My fax to Pelosi regarding impeachment - This is not America
by Dave Robinson
Date: November 16, 2007
Re: Impeachment
To: Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House 202- 225-4188
Cc:
Rep. John Conyers, Chair, House Judiciary Committee 202- 225-0072
Rep. Jerrold Nadler, Subcommittee Chair, Constitution,
Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Committee 202- 225-6923
Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, Democratic Majority Leader 202- 225-4300
Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich, Sponsor H. Res. 333 202- 225-5745
Rep. Yvette Clarke, (D-NY 11th), Cosponsor H. Res. 333 202- 226-0112
Rep. Edolphus Towns, (D-NY 10th), Cosponsor H. Res. 333 202- 225-1018
Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) 202- 228-3027
Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) 202- 228-0282
Rep. Rahm Emanuel, DCCC Chair 202- 225-5603
Howard Dean, DNC Chair 202- 863-8174
Dear Speaker Pelosi, I am blessed to live in Brooklyn, NY. I was honored to be involved in meetings earlier this year with two of our Brooklyn Congressional representatives, Yvette Clarke and Ed Towns. As a result of our meetings, both of these reps stepped up to co-sponsor H. Res. 333.
My fellow citizens and I prepared diligently for these meetings. We knew the resolution’s three articles of impeachment against Cheney. We studied the supporting documentation available on Kucinich’s website. As Americans paying attention well before H. Res. 333 was introduced, we knew the Downing Street Memo, Henry Waxman’s Iraq on the Record, Elizabeth Holtzman’s The Impeachment of George W. Bush and of course John Conyers’ The Constitution in Crisis; The Downing Street Minutes and Deception, Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, and Coverups in the Iraq War, and Illegal Domestic Surveillance. We also knew our history regarding both Watergate and the Clinton impeachment. We were quite prepared to make the case and fight for it in each of our meetings with Representatives Clarke and Towns.
However, to these representatives’ great credit, we did not have to fight them to represent us. We only had to quote the exact language of the resolution. In Articles I and II, Cheney stands accused of having “purposely manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the citizens and Congress of the United States” regarding Iraq’s nonexistent WMD’s and mythical ties to Al Qaeda. In Article III, Cheney is called to account for his illegal threats and warmongering against Iran. As per the resolution, “the Vice President is legally bound by the U.S. Constitution's adherence to international law that prohibits threats of use of force.” Both Clarke and Towns listened attentively to us, their constituents, and agreed on the spot to cosponsor H. Res. 333.
Speaker Pelosi, you know as well as anyone that we are now in Iraq and apparently can’t get out because of the lies told by this administration, and in the case of Cheney, so well documented in H. Res. 333. It is because of these lies that as of today 3,866 of our soldiers are now dead, leaving their families shattered. 28,424 of our soldiers have been wounded, some horrifically maimed. Over 1 million Iraqi civilians are dead, over 2 million are refugees, and another 2 million Iraqis are internally displaced, all because of the lies told by the Bush Administration and left unchallenged by complicit members of Congress.
Representatives Clarke and Towns are committed to specifically holding the Vice President (and by extension, the entire Bush Administration) responsible for the lies that resulted in the catastrophic invasion and occupation of Iraq. What do Representatives Towns and Clarke understand about demanding Executive accountability that the rest of you Democrats don’t?
The arguments against impeachment are shameful, ridiculous and demeaning. Our NYC representative Jerrold Nadler, a man I once held in great respect, says over and over again that “we don’t have the votes”. As the chair of the subcommittee that is now purposefully blocking H. Res. 333 from ever seeing the light of day, his statement is breathtakingly cynical and disingenuous. As you both know, impeachment hearings are the beginning of the investigative process, not the end. Until and unless the Judiciary Committee begins asking the questions, issuing subpoenas, compelling testimony and examining documents and other evidence, it is impossible and intellectually dishonest to presume to know what the evidence would finally show if the Committee bothered to look for it. Therefore, neither Congressman Nadler nor anyone else can count votes regarding a case the Judiciary Committee refuses to make. (It is useful to remember that the Watergate hearings were well underway before Butterfield revealed the existence of the Nixon tapes. No one on the 1972 Judiciary Committee knew about the tapes before the hearings began. Similarly, no one knows what today’s Judiciary Committee would find this time, but by all indications a real investigation into the details of the run up to war would not present Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld or other members of the Bush Administration in an especially positive light.)
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