What We Have Lost: Impeachment As Existential Imperative

In the past weeks, even the most ardent Democratic partisans have come to condemn Congressional Democrats for their lack of will, in confronting Bush and the Republicans: the war, domestic spying, torture, the absurd MoveOn resolution, the dangerous Iran resolution- we're all baffled and discouraged and heartbroken, and many of us are just plain pissed off. Those of us who still intend to work for the election of Democrats, next year, find it increasingly difficult to convince those who have been straying that they should remain in the fold. We continue to insist that we need larger Congressional majorities, the executive branch, and if nothing else- and this ought to convince even the most recusant- to prevent four more years of Republican judges. But we cannot pretend that we don't feel betrayed. We cannot pretend that we are having trouble answering the question: why? We are not using our majority power, and we are not using all the legislative and procedural tools we have available. Why?

Some say the Democrats are willfully complicit- beholden to the same nefarious interests as are the Republicans. I disagree. To me, it all comes back to impeachment. It comes back to the lack of will to make the ultimate and necessary confrontation. It comes from allowing a criminal administration to remain in power, and thus conferring on it a legitimacy that its criminality should have long ago voided. It comes from establishing a precedent and a dynamic that say the Bush Administration can push all boundaries, and the Democrats will not push back. If impeachment is off the table, then every form of criminality is on it!

Let me state, at the outset, that I do think the window for impeachment likely has closed. Barring some new bombshell revelation, there is likely neither the will in Congress to even start proceedings, nor the time for such proceedings to produce fair results. I come neither to praise nor bury impeachment. I come to discuss what I deem to be the consequence of its not having been pursued: a paralysis in the Democrats that renders them incapable of confronting Bush on anything.

If we were lied into the war, then being unwilling to hold the Administration accountable for those lies makes it impossible to accept the necessity of ending what should never have been started. If domestic spying is a Constitutional crime, then being unwilling to hold the Administration accountable for that crime necessitates the further Constitutional outrage of attempting to legislatively make such crimes legal. If torture is a crime against humanity, then being unwilling to hold the Administration accountable for that crime gives it tacit permission to violate pretty much any legal or moral standard. Oversight and subpoenas are irrelevant, because there are no consequences to what is discovered, and subpoenas can be, and are being, ignored. Despite being as unpopular as any "president," ever, Bush knows he can just thumb his nose at the Democrats, and they will do nothing. They are incapable even of sound and fury.

In December 2005, John Conyers proposed an impeachment investigation. Once the Democrats regained Congressional majorities, he began making excuses for not again doing so. Even before regaining the majorities, Barney Frank said:

I know of virtually no support for trying to impeach President Bush among House Democrats, because we understand that this would be entirely counterproductive to what we are trying to accomplish both politically and governmentally.

Note that he did not render an opinion on whether impeachment is even plausibly justified. His is a statement of pure political calculation. The concept of legal and Constitutional right seems irrelevant. And this from one of our best and smartest elected representatives!

And then there was Senator Russ Feingold, who wrote this diary, on Daily Kos. It included these telling words:

I believe that the President and Vice President may well have committed impeachable offenses.

And it then proceeded to make excuses for not holding the Administration accountable for such offenses- as if a President and Vice President committing impeachable offenses is somehow of little import. This, too, from one of our best and smartest elected representatives! My full response was here.

It is clear that many of our best elected officials believe, at the very least, that Bush and Cheney may have committed impeachable offenses. That they have been unwilling to do anything about it speaks to something much graver than the issue of impeachment. I want, now, to briefly discuss a psychological mechanism best articulated by Frantz Fanon, in his seminal work, The Wretched Of The Earth. Let me first say that the situations are not at all comparable, but I do think the psychology is. Writing of the insidious effects of colonialism, Fanon says:

At times this Manicheism goes to its logical conclusion and dehumanizes the native, or to speak plainly, it turns him into an animal. In fact, the terms the settler uses when he mentions the native are zoological terms. He speaks of the yellow man's reptilian motions, of the stink of the native quarter, of breeding swarms, of foulness, of spawn, of gesticulations. When the settler seeks to describe the native fully in exact terms he constantly refers to the bestiary.

