I SAW NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING - AT 7:52 P.M. ET:  Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi seems to be getting in deeper and deeper with her denials that she knew, or thought, or had cause to know, or was prompted to think, about controversial interrogation techniques.  The bottom line seems to be that she knew a great deal about the Bush administration interrogation programs, but did not protest them.  Maybe she just didn't understand the vocabulary.  Fox News reports:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi insisted Friday that she was briefed only once about the "enhanced" interrogation techniques being used on terrorism suspects and that she was assured by lawyers with the CIA and the Department of Justice that the methods were legal.

Pelosi issued a statement after CIA records released this week showed that Pelosi was briefed in September 2002 on the interrogation methods. The briefings memo appeared to contradict the speaker's claims that she was never told that waterboarding or other enhanced interrogation methods were being used.

COMMENT:  Charles Krauthammer, in a TV commentary earlier today, suggested that, by the time everything comes out about what Democrats knew regarding waterboarding and similar methods, the appetite for deep investigations will fade within the Democratic Party.

Pelosi's latest story - that she was assured that certain methods were legal - rings hollow.  If she had serious moral objections, legality would not be an issue.  One can be repelled by something that is completely legal.  It's apparent that Pelosi raised no objections because she had none.  She was briefed in the months after the 9-11 attacks, and preventing another attack was paramount in the minds of most Americans.

And yet, the political left calls for blood - insisting that the Bush administration lawyers who gave honest legal advice about the legality of the interrogation methods be either prosecuted or professionally disciplined.  This is the criminalization of politics, something they do in banana republics.  Oh, excuse me.  "Banana republic" is politically incorrect.  I meant to say, culturally rich nations producing vitamin-rich bananas for the health of the world.

May 8,  2009