What is Speaker Pelosi’s objective these days?

As one who tends to focus on capabilities vice intents, here’s the facts, first.

Nancy Pelosi was elected Speaker of the House on January 3, 2007 by a vote of 233 to 202, and after the 2006 congressional elections.

During the same election period, 129,000 people from the 8th District in California elected her to be their congressional representative. The 8th District is mainly San Francisco city.

She was the House Minority Leader from 2002 to 2007. This was a position elected by the then Democratic minority in the House.

Here’s some fact based reports.
· None of the promised first 100 hours House programs have become law, or even made it through the Senate.
· The House bill raising the national minimum wage had only one exception, and that was for a constituent in her District. The press called this episode Tunagate.
· Her assumption of the Speaker duties was orchestrated like a multi-day coronation.
· Her choices (nominations) for various Committee heads raised many alarms within her party and the nation as a whole.
· The recent House vote to set a timetable in Iraq along with funding for the troops is loaded with pork, or bribes using taxpayer money to many.
· During the spring recess in the House, she is on a middle east trip that appears to be less fact finding (a congressional prerogative) than assuming foreign policies of the United States and her alternatives to the President’s (not a congressional prerogative).
· During her time as the House Minority Leader she showed herself to be a very hard worker and a within-the-House vote getter.
· Her main strategy in the past (when she was in the minority) seems to be one of obstructionism. It is interesting to see how she tries to lead (when she is in the majority). This will be most difficult, I believe, and assuming leading our Nation is an objective of hers.

Here’s some report based opinions that seem like capabilities.
· She possesses a powerful ego that she does not restrain.
· She is asserting her personal politics through the Speakership, a national position.
· She is not as powerful within the Democratic Party as many are led to believe.
· She may be leading the Party to national ruin. There is a viable analogy to what Clinton did when his ego and politics superceded national politics, and the Democratic 40 years of control of the House ended in 1994. That the Democrats got control back in 2006 may have more to do with Blue-Dog Democrats than Pelosi’s brand of 8th District politics.
· She has assigned herself national responsibilities not inherent in the Speakership.
o Foreign policy
o Alternative commander in chief of the military
o Alternative presidency

So just what is her objective or objectives these days? Just because she assigns herself extra national responsibilities does not make it so. Or is she running for President at taxpayer expense?

Most people focus on the intents of others. This is most difficult. Focusing on capabilities is simpler. Speaker Pelosi’s actions and capabilities suggest she is running for President. Whether it is the USA, or the World, is still up for grabs. And all this speculation is from a base of 129,000 San Francisco fellow citizens, amplified by the Democratic Party in our House of Representatives.