Now, the Bush Administration obviously hasn't colonialized the United States, although it is imposing Neo-Colonial conditions on Iraq. But it is here, in the United States, that this Neo-Colonialism must be stopped. It is here that the continued failures of the Democrats prove that their will has been broken. Politically marginalized, their very ideology ridiculed by the corporate media, Democrats have come to accept that the best they can achieve is incremental advances on relatively small issues, while the largest issues, including the very legitimacy of government, cannot be even openly debated. They don't need Bush or the Republicans to beat them down, because they have already internalized that they are beaten!

In The Hermeneutics of African Philosophy, Tsenay Serequeberhan succinctly defines Fanon's answer to colonialism:

It is only when the colonized appropriates the violence of the colonizer and puts forth his own concrete counterviolence that he reenters the realm of history and human historical becoming.

Again, let me be explicit: clearly, what the Democrats have suffered is in no way comparable to the suffering of those subjected to imperialist violence; but just as clearly, impeachment is in no way comparable to revolutionary violence against imperialism. The scale is immeasurably different, but it is, again, the psychological mechanism that I propose as being the same. Having been, essentially, exiled from participation in both the functions of government, and the framing of its political dialogue, Democrats have been humiliated to the point of no longer even remembering who they are and for what they stand. They have come to accept that they have no role to play in the process of constructing major policy decisions, and that their entire ideology is effectively void. Politically, they have grown accustomed to being adrift and irrelevant. Psychologically, they have been not only neutralized, but neutered.

Impeachment, then, is not only necessary for Constitutional reasons, but for existential ones! Failing to pursue impeachment proceedings is a failure to rupture what has now become a calcined political framework, within which Democrats cannot fully function. Only something so bold and dramatic, only something so just but unthinkable, can restore to the Democrats their ability to reenter the realm of history and political historical becoming.

I hope I am wrong, and that the Democrats will soon begin actually standing up to Bush. I don't see it happening. For the Democrats to realize the historical and practical necessity of taking control of our government, they will have to come to terms with the depths of the depravity that is the Bush Administration. It is not just about ending one war, or preventing another, or restoring the Constitutional rights that have been so blithely tossed to the wind, it is about truly confronting both the people and the ideology that have created this historical crisis. It is not going to be pretty, and it is not going to be nice. It will, of necessity, be as dramatic as have been the assaults on our American ideals.

For a generation, the Republicans have spoken of a revolution. The Democrats seem to have taken such talk as mere rhetoric. Clearly, it was not. This has been more than a revolution, it has been an anti-Revolution. It has been an attempt to effectively reverse the American Revolution! By failing to impeach Bush and Cheney, the Democrats have allowed our very system of government to teeter on the brink of collapse.

We may win, big, in next year's elections, but will the nation we take over even any longer exist?

A Great American Hero Discusses Impeachment

First of all, why impeach? Aren't you just letting your anger get ahold of you?

Has the President committed offenses, and planned, and directed, and acquiesced in a course of conduct which the Constitution will not tolerate? That's the question. We know that. We know the question. We should now forthwith proceed to answer the question. It is reason, and not passion, which must guide our deliberations, guide our debate, and guide our decision.

My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total. And I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction, of the Constitution.

But if we don't have the votes to convict, today, isn't it wrong to even begin impeachment proceedings? Even if we get this through the House, it'll never get through the Senate. Wouldn't it reflect badly on the House to vote impeachment when it still might fail in the Senate?

