Representative John Conyers, D-Mi., has been a beacon of hope for the growing majority of Americans pressing for the impeachment of George W. Bush. Following the Democratic mid-term victory follows Conyers' about-face and the "My Pet Goat" fatality of the Democratic Party...
...Prior to the November 7th Congressional midterm elections – approximately eight months to the day – Harper's Magazine proceeded with a prominent panel in an impressive forum on the necessary impeachment of George Walker Bush. Among the panelists was Radcliffe College and Harvard Law School graduate, Elizabeth Holtzman, who, while formerly in the House of Representatives, steered way in the House Judiciary Committee bringing about Articles of Impeachment against former President Richard Milhous Nixon. Alongside Holtzman sat current Representative John Conyers, D-Mi.; America's foremost Congressional advocate in the fight for impeachment of the 43rd president. In addition to prior admonishing, and days following the Harper's forum, Conyers hosted a meeting of forty five distinguished attorneys and legal academicians in downtown Washington on putting forward a bill of impeachment against – among other things – the federal felony in misleading and lying to Congress in the run up to the pre-emptive invasion of Iraq.
On the heels of the Democratic Party midterm victory – retaking both houses of Congress – Holtzman spoke at the November 11th Impeach for Change conference at the Constitution Center in Philadelphia. Poised and precise, as she was during the Harper's round-table, Holtzman remarked - profoundly succinct - on why checks and balances, while positive, do not go far enough in excoriating the younger Bush. "The constitution doesn't require the minimum. It requires the maximum. We can't have a president of the United States who puts himself above the rule of law if we want to continue with this democracy. That's it. No ifs ands or buts. The fact that we have checks and balances does not mean that we are not obliged to remove the person who threatens our democracy from the presidency."
Yet, on November 15th – eight days following the Democratic victory – John Conyers sent an email to supporters telling them that proceedings of impeachment are now "off the table".
Newly appointed Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, D-Ca., is in public agreement with Conyers, declaring the potential proceedings "a waste of time".
It's time for a reinvention. The Democrats possessed a reinvention opportunity in allowing the Republican Party to implode upon itself. Republicans across the spectrum suffered the same self inflicted fatality. The Democratic Party did not win this election – George W. Bush, and the neoconservative ideology behind his presidency, sacrificed it. Indeed, had states not been subjected to thieving gerrymandering over the last decade, Americans would have seen twice to three times as many House seats flip in favor of the opposition – the Democratic Party.
But where is the opposition? The force of electoral frustration which surged Democrats into power November 7th seems filled with the very opposition the Democratic Party itself lacks. Indeed, come January, if Conyers and Pelosi hold fast, the 110th Congress will allow the criminal precedents of Bush/Cheney to escape reproach without ever being held to account.
Politicians and pundits alike are espousing the same rant: Impeachment may be justified, but in the end it proves a national distraction. A national distraction? According to Newsweek, Americans support the impeachment of George W. Bush in record numbers over those which ever backed the prosecution of William Jefferson Clinton.
But the real distraction is not about a need to focus on policy, or the discouraging of partisan politics. The distraction is simply the Democrats stating there is one. Government functioned when impeachment proceedings set forth against Nixon. Clinton too. Just as the forthcoming Baker Report is craven political cover for the Iraq War, the Democratic assertion of impeachment as a 'distraction' is cover for inherent deficiencies in the "opposition" party itself.
Senator Joe Biden, D-De., and his colleagues, may charge ahead with hearings come 2007, but make no mistake, any and all hearings with regard to the Iraq debacle will focus solely on the mismanagement of the war itself – not the federal felonies which brought upon invasion in the first place. The Democratic Party knows, at its core, that facing their own complicity in the build up to war could very well cost them the White House. Not to mention that bringing upon the Articles of Impeachment – articles already drafted, mind you – will charge Democrats with the sole responsibility of providing a solution to Iraq. And they don't have one.
Perhaps it's no surprise that the two most legitimate Democratic presidential contenders for 2008 have stepped outside the beltway in the conviction of personal and political reinvention. One working effortlessly over the last two years, spearheading the Center on Poverty at the University of North Carolina. His name is John Edwards. The other, chairman of London based Generation Investment Management, focusing on the merger of traditional investment analysis with environmental responsibility and eco-efficiency. This guy put out a movie last summer.
