All in favor of partisan witch hunts?

The Krugman:

Last Sunday President-elect Barack Obama was asked whether he would seek an investigation of possible crimes by the Bush administration. “I don’t believe that anybody is above the law,” he responded, but “we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards.”

I’m sorry, but if we don’t have an inquest into what happened during the Bush years — and nearly everyone has taken Mr. Obama’s remarks to mean that we won’t — this means that those who hold power are indeed above the law because they don’t face any consequences if they abuse their power.

I'd be curious as what polling says about this. Do the American people want to get to the bottom of the abuses and lawlessness? If so, it would make a tough political choice a lot more palatable. I have to admit that if the cost of getting to see Cheney frogmarched into Federal prison is no health care reform or energy bill because of the bad blood engendered by a "Truth Commission"... then I think that price is to high. I certainly would like to see the guilty punished, and think a serious investigation would do a lot to restore our reputation in the world... but I don't want to see the next four years wasted for it.

That's assuming that Bush doesn't give blanket preemptive pardons to everyone involved Monday night... not an assumption I feel safe making.