Remarks delivered in Oakland, Calif., on April 24, 2008.
It's wonderful to be here in the Bay Area and to discover that wherever Nancy Pelosi gets her ideas from, it's not from her constituents. But I have some bad news for you. Last night I spoke in San Luis Obispo on why we should impeach Dick Cheney. The night before that was a speech in Ventura on why we should not dump another $178 billion into the occupation of Iraq and why we should impeach Dick Cheney. But on the drive up here from San Luis Obispo I had a long conversation with someone who began to change my mind. I confess that I had, prior to today, not given proper consideration to how impeaching Dick Cheney could backfire, namely by turning Dick Cheney into a figure of sympathy.
Imagine if we held impeachment hearings on Cheney's support for torture, for example. This could involve dragging across our television screens and newspaper front pages accounts, and possibly videos, of meetings in which Cheney and his lawyer and his close associates discussed and dramatized and gave approval for specific acts of torture, including some very intense and in some cases probably sexual acts of torture performed on some very exotic and thrillingly frightening evildoers. The personal pleasure that Dick Cheney may have derived from these torture approval sessions is as private an affair as some past president's oral sexcapades, and sticking the public's nose where it doesn't belong is likely, I now realize, to result in comparisons being drawn between the victimization of Dick Cheney and that of Princess Diana.
Or imagine if we were to hold impeachment hearings that meticulously laid before the public the lead role Cheney played in fabricating a false case for attacking Iraq. Americans admire a strong work ethic, and Cheney worked very long hours for many months without a break, relentlessly badgering the CIA, the Pentagon, Congress, and the media. And we put him to all that trouble because of our predictable failure to understand the need to attack Iraq for the reasons Cheney and his friends had so straightforwardly presented in the papers of the Project for a New American Century. If we had supported the real reasons, Cheney would never have had to go to all that trouble to invent fake ones. Now guilt may begin to set in, which will only add to the sympathy we feel for Dick Cheney.
And, remember that when certain busybodies exposed some of Cheney's laboriously constructed lies, he was forced to go to even more trouble to destroy their careers or expose their wives as secret agents. Do you think that was pleasant? Do you think Cheney enjoyed exposing a CIA agent? This is the same man who is presently constructing a multi-million dollar house in Virginia just a few minutes' walk from CIA headquarters. Don't you think he'd prefer to get along with the neighbors and not have been caused all that grief? Imagine the sympathetic figure Dick Cheney might become if impeachment hearings examined where he obtained his millions of dollars, profiting from a company to which he directed no-bid contracts for the work of pretending to reconstruct a country he had just destroyed.
So, I now take my friend's concerns very seriously. Impeachment, I now see, might very well backfire. In fact, I think it might go even worse. Along with Dick Cheney, we might very well turn John McCain into a figure of sympathy. An impeachment hearing on torture, for example, would bring back into the news that unfortunate incident in which Cheney lobbied Congress not to absurdly and redundantly re-criminalize torture, but McCain lobbied successfully to do so. Bush signed the bill into law and added a little "signing statement" drafted by Cheney's lawyer that said, effectively, "We'll torture if we want to, and we'll start with you, John McCain, if you make a peep about it." OK, it didn't actually say that last bit, but from that moment on, McCain became a supporter of torture.
Imagine if the media were forced to drop its fascistic fetishes with flag pins and religions and instead ask John McCain if he would torture as president, and how a supposed victim of torture who used to condemn it as both evil and useless can justify that, and if he can justify that how there can possibly be anything he couldn't justify. If those mean reporters make John McCain scream or cry, he might not stand a snowball's chance in hell of being elected president, but he'll become a figure of sympathy. I feel sorry for the poor gutless murdering bastard myself already.
You know who else I feel sorry for - seriously - Nancy Pelosi, because she has Shirley Golub and Cindy Sheehan and all of you to contend with. When you get your so-called economic stimulus tax rebate checks in the mail, I recommend signing them over to one or both of those candidates. And write in the memo line "FOR IMPEACHMENT." And photocopy the check, and send photocopies to Nancy Pelosi and to newspapers.
Almost three years ago, on May 1, 2005, the Downing Street Minutes were published, and a lot of us worked for a year together with John Conyers pushing for impeachment. Well, we were pushing for impeachment. Conyers may have just been pushing for our votes to make him a chairman and give him a bigger office. Because guess what happened in the first week of May 2006? Actually two things happened, but I've come to think of them as one. First, the Republican National Committee released a statement announcing that any talk of impeachment would backfire and benefit Republicans in the 2006 elections. This statement did not even pretend to be based on any evidence, and it flew in the face of every relevant poll. In fact, as it turned out, a poll not long before the elections found that a majority of Americans believed that giving the Democrats a majority would mean impeachment. And what happened? Americans gave the Democrats 30 new seats and the Republicans not a single one (or possible 40 or 50 new seats if we had elections that based the outcomes on - you know - who got the most votes).
So, the RNC's statement looked like a bluff, and it proved to be baseless. But I forgot to mention the second thing that happened that first week of May 2006: Nancy Pelosi announced that impeachment was off the table, in obedience to the RNC. And from that moment on, John Conyers' position on impeachment has paralleled John McCain's on banning torture.
But the movement for impeachment has grown anyway, with leaders in Congress including Dennis Kucinich (ask him to please introduce the articles of impeachment he has drafted on George W. Bush!) and Robert Wexler, who is pushing for impeachment hearings from within the Judiciary Committee. Those supporting impeachment include Barbara Lee and Lynn Woolsey, and more recently Pete Stark. Barbara Lee was invited here tonight and did not come. Brad Newsham did come and is running against her in the primary on June 3rd because, while she's put her name on a resolution, she has not spoken out for impeachment, lobbied her colleagues for it, or introduced a new resolution or articles of impeachment. And Brad is going to be a write-in candidate, something that any of you can be in any California district by collecting 40 signatures by May 20th.
Another Brad, Brad Sherman, has been moved by his constituents and by new revelations regarding torture, and he is moving in the direction of supporting impeachment. And Pete Stark signed onto Kucinich's resolution because the amazing Cynthia Papermaster threatened to run against him. Having won that battle, Cynthia announced she would run against Zoe Lofgren instead. And Lofgren's constituents are pushing her too, and she's starting to come around.
Other pro-impeachment candidates I know of include Bill Callison challenging George Miller, Eugene Ruyle challenging Ellen Tauscher, and Republican Mike Moloney and Barry Hermanson, both in the 12th district. And Carol Brouillet who is here tonight and running in the 14th. Support these candidates!
And don't imagine that we can't accomplish anything. Last week Senator Hillary Clinton gave the peace movement credit for defeating her campaign. She didn't concede yet, although mathematically she has no chance, but she made clear who will get the credit for it when she does. She blamed the Democratic Party's activist base, which she said turns out in annoyingly large numbers and disagrees with her on foreign policy. She meant you. Give yourselves a round of applause.
Now the Democrats are hurting their own chances in 2008 by failing to do what we elected them to do in 2006 on impeachment and on peace. And we are losing the power we gained in 2006 by not forcing them to do so. Impeachment hearings would benefit Obama and the Democrats as well as restoring the rule of law to Washington. A commitment by Obama to prosecute Bush and Cheney for their crimes would give him a landslide. A serious effort by Obama to block the next $178 (or so) billion for Iraq would also give him a landslide. Have you noticed that the White House wants another war money vote just before the elections, and the Democrats don't? Obama won't understand unless we show it to him. Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney are trying to show it to him, and they could use our help. We need to make clear to the Democrats that they cannot fund another year and a half of slaughter, spending our grandchildren's borrowed treasure, and still call themselves opponents of what they are funding.
Imagine if Nancy Pelosi were to mortgage her house, empty her bank accounts, max out her credit cards, and give all that money to Halliburton with a little gift card expressing her sincere opposition to everything Halliburton does. She would look no more foolish than she does right now, and I'd prefer that scenario because she'd be leaving the rest of us out of it.
