35 Articles of Impeachment Introduced Against Bush 1657
vsync64 writes "Last night, Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) spent 4 hours reading into the Congressional Record 35 articles of impeachment against George W. Bush. Interestingly, those articles (63-page PDF via Coral CDN) include not just complaints about signing statements and the war in Iraq, but also charges that the President "Sp[ied] on American Citizens, Without a Court-Ordered Warrant, in Violation of the Law and the Fourth Amendment,' 'Direct[ed] Telecommunications Companies to Create an Illegal and Unconstitutional Database of the Private Telephone Numbers and Emails of American Citizens,' and 'Tamper[ed] with Free and Fair Elections.' These are issues near and dear to the hearts of many here, so it's worth discussing. What little mainstream media coverage there is tends to be brief (USA Today, CBS News, UPI, AP, Reuters)." The (Democratic) House leadership has said that the idea of impeachment is "off the table." The Judiciary Committee has not acted on articles of impeachment against Vice President Cheney introduced by Kucinich a year ago.
Setting the standard (Score:2, Interesting)
History will do more to condemn Bush (Score:5, Interesting)
Plus, the Democrats are looking to rout the Republicans in November at least in the Senate and House(President is still a bit up in the air), doing something showboating like this can only benefit the Republicans.
For the readers from Europe ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Some points are intruiging for me, such as:
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:5, Interesting)
Now there needs just needs to be a Constitutional Amendment which requires the ENTIRE US TAX CODE to be read into the Congressional Record every single year for it to be legally binding! Of course, that would either require CSPAN to get another satellite or for the tax code to be shortened into the flat tax...
Then again, I was under the impression that "earmarks" were not required to be read into the record either? Whoops... confusing the Congressional Record's purpose with that of Official Congressional Business as Usual...
What? What was its purpose again?
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, that would've been a good thing -- the people hearing it would've actually known behind a doubt what they were stealing from us all.
nobody in congress seriously wants to impeach (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:5, Interesting)
If we were to allow Congressman Kucinich ten minutes of airtime for every legally questionable act by the Bush administration, he would still have many hours of airtime left today. Or how about we do it one to one? One minute of airtime for every minute used up in White House press briefings by their fake journalist [wikipedia.org]?
Four hours is a drop in the bucket. My only regret is that Dubya didn't have to stand in a stress position and listen to all of it and then recite it back.
It's a mix (Score:2, Interesting)
But it's a shame that those are mixed in with whackjob conspiracy accusations like fixing elections.
Does it matter? (Score:3, Interesting)
Does this really matter?
Now as I remember, people have been calling for Bush to be impeached since his first 6 months of office. It died down for a little bit during the "we are one" period after 9/11, but then came back.
Now to impeach him then would have meant something. Doing it in '04 would have meant something. Doing it in '06 would have meant something.
It's July '08. It's too late. You can't impeach him and have something useful happen.
Let's just assume that you could get the impeachment passed in under a month. That's impossible thanks to the grandstanding that will happen in this election year. Having both major candidates be Senators won't help. They'll stretch it on as long as they can. Then there is the impeachment trial. That will last months and months and months.
By the time the whole thing is over (assuming he is impeached and convicted) he will have been out of office for... months. Congratulations, you've accomplished nothing.
This is pure theater. Whenever some of the Dems want an anti-republican issue they bring this one up. The hard-core left pipes up about it for a while and gets a little air time. The fact that the leadership doesn't even support it shows how far it's going to go in reality.
A quick look at Wikipedia seems to show that he isn't running again. He has nothing to lose, he can grandstand like this with no repercussions in the next election.
Congress did (next to) nothing to control Bush (both sides). They had plenty of chances. Congress changed hands with a bunch of people coming in or being reelected on promises of changing things, and we all know what happened then: nothing. It is up to history at this point to judge Bush. Whether some of his policies turn out for the best, he is the worst president in history, or just a footnote as "the guy who got us in Iraq." Various policies may be changed by the next administration to undo/fix things Bush has done "wrong", but it's too late now to kick him out. He's already gone, and has been out of political capital for at least months.
So, does all this matter that much? It's too late to change things.
Pointless? (Score:2, Interesting)
That sounds like a good enough reason to me.
Re:Result: civil war (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Too little too late... (Score:1, Interesting)
Would it be a big surprise if with a month or so to go in his term, Bush might invade Iran. Then he might try to say that during war, a President cannot leave office. He would try to argue that no American President has left office during a war and he would be right. The only time that happened was LBJ not running for reelection during the Vietnam War. With all the Executive Orders outlawing criticisms of a wartime Administration there could be mass arrests.
This may all seem unlikely, but he has the power and the morality to do something like this. Bush has said he leads by the feelings in his gut, not fact or newspapers or briefings. If his gut says so, he'll do it no matter how illegal or illogical.
