The junior senator from California on Wednesday stated publicly on national radio (the Ed Schultz Show) that in her view, impeachment of the president should be “on the table.”
' The reference, of course, was a pointed dig at Boxer’s San Francisco neighbor, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who over a year ago announced that if Democrats were to regain control of the House, impeachment would not even be considered. It would, she famously vowed, be “off the table.”
Of course, since Pelosi made that shameful declaration, brushing aside Bush’s already committed crimes against the Constitution, it has become clear that this president has been refusing to enact dozens, perhaps hundreds, of laws duly passed by the Congress, and that he has ignored the clear will of the people to have the disastrous Iraq War brought to a quick, merciful end As well, proof has mounted of presidential and vice-presidential lying to put the country at war with Iraq. Also, more recently, the vice president pushed for, and the president decided on a commutation of I. “Scooter” Libby’s sentence for perjury and obstruction of justice. Beyond that, news has come of a string of political firings of U.S. Attorneys, primarily because they had not acceded to the filing of harassing election fraud lawsuits designed to help keep Democrats away from the polls.
In short, evidence of outrageous administration lawlessness and abuse of power has been piling up for a year since Pelosi’s statement, and during her six-month stint as Speaker, during which time she has continued not just to block impeachment bills in Congress, but to work hard behind the scenes to undermine a growing grassroots impeachment movement.
Sen. Boxer’s bold statement puts impeachment front and center inside the Beltway, and in the national media. It adds new weight to the bill calling for the impeachment of Dick Cheney which Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) filed in the House on April 24, and which now has 14 additional co-sponsors.
We’re not there yet, but thanks to a growing grassroots campaign, impeachment is being forced into public and Congressional consciousness. It is reaching a point where even the most cowardly or complicit news editors will not be able to push it aside, black it out, or deride it as a “fringe” thing.
We’re getting to a point where the powerful in Congress, and the pundits and opinion makers in the media, are going to have to acknowledge that impeachment is being demanded by the public, and that it is appropriate to the crimes that are being perpetrated by the White House.
Speaker Pelosi’s position is becoming less and less tenable, and is looking more and more shrill and even ridiculous.
How, after all, can the leader of the House say that impeachment is inappropriate when the president is thumbing his nose at Congress every time they send him a bill! She and the rest of the members of Congress are well aware that if Bush doesn’t like a bill, he will just sign it and then refuse to enact it, making a joke of the whole legislative process.
How many other institutions can you think of where the members of that institution have stood idly by, hands in pockets, while their power and authority was trampled? Even on the grounds of simple ego, you would think that Congress would be rising up as one to put an end to such a travesty, and yet not one bill has been submitted calling for the president’s impeachment.
Even Kucinich’s bill is limited the vice president, and to issues of war and peace, and it says nothing about abuse of power—the really serious crime of this administration.
No wonder support for the Democratic Congress has tanked, falling to 23 percent in the latest poll on the subject. No wonder Pelosi herself has seen her popularity in California plunge to 39 percent. No wonder she’s being threatened by peace activist and Gold Star Mother Cindy Sheehan with a challenge for her seat in 2008.
But with each new member of the House who signs on to Kucinich’s H Res 333 (the latest is California Democratic Rep. Sam Farr), and with each new senator who joins Barbara Boxer in standing up and calling for impeachment, it becomes easier for the next ones to follow.
President Bush and Vice President Cheney have been having pretty much a free ride for six years, and have probably shared plenty of laughs at the Democratic “opposition” over the last six years as they steamrollered both them and the Constitution. But suddenly, things are turning around, and as is often the case in politics, they are turning quickly.
My guess is that Bush and Cheney are starting to lose sleep, wondering if they may end up facing impeachment after all. I suspect Pelosi is starting to lose sleep too, wondering if she needs to rethink her menu. --------------------
DAVE LINDORFF is co-author, with Barbara Olshansky, of "The Case for Impeachment" (St. Martin's Press, 2006, and now out in a paperback edition). His work is available at www.thiscantbehappening.net
http://www.thiscantbehappening.net
Dave Lindorff, a columnist for Counterpunch, is author of several recent books ("This Can't Be Happening! Resisting the Disintegration of American Democracy" and "Killing Time: An Investigation into the Death Penalty Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal"). His latest book, coauthored with Barbara Olshanshky, is "The Case for Impeachment: The Legal Argument for Removing President George W. Bush from Office (St. Martin's Press, May 2006). His writing is available at http://www.thiscantbehappening.net
I clear the table regularly. What's off the table tonight might be on the table tomorrow. Pelosi wanted to start with just your basic Congressional place setting, and who can blame her? She knows that the casserole's got to come out when it's ready. It's ready.
by
Steve Fournier (31 articles, 17 quicklinks, 5 diaries, 41 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 8:41:09 AM
Bush and Cheney can sleep fairly soundly. Pelosi "table" is their "waterbed".