DAVID SWANSON is a co-founder of After Downing Street, a writer and activist, and the Washington Director of Democrats.com. He is a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, and serves on the Executive Council of the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild, TNG-CWA. He has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including Press Secretary for Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign, Media Coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as Communications Coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Swanson obtained a Master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia in 1997.
are out of office....then lets push President Obama (the "from the bottom up" change) to file civil suits agaisnt all those involved in their various criminal enterprises...there will be, no Executive immunity, no States Secret and no Presidential pardons can be invoked.... ! Just a straight up trial..and they won't be able to hide behing the politicized DOJ or Mukasey, the Attorney General..maybe then we would get real justice.. can open the civil suit investigations with a War Criminal charge..(dig up all "the bodies")......
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Susan Nelsen (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 217 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 11:59:08 AM
Before election day there will be a "false flag" attack bigger than 9/11 - read The Shell Game - to bitch-slap an awakening public back into being cowardly sheep once again.
This attack will be blamed on Iran and immediate reprisals will follow, most likely nuclear. A "state of national emergency" will be declared along with Marshall Law. The tens-of-thousands foreign troops that have been training in various off-shore military bases will join forces with police that have been steadily brainwashed into accepting unconstitutional methods of repression to quell riots that will occur from food shortages, fuel prices doubling, and general discontent. A "them vs us" mentality will be pounded 24/7 by M$M as everyone of military age (everyone but the elite) is conscripted to fight in this now world-wide war. If you refuse, you can join the rest of us in one of the 800 FEMA camps that are already staffed and waiting.
The election will go off, they'll want to keep the illusion going, but it will be so tainted as to be meaningless. McCain will win in another close election brought to you by E-voting because we can't have any wimpy "peace" candidate or a women running things when there's a full-blown war on.
If you think this scenario is too far fetched than you haven't been paying attention. Does anyone think that after all that these cretins have gotten away with that they're going to risk handing power handed over to anyone that might threaten them? Do you think that after they rigged two elections, murdered 3,000+ people in broad day-light, attacked two countries on false pretenses, murdered another one-million people, looted our treasury, purged every agency and court of competent people and replaced them with cronies, that everything is going be turned around because of an election?
All the pieces are in place and we're much closer to having the above take place than we are to having a fair election and having to see justice done.
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Mr M (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1003 comments)
on Saturday, April 26, 2008 at 8:34:53 AM
First guys--perspective. These public servants are only doing the job they were selected to do. Try to look at it from an objective stance: America needs to take a fall, a big one. The karma in place for what our SS has been doing in the world since WW2 alone insures that. The world is a mighty dangerous place owing to America's "might" and the hijacking of our ship of state, and the best thing that can happen globally is for the American Way to go crashling down. That's what The Bush cabal is helping to bring about. It won't be pleasant, but like cancer surgery--highly iffy as to whether the patient will survive--its, how you say, INDICATED. As Americans, you may not care much for the diagnosis (much less the treatment), but if you were a "bloody third-worlder" (to paraphrase Chrissie Hynde) you'd have reason to hope in the wake of America's fall from...grace?
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Randje Mitchell (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 46 comments)
on Saturday, April 26, 2008 at 12:34:21 PM
I can't imagine voting for Clinton or Obama at this moment. Neither of them are progressive enough. I wrote Obama and live in his state, he's my Senator. He does not favor impeachment. He "might" do something after he is elected in terms of investigating crimes.
NOT GOOD ENOUGH.
None of the politicians in Washington follow the lead of the people. A year and half long "close" campaign, wasting hundreds of millions of dollars talking about dribble. SICK OF IT.
NO SOLID ISSUES OUT OF THESE YUCKS. NO SOLID POLICY COMMITMENTS. ONLY DRIBBLE. BUZZ WORDS. "Change", "Experience", "Economy", "Iraq", "Health Care" but no conversation. No way for the people to be part of the process of change, to be included in the decisions, to be assured that we won't vote and then be disgarded for 4 years. No way to hold these SOB's accountable.
THis system is so damn broken.
Pelosi - should be removed from office.
Conyers - should step down. He's embarassed his office and the nation and failed in his constitutionally mandated oath.
Obama - please, platitudes and pockets full of bundled cash. What precisely does he mean by "change"? Iraq - will continue - Impeachment doesn't support it - Health Care - Big Pharma and Insurance will be the same. Wall Street - my GOD!
