Barron's: Investigate a possible impeachable offense

Unwarranted Executive Power

AS THE YEAR WAS DRAWING TO A CLOSE, we picked up our New York Times and learned that the Bush administration has been fighting terrorism by intercepting communications in America without warrants. It was worrisome on its face, but in justifying their actions, officials have made a bad situation much worse: Administration lawyers and the president himself have tortured the Constitution and extracted a suspension of the separation of powers.

snip

Willful disregard of a law is potentially an impeachable offense. It is at least as impeachable as having a sexual escapade under the Oval Office desk and lying about it later. The members of the House Judiciary Committee who staged the impeachment of President Clinton ought to be as outraged at this situation. They ought to investigate it, consider it carefully and report either a bill that would change the wiretap laws to suit the president or a bill of impeachment.

It is important to be clear that an impeachment case, if it comes to that, would not be about wiretapping, or about a possible Constitutional right not to be wiretapped. It would be about the power of Congress to set wiretapping rules by law, and it is about the obligation of the president to follow the rules in the Acts that he and his predecessors signed into law.

snip

Published reports quote sources saying that 14 members of Congress were notified of the wiretapping. If some had misgivings, apparently they were scared of being called names, as the president did last week when he said: "It was a shameful act for someone to disclose this very important program in a time of war. The fact that we're discussing this program is helping the enemy."

Wrong. If we don't discuss the program and the lack of authority for it, we are meeting the enemy -- in the mirror.


http://online.barrons.com/article/SB113538491760731012.html (subscription required)

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2005/12/barrons_investi.html

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_12_18_atrios_archive.html#113543792255944492


Toast? :)

Some communist rag called Barron's says it's time to consider impeachment.

Recommended for "Greatest" page.

Thanks for posting.

Oooh, chills run up and down my spine.

Want some butter on that toast, or do you prefer jam? :)

But I had to sit up and take notice this morning, when I saw the normally conservative-leaning financial weekly Barron's calls for an investigation into the Bush administration's use of domestic surveillance as a possible impeachable offense:

Precisely.
If the powers that be in business turn against Bush, he is in real trouble.

Eisenhower, Goldwater, and Nixon would have spoken out against W years ago.

Conservatives haven't been doing their jobs. It's about time they started.

Remember Watergate? Abuse of power? to hell with the Constitution?

:toast:

...to a clear perspective - the president's obligation to follow the rules

and :toast:

"They ought to investigate it, consider it carefully and report either a bill that would change the wiretap laws to suit the president or a bill of impeachment."

They're more likely to change the laws to suit the situation and give the pResident more power.

from behind his podium and beady eyes. He's telling us we mustn't question his actions. The America I grew up with can weather terrorists' blasts, find terrorists and defeat them without violating its own laws and traditions of individual liberty, and shrug it off. But we won't survive a Fascist takeover from the inside, not if we sit back and allow things to go on as though we were in normal times with a legitimate government.

They KNEW a year ago that someone had talked--they actually negotiated with the NYT to hold the story. Where was their Justice Department, hunting down leakers, a year ago??? So long as no one mentions it, even though the leak--and the supposed compromise of national security material-- occurred, it ain't a crime??? Only when their asses are in political slings, it becomes a problem???

The whole thing stinks, and the whole lot of them need impeaching, now.

}(

covert corporate spying that causes the worm to turn. Corporate America was all for the fascist takeover until they realized it could possibly come back to bite them.

struck at the top of their tower. The weapon is a combination of leaks? AND revelations through investigative digging? The remaining question is whether they will be able to save the tower, repair it, top if off, or will there be explosives planted on the lower floors - explosive revelations that will bring their tower down completely?

Topping it off for us only means that the people behind what we see and hear will only continue with their agenda established decdes ago to control the people and the earth.

What we see and hear is all a show to delude us into thinking that it is our country, that we can elect our representatives, that our taxes our going to good causes that everyone benefits from.

Pigs are flying, hell is freezing over!

can the WSJ be far behind? or the hopeless Investors Business Daily? (which makes WSJ look like a leftwing tabloid)?

:kick: