|
Some notes on impeachment from Glenn Greenwald's site from his guest blogger. Just a few paragraphs from this well written piece...check it out in its entirety at salon.com:
"For above all, impeachment should be moved to the top of the congressional agenda. It should be the overriding, all-consuming priority of the people's representatives. For this is the inescapable, stone-cold truth: nothing, absolutely nothing but impeachment, will stop the Bush-Cheney regime from carrying out its criminal agenda.
We have seen in recent days some heartening moves toward restraining the regime. The effort led by Sen. Christopher Dodd to put a hold on legislation that would excuse the telecoms' complicity in Bush's illegal surveillance schemes is a welcome development. And as Jonathan Schwarz reports, MoveOn.org is launching a major public awareness campaign to try to head off a war with Iran. These are very small straws in a howling wind -- but then again, it only takes a few straws to start a fire. And as noted above, all efforts to put fetters on the regime should be encouraged. But the history of the past seven years has proved over and over and over again that the Bush-Cheney regime will simply ignore any attempt by Congress or the courts to limit its rapacious agenda and its exercise of arbitrary power.
Congress passes laws forbidding torture; Bush and Cheney ignore them. Congress issues subpoenas and demands documents for its corruption probes; Bush and Cheney ignore them. Bush's "signing statements" explicitly state that he will follow only those parts of the law that suit him. Congress could vote tomorrow that Iran cannot be attacked without a formal declaration of war, and Bush would attack whenever he chooses anyway, calling it an extension of the congressionally authorized action in Iraq, a "defensive" action to protect the troops. Congress can pass any law it wants, but if you have an executive branch that considers itself above the law -- as this one demonstrably does -- then it doesn't matter. As long as Bush and Cheney remain in power, their criminal enterprise will go on.
Thus impeachment is not a "distraction" from efforts to end the war in Iraq, or stop a new war with Iran, or quell the vast and sickening corruption of the regime. It is their prerequisite. And even if impeachment is "politically impossible in the present circumstances," as Bush enablers like the pusillanimous Nancy Pelosi likes to tell us, it should be shoved to the forefront of national debate nonetheless. Let us have a "constitutional crisis;" let us bring our festering sickness to a boil. Let's lay it all out, and let people declare once and for all where they stand. Are you for the republic, or do you hold with tyranny, torture and mass murder? Let's draw the line at last, and be done with all pretense.
But we know that what should be done will not be done. We see that the Democrats have taken impeachment "off the table." We see that far from stopping or curtailing the war in Iraq, Pelosi and the Democratic leadership punish those among their number who dare speak the truth: that Bush has indeed sent American soldiers to have their heads blown off for his amusement, for his aggrandizement, for his radical agenda of loot and dominion. We see that far from stopping the rush toward a new war with Iran they are instead abetting it, declaring their overwhelming assent to the deceitful casus belli Bush has offered. We see, with despair, that the national Democrats share the regime's radical agenda of endless militarism and hegemonic sway, differing only on a few points of style and decorum, and a desire to see more "competence" in Iraq and "future wars." ..."
(More at salon.com)
Kucinich is the only braveheart in congress right now with the guts to demand impeachment of Cheney.
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(962 posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
