On the Impeachment Front

Curious - I wonder if the editorial board over at the Trib even reads the newspaper. Take a look.

Despite constituents' continual calls to impeach President Bush -- or so leading congressional Democrats say -- the majority party insists it won't go down that road in the interest of national unity.

Oh, please. If Dems had any hook on which to hang a case -- such as catching President Bush in a bald-faced lie, for example -- they'd be all over impeachment like maggots to swill.

And:

Notice how neither lawmaker, nor the party's other nattering nabobs, even hint at what high "crime" is involved. Blathering on without so much as a shred of specifics -- while presuming themselves to be superior to Republicans because they impeached Bill Clinton -- reveals a truly twisted perspective.

We've been over this before.

Here's John Dean on the legal/politics of impeachment. The proper number of votes needed to impeach just can't be found in the Senate. Not because of any legal basis, but because of party loyalty - not enough Republican Senators will vote to Impeach. He wrote the article a little more than a year ago, and while the membership of the Senate has certainly shifted (yay!), I don't think that shift has been enough to erase Dean's analysis.

Then there's Congressman Mike Doyle. His position was that Impeachment would only serve to improve the President's poll numbers, as the Republicans would circle the wagons around the leader of their party. It would be a diversion. Strict oversight followed by the humiliating resignations of those found guily would be much more solid.

But neither Dean nor Congressman Doyle explicitly denied the existence of evidence to support impeachment as does the Trib's editorial board.

We've been through this before.

If the Trib editorial board wants some evidence, here's some.

On December 17 (2005) President Bush acknowledged that he repeatedly authorized wiretaps, without obtaining a warrant, of American citizens engaged in international calls. On the face of it, these warrantless wiretaps violate FISA, which requires court approval for national security wiretaps and sets up a special procedure for obtaining it. Violation of the law is a felony.

How long was George W Bush committing a felony?

Then there's the niger claims to Congress, the use of torture, the lies and distortions leading up to the Iraq war. Need I go on? What "news" has the editorial board at the Trib been reading?

Meanwhile up in those green and pleasant hills of Vermont, Impeachment's been chugging along anyway.

Members of Vermont's grassroots impeachment movement will meet with Vermont's top two Democrats on Wednesday in a final effort to push along legislation calling for President Bush's removal from office.

Supporters hope to convince House Speaker Gaye Symington, D-Jericho, and Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin, D-Windham, to put their political support behind a resolution asking the U.S. Congress to begin impeachment hearings against Bush.

And you know it's serious when Roland Hedley is on the story.

And while I still feel that in order to protect the integrity of the whole system, impeachment of some sort is demanded, I can see the points made by Dean and Doyle. We live in the real world and sometimes that means we gotta live with less than what we think is necessary.

Impeach.