Pelosi's request

(from the Washington Times)

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday asked the Justice Department to open a grand jury investigation into whether Joshua B. Bolten, the White House chief of staff, and Harriet Miers, President Bush's former counsel, should be prosecuted for contempt of Congress.

Mrs. Pelosi, California Democrat, demanded that the department pursue misdemeanor charges against Miss Miers for refusing to testify to Congress about the firings of federal prosecutors in 2006 and against Mr. Bolten for failing to turn over White House documents related to the dismissals, the Associated Press reports.

The Democrat-led House voted two weeks ago to hold Mr. Bolten and Miss Miers in contempt for failing to cooperate with committee investigations.

"There is no authority by which persons may wholly ignore a subpoena and fail to appear as directed because a president unilaterally instructs them to do so," Mrs. Pelosi wrote Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey.

She added: "Short of a formal assertion of executive privilege, which cannot be made in this case, there is no authority that permits a president to advise anyone to ignore a duly issued congressional subpoena for documents."

Earth to Nancy------executive privilege HAS been asserted you moron:

"The contempt of Congress statute was not intended to apply and could not constitutionally be applied to an executive branch official who asserts the president's claim of executive privilege," Mukasey wrote, quoting Justice policy.

"Accordingly," Mukasey concluded, "the department has determined that the noncompliance by Mr. Bolten and Ms. Miers with the Judiciary Committee subpoenas did not constitute a crime."

This is your speaker of the house and the democratic leadership that remains the gift that keeps on giving.