In a Just World, Crist Should Now Be the Frontrunner...

The most evil man in America endorses Marco Rubio for the GOP nomination for US Senate.

And Rubio hasn't rejected it.

What more needs to be said?

Post-Convention Cull Day

Wow, a LOT apparently happened while I was busy at, or recovering from, the convention I worked at this past weekend. Too much for me to keep track of, or research, or comment in detail on.

So... it's Cull Day!

First off: Oklahoma becomes the first state to begin organizing its secessionist army.

Frustrated by recent political setbacks, tea party leaders and some conservative members of the Oklahoma Legislature say they would like to create a new volunteer militia to help defend against what they believe are improper federal infringements on state sovereignty.

. . .

"Is it scary? It sure is," said tea party leader Al Gerhart of Oklahoma City, who heads an umbrella group of tea party factions called the Oklahoma Constitutional Alliance. "But when do the states stop rolling over for the federal government?"

Incidentally, folks, it should be borne in mind that, just before the Civil War, most newspapers in the South were agents of the fire-eating secessionist wing of the Democratic Party, deliberately ginning up fear, hatred and paranoia among their readership. Today... we have Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, NewsMax.com, Drudge, National Review... so, yeah.

The Tea Parties are trying to unite... except, well, it's only those tea party groups funded and run by Republican Party activists that are uniting:

Mark Skoda, a Tea Party leader from Memphis (and a founder of the recent Tea Party Convention), is serving as the chief spokesman for the effort, and appears to have played a leading role in putting it together. Skoda, working closely with Judson Phillips of Tea Party Nation, had helped organize and promote February's convention, at which Sarah Palin delivered the keynote speech and which enjoyed widespread media coverage. Also part of the new coalition is the Tea Party Express, the brainchild of a team of California Republican political consultants.

But one prominent group, the Tea Party Patriots (TPP), doesn't appear to be joining the party. Jenny Beth Martin, a leader of TPP noted to TPMmuckraker that her group already considers itself the largest grassroots Tea Party organization, and said it hadn't been involved in planning the new federation. TPP had also stayed away from February's convention.

It should be noted that Tea Party Nation is the group founded and led by former Republican leader Dick Armey. This is a clear case of the Republican Party trying- and failing- to co-opt the teabaggers, who are definitely much more radical and bigoted than the national average. Even Fox News is calling the teabaggers out on their lunacy, now that they realize they won't be controlled.

Even as Virginia Governor McConnell apologizes and backtracks on his leaving slavery out of the Civil War, Mississippi governor Haley Barbour brushes slavery off as unimportant:

CROWLEY: You know what I'm trying to get at here is that there's a sort of feeling that this is insensitive. But you clearly don't agree?

BARBOUR: To me, it's a sort of feeling that it's a nit, that it is not significant, that it's not a -- it's trying to make a big deal out of something doesn't amount to diddly.

So, yeah: slavery was wrong, "everybody knows that," but apparently it wasn't important at all to the Confederacy. Riiiiight.

Matthew Yglesias cuts right to the heart of both the Republican desire to celebrate the CSA, and the core of teabagger support:

... something that links the mentality of today’s right to the mentality of the slaveowners and segregation proponents is the white southern political tradition’s very partial and selective embrace of majoritarian democracy. As long as national institutions are substantially controlled by white southerners, the white south is a hotbed of patriotism. But as soon as an non-southern political coalition manages to win an election—as we saw in 1860 and in 2008—then suddenly the symbols of national authority become symbols of tyranny and the constitution is construed as granting conservative areas all kinds of alleged abilities to opt out of national political decisions. Even if you think opposition to the Affordable Care Act has nothing whatsoever to do with race, the underlying political philosophy by which a George W Bush or James Buchanan is a national president but an Abraham Lincoln or a Barack Obama merely a sectional one remains incoherent and pernicious.

