Is Nancy Pelosi saying that she wishes Iraq war protesters were treated like the homeless?
“Look,” she said, the chicken breast on her plate untouched. “I had, for five months, people sitting outside my home, going into my garden in San Francisco, angering neighbors, hanging their clothes from trees, building all kinds of things — Buddhas? I don’t know what they were — couches, sofas, chairs, permanent living facilities on my front sidewalk.” Unsmilingly, she continued: “If they were poor and they were sleeping on my sidewalk, they would be arrested for loitering, but because they have ‘Impeach Bush’ across their chest, it’s the First Amendment.”
The Politico reports on the same luncheon with the Speaker, and notes that she displayed a personal flaw she previously attributed to the president–an inability to own up to mistakes:
In 2004, the president came under fire when, in response to a question at a press conference, he could not think of a single mistake he had made during his presidency… At the time, Pelosi took a dim view of his comments. She could think of many mistakes the president had made. The Iraq war was a “grotesque mistake,” she said. (Bush later admitted he had erred in some ways on Iraq.) Now that the California Democrat has risen to speaker, however, she’s dodged a question about her own mistakes. Asked Tuesday whether she thought she had made any during her first nine months with the gavel, Pelosi replied that ending the Iraq war had been her “biggest challenge,” but “I won’t call it a mistake.”
I bet the people in Pelosi’s garden could help her think of a few.
