to impeach a president, stop this war, provide health care to poor children, institute stem cell research and all the other things we wanted them to do immediately upon getting elected. Yet you write posts screaming about how they have "sold out", have no guts and have let down all those who voted for them.

The reality of U.S. politics is very frustrating to those who hate the Bush administration as much as so many of you do. But the fact of life is that nothing happens in America unless it is non-partisan, when one party or the other does not have total, complete control.

If we want that control, then we have to elect far more Democrats to the Senate and House then are there now. It's just that simple.

[Ephemera]

But she prays!

“We just pray that God’s will will be done. We pray for the children, we pray for poor people, we pray for people who need help,” she said. “And we always, always, always pray for our men and women in uniform who make our freedom to pray possible.”

Sometimes God puts you in a position where he expects you to ACT not just pray...what is that the book of James says? "To him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." Something like that anyway.

Unfortunately, Pelosi doesn't get it. She is in a position to act -- I'm sorry, but I don't have a lot of faith in her "prayers." Keep praying Nancy, and one of these days Cheney will be our nation's dick-tator and we'll no longer have the freedom to pray.

[Stevelagain]

I think you fellows are missing out on a few things.

Nancy has done away with pork spending. Nancy has put forward the path we are presently on to a balanced budget. Nancy has put together a bi-partisan committee that will soon put out a plan to fix Medicare and keep it from collapse as baby boomer's retire. Nancys next fix after medicare passes late this year will be social security early next year. Nancy has sealed the southern boarder. Nancy has given illegals a path to citizenship. Nancy has come up with more effective work permits and background checks at the boarder. Nancy has.........

Oh wait a minute, wait a minute....my nurse has just adjusted my medications. Thank you nurse, yes, I was freaking out there.

Yup, you are right.....she's done nothing. Lots of empty promises. They are spending more than republicans, want to massively expand spending, raise taxes, and have not fixed our already broken social programs.

Just another big-spending, do-nothing, corrupt party pandering but not getting anything of real importance accomplished..

[YellowDogInRedCounty]

Both Pelosi and Reid are collosal disappointments to us all. Every time I see them standing behind a microphone to make some pronouncement, she looks like a beaten dog and he looks like a comotose beaten dog. For the good of the country, not to mention their party, they should both step down and be replaced by individuals with integrity and guts. How about Kucinich for Speaker and Feingold for Senate Majority Leader? Since Kucinich won't win and Feingold won't run for the Presidency, let's use them where they can actually accomplish something good for the country and make the USA a country that is respected around the world like it was when Bill Clinton was in office.

[KnoxBlues1]

Kucinich WOULD be President if he replaced Pelosi, and Cheney-Bush were impeached, convicted and removed from office - to stand trial for war crimes.
But of course that is an unrealistic fantasy. What we're doing now makes so much more sense.
Next stop: Iran. Then, the World is our oyster!

[godlessclif]

Oo Bet youre wondring how I knew 'bout Pelosi's plans to make me blue
Impeachment was taken off the table.
To get justice; you were not able
Between Bush and me, you know I love you more.
Why not put impeachment on the floor
It took me by surprise I must say when I found out yesterday. Oo

CHORUS:
I heard it through the Nightline, Speaker Pelosi would not be mine.
Oo I heard it through the Nightline and Im just about to lose my mind.
Honey, honey yeah.

You know that a man aint supposed to cry, but these tears I cant hold inside.
Losin the war is bad you see,
Losin' the rights that make us free
You could have told me yourself,
that you were lobbied by someone else.
Instead,
I heard it through the nightline
not much longer would you be mine.

[hrholmes]

I have suppoeted and even donated to Speaker Pelosi during the last election cycle. By mid September of 2007 due to her fading credibility and lack of action when she asked for more donations I responded as follows;

Dear Speaker Pelosi,
Your primary goal should be to strengthen and lead our party before you dare ask for another dime! You have made congressional subpoenas such a joke that they are now just ignored and thrown into the trash as unenforceable liberal drivel. With all of the lies and crimes being committed by members of this administration you still present yourself and the entire democratic house as a rudderless and wishy washy leaderless group at best. Even with the full support of over 70% of the American population you still can't even utter things like 'impeach' or 'restore habeas corpus'. Your weak leadership still leaves the Republicans well in charge.

Good job gramma,

HR Holmes

At least some of the folks here at huffpo are awakening. Ain't it funny none of this ever gets onto the Dem site blogs?! WTF? Hey Howard Dean... you need to pull the stethoscope from you ears and check yourself for some balls there ol buddy!

[Dianekkdi]

I didn't contribute to her campaign thank God.

this is what I'm thinking of doing!:

The Deadline for Registering as a Repukican is Oct. 12th. Very soon. I just found this--and it is

Serendipity.

Okay so I might puke once or twice as I fill out the form.

But, Florida is a closed primary state and right now I'm an Independent. So, I can't vote in the Democratic primaries anyway.

Why not really make a statement and maybe even influence something? Could be fun.

I would seriously love the idea of being faced with a real choice come November of 2008.

Wouldn't that fantastic?

[Waitaminute]

Has subpoena from congress worked?

Has the department of justice been taken over?

WHAT ABOUT THE PENTAGON?

What about request for documentation by congress.

What was done about the outing of cia agent in time of war.

Was anybody held accountable for all the screwups on 9-11. That is, if it was not an inside job?

How long did it take to get a fake 9-11 investigation?

What about the elections. the machines, the crooked machines, the caging, the felons list, the long lines. Has anyone done anything about it?

What about alllll the liieeeees. Has anything been done about that?

Please add to this list. I think it will adds up to coup d'tate and dictatorship, fascism.

[Independent voter]

Poor Granny Pelosi - you have to feel bad for her. She sold her soul to the Republicans so that she could get the top man's job in the House.

But nobody gave her a set of balls to go along with the title.

Being the first woman 'anything' doesn't mean shit if you are a collosal failure and totally ineffectual.

What an embarrassment to women everywhere.

[bolderdash]

How wonderful, how in what's world is Nancy Pelosi afraid of anyways? A backlash from the neo-conservative Republicans, or the "Bush-lite" Democrats for afraid of taking on the pro hawkish Iraq supporters? Better to do a "fillabuster" in Congress over what you believe in ending this immoral/unethical war in Iraq, then making yourself and the Democratic party look like "chicken_ _ _ _ _". Even the "bullies" in the Republican party would respect that!

[flatus]

I think Pelosi is best described as having a perpetual "deer in the headlights" look.

...and Reid is too old to have the energy required of him.

..and so we sit in shit.

[didereaux]

Perhaps the thing NAncy Pelosi needs most in the whole world is THIS...

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1235/1472318254_ee330b8350_o.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12461951@N03/
Use the whole line including the @No3/. HuffPo's Doller Store Bogware cannot recognize some URL strings.
.

[grannyE]

YES!!!! So let's fix it. Let's add following to our Constitution:
Elected representatives (of the people, sigh) will be impeached when they are incompetent by a vote of the people.

[LibbyBuck]

Don't trash the Walgreens check in girls. They work harder than anyone in Congress does.

[Qbear]

KINK has a face...it's Republican

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2006-8/1210139/CraigRomney.jpg

[sa]

CORRECTION: "..someone must continue all investigations INTO all crimes." (whoops)