It is wrong, I suggest, it is a misreading of the Constitution for any member here to assert that for a member to vote for an article of impeachment means that that member must be convinced that the President should be removed from office. The Constitution doesn't say that. The powers relating to impeachment are an essential check in the hands of the body of the legislature against and upon the encroachments of the executive. The division between the two branches of the legislature, the House and the Senate, assigning to the one the right to accuse and to the other the right to judge, the framers of this Constitution were very astute. They did not make the accusers and the judgers -- and the judges the same person.

Well, wouldn't it be better to just wait for the President's term to expire, rather than taking this extraordinary step? I mean, with so little time remaining in this President's term, what's the point?

We know the nature of impeachment. We've been talking about it awhile now. It is chiefly designed for the President and his high ministers to somehow be called into account. It is designed to "bridle" the executive if he engages in excesses. "It is designed as a method of national inquest into the conduct of public men." The framers confided in the Congress the power if need be, to remove the President in order to strike a delicate balance between a President swollen with power and grown tyrannical, and preservation of the independence of the executive.

"No one need be afraid" -- the North Carolina ratification convention -- "No one need be afraid that officers who commit oppression will pass with immunity."

But won't impeachment only further inflame political tensions in this country?

"Prosecutions of impeachments will seldom fail to agitate the passions of the whole community," said Hamilton in the Federalist Papers, number 65. "We divide into parties more or less friendly or inimical to the accused." I do not mean political parties in that sense.

But aren't you really talking impeachment because you just hate this maladministration?

The nature of impeachment: a narrowly channeled exception to the separation-of-powers maxim. The Federal Convention of 1787 said that. It limited impeachment to high crimes and misdemeanors and discounted and opposed the term "maladministration."

Okay, but the impeachment of President Clinton demonstrated how impeachment can be abused- and what happens to the party that so abuses it.

"It is to be used only for great misdemeanors," so it was said in the North Carolina ratification convention. And in the Virginia ratification convention: "We do not trust our liberty to a particular branch. We need one branch to check the other."

The drawing of political lines goes to the motivation behind impeachment; but impeachment must proceed within the confines of the constitutional term "high crime and misdemeanors." Of the impeachment process, it was Woodrow Wilson who said that "Nothing short of the grossest offenses against the plain law of the land will suffice to give them speed and effectiveness. Indignation so great as to overgrow party interest may secure a conviction; but nothing else can."

But shouldn't we be focused on passing laws, establishing our agenda, and looking to the future?

Common sense would be revolted if we engaged upon this process for petty reasons. Congress has a lot to do: Appropriations, Tax Reform, Health Insurance, Campaign Finance Reform, Housing, Environmental Protection, Energy Sufficiency, Mass Transportation. Pettiness cannot be allowed to stand in the face of such overwhelming problems. So today we are not being petty. We are trying to be big, because the task we have before us is a big one.

Well, shouldn't we allow the President time to respond? Shouldn't we allow the courts to decide whether he really has to?

We were further cautioned today that perhaps these proceedings ought to be delayed because certainly there would be new evidence forthcoming from the President of the United States. There has not even been an obfuscated indication that this committee would receive any additional materials from the President. The committee subpoena is outstanding, and if the President wants to supply that material, the committee sits here.

But we can't impeach just because we're angry, and just because we hate the President's agenda! That would be partisan, it would be perceived as being partisan, and we would suffer the political consequences. You need actual grounds for impeachment.

At this point, I would like to juxtapose a few of the impeachment criteria with some of the actions the President has engaged in. Impeachment criteria: James Madison, from the Virginia ratification convention. "If the President be connected in any suspicious manner with any person and there be grounds to believe that he will shelter him, he may be impeached."

Okay, so the Scooter Libby commutation might meet that criterion. But is that really enough?

Justice Story: "Impeachment" is attended -- "is intended for occasional and extraordinary cases where a superior power acting for the whole people is put into operation to protect their rights and rescue their liberties from violations."

Domestic spying? Habeas corpus? Okay. Anything else?

The Carolina ratification convention impeachment criteria: those are impeachable "who behave amiss or betray their public trust."