Impeachment proceedings starting now could force him out before any damage can be done.
I would not put anything beyond the possibility of this President. The man is a shameless egoist and nothing he does is wrong, just ask him.
The only reason..... (Score:4, Interesting)
"going to war with Iran" (Score:1, Interesting)
A lot of people are saying that those who control the U.S. government, obviously oil and weapons investors, are planning another terrorist attack on the U.S.*, which they will use to justify an attack on Iran so that there can be even greater control over oil supplies to make the price rise further.
*Buildings do not fall symmetrically into dust and small pieces, even if there is destruction at the top. The destruction of the World Trade Center was a controlled demolition.
There is a lot of evidence [radaronline.com] that whoever controls the U.S. government is planning to declare martial law. It's a top-rated story [digg.com] on Digg.com.
Search for "martial law" on digg.com [digg.com] or reddit.com [reddit.com]. There are hundreds of links.
Re: BBC uncovers lost Iraq billions (Score:2, Interesting)
This serves to illustrate how closely tied politics, business, and media are in the U.S.
Re:Kucinich is an idiot; He hurts the Democrats (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Kucinich is an idiot; He hurts the Democrats (Score:2, Interesting)
Agreed; Obama is a collection of empty slogans engineered by a West Wing scriptwriter (fact!). But what good on Earth has Bush done for the world?
Lincoln and FDR actions /= Bush (Score:3, Interesting)
Lincoln's suspending of habeus corpus was actually not that widespread, nor were most of his other questionable activities, none of which even began to reach the scale of Bush's ones. As for FDR, well, first of all, we really did have a world war going on and secondly, yeah, no sh*t, and look at how much trouble his actions have gotten us into since. The "Military-Industrial Complex" that Bush is so tied to grew directly out of FDR's policies and his obsession with secrecy (not to mention the influence of Hoover) played a huge role in Truman getting suckered by the security establishment into creating so much of the core institutions that are so central to our current national security state. If FDR had lived a few years longer he probably would have faced impeachment hearings. He certainly had enough enemies. Gawd knows Churchill was out on his butt as soon as anybody was in a position to do so.
If you want to try that line of patter, might I suggest that you start with the Alien and Anti-Sedition Acts and Wilson's various illegal actions against folks like Eugene Debs.
Amazing news, but not on CNN? (Score:3, Interesting)
This seems like huge news, so it seems odd that CNN wouldn't be all over it?
An evil president? (Score:2, Interesting)
Clinton lied ABOUT HIS PERSONAL LIFE (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:how long till the next 9/11? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Too little too late... (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, no. Remember, this was a result of a Sexual Harassment Lawsuit against Clinton. Remember that the Supremes had recently ruled that someone's past sexual history WAS RELEVANT in a sexual harassment trial.
Based on the Supreme's Ruling, Clinton might very well have lost the case if he'd told the truth. Which makes the perjury a moderately serious issue, legally speaking.
Which latter makes it, arguably (only arguably, I'd have voted to Impeach if I'd been in the House then, but not to convict if I'd been in the Senate), an Impeachable offense.
By contrast, if Clinton had just screwed Monica, it would still have qualified as Sexual Harassment, by the standards of the leaders of the Feminist Movement, for anyone but Clinton. But it would NEVER have come to trial, since there would have been no underlying perjury to get things rolling.
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:5, Interesting)
-Em
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:5, Interesting)
Nonsense. The Legislative Branch should not be responding to emergencies. That's the Executive Branch's job.
The quintissential case is a Pearl Harbor style scenario, where America is under attack and we need a declaration of war. I'd argue that, in this day and age, we could have a provision stating that the President is free to deploy the troops for up to 90 days, but, following that grace period, he must get a declaration of war from Congress (not a resolution, or an authorization, but a formal declaration of war), otherwise he has to bring the troops home. This would allow ample time for the president to respond to short term emergencies, while still leaving leeway for the US to respond credibly to unprovoked attacks.
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:0, Interesting)
He is the original tin hat congressman. He puts Alex Jones to shame.
And Richard Armitage outed V.P.
Geez this place is bonkers (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:3, Interesting)
Just like Kyoto (never signed by Clinton, never ratified) for some reason people have a hard time understanding how the treaty system works.
Re:Too little too late... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:5, Interesting)
Bush does not own Haliburton stock, but Cheney does, guess which one of them got rich over Iraq? It was Cheney, so you have more evidence against Cheney than Bush.
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:4, Interesting)
If any Bush administration official is charged with war crimes, I will personally put up $1000 as part of a bounty for "extraordinary rendition" of said official to the Hague. Who's with me?
Re:Not my support. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:3, Interesting)
I got this description (from someone who lived in the states) that if you don't like how your congressman votes, you can call him at home and ask him why; If you don't like his answer, you can put it in the newspaper and maybe, get him to resign.
I think it was an oversimplification, but I also think that with all the American democracy(TM) nothing will happen this time.
I get the feeling (I've never been to the states so I may be wrong) that what you're starting to see here is a well-oiled leadership machine, changing it's public figure every four (or eight years), but with the same system behind, with the same small group of people amassing power (how is that for representing the people?).
There may be a scandal and that's it (when he started his speech no major news agencies even touched the subject, and that in itself might be bigger news that what the president did: it's part of the system for covering it up).
I hope I'm too cynical about this.
Where were you?!? (Score:4, Interesting)
In 2004, half of America voted for a guy who did nothing right and everything wrong. They chose to continue down the path of complete fucked-upedness. I say, you wanted it, you got it, bitches. The Republicans, the Limbaugh fans, the Christian wackos, they all had everything they ever wanted - blind control of Congress, the Supreme Court, an executive who felt he was above the law and could do whatever he felt like - yeah, how that'd work out for ya? Me, I won't forget all the bullshit and vitriol those people put us through, and how everything they believed in ended up in failure and ruins. But where are all these people now? Give them a little impeachment filing that goes nowhere, and that's it? These people were chock-full of evil. C'mon, what ever happened to being tarred and feathered?
Oh, sorry, I'll just go put on my flag lapel pin... carry on, nothing to see here...
I'll never understand (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:You don't seem to understand the point... (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't think a foreign country would risk putting a former president in front of a war crime tribunal, even if its as unpopular a president as Bush.
In many parts of the EU any citizen can ask the police to arrest him if he was no longer president and dared to step foot here. You might want to read about General Pinochet's arrest warrant [wikipedia.org] (issued by a Spanish judge and only very narrowly avoided), and this WP page on universal jurisdiction [wikipedia.org].
Rich.
Re:Too little too late... (Score:3, Interesting)
You're right. It should have been modded +Insightful, not +Informative.
Oh, I'm sorry, were you suggesting he should have been modded DOWN?
Sounds like a squeal of pain against a comment that hit a you dead on.
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Re:Drill Everywhere, Drill Now (Score:5, Interesting)
So, why is it a bad thing? It means that the US gets to use up the domestic supply of other nations, preserving its own for a time of real need. Sounds great from an economic and security perspective. Would you rather we used up our own supply on petty uses? The we would really be at risk in the future, when oil becomes expensive and other nations can hold an economic gun to our heads.
Nope, not always. Especially not in this case. Demand for oil is massive. A small increase in supply is going to have negligible (or none at all) effect on prices at the pump. And why would they sell it at a reduced price to American motorists, when there are plenty of other buyers who would pay the market rate? It doesn't make any sense, economically, unless you are advocating some socialist means of distribution with controlled pricing.
And that's not even considering the costs of refining and distribution to the retail market. Domestic drilling just isn't going to have any effect on prices at the pump. Unless you are talking about some sort of charity case or government subsidy. And why should the government offer such a subsidy? I consume very little gasoline, I spend a lot more on computers, technology and food. Should the government subsidize my computer purchases because I feel they are too expensive?
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:3, Interesting)
First, the supposed threat to an undercover agent would be exposure. By definition, that means exposure to someone other than their own association. You seem to have missed that point. Second, it is impossible for any entity to find every person someone has interacted with over the course of 15 years in free societies. It's very clear you don't have any legal or intel experience. Statement of fact.
It's not possible for the general public to know if President Bush "lied" when he said he'd fire anyone involved in revealing a covert agent. First, you'd need inside knowledge to ascertain at what point the administration knew Valerie's actual status. Second, since she wasn't covert, nobody could reveal her as being covert. You refuse to admit the claims have prerequisited which were not met. It is just as valid to say President Bush did indeed fire everyone involved in leaking Valerie Plame's name as a covert operataive. She did not have the legal status of being covert. That's all there is to it.
You're trying to build a straw man again. By definition, anything the President chooses to release is unclassified. That's all there is to it. You are more than welcome to study the laws.
True, the UN Security Council could issue a piece of paper condemning Saddam but that's all it can do, in and of itself. The UN Security Council is really nothing more than a group of Ambassadors to the UN. Their agreements become the responsibility of the memebre nations. The United States is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and carries the responsibility to enforce the Security Council resolutions. The UN Security Council has no military forces of its own. The conditions of the cease fire did not cease to pertain simply because a subsequent unanimous decision was not reached. The UN Security Council has reached unanimous vote to take military action twice; the Korean War and the first Gulf War. Neither war had been ended. Fact.
Uh...can't "blow a cover" which doesn't exist. See previous message, comments above, basic logic and law.
Joe Wilson was not privy to all intel. He was an unemployed ex-Civil Service worker with no security clearance. In fact, yellowcake from Niger was found in Iraq and there were commercial records of the transactions. Even if it were not, the mere act of pursuing negotiations with Niger for Uranium violated the cease fire. That's all there is to it. 10 years of violating the cease fire agreement of an active war created the obligation and authority to respond militarily. That's the law.
No, it was Jack's column which revealed Valerie's name. Wilson's "article" was so full of lies the Congressional investiagtion threw it out. If it had been an actual trial and he made such claims, he would be guilty of perjury. Jack couldn't reveal Armitage told him Valerie's name until after the falrse trial without creating legal risk to himself. The press will promoteo whatever it chooses to promote. They built a strawman because that's what they wanted.
No, the forged document was widely acknowledge to be forged. That wasn't the only evidence. President Bush stated that the British intel believed Saddam was pursuing Uranium purchase. That statement of fact was followed by Joe Wilson's strawman "article" which has been totally debunked. (Again, Congressional Record to read the investigation testimony and evidence.)
You don't have access to intel information of the sort which would be required to state, with any surety, wether or not nuke materials were found. All you have is free market information.
You're wasting time chasing a poorly-constructed conspiracy theory.
When asked why he voted against the PATRIOT Act (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:3, Interesting)
Immediate disclosure of all intel is never a good thing. Information has value. Sometimes its used to "turn" people. Look at the public disclosure by Libya of their WMD programs, turn over and cesation. That didn't happen because Moamar had a dream. It happened because of intel operations and non-public communications. Publicity makes it much harder to dismantle an enemy because they hide more.
Rational people don't have any problem with this.
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a country of laws, It's the usA, not the usSR.
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't remember Haydn making any such statement. Can you provide a reference? The exact language would be very critical because if, as was widely stated, Valerie HAD BEEN covert but it had been 10 or 15 years, whatever the time limit was, then wether her name was released would be illegal would depend on a lot of things. As I understand it, she wasn't undercover in the legal sense, which is all that mattered. There are many levels of less-than-open legal status. They are not all "undercover" and not all are "spies" or "agents."
Even so, as I've already stated, if the President directed revealing Valerie's name, there was no crime committed because the President's authority to declassify is absolute and both implicit and explicit. For there to be a crime, there must be grounds. There ain't no "there" there no matter how much anyone tries to parse it.
Intelligence isn't law. It doesn't work that way. Pieces of information have relative authenticity and the aggregate is what is important. The "bad guys" don't follow a script and don't stop what they're doing, surrender and turn everything over to the "good guys" when they are caught.
You could theorize any possible scenario you want. Why didn't Armitage come to Libby's rescue given Libby had saved his butt yers earlier? Why did Bush commute the sentence of Libby? Why did the investigation continue, or even start, given the special prosecutor already knew it was Armitage who revealed Valerie's name? Why did Wilson contradict himself so often?
Re:...Brought to you by Carl's Jr. (Score:4, Interesting)
Second, it is impossible for any entity to find every person someone has interacted with over the course of 15 years in free societies.
Some spies who knew Valerie Plame were able to avoid exposure. This is probably true of every blown cover in the history of the world, so it doesn't really win Bush any points.
By definition, that means exposure to someone other than their own association. What does this mean?
It's not possible for the general public to know if President Bush "lied" when he said he'd fire anyone involved in revealing a covert agent. First, you'd need inside knowledge to ascertain at what point the administration knew Valerie's actual status. Second, since she wasn't covert, nobody could reveal her as being covert. You refuse to admit the claims have prerequisited which were not met. It is just as valid to say President Bush did indeed fire everyone involved in leaking Valerie Plame's name as a covert operataive. She did not have the legal status of being covert. That's all there is to it.
First point we now know that Armitage, Libby, and Rove were behind the leak and attempted earlier leaks, by their own admission. Second, she was covert and under an unofficial cover which means that merely revealing her as CIA blew her cover. Her cover, BTW, doesn't become useless just because she wasn't in the field. Anyone with intel experience would know. You're also putting words into the Whitehouse's mouth. They pledged to fire "anyone involved in it." There wasn't always your careful parsing about "covert agents".
No, the forged document was widely acknowledge to be forged. That wasn't the only evidence. President Bush stated that the British intel believed Saddam was pursuing Uranium purchase. That statement of fact was followed by Joe Wilson's strawman "article" which has been totally debunked. (Again, Congressional Record to read the investigation testimony and evidence.)
"British Intel" is not evidence, a point which becomes crystal clear when you research the source of their belief, which was the same poorly forged documents, and which lead to Bush's tortured phrasing, since they didn't have any evidence that could convince American Intel.
You don't have access to intel information of the sort which would be required to state, with any surety, wether or not nuke materials were found. All you have is free market information.
This is nothing more than deluded authoritarianism. Consider that they paraded around every piece of crap "evidence" that they could find, then try to convince anyone that they withheld the good stuff.