Meanwhile, if you haven't had enough reminders of innate Republican evil, Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's chief of staff in the State Department, testified that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Donald Rumsfeld knew full well they were imprisoning- and torturing- innocent people in Guantanamo and elsewhere:

I came to understand that there were several different reasons for the refusal to release detainees in Guantánamo, even those who were likely innocent. These reasons continued to the time of my departure from the Department of State in 2005. At least part of the problem was that it was politically impossible to release them. The concern expressed was that if they were released to another country... the leadership of the Defense Department would be left without any plausible explanation to the American people...

. . .

Another part of the political dilemma originated in the Office of Vice President Richard B. Cheney, whose position could be summed up as “the end justifies the means”, and who had absolutely no concern that the vast majority of Guantánamo detainees were innocent, or that there was a lack of any useable evidence for the great majority of them. If hundreds of innocent individuals had to suffer in order to detain a handful of hardcore terrorists, so be it. That seemed to be the philosophy that ruled in the Vice President’s Office.

Of course, with Dawn Johnsen's nomination to the Office of Legal Counsel scuttled, the last faint hope of Obama ever following up on this testimony has long since flown away.

And finally, a recent federal court ruling puts a major kink in plans for net neutrality regulations. That said, it was almost certainly the right ruling:

If “ancillary jurisdiction” is enough for net neutrality regulations (something we might like) today, it could just as easily be invoked tomorrow for any other Internet regulation that the FCC dreams up (including things we won’t like). For example, it doesn't take much imagination to envision a future FCC "Internet Decency Statement." After all, outgoing FCC Chairman Martin was a crusader against "indecency" on the airwaves and it was the FCC that punished Pacifica radio for playing George Carlin’s “seven dirty words” monologue, something you can easily find on the Internet.

Of course, this ruling can- and probably will- lead to more direct and stringent regulation of telecoms and internet providers by the FCC, since they won't be allowed to do spot-checks on egregious incidents. This issue is by no means settled.

Dick Cheney Brags: "I'm a Big Fan" of Torture

On national TV Sunday, Dick Cheney admitted to being "a big supporter of waterboarding, a big supporter of enhanced interrogation techniques."

"Enhanced interrogation techniques," of course, is torture. Under Cheney- and under his putative boss George W. Bush- Americans held hundreds of people imprisoned without either writ of habeas corpus or combatant status under the Geneva Accords- in other words, wholly outside the law. These people were beaten, waterboarded, held in stress positions for days until their muscles collapsed, denied sleep for days, put in total sensory deprivation or disorientation, and threatened with their death and the death of their loved ones, among many other techniques documented. These techniques were used by Imperial Japan, the Gestapo, the Khmer Rouge, and Saddam Hussein, among others- and in all those cases those responsible either were punished or are currently in the process of meeting justice.

Scott Horton, in the above link, makes it very plain:

Section 2340A of the federal criminal code makes it an offense to torture or to conspire to torture. Violators are subject to jail terms or to death in appropriate cases, as where death results from the application of torture techniques. . . What prosecutor can look away when a perpetrator mocks the law itself and revels in his role in violating it? Such cases cry out for prosecution. Dick Cheney wants to be prosecuted. And prosecutors should give him what he wants.

Glenn Greenwald brings home just how important prosecution is- and why it is imperative:

What would stop a future President (or even the current one) from re-authorizing waterboarding and the other Bush/Cheney torture techniques if he decided he wanted to? Given that both the Bush and Obama administrations have succeeded thus far in blocking all judicial adjudications of the legality of these "policies," and given that the torture architects are feted on TV and given major newspaper columns, what impediments exist to prevent their re-implementation?

But earlier in the same article, Greenwald pretty much admits that this is exactly what will happen- as soon as Obama leaves office, torture will resume.

