With the Democratic nomination contest finally over, Democrats now have the opportunity to put the rancor of last many months behind them and unite to defeat the Republicans in November by taking the White House and adding to our leads in the House and Senate.

Among the most important issues that will arise for the next administration is the question of accountability for the villains that preceded it in the Executive Branch.  Yesterday on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Richard Clarke suggested a "Truth and Reconciliation Commission".  Some would go farther, others less far.

But few in American politics today have as much personal knowledge and experience with the Bush Administration's lies and its mafia-style intimidation as Ambassador Joe Wilson, whom clammyc and I will be interviewing today at 2pmPST/5pmEST.  And topic we'll be covering?  Accountability for Bush and his cronies after that glorious day on which they leave office.

I had the pleasure of meeting Ambassador Wilson for the first time at a Los Angeles fundraiser for Ron Shepston.  I know there are some hard feelings in progressive blogosphere about things the Ambassador may have said about the primary race.  But Joe Wilson is and remains a true American hero willing to lay everything on the line for this country.  At the fundraiser, he gave a rousing 30 minute speech, and went well beyond the call of duty by staying past midnight to speak with all the guests, even though he had a plane to catch at 6am the next morning.  My brother Dante and I spoke with him for over an hour in an amiable (if heated at times when it came to the primary race) discussion of the current state of political affairs, and what the necessary steps will be to fix what's wrong.  And quite frankly, this strong Obama supporter came away with a great deal of admiration for the man: he's just the sort of aggressive progressive willing to take a stand for what he believes in that we need going forward.

Oh, and his book is one heck of a read, too.  After all, this is the same guy who defied Saddam Hussein to arrest and execute him by holding a press conference with a noose around his neck from the American Embassy in Kuwait, and the same guy who later took on the Bush Administration at the height of its popular and power in a defiant act of courage and patriotism--and, as he would say, of citizenship.

Of perhaps the greatest interest among the many topics covered in his speech and the conversations afterward was the subject of accountability for the Bush Administration after it leaves office.  Ambassador Wilson, sporting a new buzz cut that made him appear more ex-military than ex-State Department, wasted no time in laying out various suggestions that ranged all the way from trials for treason to interesting ideas on jump-starting war crimes tribunals abroad to obstruction of justice charges for Bushco in the wake of the Scooter Libby pardon--and those are just a few.  And that's what clammyc and I will be speaking with the Ambassador about in today's BlogTalkRadio interview.

If you're interested, come check it out and give us a listen!  In our newly unified Democratic Party, the fight to hold the Republicans accountable not only at the ballot box but also in the court of law has barely begun.