Boehner Wins BuzzFlash's GOP Hypocrite of the Week Award for Supporting National Security Only When It Makes Him Look Good

Rep. John Boehner (R-OH)

Welcome back to the BuzzFlash GOP Hypocrite of the Week.

It's amazing how much moral outrage Republicans can muster about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's accusation that the CIA lied to her about torture. The GOP must just have plenty of leftovers, since they haven't had to get upset about torture.

And, of course, House Minority Leader John Boehner is no exception. He must've thought he was being real cute when he twisted Pelosi's infamous words to indict her for sanctioning torture after he was asked about whether the California House leader should step down.

"I’m not going to take anything off the table, but I do believe that -- that the ball is in her court. And she has to either put up or have an apology and move on," Boehner said on Fox News.

As many on the left may remember (with renewed bitterness of late), Pelosi said after the 2006 midterm elections that she was taking the idea of impeachment "off the table." Yet another demonstration of the differences between Blue and Red, we suppose.

But the true hypocrisy here is Boehner's criticism of the very notion that Pelosi would accuse the hallowed CIA of lying to her. From Politico:

Boehner defended the agency's record and said it was "hard" for him to imagine "anyone in our intelligence area would ever mislead a member of Congress."

No sooner had the words come out of the Republican leader's mouth than Democratic staffers were passing around Boehner quotes in which Boehner -- you guessed it -- questioned the effectiveness of U.S. intel agencies.

On Dec. 9, 2007, CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked Boehner: "Are you suggesting, as I think you are, that you don't necessarily have confidence in this new NIE [National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq]?"

Boehner: "Either I don’t have confidence in what they told me several months ago or I don't have confidence in what they’re telling me today."

Nine months earlier, on NBC's "Meet the Press," Boehner said: "It's clear to all of us, Democrats and Republicans, that we have flawed intelligence. The CIA had bad intelligence, the Pentagon had bad intelligence and, for that matter, all of our allies around the world had the same bad intelligence."

And, as you can see in this clip at Daily Kos, Boehner has now admitted that, yes, the CIA has lied to Congress in the past. But apparently, as you can see in this clip from Keith Olbermann's Countdown, Republicans are the only lawmakers who are allowed to call out the CIA for its misdeeds.

As our own Christine Bowman pointed out earlier this week, Boehner is just part of a larger campaign to distract from the GOP's complicity in torture by attacking a Democrat who is less popular that the president.

The GOP has gone so far as to call for investigations over what Pelosi knew about torture and when she knew it, but -- of course -- not a commission to find out the same information about the people who actually sanctioned torture.

Still, Boehner himself has been on the hypocritical side (which is to say both sides at the same time) of many a national security issue. We all remember when Boehner insisted upon immunity for the telecom companies that wiretapped American citizens, but then whined and cried about being wiretapped himself.

Clearly it's more about personal and political security for Boehner himself, rather than national security for his constituents. Now that's leadership! And it's also what earned Boehner BuzzFlash's GOP Hypocrite of the Week Award.

Remember our motto: So many Republican hypocrites, so little time.

Catch up with you soon.

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This is John Boehner's second GOP Hypocrite of the Week Award. He also won September 22, 2006. You can see a list of all previous nominees here.

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