"Holy whiplash, Batman, isn't that exactly the opposite of what she's been saying since crowned Speaker last January? What happened there?"

Well, a person may walk in with one idea, and then change their mind when they receive new data. Despite the fact that political opponents will try to make hay out of this by accusing them of "flip-flopping," this is what rational people do.

I can't recall now what the issue was, but at one point, Arnold Schwarzenegger tried to get something passed in the California legislature, and suddenly there was a storm of opposition—from the people at large. Arnie thought about it, then said, "Okay, scratch that! Obviously, the people don't want it!" Because of things like this, I've come to the conclusion that Arnie is a helluva lot better governor than I expected him to be.

When Nancy Pelosi became Speaker of the House, she came in with an agenda. She's managed to get several of her agenda items passed, but the big one is ending the war and bringing the troops home. She's meeting lots of opposition on the Right, but she's still working hard at it. Now, her thinking on the "Impeach Bush" issue was that this would tie up Congress and be a major distraction, preventing the other items from being acted on. And, of course, she would have been right. But—she notes the clamor from a sufficiently large number of people to begin to reconsider the matter of impeachment. A substantial number of people seem to want it. So, like Arnie, she reconsiders the matter (note the literal meaning of the word: "re-consider.").

Elected officials are supposed to be responsive to what the people want.

That's what happened there.

Don Firth