Corrupt Democrats, but it was for Israel you see

"Rep. Jane Harman, the California Democrat with a longtime involvement in intelligence issues, was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department to reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington."

It's not surprising that Democrats like Nancy Pelosi support Israel, but sometimes they're caught doing something that really makes you wonder how much influence AIPAC has in Congress. Apparently these allegations are old, but there is new evidence, reported by a journalist named Jeff Stein, which suggests former Attorney General Gonzales killed the FBI investigation of Harman because she was for the Bush administration's desire to wiretap people without warrants. In any case, this story illustrates how influential AIPAC is, and it's not being covered by mainstream media except MSNBC (Countdown with Keith Olbermann thus far) and the LA Times:

'As Stein said, "It’s true that allegations of pro-Israel lobbyists trying to help Harman get the chairmanship of the intelligence panel by lobbying and raising money for Pelosi aren’t new." Neither, he said, is the allegation that the FBI dropped its investigation of the case for "a lack of evidence."

What is new, Stein said, is word from intelligence sources about the court-approved NSA tap, and about this nugget: those same sources say the case was dropped not for lack of evidence but because of pressure from Bush Atty. Gen. Alberto Gonzales, who apparently hoped in return that Harman would help President Bush win approval for its warrantless wiretap program.'

So Bush's Attorney General obstructed an FBI investigation, killed it in fact, in order to protect a conservative Democrat who was pro-Bush in some ways, including in the very important Israel category, which can't be bad, right? I wonder if the only reason MSNBC (a very liberal news show) has covered this story is because it implicates the hated Bush administration with corruption charges. If true, both Democrats and Republicans can be accused of corruption in this case, which should not be at all surprising.