The speaker said she had "no hesitation" criticizing the president about his handling of the war, but said there were more important priorities for lawmakers -- such as health care and creating jobs -- than the divisive pursuit of impeachment.

"Look, it's hard enough for us to end the war. I don't know how we would be successful in impeaching the president," Pelosi said.

She did note that calls for the president's removal are not coming just from San Francisco.

"I'm not unsympathetic to the concern people have -- I hear it all over the country. People here have said to me, 'Well, people on the left want the president to be impeached.' I hear it across the board across the country. It's not just the left," Pelosi said.

I've heard over and over and over again that the Democrats should impeach the President and Vice President.  Many of my friends - both on the left and in the "center" - say that the Congress is a failure if they don't impeach the President.  My response has always been that unless there's a way to somehow convince 67 United States Senators to vote for a conviction (and remember that only 49 of them are Democrats), then the Congress is better off spending its time on other issues like getting the troops out of Iraq, improving education, making it easier to join a union, and so on.  Still, fervent calls to "Impeach!!" continue, and there's a lot of frustration that the Congress isn't listening.

Well, you know what, the Congress is working on impeachment, and they're working on it hard.  For months now, both the House and Senate have been digging deeper and deeper on the Attorneygate scandal, trying to see just how involved the President and Vice President were in the decision to fire US attorneys in an act of unabashed political cronyism.  Testimony at the ongoing hearings, coupled with unprecedented use of "Executive Privilege" to compel former White House counsel not to speak with Congress, all suggest a huge and probably criminal cover-up.  (Speaking of cover-up, this week, Democrats in Congress will open hearings into the Libby commutation, which looks like yet another unprecedented abuse of presidential power.)

In order to successfully impeach, there needs to be solid evidence of criminal wrongdoing - the kind of smoking gun that Nixon faced during Watergate.  The CIA leak, the Libby commutation, and the Attorneygate scandals might provide that smoking gun after the investigation runs its course.  The Democrats, particularly Judiciary Committee Chairs John Conyers in the House and Patrick Leahy in the Senate, continue to run their investigations despite finding little public acclaim or reward for churning in minutiae.  If you're looking for impeachment, it might be best to show support for these stalwart Democratic investigators.

Even though Bush and Cheney clearly did lie to the American people to get us into the Iraq War, I really don't see 67 Senators voting to convict Bush and Cheney on charges of lying and fabricating intelligence.  But the ongoing investigations on Capitol Hill have the White House scared and stonewalling in desperation.  If the Democrats find impeachable high crimes and misdemeanors - and have evidence to prove it - then impeachment over Attorneygate and the criminal cover-ups surrounding it might become very possible.  Those of you crying out "Impeach!!" it looks like the Democrats are listening.

The number of U.S.-paid private contractors in Iraq now exceeds that of American combat troops, newly released figures show, raising fresh questions about the privatization of the war effort and the government's capacity to carry out military and rebuilding campaigns.