You're talking about Iraq, right? Deliberate lies, both to Congress and to the public, to incite support for a war that has turned out to have been unjustified, a violation of international law, and a moral blight.

James Madison again at the Constitutional Convention: "A President is impeachable if he attempts to subvert the Constitution."

You mean like using signing statements to circumvent Congress's unique Constitutional lawmaking authority? Or back to domestic spying?

If the impeachment provision in the Constitution of the United States will not reach the offenses charged here, then perhaps that 18th-century Constitution should be abandoned to a 20th-century paper shredder.

Now, in case you haven't noticed, this is actually from a speech, not a question-and-answer session. I've transposed a few paragraphs, but added nothing. You can read the speech here. You can listen to it here.

I will close with one more quote, from another great American hero:

Whether ours shall continue to be a government of laws and not of men is now for Congress and ultimately the American people.

And imagine if people were talking about it...

A new ARG Poll shows that 45% favor impeachment proceedings against Bush, with 54% supporting proceedings against Cheney. And that's without any public discussion, by Democratic leaders or corporate media pundits.

To Our Democratic Leaders: Say The Fucking Word!

The Libby commutation was the modern day equivalent of the Saturday Night Massacre. Even though that, too, was technically legal, it was the final outrage epitomizing an entire climate of criminality. The Democrats, then, knew how to respond. The Democrats, now, need to. I've read their statements. They're all pissed and outraged and blah blah blah. I have one answer:

Say the fucking word!

You really think your expressions of outrage matter? You think Bush cares? You think the Republicans care? You think we care?

Speaker Pelosi said this:

The President’s commutation of Scooter Libby’s prison sentence does not serve justice, condones criminal conduct, and is a betrayal of trust of the American people.

The President said he would hold accountable anyone involved in the Valerie Plame leak case. By his action today, the President shows his word is not to be believed. He has abandoned all sense of fairness when it comes to justice, he has failed to uphold the rule of law, and he has failed to hold his Administration accountable.

Wow. Sounds bad. Anything you want to do about it?

Say the fucking word!

Majority Leader Reid said this:

The President's decision to commute Mr. Libby’s sentence is disgraceful. Libby’s conviction was the one faint glimmer of accountability for White House efforts to manipulate intelligence and silence critics of the Iraq War. Now, even that small bit of justice has been undone. Judge Walton correctly determined that Libby deserved to be imprisoned for lying about a matter of national security. The Constitution gives President Bush the power to commute sentences, but history will judge him harshly for using that power to benefit his own Vice President’s Chief of Staff who was convicted of such a serious violation of law.”

History? Ouch. I'm sure that will hurt. I'm sure that will restore our Constitution. How do you think history will judge this Democratic Congress?

Say the fucking word!

Chairman Conyers said:

Until now, it appeared that the President merely turned a blind eye to a high ranking Administration official leaking classified information. The President’s action today makes it clear that he condones such activity. This decision is inconsistent with the rule of law and sends a horrible signal to the American people and our intelligence operatives who place their lives at risk everyday. Now that the White House can no longer argue that there is a pending criminal investigation, I expect them to be fully forthcoming with the American people about the circumstances that led to this leak and the President’s decision today.

Really? You expect that? Seriously? What in Bush's entire record of behavior would lead you to believe he will be forthcoming about anything?

Say the fucking word!

And how about our plausible presidential candidates?

Senator Biden said:

It is time for the American people to be heard.

I call for all Americans to flood the White House with phone calls tomorrow expressing their outrage over this blatant disregard for the rule of law.

Oh, gosh. That'll teach them! You know what? We send people to Congress to ensure the rule of law. To express our outrage with actual actions. Actions that have consequences. People like you, Senator. You want my vote?

Say the fucking word!

Senator Clinton said:

Today's decision is yet another example that this Administration simply considers itself above the law. This case arose from the Administration's politicization of national security intelligence and its efforts to punish those who spoke out against its policies. Four years into the Iraq war, Americans are still living with the consequences of this White House's efforts to quell dissent. This commutation sends the clear signal that in this Administration, cronyism and ideology trump competence and justice.

A clear signal? Glad you figured that out. As if they haven't been sending that clear signal since day one. Since before day one. Yes, we're still living with the consequences. Any consequences you'd like them to have to live with? You want my vote?

Say the fucking word!

Senator Edwards said:

Only a president clinically incapable of understanding that mistakes have consequences could take the action he did today. President Bush has just sent exactly the wrong signal to the country and the world. In George Bush's America, it is apparently okay to misuse intelligence for political gain, mislead prosecutors and lie to the FBI. George Bush and his cronies think they are above the law and the rest of us live with the consequences. The cause of equal justice in America took a serious blow today.

A serious blow? You think? Anything you think your former Congressional colleagues ought to do about it? And you want my vote?

Say the fucking word!

Senator Obama said:

This decision to commute the sentence of a man who compromised our national security cements the legacy of an Administration characterized by a politics of cynicism and division, one that has consistently placed itself and its ideology above the law. This is exactly the kind of politics we must change so we can begin restoring the American people’s faith in a government that puts the country’s progress ahead of the bitter partisanship of recent years.

Yes. Let's change the kind of politics. By letting it stand, by moving on, and by waiting for grave breaches. And you want my vote?

Say the fucking word!

Governor Richardson said:

This administration clearly believes its officials are above the law, from ignoring FISA laws when eavesdropping on US citizens, to the abuse of classified material, to ignoring the Geneva Conventions and international law with secret prisons and torturing prisoners.

There is a reason we have laws and why we expect our Presidents to obey them. Institutions have a collective wisdom greater than that of any one individual. The arrogance of this administration's disdain for the law and its belief it operates with impunity are breathtaking.

My breath is taken. Anything you care to suggest actually doing when officials behave as if they are above the law? Or are they above the law? Certainly, if they are allowed to get away with this kind of criminal activity, their belief is actually justified. Is it? Do you want my vote?

Say the fucking word!

I respect every one of our Democratic leaders. I don't respect everything they do. I don't respect what they're not doing. I don't respect what they're not even saying! It's time. It's long past being time! Senator Sam Ervin, Congressman Peter Rodino, and the Democrats of the 93rd Congress knew what they had to do to save our nation from Constitutional collapse. They dared public opinion and the judgment of history. They did what had to be done. They were heroes. I respect the Democrats of the 110th Congress. We need a Congress that is more than respectable. We need heroes.

Say the fucking word!

And then do something!

Leaders Lead, Senator

AP:

US Senator Barack Obama (ber-AHK' oh-BAH'-muh) says he doesn't favor impeachment proceedings for President Bush and Vice President Cheney....

The Illinois Democrat says he's distressed by the Bush administration's ethical standards and secrecy. But the presidential hopeful says impeachment should be reserved for "grave" breaches of the president's authority.

Both Obama and US Senator Dick Durbin say having to deal with month after month of impeachment hearings wouldn't be in the best interest of America.

"Grave breaches"? Like what- domestic spying, authorizing torture, lying the nation into a war, refusing to turn over subpoenaed documents, using signing statement to undermine Congress's Constitutional lawmaking authority?

"(B)est interest of America"? Like what- holding criminals accountable, demonstrating that even the President and Vice President aren't above the law, or defending the Constitution? Good thing Senator Sam Ervin and Congressman Peter Rodino weren't worried about having to put the country through the horrible ordeal of restoring law and order.

Nixonian

AP:

President Bush, moving toward a constitutional showdown with Congress, asserted executive privilege Thursday and rejected lawmakers' demands for documents that could shed light on the firings of federal prosecutors.

Bush's attorney told Congress the White House would not turn over subpoenaed documents for former presidential counsel Harriet Miers and former political director Sara Taylor. Congressional panels want the documents for their investigations of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' stewardship of the Justice Department, including complaints of undue political influence.