Its good that Barbara Boxer has spoken of it being on the table.
Damn this bloody "table" is an important "table" and its not even an actual
table. Its Nancy Pelosi's agenda. Its Nancy Pelosi's mission as she sees it. Its not what Nancy took an oath to do. Its what she prefers and wants to do. The Constitution has to come first.
A Speaker of the House that wants to avoid divisiveness with a President that is acting outside the Constitution herself becomes a problem. Moderation is not ALWAYS good.
by
Brett Paatsch (0 articles, 2 quicklinks, 21 diaries, 953 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 1:47:19 PM
From Nixon, Reagan to Lil Bush we have seen a reoccurring theme of Republican lawlessness and systematic abuse of power. Isn’t it about time we asked, “Are all republicans sociopaths?”
Republicans have turned our government into a dictatorship in all but name only. Once independent federal agencies have been corrupted and subverted into Republican fiefdoms answerable to no one but the president. Bush’s never seen a covert plan to increase his power by lying, violating laws and the Constitution, he didn’t adore. This power mad monkey has no respect for our troops, our people, our country, or the rule of law. He is a sociopath.
Bush’s ascension to the throne began with a crime committed by the Republican dominated Supreme Court’s decision to appoint him president. And it’s been followed by an unprecedented Republican Crime Spree ever since. Nothing apparently bothers republican voters but illegal aliens, abortion, gays and sex scandals. They are oblivious to a multitude of crimes too numerous to list, committed by Bush and Republican Congressmen. Not war profiteering, war crimes or stolen elections. For republicans there is no law but the Law of the Jungle.
Cheney/Bush lied us into an unwinnable, illegal and insane war with less planning than a White House Easter Egg hunt. One would think we might have learned a lesson in Viet Nam, where we didn’t win with a half million troops surrounded by millions of Vietnamese guerillas. If Republicans had had their way, we’d still be fighting in Viet Nam, and still losing. The same applies to Iraq. We can bomb them into the stone age, but we can’t dominate their people.
Why has no national news agency (or the Monopoly Media) called for Bush’s impeachment?
Why has no national leader called for Bush’s impeachment?
The answer is simple, they justifiably fear him and the Almighty Republican Establishment.
But how did things get to the point that the American people fear elected and non elected (Bush & Rupert Murdoch for instance) criminals and tyrants?
Are we not “the land of the brave and the free?”
.
.
by
rabblerowzer (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 227 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 10:56:07 AM
I'm 110% in agreement with your article on impeachment I saw today. Thanks for telling it like it is.
Here's my question:
Has it occurred to you or anyone else that way back in the beginning of this sad, sick administration when NSA surveillance began on a broad scale against America's own citizens that quite possibly one of the FIRST targets of such surveillance were the members of the House and Senate themselves?
The U.S. is known to have bugged the offices of member nations of the U.N. during the run-up to the war in order to know who was "with them and who was agin''em". Why *wouldn't* a lawless administration like this do the same to the very politicians who vote this nation's laws into being??
How do you think they kept the Repugs in lock-step with votes all these years? Why do you think that Pelosi, Reid, Conyers, and the other Dems (with notable exceptions - I am a Kucinich supporter) are so freakin' timid now, paper tigers?
I have no physical proof of what I am claiming has been done in this surveillance game on Congress. BUT, shouldn't some bloggers be digging this up or just asking the question? My wife spoke to Katrina V.H. of the Nation after one of her speeches a few weeks ago and posed this surveillance question to her, i.e., would she have one of her writers dig into the possibility? She did not say "no", said that the possibility hadn't occurred to her, and would think it over.
How well-connected are you? Imagine how easy it is to cow *any* politician when you have bugged them and have whatever sort of dirt on them. Think of these neocon guys/gals as mafioso who would use any leverage, any innuendo, veiled threat to put fear and loathing into the hearts and minds of Congress.
It just makes sense to me which explains the timid Dem behavior since Nov. 2006.
I will also write this to Brad Blog and see if there is any traction.
They say you should keep your friends close and your enemies closer? Do you think that this mafia op in the US Govt. wouldn't resort to such tactics???
Thanks for your thoughts on this and whatever you can or might want to do with the idea.
