I swear

Hearings, or rather a hearing, on NSA domestic wiretapping without court orders began today and if there was any thought that the Republican Congress would actually act as a co-equal branch of government doing oversight and investigation on the Executive branch went bye-bye immediately. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was allowed to testify without being under oath. I mean why do that? The adminstration has been so truthful so far why even have an oath? Come to think of it why have W or his appointees even take an oath of office since preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States can have so many different interpretations under a unitary executive. Here is the transcript of what I like to call the continuing sad commentary of the death of accountable government.

Chairman ARLEN SPECTER (R-Bush): So the question is, should the ruling of the chair be upheld that Attorney General Gonzales not be sworn?

Sen. ORRIN HATCH (R-Bush): Aye.

Sen. CHARLES GRASSLEY (R-Bush): Aye.

Sen. MIKE DEWINE (R-Bush): Aye.

Sen. LINDSAY GRAHAM (R-Bush): Aye.

Sen. JON KYL (R-Bush): Aye.

Sen. JOHN CORNYN (R-Bush): Aye.

SPECTER: By proxy, for Sen. Brownback, aye. Sen. Coburn – We’ve got enough votes already. Sen. Leahy?

Sen. LEAHY: Emphatically, no.

Sen. KENNEDY: No.

Sen. BIDEN: No.

Sen. KOHL: No.

Sen. FEINSTEIN: No.

Sen. FEINGOLD: No.

Sen. SPECTER: Aye. The ayes have it.

Sen. FEINGOLD: Mr. Chairman, I request to see the proxies given by the Republican senators.

Sen. SPECTER: Could you repeat that Sen. Feingold?

Sen. FEINGOLD: I request to see the proxies given by the Republican senators.

Sen. SPECTER: The practice is to rely upon the staffers. But without counting that vote – Well, we can rephrase the question if there’s any serious challenge of the proxies. This is really not a very good way to begin this hearing.

So let's review. Rafael Palmeiro, put under oath. Mark McGwire, put under oath. Oil executives, not put under oath. Attorney General Gonzales, not put under oath. Truthful testimony about steroids in baseball is a higher priority for Republicans than getting the truth about spying on Americans simply because a shift manager at NSA wants to listen into your phone calls. At least there was about 4 or 5 seconds there when I actually thought there might be an actual investigatory hearing. Oh well. Back to reality.