Reply #74: There are bound to be a lot of rumors flying. I wouldn't credit them much. [View All]

And I would recommend regarding statements like "impeachment is off the table" the way we regard "I am not running for president" which often just flips over when the time is ripe. Routine denials.

This IS a grave matter, however. The integrity of the Congress as an equal branch of government is at issue. And I don't like Pelosi's statement--"impeachment is off the table." I think it is a violation of her oath of office. How dare she take it off the table! It is our ONLY tool to reign in a rogue president! It is a requirement and duty of the Constitution. Congress has been utterly derelict in demanding accountability from Bush and Cheney. It is Congress' DUTY to bring them to account! If Pelosi doesn't want to show her hand just yet, she should have put it another way.

That said, what we are looking at is a fascist junta, which used tools that the Democrats agreed to, knowingly or unknowingly, to keep itself in power--namely the fast-track installation of electronic voting systems, run on TRADE SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code, owned and controlled by Bushite corporations, during the 2002-2004 period. There is no reason to install non-transparent voting systems except fraud. I am certain that that was Tom Delay's and Bob Ney's intention in ramming through the "Help America Vote for Bush Act" of 2002.

The ACTIONS of the Bush Junta make their illegitimacy apparent. They are ACTING LIKE people who feel NO ACCOUNTABILITY whatsoever to the American people. And they are correct. They owe their power to the winger nutballs behind Diebold and ES&S. And you see how difficult it is for even Daddy Bush and the Cartel to rein these people in (--if that isn't all just a dumbshow). SEVENTY PERCENT of the American people want this war ended. Do they care? Not a bit. What does that tell you about the legitimacy of their re-election?

These people, Bush and Cheney, and the corporate powers behind them, are bad, bad, bad. They are master criminals. They are immensely powerful. They've had six years to entrench themselves in ways we cannot even imagine yet. It is not clear that the Congress CAN impeach them. It is not clear that Congress has that power any more. We are in a grave situation--a grave Constitutional crisis.

And the Democrats have several problems in addressing it: 1. They backed electronic voting. 2. Many of them backed the war. 3. They don't have the strength they should have--even with the Dem wins last week--the FL-13 is just the most obvious of the fraudulent vote counts; there are likely more; and these voting systems have been entrenched by means of corruption (the $3.9 billion in HAVA money, lavish lobbying) on a bipartisan basis. 4. The strength of the real Democrats is hampered by a faction of Bushite Democrats, like those who voted for torture and suspensions of habeas corpus a month ago (and they are VERY hampered in the Senate, with Lieberman a pivotal vote). 5. Bush and Cheney have abrogated to themselves powers of pervasive domestic spying--they likely have dirt on many Congress critters. 6. Cheney has stated that he will not answer Congressional subpoenas. 7. Bush has written, time and again, in "signing statements" that Congress' laws do not apply to him and his junta. 8. We are emerging from the most spineless, rotten, lapdog Congress we have ever known in this country--it will be difficult to reestablish precedents of Congress as a coequal branch of government in this circumstance.

I don't know where we go from here. I don't know where Pelosi is going from here, or I'm not sure of where I think she should go (as a strategy or as a goal). And I don't think we have all the cards on the table either--we, the citizens of this country. I think a lot of stuff--real serious stuff--is going on behind the scenes. One other thought, Pelosi is in line to become President after Bush and Cheney. She may consider it inappropriate to lead the charge on impeachment. And, finally, if they do intend impeachment, the last thing in the world they may wish is for Bush and Cheney to know it. And the other last thing in the world they would want is for the war profiteering corporate news monopolies to know it and to start nosing around in efforts to derail the end of their darling war regime.

All this is not to say that impeachment is not righteous--and even imperative, if our Constitution is to be restored. If not impeachment, I hope to God they have something else in mind, to curtail this regime. What are they going to do if a committee chair issues a subpoena, and Bush or Cheney refuse to answer it? They MUST assert their power in some way.

I am not ready to say that Pelosi and Conyers and others are in some kind of military-industrial complex conspiracy to keep the war profiteers in private jets and caviar, by keeping the war going indefinitely, and/or to keep the entire US military in the Middle East indefinitely, with the constant threat of instigating or becoming embroiled in a Mideast-wide war. I think it is a possibility--I repeat, a POSSIBILITY--that they are, willingly or unwillingly. We don't have a lot of reason to trust our representatives--even the best of them. Any of them can be subject to fear or blackmail, or just to the filthy, collusive atmosphere of the Washington DC war profiteering hogpen. But PLEASE do not jump to conclusions, that somehow they are chickening out, on the basis of current information. It is not fair to them. We really do not know what they are up against. They have not yet even convened with full Congressional powers in their possession. And I am speaking of the best of them right now--those who opposed the war--as well as any who are honest and want to do the right thing. Congress is in an extremely shaky position, unlike at any other time in our history. Let's give them a bit of breathing room on how to proceed. Doesn't mean we shouldn't work on impeachment petitions. I just think it's too soon to condemn them for not acting. Much too soon.