In the Spirit of Peace,
Kosta Makreas
San Bruno, CA
by
Kosta Makreas (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 11:01:23 AM
While the crimes against the constitution and liberty perpetrated by this administration continue to mount impeach would seem a logical choice, but it will not happen.
Why?
The answer is simple: politics and power. The Dems believe that if they do nothing here, the administration will piss everyone off so badly that a Democratic President in 2008 will be a shoo in.
Further, by not impeaching, all the presidential powers obtained by this president will carry over to the new... DEMOCRAT president.
Thus, we can look forward to a democratically controlled congress and executive branch ready to push a FAR LEFT agenda.
I haven't missed a call with these RIGHT WING WACKOs yet, and I hate to say it, but it ain't lookin' much better with the DEMS.
The only solution I see is a grass roots independent effort to overthrow BOTH parties. Otherwise, our country as we know it is doomed.
by
David Wile (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 1 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 11:47:27 AM
Boxer and Sheehan, Kucinich, it all begins to add up. Dave is absolutely correct that it was shameful to take impeachment off the table. Yes, of course, it can be put back on and it must and soon! The rumblings of Chertov's viscera and the publication of the NIE about al Qaeda being stronger than ever suggest that Cheney has no intention of handing over the government peacefully. As long as there is a public posture that "we ain't there yet" he will continue his dark plan to "save us from ourselves."
by
James Brett (80 articles, 95 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 80 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 11:57:35 AM
http://www.sheehanforcalifornia.com Please sign up as a supporter (newsletter reader), volunteer or donor. (disclosure: site is two days old, unofficial so far, but I'm seeking to work with Sheehan's people as soon as I can make contact).
by
Marcus B (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 26 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 11:59:12 AM
Reason: nasty attacks and name calling inappropriate for this community. member who submitted it should consider this a strike one warning. You can disagree without this kind of mean spirited name-calling
Bush owns both the justice department and the supreme court. any impeachment or contempt charges will get challenged in court and guess what the ruling will be
by
mike (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 89 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 1:34:25 PM
Nor can a president claim "executive privilege" or "national security" in an impeachment hearing. that's why it's so stupid for Congress to be doing "investigations" of this administration without doing it via impeachment.
by
Dave Lindorff (315 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 151 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 1:46:42 PM
Chief Justice Roberts may "run the hearings in the senate",
(when we get past Pelosi's delays). Convict, would require the cooperation of at least sixteen Reps. (each with their own reason). Roberts is bright enough to know that to cross that large a coalition could place his head on the impeachment table.
by
Samuel Bryan (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 111 comments)
on Friday, July 13, 2007 at 11:29:58 AM
I'm not worried about that after watching the Clinton Farce.
The SCOTUS made it clear that their role in an impeachment is limited at best. I think all they do is choose in which order everyone speaks. they have no authority to tell anyone to stop speaking, whether anything is admissable, etc.
by
Steven Leser (189 articles, 35 quicklinks, 32 diaries, 1291 comments)
on Friday, July 13, 2007 at 3:19:26 PM
I'm trying to get this message to all members of the House and Senate.
Please help me. I've covered the state of Washington but they all need to hear from more than me.
Dear Congress Members and Senators:It has come to the attention of the citizens of the United States of America that you have been hamstrung by politics in the matter of impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney and President George W Bush.May I remind you that, the grievances against King George III are very much the same as the grievances “WE THE PEOPLE” have against the present administration.“WE THE PEOPLE” expect the congress and the senate to respect our forefathers, the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution.Over 50 percent of our citizens favor impeachment.“WE THE PEOPLE” expect the congress and senate to act in our behalf.I hear that many of you think that impeachment would divide our country and cause too much controversy.You may look around your own halls of congress and see that, we are already divided.My challenge to you is, take this adapted “DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE” to the floor and share it with the other members and bring it up for discussion.My second challenge to you is, send copies of this adapted Declaration of Independence out in your newsletters and emails, to your constituents and ask them for a response.Declaration of Independence[Adapted In The United States Of America July 4, 2007]The Unanimous Declaration of the Citizens United States of America From the George W Bush Administration, Corporate Control, Shadow Government, Right Wing Main Stream Media and The Military Industrial Complex When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these States; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present President of the United States is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.He has forbidden his Congressto pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operationWith Signing Statementstill his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to Obey them. He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.He has Divided representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected;With Voter Caging and Suppression of Votes, whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.He has endeavored to Increase the population of these states; for that purpose Ignoring the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and Lowering the conditions of Seeking Employment In The U.S.A, Therefore Driving Down The Wages Of The Working Class. He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.He Has Misled The American Citizens To Invade A Sovereign Nation To Gain Control Of Their Oil Resources At The Expense Of Taxpayer Funds And The Lives Of Our Young Men And Women In The Military.He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.He has combined with Corporations And The Free Press to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:For cutting off FAIR trade with all parts of the world:For imposing taxes on While Lowering Taxes On The Most Wealthy Among us without our consent:For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:For abolishing the free system of Constitutional laws in a neighboring States, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these States:For taking away our Freedoms, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:For Hamstringing our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war Against Foreign Nations.He has Ignored Our Citizens On OurRavaged Gulf Coasts, Torn Down Our Educational System, and destroyed the lives of our people.He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy of the head of a civilized nation.He has constrained our Fellow Citizens And Citizens Of Other Nations taken captive In All Lands to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.He has excited domestic insurrections Of Foreign Nations, and has endeavored to bring on the Civil Discourse In Iraq And The Middle East Oil Producing Nations, whose known Rule Does Not Conform With Our Democratic System.In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A President, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the Leader of a free people.Nor have we been wanting in attention to our Republican brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our Disappointment With Them. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.We, therefore, the Citizens of the United States of America, in Objection To The Current Administration Are , assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these States, solemnly publish and declare, that these united Citizens are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the George W Bush Administration, and that all political connection between them and the state of Corporate Oligarchy, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.
