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When the Walls Come Tumbling Downby George Ziemann -- June 4, 2008 While politics is generally a snooze-fest, the dissection of the Bush Administration has begun. If you're too young to remember how it went for Nixon, you're going to want to watch this because people go to jail at the end of the story and the plot is a lot easier to follow than Lost. In the cases of Clinton and Nixon, their actual offenses were trivial. Nixon got impeached over a petty burglary at the Democrat's headquarters. He was trying to spy on the other team, an American tradition dating back to the Revolutionary War. Clinton lied about a blowjob (and who among us has not?). During the Iran-Contra hearings, I was pretty sure Reagan's repeated use of "I do not recall that" as a response to almost every question was a clue that maybe he was lying his ass off. We now know that Reagan had Alzheimer's but we're not supposed to consider that he was still president when it started because we already named too much shit after him. Which brings us to George W. Bush, who campaigned with the recurring reminder that, "The purpose of the military is to fight and win wars." This alone was enough to make me vote against him, even as I gave John McCain my vote for another Senate term. Ironically, I now have to vote against McCain, for pretty much exactly the same reason. I started out as a Republican because the Democrats started Vietnam, based on a lie. Without changing my underlying principles or positions, now I'm suddenly on the far left because I am opposed to another war, based on another lie. I haven't read Scott McClellan's book and don't intend to. My understanding of it is that it confirms that when McClellan was press secretary at the White House, everything he was telling us was bullshit, just as a lot of us thought when he was saying it. Except for the media, who printed every word, paid the "military analysts" to deliver the propaganda directly, and acted like they had no clue that any of it was happening because they were obligated to support the "war on terror," even if it meant abandoning every principle of journalism. No use going into a litany of what the Bush Administration has done. You either already know what has happened or you just don't care. Suffice it to say that the lies were numerous, the known crimes are not trivial. The current unprecedented redefinition of executive power ("I am the Decider") threatens the existence of democracy if it is allowed to become the unchallenged precedent. The Stupid Factors1) If Scott McClellan had not written his book, no one else was going to point out the obvious truth. Not the Democrats, not the Republicans, not the "liberal" media, not Fox News, CNN, NBC, CBS, the Washington Post or the New York Times. 2) Now that the truth appeared, everyone is going to ignore it. We've already moved on to the Obama/Clinton/McCain thing and we're just going to hope that Bush doesn't go to war with Iran in August so he can declare martial law and suspend elections, along with what few civil rights he hasn't already crossed off the list. 3) Even if Congress pursues this matter, Bush will avoid punishment. Yeah, I know, Vincent Bugliosi, the guy who prosecuted Charlie Manson, is pushing for murder charges and the death penalty, but I don't think that'll happen. Why? The Stupid DefenseTo my beady little eyes, Cheney and Rove are the ones responsible for raping the Constitution. Since the only thing we ever impeach presidents for is lying to us, there is a solid argument that Bush never lied to us. Maybe he's just a gullible moron. Maybe he believes everything he's said. Maybe he just Hispanically misunderestimated the accuracy of his intelligencers and adviserators. As long as Bush sticks with the dim bulb routine and swears that all his decisions were based on what his adviserators Cheney and Rove told him, which he believed unquestioningly because he's not very inquisitive, it's almost an easy sell that he wasn't lying, he's just a dumbass. I'd almost believe it myself, but I've watched him speak. He smiles when he lies. Every time. Has been doing it all along. Keep that in mind if there's a trial or Senate inquiry. Or the next time you seem him give a speech. June 9 -- According to Fox News, Scott McClellan will testify in front of a House subcommittee. More interesting, I watched a portion of Dennis Kucinich reading the 35 articles of impeachment against President Bush into the record of the House of Representatives this evening on C-SPAN. I thought it was significant, but not one major news outlet seems to be reporting on this. So much for the "liberal" media. June 12 -- The articles of impeachment have been shuffled off to the House Judiciary Committee, where they are expected to die because the Democrats do not have the balls to move it forward. Kucinich has promised that, should this be the outcome, he is prepared to introduce them again, this time with 60 charges. The media still prefers to act as if this hasn't happened. Later that same day... The Supreme Court decides that the Guantanamo concentration camp is breaking the law. Everyone immediately calls for the closing of the camp, ignoring the fact that this is evidence backing one of the Articles of Impeachment. June 13 -- Supreme Court to Bush: You Are Not Above the Law Nancy Pelosi to Bush: Yes, You Are! Michael Moore reports: "Wednesday, a 17-member delegation of Veterans For Peace presented some 23,000 petitions to Congressman John Conyers (D-MI), demanding the impeachment of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney." June 20 -- From the Washington Post:
Also from the Washington Post, lawyers have been telling Bush for 6 years that he was going to have a problem when the activities at Guantanamo came under judicial scrutiny. They were ignored. Now that said scrutiny is beginning to take place as predicted, who is responsible? The Supreme Court, of course. Why? "...the narrow Supreme Court majorities in the Guantanamo cases deserve far harsher criticism for their gross misreadings of the law and their abandonment of sound precedent on which the administration reasonably relied." If you think that last quote reflects a disconnect from reality, consider the fact that it came from the guy who is currently the top dog at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. June 27 -- Washington Post
I especially liked the part where the vice president is compared to a barnacle, which may or may not be mentioned in the column, but can be found on YouTube. June 30 -- A federal appeals court has ruled that the government must present reliable and verifiable evidence to hearing panels that determine whether terrorism suspects should be held indefinitely as "enemy combatants" at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. (Link) July 3 -- A federal judge rules that the "executive privilege" does not extend to wiretapping Americans, unless it complies with the standards enacted by Congress that the Bush administration has ignored. (Link) July 10 -- Karl Rove ignores a Congressional subpoena. The best quote from the story is "House Republicans called [the] proceedings a political stunt and said if Democrats truly wanted information they would take Rove up on an offer he made to discuss the matter informally." This places us at the intersection of bullshit and chickenshit. The Republican stance requires pretending the last 8 years didn't happen. The Democrats are the majority and they are afraid to stand up and demand the truth. Neither side seems concerned about the honor and dignity of the office of President of the United States that was so overwhelmingly important when Clinton was in charge. That political stunt did not allow for informal discussion. Maybe Clinton didn't know he could just make an executive order to ignore Congress. Or maybe he thought about it and just didn't think anyone would fall for such a transparently lame ploy to prevent the truth from coming out. As it turns out, the Republicans think this is the perfect way to go. July 30 -- A House subcommittee voted to charge Karl Rove with contempt of Congress, which almost everyone is certain will be ignored by the White House because it relies on the Attorney General's blessing. Last week, Kucinich got to argue one of his impeachment articles, with the small limitation that the hearings not impugn the character of the President. So it turned into a Mad Hatter Tea Party where they talked about what an impeachable offense is and refused to entertain the notion that they might actually impeach anyone. One recurring argument I hear a lot is that it's too late to do anything. Bush will be out of office before any substantial action could be taken since glaciers move faster than Congress. But Kucinich isn't quite finished yet. August 23 -- CIA More Fully Denies Deception About Iraq August 30 -- Well, I am forced to admit that it's not going to happen. Pelosi has never even read the Articles of Impeachment submitted by Kucinich. I find this disturbing only because the entire country is trying to ignore what happened over the last 8 years. We're actively creating false history. I've never seen that happen before in America. |
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