Political comedian Bill Maher said it best in speaking with Joe Scarborough during a recent MSNBC interview: "I don't think you can allow the precedent of a president not only blatantly ignoring the constitution and breaking constitutional law, but bragging about it... and I wouldn't impeach him for (the Iraq War). I'd impeach him for sitting there for seven minutes on 9/11."
Over an audacious burst of laughter out of Scarborough, Maher's tone became extremely serious. He was not kidding.
"Take out of the equation whether this is a Republican or Democrat or George Bush or anybody else. Just in a hypothetical," asserted Maher. "A president. In the nuclear age, Joe – the nuclear age – is told the words 'the country is under attack'... And let's get our facts straight! They didn't say to him 'the second tower's been hit'. This is from Andy Card himself, the words he heard were 'the country is under attack.' And for you to defend a president to sit there for seven seconds, let alone seven minutes, tells me you're blinded to who this man is and where your loyalties lie."
The backpedaling of John Conyers and the Democratic Party tells me the same thing.
The country is in need of a reinvention. Perhaps a rebirth in its courage.
Maryann Mann is a freelance socio-political columnist whose work has been published with a variety of outlets including: Raw Story, Currents of Awareness, OpED News, Atlantic Free Press and Populist America.
I totally agree with this analysis, but there are some complicating factors.
The American people overwhelmingly voted against the war, it is true, but largely because we have been losing, not winning it. Bush & co. understand this, and so does the Dem leadership, and so they are going for the only option left them to survive: to try to win afterall. They all recognize that defeat would mean the end of American super-power status and world hegemony. They are so serious about this that they may even reintroduce the draft, at the risk of provoking domestic social unrest. These folks are determined NOT to have another Vietnam.
The antiwar and impeachment movement, if we can call it that, has to develop a fuller alternative to the current imperial policy. It has to call for a withdrawl of American military power from overseas (closing those hundreds of foreign bases) and use waning American power abroad to build genuine democratic international institutions. Some better word than 'neo-isolationism' has to be found. Brits who opposed their empire a century or so ago called themselves Little Englanders. Maybe we should call ourselves Little Americans, a movement promoting decentralization or political and economic power and building a sustainable economy.
by
Kuzminski (5 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 73 comments)
on Friday, December 22, 2006 at 7:11:56 AM
Maybe we all could just do what is right and let the chips fall where they may. We are so into analyzing everything and anything and invariably, we never get it right. There is no accurate way of predicting the future, that is a time consuming game of intellectual masterbation. I have always thought that if we just did what was right, instead of what was politically expediant, we could accept the outcome as the result of a moral decision. There is no one keeping score here. There is no clock keeping time. There is no reason to claim there is no time to impeach or that it is not in our best interests. It is in our best interests. If we impeach this sociopath, we will have done so much to move on to what this nation could be. It is never too late to do what is morally right.
To set an example for the next would-be conquerer would be another reason to impeach. For crimes to be committed without punishment sets a most dangerous precident. The democrats are committing a crime of omission. They are the ones that must bear the burden for whatever this President brings down on us. If Bush starts a war in with Iran, or this war in Iraq goes on in the same manner that it is going now, with more deaths and no victory, will that bode well for their chances of electing a majority in Congress or a Democrat winning the White House?
Why does it take so long for our elected representatives to finally do the peoples will? Is it because the people are not their true employers? We all know that most representatives in Washington just pay lip service to their constituancies. The real bosses are their corporate and special interest campaign financiers. Things are so bad in Washington now, that we might as well admit that we have lost all control over our government. This is not a Democracy. This idea of democracy is an excuse to meddle in other nation's affairs. We don't have a democratic America, why would we believe we are really bringing democracy to anyone if we don't have it in our own country?
Thanks Nancy Pelosi, you've shown me the truth. While you go out to celebrate your Speakership, I'll toast the end of our democratic experiment in America. An experiment that looks like it's failed.
by
Timothy V. Gatto (348 articles, 177 quicklinks, 38 diaries, 574 comments)
on Friday, December 22, 2006 at 9:51:08 AM
This comment has been flagged and is awaiting review by the editors -
Reason: Nasty Attacks
I am sick to death of having this issue of impeachment analyzed and dissected. The issue is clear: DUBYA, Dick(LESS), Hot Karl Rove, and Condi have all committed high crimes and misdemeanors. The first three are guilty of no less than treason in the outing of Valerie Plame. What other issues can there be?
Frankly, if the investigation and impeachment turn up some rotten apples in the Democratic Party, all the fucking better! Clean the shithouse that is the Federal government in one fell swoop if that's what it takes to get this country back in its feet of clay. Maybe in the process we can replace the clay feet with something a little less mushy and malleable.
Can the idiots in congress not see this isn't about the political party of DUBYA, it's about his crimes? I'd be banging the drum to get his sorry ass out of office if he were a Democrat, a Libertarian, a Green, or even a fucking Whig. He has done wrong. He has committed crimes against the constitution; a document he swore to uphold on the bible, a book he supposedly reads nightly before he goes to bed. How can he stand living inside his own skin?
Further, how can congress stand up and tell us they are working for us when they can't even remember why we elected them in the first place? If there was ever a worthy target for a carpet bombing raid, it's Washington DC! Blast all those ass kissing fucks to kingdom come, then start all over with some people of integrity. Make sure terms are shortened so we can get the more flea-bitten of the mutts that will rise out before they can spread their parasites to others.
We need to stop the analysis paralysis on this issue. DUBYA needs to go, NOW! Frankly, I don't care how he goes, as long as he's gone. Where's John Hinckley when you need him?
Blessed be!
Pappy
by
Pappy (61 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 860 comments)
on Friday, December 22, 2006 at 3:40:58 PM
After reading and reading article after article.
It is impossible for the newly Democratic controlled congress to be unaware of what is being said by the American public. Maybe it is time to flood the lines, emails and post office again. Is it time for "john Q", to save us? Contact your congress person. Tell them American democracy is dying. Tell them to watch the movie "John Q" and let them know the American people are saying, you need to DO SOMETHING!! Ask them, if we need to DO SOMETHING?? America belongs to Americans, not to the Democrates or the Republicans. We only gave them permission to be seated in the Government. If they won't listen, do a Donal Trump on them. "YOUR FIRED" And never mind waiting for the next election.
by
Theo (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 27 comments)
on Friday, December 22, 2006 at 10:27:37 PM
This comment has been flagged and is awaiting review by the editors -
Reason: Inappropriate Content
Where? I attacked no one in this article other than those who are on my standard hit list: DUBYA and congress. I'd like to know what I did in this comment that's so bad when compared to the rest of what I have written here.
Blessed be!
Pappy
by
Pappy (61 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 860 comments)
on Saturday, December 23, 2006 at 4:30:58 PM
Yes, a strictly political decision has been made on this matter. Politics standing above principle. Politics is supposed to SUPPORT principle, not defeat it. When the two are in conflict, principle must reign, not politics.
But the dispute should not even be taking place. We have a real and present danger to the continuing existence of this democracy (and I agree, democracy is dead, at the present moment) - and in larger fact, to the world as a whole. If EVER a time existed when politics has to stand aside, it is right now!
Unfortunately, the people who were placed and kept in office by what was certainly an election of rebellious proportion, fail to take their mandate seriously, or simply have other agendas to pursue, than those they ran on. Not only is the Bush administration a treasonous gang, but the oppositional gang (called Democrats) is revealing themselves to be complicit in the very treason they were elected to challenge.
Let us hope that the people, ourselves, rise up in a rebellious reaction. Bush and Cheney both should be dragged out of office by their heels. The old time remedy of tar and feathers would be about right for them. But some special ceremony of dishonor should be reserved for the likes of Conyers and Pelosi, who have misled their public disgracefully, if they fail to change their present course.
by
Irvthom (7 articles, 2 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 83 comments)
on Friday, December 22, 2006 at 10:06:45 PM
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...and principles. It seems we have lots of the first, and little of the second. It's sad indeed.
I guess that's what frosts me so much when I hear that impeachment is off the table. If we ignore the principle that no man is above the law, we set a dangerous and deadly precedent. As I said above, I don't care about DUBYA's political party. I'd call for his impeachment if he were a Democrat, an Independent, a Libertarian, a Green, or a "fucking Whig".
Is there no place left for principles in this country? If there isn't, then why don't we just hang it all up and all run headlong into anarchy? We might as well at this point in reality. At least we'd get the feeling like we are doing SOMETHING!
Oh well, why should I care? Principles have yet to net me one red cent in this pathetic world.
Blessed be!
Pappy
by
Pappy (61 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 860 comments)
on Saturday, December 23, 2006 at 4:39:58 PM
Were not going to be called any less than a super power to began with or anything else if we withdraw our troops. This is just another Bush ALL MIGHTY smoke screen to avoid looking for a true alternative peaceful solutions. It don't take a rocket scientist to see that Bush and company are deceit full from the get go.
Yes, giving the chance they'll have there revolutionary war because Bush failed to stabilize them from the get go after the fall of Sadam.
That country has been at civil unrest for many years, and Bush opened the gate the day he overpowered Sadam's regime. Bush Sr. was warned of such a disaster would occur if Sadam was removed from power, it would take someone that was idiotic war plans not to consider it into a war plan. Now the reason why our country had any dealings with Sadam to began with would surface as well. That being the populous of Iraq was Shiite with strong ties to Iran. That would mean basically Iranians would gain control eventually of the country and the oil rights. The tensions between Iran and USA would have out weighed our relation with Sadam without a major military strike of our own in that region. For our country to get into such a war would have been unethical for oil rights. So Bush has failed in all aspects the oil is not flowing enough to even pay for restructuring Iraq and all this destruction of the oil fields is for that reason alone to break off our interest. Even if we could control the oil fields and get the oil flowing the Shiites will never allow this country to access it or control the oil. So, I ask why send are young there to die you can't force a democracy on a civil unrested country to start with and there's no WMD to be found. More troops will just pro long the suffering and misery going on there daily. The more stubborn Bush becomes the more stubborn they become. Its dumb to think Bush can control a civil war without sending fear out like Sadam did for all those years that made him into a war criminal trying to rule and survive such hostility among the different cultures and religions of that region.
by
Fred F (1 articles, 1 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 361 comments)
on Saturday, December 23, 2006 at 1:21:28 AM
If we get outside our roles in this cosmic drama, we cannot act effectively. (Just take a look at the miserable failure of those who have.)
If you are anything like me, and my hunch is quite a few of you are, you are not elected officials and you are not paid staff members of any elected official, who could really make a differnece where our current (or should I say, ongoing?) national nightmare in concerned.
You are a citizen, no more or less. How much you experienced of this nation's history is more important than that which you think you know, because of what you read in text books.
History text books tend to talk about governmental action, Presidents, Prime Ministers, etc, etc. and is always written by the winners of any struggle for power and wealth. Not in a very long time, if ever (with one well known exception) has the people's history been written. It is, often, as if governments exist in a vaccum. What kind of history is that, for various types of Democratic cultures/nations around the world, to be teaching their children; their future and the keepers of their traditions? Lies? Not so good.
In 21st century America, it is the job of the electorate, not only to make its wishes known at the ballot box, but every day, thereafter, especially when this nation is in crisis, as it is, currently.
It is, then, the job of our elected officials to heed our cries of protest and act, in a way, that truly represents the people.
America has now voted a resounding condemnation of the GOP in the executive and the Congress.
If our ballots are not heeded or heard, the next step is massive non-violent protest and CD.
We gave up bullets for ballots a long time ago (supposedly we did, and I hope we did) As a Kennedy Democrat(today, independent), I would abhore the return to bullets or violence. When Bobby died, a piece of me died with him. That part of me could be called joyous, youthful, idealistic hope; a final loss of innocence, his murder brought.
Yet, today, I cannot afford cynicism. I must have hope, to be effective. I can only get to hope through seeing the unity of all things and beings. I can only see unity through the lens of peace in diversity.
We all have our roles. Let us not confuse them.
Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have their role, George Bush and Dick Cheney have another,, but we have THE role in a Democracy: The role of the owners of this nation; We, the people, the final voice on everything.
We vote and then we enforce it, in the best way we can.
It is up to the majority.
by
wintefire6 (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 87 comments)
on Saturday, December 23, 2006 at 10:22:54 AM
I agree some people quickly act in haste, they simply don't give anything thought to there outcome. In Bush's case I call those types war pigs. War piigs is not a new concept by any means they tend to have lots of followers through acts of deception and lies.
by
Fred F (1 articles, 1 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 361 comments)
on Saturday, December 23, 2006 at 9:59:06 PM
As a matter of fact, it's a song by Black Sabbath:
"Generals gathered in their masses
Just like witches at Black Masses
Evil minds that plot destruction
Sorcerer of death's construction..."
And so on.
Of course, that song was written for the Vietnam War. Funny how apropos it is now!
Gee, I wonder if this comment will be flagged for some reason...seems every other one I have written here has been flagged. What a waste of the editors' time.
Blessed be!
Pappy
by
Pappy (61 articles, 0 quicklinks, 11 diaries, 860 comments)
on Tuesday, December 26, 2006 at 7:22:33 PM
11 comments
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