Clinton - Still stuffing her pockets full of cash, leader of the corporate party, where's her stand on Impeachment? Why isn't she saying, no more MONEY for the WAR.
The whole damn system is a sham. How the hell are we ever going to fix anything.
And the biggest buzz word of the election, the number one polling issue, the "Economy". Well let's define that shall we? Are we talking about the working men and women that continue to be shafted. Outsourced jobs at poverty wages? Bail outs for Big Banks but not for the people they screwed? Health Profits for Insurance and Big Pharma and a big F U to the people?
WE HAVE HAD ENOUGH. ENOUGH.
GET SPECIFIC ABOUT THE ISSUES, or we need more than a few letters. We need to shut the whole damn country down.
PEACEFUL ASSEMBLY IN THE MAJOR STREETS.
Democracy. Never was, still isn't. But still a beautiful idea.
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August Adams (10 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 372 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 1:41:50 PM
Millions of innocent Iraqi men, woman and children have been displaced, hundreds of thousands are dead not to mention the millions who'll die from depleted uranium poisoning and the thousands of dead innocent American troops and countless numbers who've been maimed for life and for what? This is insane!
And to think that Impeachment is off of the table and yet there's a plan to attack Iran on? It's not just beyond comprehension, it is un-american!
The question we must ask is do we have a functioning Democracy? If we do not then how do we continue to call this the United States? In name only. It sounds good doesn't it. How f'n pathetic!
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Munich (0 articles, 44 quicklinks, 12 diaries, 632 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 2:29:48 PM
Let's just take a few seconds to let it register...Those mothers, fathers and their children...THEYRE DEAD! IT'S PERMANENT. WE KILLED THEM. OUR BOMBS, OUR TAXES, OUR BOYS AND GIRLS PUT TO THE TASK, OUR MILITARY, OUR POLICIES... WE SHOP, THEY DROP.
When I think about this scenario being played out HERE. Happening to my family and friends. The daily dread and depression. It is sobering.
People are people -- we ain't special. EXCEPT...WE CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT -- STOP IT!
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boomerang (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 193 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 7:58:24 PM
If you are, I'll advise you to lay off the hashish...........I will never have sympathy for the top three.........I don't care if Pelosi is Democrat.........you people ain't readin enough.........David sometimes when you get too close to the evil forces it tends to rub off on you........
In any case, back away from the main stream.........google out some of those Iraqi beheadings..........take a closer look at their 1,000,000 person graveyard.........look much closer to the children in the streets and compare with your on..............and YOU WILL SAY........SOMEBODY HAS TO PAY!!!......
Somebody has to be accountable for that horrible mistake........Please don't have mercy now for the monsters other than to ask for mercy for their souls.........
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Ernest (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 129 comments)
on Friday, April 25, 2008 at 11:01:01 PM
Impeachment is a process to remove people in positions of authority for breaches of rules, for the likes of Cheney there is a more apt procedure which is arrest, try, torture then bury alive. Sadistic bastards like Cheney should be given no sympathy, no leeway, no concessions, just for this one time I'm in favour of capital punishment.
Mob rule, which is what America has now will not change through normal procedures because the mob controls the procedure. The people have to get off their fat arses and take positive action.
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douglas kay (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 83 comments)
on Saturday, April 26, 2008 at 8:20:20 AM
Thanks for the input on the May 1st work action by the ILWU here in San Francisco. It's support is increasing and the event is going to include Cynthia McKinney http://www.runcynthiarun.org who is running for the Green Party nomination for President and has publicly supported the ILWU's work action, as well as Cindi Sheehan. The focus of activity here is to defend the rights of the longshoremen in the face of possible legal efforts from the government.
In moving forward there are distinct priorities that present themselves in order to increase the ability to influence policies and policymakers. One obvious way is to increase ballot access to Green candidates and become active in working for the election of Greens, such as Barry Hermanson, who you mentioned in your article. http://www.barryhermanson.org/
Each of us have particular base of support that we can utilize and bring to the table.
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Martin Zehr (36 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 75 comments)
on Saturday, April 26, 2008 at 3:37:30 PM