In general, people who commit felonies avoid publicly confessing to having done so, and they especially avoid mocking the authorities who fail to act. One thing Dick Cheney is not is stupid, and yet he's doing exactly that. Indeed, he's gradually escalated his boasting about having done so throughout the year. Why? Because he knows there will never be any repercussions, that he will never be prosecuted no matter how blatantly he admits to these serious crimes. He's taunting the Obama administration and the DOJ: not only will I not hide or apologize, but I will proudly tout and defend my role in these crimes, because I know you will do absolutely nothing about it, even though the Attorney General and the President themselves said that the act to which I'm confessing is a felony. Does anyone doubt that Cheney's assessment is right? And isn't that, rather obviously, a monumental indictment of most everything?

Cheney is taunting Obama- but more to the point, he's saying to his base: Obama knows, in his heart, that I'm right- torture is NOT immoral or illegal, and that's why he'll never, ever prosecute me or anyone else for it. He knows we were right all along, or else he'd do something about what we did. And since torture is right, that means as soon as we regain power, we'll start it up all over again.

If Obama doesn't change his mind about this and begin proper investigations and prosecutions of those who violated American and international laws against torture, then his legacy on the subject will be limited to one immediately-overturned executive order- in other words, completely empty.

He will be remembered as a president who, when faced with evil, did nothing.

Impeachment Support from an Unlikely Side...

... the far right fringe, to be exact. Alan Keyes' followers, notable for being rabidly anti-abortion and pro-"intelligent design", are calling on fellow Republicans to support the impeachment of Bush and Cheney.

For any Republicans reading this, let's look at the articles of impeachment (minus the formal boilerplate) against Bill Clinton and see if what Bush has done matches them:

From the first article, on perjury:

"On August 17, 1998, William Jefferson Clinton swore to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth before a Federal grand jury of the United States. Contrary to that oath, William Jefferson Clinton willfully provided perjurious, false and misleading testimony to the grand jury concerning one or more of the following: (1) the nature and details of his relationship with a subordinate Government employee; (2) prior perjurious, false and misleading testimony he gave in a Federal civil rights action brought against him; (3) prior false and misleading statements he allowed his attorney to make to a Federal judge in that civil rights action; and (4) his corrupt efforts to influence the testimony of witnesses and to impede the discovery of evidence in that civil rights action."

George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have carefully avoided giving any testimony under any oath in any venue whatever. However, on many occasions, ranging from the GOP Emails Scandal to the DoJ Firings to, of course, Iraq, Bush and Cheney have lied, bare-faced, to Congress. Is that close enough?

Article 2, obstruction of justice in the Paula Jones civil suit:

"(1) On or about December 17, 1997, William Jefferson Clinton corruptly encouraged a witness in a Federal civil rights action brought against him to execute a sworn affidavit in that proceeding that he knew to be perjurious, false and misleading.

"(2) On or about December 17, 1997, William Jefferson Clinton corruptly encouraged a witness in a Federal civil rights action brought against him to give perjurious, false and misleading testimony if and when called to testify personally in that proceeding.

"(3) On or about December 28, 1997, William Jefferson Clinton corruptly engaged in, encouraged, or supported a scheme to conceal evidence that had been subpoenaed in a Federal civil rights action brought against him.

"(4) Beginning on or about December 7, 1997, and continuing through and including January 14, 1998, William Jefferson Clinton intensified and succeeded in an effort to secure job assistance to a witness in a Federal civil rights action brought against him in order to corruptly prevent the truthful testimony of that witness in that proceeding at a time when the truthful testimony of that witness would have been harmful to him.

"(5) On January 17, 1998, at his deposition in a Federal civil rights action brought against him, William Jefferson Clinton corruptly allowed his attorney to make false and misleading statements to a Federal judge characterizing an affidavit, in order to prevent questioning deemed relevant by the judge. Such false and misleading statements were subsequently acknowledged by his attorney in a communication to that judge.

"(6) On or about January 18 and January 20-21, 1998, William Jefferson Clinton related a false and misleading account of events relevant to a Federal civil rights action brought against him to a potential witness in that proceeding, in order to corruptly influence the testimony of that witness.

"(7) On or about January 21, 23 and 26, 1998, William Jefferson Clinton made false and misleading statements to potential witnesses in a Federal grand jury proceeding in order to corruptly influence the testimony of those witnesses. The false and misleading statements made by William Jefferson Clinton were repeated by the witnesses to the grand jury, causing the grand jury to receive false and misleading information."

Again, Bush has avoided sworn testimony. Both he and Cheney, and their staffers, have routinely mislead and outright lied to investigators, most notably during Plamegate when they denied any involvement in the leaking of Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent. As for corruptly influencing witnesses, the commutation of Lewis "Scooter" Libby's perjury sentence, and the probable future pardon of Libby, is the single greatest incident of payback for coverup.

Now, for the rest of us, here's Richard Nixon's articles of impeachment. Bold items indicate crimes Bush has either committed or mirrored.

(Article 1, the coverup of Watergate)

"The means used to implement this course of conduct or plan included one or more of the following:

"1. making false or misleading statements to lawfully authorized investigative officers and employees of the United States;

"2. withholding relevant and material evidence or information from lawfully authorized investigative officers and employees of the United States;

"3. approving, condoning, acquiescing in, and counselling witnesses with respect to the giving of false or misleading statements to lawfully authorized investigative officers and employees of the United States and false or misleading testimony in duly instituted judicial and congressional proceedings;

"4. interfering or endeavouring to interfere with the conduct of investigations by the Department of Justice of the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the office of Watergate Special Prosecution Force, and Congressional Committees;

"5. approving, condoning, and acquiescing in, the surreptitious payment of substantial sums of money for the purpose of obtaining the silence or influencing the testimony of witnesses, potential witnesses or individuals who participated in such unlawful entry and other illegal activities;

"6. endeavouring to misuse the Central Intelligence Agency, an agency of the United States;

"7. disseminating information received from officers of the Department of Justice of the United States to subjects of investigations conducted by lawfully authorized investigative officers and employees of the United States, for the purpose of aiding and assisting such subjects in their attempts to avoid criminal liability;

"8. making or causing to be made false or misleading public statements for the purpose of deceiving the people of the United States into believing that a thorough and complete investigation had been conducted with respect to allegations of misconduct on the part of personnel of the executive branch of the United States and personnel of the Committee for the Re-election of the President, and that there was no involvement of such personnel in such misconduct: or

"9. endeavouring to cause prospective defendants, and individuals duly tried and convicted, to expect favoured treatment and consideration in return for their silence or false testimony, or rewarding individuals for their silence or false testimony."

Article 2, violations of the Constitution:

"1. He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavoured to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information contained in income tax returns for purposed not authorized by law, and to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be intitiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner.

"2. He misused the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Secret Service, and other executive personnel, in violation or disregard of the constitutional rights of citizens, by directing or authorizing such agencies or personnel to conduct or continue electronic surveillance or other investigations for purposes unrelated to national security, the enforcement of laws, or any other lawful function of his office; he did direct, authorize, or permit the use of information obtained thereby for purposes unrelated to national security, the enforcement of laws, or any other lawful function of his office; and he did direct the concealment of certain records made by the Federal Bureau of Investigation of electronic surveillance.

"3. He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, in violation or disregard of the constitutional rights of citizens, authorized and permitted to be maintained a secret investigative unit within the office of the President, financed in part with money derived from campaign contributions, which unlawfully utilized the resources of the Central Intelligence Agency, engaged in covert and unlawful activities, and attempted to prejudice the constitutional right of an accused to a fair trial.

"4. He has failed to take care that the laws were faithfully executed by failing to act when he knew or had reason to know that his close subordinates endeavoured to impede and frustrate lawful inquiries by duly constituted executive, judicial and legislative entities concerning the unlawful entry into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee, and the cover-up thereof, and concerning other unlawful activities including those relating to the confirmation of Richard Kleindienst as Attorney General of the United States, the electronic surveillance of private citizens, the break-in into the offices of Dr. Lewis Fielding, and the campaign financing practices of the Committee to Re-elect the President.

"5. In disregard of the rule of law, he knowingly misused the executive power by interfering with agencies of the executive branch, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Criminal Division, and the Office of Watergate Special Prosecution Force, of the Department of Justice, and the Central Intelligence Agency, in violation of his duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed."

Article 3:

"In his conduct of the office of President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, contrary to his oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has failed without lawful cause or excuse to produce papers and things as directed by duly authorized subpoenas issued by the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives on April 11, 1974, May 15, 1974, May 30, 1974, and June 24, 1974, and willfully disobeyed such subpoenas. The subpoenaed papers and things were deemed necessary by the Committee in order to resolve by direct evidence fundamental, factual questions relating to Presidential direction, knowledge or approval of actions demonstrated by other evidence to be substantial grounds for impeachment of the President. In refusing to produce these papers and things [the President], substituting his judgment as to what materials were necessary for the inquiry, interposed the powers of the Presidency against the the lawful subpoenas of the House of Representatives, thereby assuming to himself functions and judgments necessary to the exercise of the sole power of impeachment vested by the Constitution in the House of Representatives."

And what I really want to know is this: why hasn't Ron Paul, who portrays himself as the quintessential Constitutionalist, why hasn't he come out in support of impeachment? He should have been the first voice to speak, even before Dennis Kucinich or Cynthia McKinney...

Impeachment: Why It is Vital

"The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other officers, and shall have the sole power of impeachment." - Constitution of the United States (1787), Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 5.

"The Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. When sitting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside; and no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of two-thirds of the members present." - Constitution of the United States (1787), Article 1, Section 3, Paragraph 6.

"Judgment of cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States; but the party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment, trial judgment and punishment, according to law." - Constitution of the United States (1787), Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 6.

"The President, the Vice President, and all civil officers of the United States shall be removed from office on impeachment for and conviction of treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors." - Constitution of the United States (1787), Article 2, Section 4.

"shall, verb participle; an auxiliary used in formal speech: (a) to express futurity in the first person, and determination, obligation or necessity in the second and third persons..." - Webster's Second Unabridged Dictionary

The tragedy of our current government is in a missing shall. According to the Constitution of the United States, the President shall be removed from office upon impeachment and conviction for high crimes and misdemeanors- there's no option. Unfortunately there is no clause that states that Congress shall impeach and convict the President if and when he does commit high crimes and misdemeanors. Congress has the option to ignore the President's conduct... and, by ignoring it, endorse it.

Of course, it's easy to understand Congress being reluctant at this point. On July 6 an American Research Group poll showed that 46% of respondents favored beginning impeachment hearings against George W. Bush in the House of Representatives- only one point less than the 47% opposed. (The same poll showed a clear majority of 54% for impeaching Vice President Cheney.) That spurred a rash of "yay! impeach now!" posts on various blogs and LiveJournals, but it should be tempered by two other polls coming out about the same time: USA Today / Gallup showing only 36% favoring impeachment hearings and 62% opposed, and Rassmussen unveiled a poll showing 39% in favor, 49% against. Averaging the three polls gives 40.3% in favor of impeachment... a number not much greater than the level of support in 1998 for impeachment hearings against Bill Clinton, which was an average (from six polls) of 36% according to Time blogger Ana Marie Cox. Popular support is not there.

And why isn't it there? I did a small nonscientific poll courtesy of LiveJournal, and among the questions was whether or not Bush should be impeached. The reasons given by those who said no to impeachment were on two grounds. First, the votes aren't there in the Senate to convict- and thus impeachment would be a waste of time. Second, impeachment would backfire against the Democrats- thus giving the Republicans back the White House and Congress and ensuring that the policies of Bush and his cronies are perpetuated.

I disagree with both these points, but it'll take me a bit to explain why.

First, let's look at what George W. Bush has done which would qualify as high crimes and misdemeanors. C-SPAN has a good article about what that phrase means. High crimes means just that- actions which are criminal under the law. Misdemeanors means- or meant at the time of the writing of the Constitution- actions which, while not strictly illegal under written law, served to injure the nation or the system of government itself. Using this test, of the three articles of impeachment passed by the Judiciary Committee against Richard Nixon- who clearly deserved impeachment-only one article was impeachment for high crimes (obstruction of justice). The other two were for abuse of office and for exercising powers not granted to the President by the Constitution- which, although they undermined our system of limited government, were either not illegal by statute or were illegal but unenforcable.

(Side note: that last link is only the second time I've seen a .info domain that wasn't a spam site. Alas. But I digress...)

So, what actual crimes has Bush committed? We only know of one for certain: the illegal and unwarranted search and seizure embodied in the NSA's domestic wiretap program. Bush has confessed that he did it, in direct violation of statute law. He defends the program as an extension of his war powers as Commander in Chief- powers which are defined nowhere in the Constitution, and are therefore questionable at best. Other crimes may come up in investigation- for example, the ordering of torture of prisoners in violation of the War Crimes Act, the deliberate destruction of White House records in the GOP email scandal, or the hiring and firing of federal attorneys on political grounds- but the current stone wall of "executive privilege" can only be overcome if the investigation is done on the grounds of possible impeachment, which trumps executive privilege.

But there's more to Bush's criminal conduct in the Oval Office than what actual statute laws he has broken. His misdeeds are not limited to tapping phones, ordering torture, destroying records, or politicizing the Department of Justice. George W. Bush deliberately used misleading or outright wrong intelligence to drum up support for the invasion of Iraq. He's manipulated the use of government secrecy to conceal corporate wrongdoing and push an anti-science, anti-environment agenda, while at the same time using strategic declassification to destroy his enemies and distract the public from his own misdeeds. He's held people in prison without habeas corpus, then had his stooges make his imprisonment and torture of those prisoners legal ex post facto. He's used his office to make select corporations billions, if not trillions, of dollars in profit at American taxpayer expense. He's done a lot of other things, too... but most, if not all of these, are not strictly speaking illegal, because there's no actual law against exceeding the legitimate powers granted the office of the President.

Despite this, some people still argue that nothing Bush has done constitutes an impeachable offense. He might have committed crimes, he might have abused his office, but it's not bad enough to warrant throwing him out of office, they say. However, it's important to remember that there is no other means of punishing someone in office, according to the Constitution, except by impeachment. In fact there's a very specific principle of law that states that no person serving in political office can be prosecuted for actions taken while performing that office until after they leave- if ever. In short, there is no means whatever for stopping a President out of control except impeachment.

And let's not mince words: the President, and his Vice President, are definitely out of control. Andrew Sullivan at the Atlantic has come out in favor of Cheney's impeachment, which as of this writing has thirteen sponsors in the House, but his article applies just as well to Bush. Both men believe, as Richard Nixon did, that the President is only accountable once every four years- when he is elected. For the rest of the time, the President is all-powerful, accountable to no one, subject to no law, and limited by no aspect of the Constitution. In short, he's an elected monarch- king for four or eight years- unless he is impeached.

And here's something important to note: sovereign immunity extends, in many cases, for the lifetime of the former officeholder. That means that if George Bush is not impeached, and he is allowed to leave office on January 20, 2009, the odds are extremely good he can never be tried in criminal court for anything- ANYTHING- he has done in office. Impeachment is the only way he can be made liable to the criminal courts.

That's what's on the table. If George W. Bush is not impeached, he and Cheney and all their cronies and supporters will go forever unpunished, forever unaccountable. There is no lesser punishment available than impeachment- censure is not merely unconstitutional, it's powerless and without effect.

