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Ed Asner on Illegal War and Impeachment
By David Swanson (about the author) Page 4 of 6 page(s)
David Swanson: Well I tell you, we're going to be at the White House taking all the signatures on this "Don't attack Iran" petition, you know, Cindy Sheehan and others in the peace movement, and we'll be protesting war, but if the elections are stolen, we'll be protesting that, and I'm hoping it wont be a small crowd, but as you say, Americans are a little behind Mexicans in these things.
Ed Asner: So if those elections are stolen, who are you going to complain to?
David Swanson: Well we're going to need a country lawyer I guess (laughing).
Ed Asner: I guess.
David Swanson: You know, the other thing that's funny in this play is that these defenders of Bush and Cheney and Rummy bring out this idea that "well it's okay to do all of these things. It's okay to lie if it's not under oath." Does that idea come out of the Clinton thing where they went after him for something that nobody would have cared about except that it was under oath......
Ed Asner: Yeah....
David Swanson: Because they went after Nixon for lying to the public and Bush has lied to congress and the public and he's lied to congress in formal, written statements. Do people now believe that you can only impeach someone if they lied under oath?
Ed Asner: You know, I don't know the fine legality there. I know that's how they got Scooter Libby, but why.. there's nobody else being charged with a crime, so I guess you're right.
David Swanson: ...because it seems that they didn't go after Nixon for tax fraud, even though he broke the law, because that wasn't an impeachable offense, but they did go after him for lying to the public, even though it wasn't a crime, because it was an impeachable offense. It was a threat to our democracy.
Ed Asner: What exactly was it? What did he say? You know, it's been so far in the past and I was so eager to have him gotten, I don't know under what......there were 18 minutes missing on the tape...what was...I guess there were statements, which said well we've got to pay them this money, we've got to get it taken care of, the money from Creep was it? Again, it's now in the past and is no longer in my mind...
David Swanson: It was mostly cover-up. It was miles from being as significant as this case, where the president lied about the most important matter possible, a war. You know, and the article of impeachment about the bombing of Cambodia was not approved by the judiciary committee, so they didn't touch on war.
Ed Asner: So I think what he essentially was facing was a revolt among the Republicans themselves, and, of course, there were more Democrats around in those days.
David Swanson: Right.
Ed Asner: ...and they were wielding more control, and there was a different supreme court.
David Swanson: You know, I like this play so much because it focuses on the war rather than just the spying or the detentions or just this endless list of possible articles of impeachment, but I was surprised that it proved...you know, this play lays out strong evidence as you can that the reasons put forth for the war were lies. It wasn't the weapons of mass destruction. It wasn't the ties to 911, but then in the course of the script, this play makes a very decisive case that we have to not just show that those were lies, but also prove what the real reason was, as we prove it was about oil, although we've also earlier in the first scene proved that it was about getting votes, and if we get to impeachment in the House, are we gong to have to do that? That seems almost as difficult, you know, as proving evidence of absence or whatever Rummy might call it, I mean, wont it be enough to prove that they lied without proving what they were really all about?
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