Impeach Bush-Cheney steering committee met yesterday, to assess the post-election situation, and set our course for the next few months. Here's what we concluded:
We the people have a new challenge- to convince the newly-elected Democratic House of Representatives that the people's will is to impeach Bush and Cheney. This is urgent, because Reps. Pelosi and Conyers, the incoming Democratic Speaker and Chair of the Judiciary Committee, are telling us that "impeachment is not on the table".
We're not going to let them get away with it. Impeach Bush-Cheney (IBC) has a greater task than ever, and it will be very intense the next few months as we pressure the incoming Congress to make impeachment the top priority.
We demand justice, and accountability for crimes committed by high officials. Bush wants to be dictator, and will be very dangerous as long as he has any power. The Democrats should NOT be colluding with criminals. One doesn't cooperate with such people, one prosecutes them.
Congresspeople have sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution and defend it from all enemies, foreign AND DOMESTIC. Let's hold them to it. Bush and Cheney are the greatest enemies the Constitution has ever known. They have systematically destroyed the basic balance of powers among the the three branches of government, and have gutted the Bill of Rights.
Our Constitution is precious. It lays the basis for our sovereignty, our right to govern ourselves as "we the people", rather than to be ruled by the president or a new King George. Let's defend it with all we have.
IBC established its credibility and earned the respect of other Bay Area peace groups with our event on 10-31, when we gave Nancy Pelosi's SF office 12,000 signatures for impeachment. Carnival of Horrors went beautifully and was well covered by local news channels.
We have ambitious plans for the next few months. We feel an urgency, not wanting the momentum of the people's will, as expressed in last week's election, to be lost.
We in IBC see that Pelosi and the Democrats are trying to convince the people that impeachment would be "retaliatory", "divisive", "obstructive of more important tasks". We are afraid these "spins",- call them lies,- will diffuse the new sense of power that "we the people" now feel, and redirect the people's mandate into what the power elite consider "safe" channels.
IBC's plans include ongoing bannering and tabling, several public events, visits to all local Congresspeople, and a campaign of radio call-ins, using talking points that we are developing to systematically rebut the arguments of the Democrats. We will continue to work closely with other groups, such as Code Pink, World Can't Wait, anti torture groups, peace groups, Greens, PDA.
Our video, High Crimes, being developed by members Jacob and Bob Clapsadle, through their company Paradise Cove Productions, is being released just in time for this post-election season.
WE NEED HELP! The core group of about 10 volunteers has accomplished amazing things this past year. Now we need to hire staff, banner and table more extensively, mobilize people to call the talk shows and write letters to the editor, etc, etc.
WE NEED MONEY. We estimate it will cost $1000/ month for the next few months to accomplish our goal- to create an IMPEACHMENT TSUNAMI. If you are a silent supporter of impeachment but not actively working on it, make a monthly pledge to support what activists are doing.
If you live in the Bay Area, and want to help fundraise, or table, etc, but can't make it to our meetings (pretty much every Sunday, 3 pm, at the IBC office- 2161 Allston Way, Berkeley- call one of us-
Carol S. Wolman, MD is a psychiatrist in Northern California. A lifelong peace activist, she has written extensively on the psychology of our times. She is a cochair of Bay Area Impeach Bush-Cheney. You can join or form a local group at http://impeachbush.meetup.com/
She ran for Congress in '06, and is now a Gteen candidate for Congress in CA district 1. She is a coordinator of The New Broom Coalition, for a clean sweep of Congress.
I think the opinion of a former member of the House Judiciary committee during Watergate was instructive to me and clarified this issue. The pressure for impeachment during Watergate came from the grassroots. It was a relentless rising tide demanding action, the Judiciary committee was unable to resist this pressure. The same thing has to happen again. Impeachment works when it is a bottom up phenomenon like Watergate and fails when it is a top down circus, as with President Clinton. Therefore, the organizing and other actions referred to in this article are the right approach I think. As more groups like this emerge I hope they can gather their forces, perhaps under auspices of MoveOn or some other umbrella group and magnify their effect. Keep the issue before the media, starting with Pacifica and Air America etc and it will eventually spill over onto right wing TV. All this will serve to create an irresistible demand on both Democratic and Republican Congress members to begin the process. In this way it can work, and it will allow the progressive agenda in Congress to proceed to pass wage, labor, energy and environmental legislation that we desperately need.
by
Jane Knisely (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 2 comments)
on Tuesday, November 14, 2006 at 6:04:19 AM
1 comments
How would you rate this?
You must be logged in (if signed up) to do ratings.
It's free to signup! And easy. And takes just a minute or two....
Must Read (
Well Said (
News (
Touching (
Funny (
Supported (
Interesting (
Inspiring (
Valuable (