Now to get back to the two main objections against impeachment- that the votes aren't there, and that the Democrats will lose if they try it.

First, the issue of the votes. We know there is a majority, although a slim one, which will vote at least one count, and probably more, of impeachment in the House. That means that, if impeachment comes to a vote, Congress will at least say that the President's conduct is criminal and will not be tolerated. The one bit of good that came out of the 1998-9 impeachment of Clinton was that the House of Representatives upheld the principle that perjury and obstruction of justice were wrong. (And yes, I think perjury should be impeachable, and I believe Clinton should have been convicted, no matter what the lie was about. The more prominent and powerful the criminal, the more severe should be the punishment, to show that power should not block justice.)

But if Congress fails to act- if Congress ignores all of Bush's crimes, fails to even vote on impeachment, and lets him leave office untouched- then Congress has in effect admitted that Bush committed no crimes, that his actions were within his legitimate powers as President. Signing statements, use of military intelligence to spy on peace protesters and political enemies, wire taps, Guantanamo, Abu Gharaib, and all the rest will not be evils to be rooted out- they will be tools left in place for the next President, and all Presidents thereafter, to use as they see fit.

In short, if we want to repudiate the principle of the "unitary executive," or elected monarchy, and if we want to make clear that Bush's actions in office are illegal, unconstitutional, and intolerable, impeachment must at least be attempted. To fail to at least make the attempt is to acknowledge by silence the justice and rightness of Bush's assertions of executive power.

This leads into the second point. Suppose Congress does not act, the Democrats win the White House, and a Democratic President is sworn in on 1-20-2009. That Democratic President would then have the power to use executive privilege to make every single action, every single conversation, every aspect whatever of the executive branch of government wholly secret from every single citizen of the United States. That President would have power to hold people indefinitely, incommunicado, with no legal venue to challenge their imprisonment. That President would have power to kidnap people off the streets of the world, torture them, and then dispose of them as they saw fit. In short, that President would have unlimited power to do anything and everything that President wanted... and thanks to the unchallenged precedent of George W. Bush, there would be no way to stop him or her.

Bill Clinton, Democrat, was a slick, two-faced, double-talking slimeball from Arkansas who had more rumors and scandals surrounding him than any President since Harding and before George W. Bush... would you trust him, or his wife, with the same power Bush now claims?

Lyndon B. Johnson, Democrat, expanded a war in Vietnam on a bold-faced lie, lied even more about the conduct of the war to the people, used intimidation and blackmail to get his way in Washington, and used the powers of his office to attack his enemies... would you have trusted him with the same power Bush now claims?

Woodrow Wilson, Democrat, sent the United States armed forces into half a dozen countries to overthrow their governments, from Haiti to the Soviet Union. He ordered the imprisonment of tens of thousands of American citizens strictly for their political beliefs. He completed the segregation of the Federal government and military and worked to destroy the few remaining protections black people had against the use of the law to enforce race prejudice. Would you trust Woodrow Wilson- a bigot, a xenophobe, an enemy of free speech, and a warmonger- with the same unlimited power Bush now claims?

No President, no matter their party, no matter their beliefs or intentions, should ever have so much power. In many of the specific powers involved, no one in government should have them at all.

But Bush currently has it, and he's using it, and he will not willingly relinquish it until his term of office expires.

For the sake of our Constitution- for the sake of our freedom- George W. Bush must be impeached, convicted, and removed from office. Preferably Dick Cheney should go first, to give Bush a chance to name a successor that keeps Pelosi out of the Oval Office, but both should go regardless of any other consequences. Even the Iraq War comes second to impeaching Bush- because Bush has vowed, repeatedly, that America will not withdraw from Iraq while his presidency lasts, and Congress has proved it can't stop the Commander in Chief from sending troops anywhere he wants.

Bush must be impeached- or else we give the Presidents to come unlimited power and, in turn, place ourselves wholly at their mercy.