by
Ron McCallie (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 74 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 2:25:35 PM
I posted this in the comments in response to your article in Oped news but I need more help getting my message to Congress. I haven't been able to figure out how to submit an article in Oped news yet. Can you submit the article and help get the message to congress.
Thank you,
Ron McCallie
Dear Congress Members and Senators:
It has come to the attention of the citizens of the United States of America that you have been hamstrung by politics in the matter of impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney and President George W Bush.
May I remind you that, the grievances against King George III are very much the same as the grievances “WE THE PEOPLE” have against the present administration.
“WE THE PEOPLE” expect the congress and the senate to respect our forefathers, the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. Over 50 percent of our citizens favor impeachment. “WE THE PEOPLE” expect the congress and senate to act in our behalf. I hear that many of you think that impeachment would divide our country and cause too much controversy. You may look around your own halls of congress and see that, we are already divided.
My challenge to you is, take this adapted “DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE” to the floor and share it with the other members and bring it up for discussion.
My second challenge to you is, send copies of this adapted Declaration of Independence out in your newsletters and emails, to your constituents and ask them for a response.
Ron McCallie
405 S 7th St #306
Renton, Wa. 98055
Phone: 206-229-2816
Declaration of Independence
[Adapted In The United States Of America July 4, 2007]
The Unanimous Declaration of the Citizens United States of America From the George W Bush Administration, Corporate Control, Shadow Government, Right Wing Main Stream Media and The Military Industrial Complex
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these States; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present President of the United States is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Congress to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation With Signing Statements till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to Obey them.
He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has Divided representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; With Voter Caging and Suppression of Votes, whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavored to Increase the population of these states; for that purpose
Ignoring the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and Lowering the conditions of Seeking Employment In The U.S.A, Therefore Driving Down The Wages Of The Working Class.
He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He Has Misled The American Citizens To Invade A Sovereign Nation To Gain Control Of Their Oil Resources At The Expense Of Taxpayer Funds And The Lives Of Our Young Men And Women In The Military.
He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.
He has combined with Corporations And The Free Press to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:
For cutting off FAIR trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing taxes on While Lowering Taxes On The Most Wealthy Among us without our consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:
For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:
For abolishing the free system of Constitutional laws in a neighboring States, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these States:
For taking away our Freedoms, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:
For Hamstringing our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war Against Foreign Nations.
He has Ignored Our Citizens On Our Ravaged Gulf Coasts, Torn Down Our Educational System, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy of the head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our Fellow Citizens And Citizens Of Other Nations taken captive In All Lands to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections Of Foreign Nations, and has endeavored to bring on the Civil Discourse In Iraq And The Middle East Oil Producing Nations, whose known Rule Does Not Conform With Our Democratic System.
In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A President, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the Leader of a free people.
Nor have we been wanting in attention to our Republican brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our Disappointment With Them. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.
We, therefore, the Citizens of the United States of America, in Objection To The Current Administration Are , assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these States, solemnly publish and declare, that these united Citizens are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the George W Bush Administration, and that all political connection between them and the state of Corporate Oligarchy, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.
by
Ron McCallie (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 74 comments)
on Thursday, July 12, 2007 at 2:44:18 PM
