As Bush&Co. isolate themselves even further in the White House Bunker with their lies, scandals, coverups and unending wars, they're becoming even more reckless and dangerous to America and its citizens. That behavior shouldn't be all that surprising: That's what happens when vicious animals are cornered.
Domestically, they're no longer even trying to hide their aversion to democracy and the Constitution. With his new Executive Order on "executive privilege," for example, Bush openly proclaims that he is untouchable by the rule of law; now there are only two branches of government-- the Legislative Branch is ignored as irrelevant -- and CheneyBush more or less control them both. More on this issue below.
Abroad, the CheneyBush Administration is preparing in the Fall to escalate the Iraq War yet again, ( http://www.abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=3382603 ) at the same time the propaganda machine is being revved-up in preparation for a coming attack on Iran. ( http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/04/17/060417fa_fact ) Both actions will help jihadi-recruiting and thus put at risk even more U.S. troops abroad and citizens at home. Plus, an attack on Iran will have far-reaching consequences with regard to Russia, China, the availability of oil, the rise of the Euro in international trade and the concomitant fall of the dollar, the impact on the U.S. economy, etc. etc.; has Bush&Co. given serious thought to any of these, and other, ramifications?
So, once again, ( http://www.crisispapers.org/essays-w/getitnow.htm ) I pose the question to previous Bush voters, to centrists and traditionally conservative Republicans: Do you finally get it? Do you understand now why the HardRight CheneyBush Administration has sunk so low in the polls and has little hope of ever getting out, thus taking the Republican Party (and, if you're an elected official, you) down the drain with them in 2008? Do you understand why, since CheneyBush will not resign, impeachment is the only constitutional way to pry their corrupt, itchy fingers from the levers of power?
Some examples here of why we're near the impeachment tipping-point, and why more and true conservative Republicans (among them many elite movers and shakers) are abandoning this sinking ship in record numbers and coming to understand that it's too risky to permit Cheney and Bush to stay in power through January 2009.
FOUNDING FATHERS & IMPEACHMENT
Though they tried for the longest time to hide it, the Bush Administration is operating on the discredited claim that the President is above the law -- nay, IS the law. (Nixon tried the same assertion when he was President -- "If the President does it, it is not illegal" -- and the Supreme Court shot him down quickly.) Cheney and Alberto Gonzales devised a theory of governance that claims the President can do whatever he wants, violate whatever laws he wants, when he's acting as "Commander-in-Chief" during "wartime."
Since the self-proclaimed "war" is an open-ended, permanent "war on terror," this theory effectively turns the presidency into a 17th-century monarchy. (Further evidence of how far into the cult of personality we've come: According to former Surgeon General Richard Carmona, his press releases had to mention Bush "three times per page.") ( http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/76600.php )
The Founding Fathers came to this country because they'd been maltreated by despotic rulers and then, as colonists, fought a war to establish their independence from a tyrannical king. There was no way to legitimately overthrow a dictatorial monarch, but they noted six times in the Constitution the one way it could be done in the new United States of America: impeachment. If an elected leader went way beyond the constitutional limits and thus was endangering the country -- in short, wa involved in high crimes and misdemeanors -- he could be, he should be, impeached before the House and tried in the Senate.
Impeachment of the president has happened only three times in our nation's history, most recently when the Republicans went after Bill Clinton for sexual behavior that most Americans agreed did not rise to the level of a high crime affecting the state.
But the alleged high crimes and misdemeanors of Cheney and Bush are directly tied to authoritarian behavior that led to, and continues to result in, death and destruction of our soldiers abroad and the mangling and shredding of our Constitutional protections and the rule of law.
EVIDENCE OF CRIMES IS SECRET
This week, persuant to Congressional committee subpoenas for documents with which to investigate various White House scandals, Bush upped the Constitutional crisis. He is preparing to assert in an Executive Order that the Legislative Branch could pass all the contempt citations it wants, but U.S. Attorneys would be instructed not to pursue these criminal charges when the President says that documents are off-limits because of "executive privilege." ( http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/07/20/executive_privilege/email.html ) In short, the Legislative Branch would be receiving no documents, nada, zilch.
Cheney, several weeks earlier, refused to produce documents demanded under law by the National Archives since, he claimed, he was not part of the Executive Branch. Former White House Counsel Harriet Miers likewise refused for the second time to abide by a subpoena to appear before a House investigatory panel examining the politicized firing of U.S. Attorneys. Yep, "executive privilege" again.
What Bush and Cheney are saying, clearly and arrogantly, is: You'll never get the evidentiary documents or testimony you're looking for. If you want 'em, you'll have to take us to court, and we can stall and appeal forever until one of our hand-picked courts backs our position. Or you can put impeachment back "on the table" and try to get us in front of your House panel, and that ain't gonna happen either. Just lie back and enjoy it.
Bernard Weiner, Ph.D. in government & international relations, has taught at universities in California and Washington, worked for two decades as a writer-editor at the San Francisco Chronicle, and currently serves as co-editor of The Crisis Papers (www.crisispapers.org).
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