The Democratic chairmen of the two committees seeking the documents accused Bush of stonewalling and disdain for the law, and said they would press forward with enforcing the subpoenas....

''Increasingly, the president and vice president feel they are above the law,'' said Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. He portrayed the president's actions as ''Nixonian stonewalling.''

Hmmm. How did Congress deal with Nixon?

Liberalism Ascendent

In a fascinating analysis of polling data for The Nation, Rick Perlstein has heartening words for unabashed liberals:

You suspected it all along. Now it just might be true: Most Americans think like you.

He begins be referencing The Pew Research Center's new study, Trends in Political Values and Core Attitudes: 1987-2007. The numbers astonish. As Pew opens their summary:

Increased public support for the social safety net, signs of growing public concern about income inequality, and a diminished appetite for assertive national security policies have improved the political landscape for the Democrats as the 2008 presidential campaign gets underway.

At the same time, many of the key trends that nurtured the Republican resurgence in the mid-1990s have moderated, according to Pew's longitudinal measures of the public's basic political, social and economic values. The proportion of Americans who support traditional social values has edged downward since 1994, while the proportion of Americans expressing strong personal religious commitment also has declined modestly.

Pews numbers show that:

In 2002, Party affiliation was about even, with 43% identifying or leaning towards both the Democrats and Republicans. Now, the Democrats lead 50-35%.

In 1994, when the Republicans took Congress, only 41% agreed that "the government should help more needy people, even if it adds to the nation's debt." Today, that number is 54%.

Five years ago, an impressive 65% said "today it's really true that the rich just get richer while the poor get poorer," but that number has actually risen to 73%.

In 2002, 62% agreed that "The best way to ensure peace is through military strength." Today, that number has dropped to 49%.

In 1987, only 8% said they were unaffiliated with any religion, but that number has now grown to 12%. Furthermore:

The poll finds greater public acceptance of homosexuality and less desire for women to play traditional roles in society. Both represent a continuation of trends that have been apparent over the past 20 years, and have occurred mostly among older people.

In 1995, 58% favored Affirmative Action. With gains across the political spectrum, that number now stands at 70%.

And while Perlstein emphasizes that the Pew numbers show Independents increasingly largely agreeing with Democrats on the issues, in the overall trends:

It's not just Pew. In the authoritative National Election Studies (NES) survey, more than twice as many Americans want "government to provide many more services even if it means an increase in spending" as want fewer services "in order to reduce spending." According to Gallup, a majority say they generally side with labor in disputes and only 34 percent with companies; 53 percent think unions help the economy and only 36 percent think they hurt. A 2005 NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found that 53 percent of Americans thought the Bush tax cuts were "not worth it because they have increased the deficit and caused cuts in government programs." CNN/Opinion Research Corp. found that only 25 percent want to see Roe v. Wade overturned; NPR/Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard found the public rejecting government-funded abstinence-only sex education in favor of "more comprehensive sex education programs that include information on how to obtain and use condoms and other contraceptives" by 67 percent to 30 percent. Public Agenda/Foreign Affairs discovered that 67 percent of Americans favor "diplomatic and economic efforts over military efforts in fighting terrorism."

Want hot-button issues? The public is in love with rehabilitation over incarceration for youth offenders. Zogby/National council on Crime and Delinquency found that 89 percent think it reduces crime and 80 percent that it saves money over the long run. "Amnesty"? Sixty-two percent told CBS/New York Times surveyors that undocumented immigrants should be allowed to "keep their jobs and eventually apply for legal status." And the gap between the clichés about what Americans believe about gun control and what they actually believe is startling: NBC News/Wall Street Journal found 58 percent favoring "tougher gun control laws," and Annenberg found that only 10 percent want laws controlling firearms to be less strict, a finding reproduced by the NES survey in 2004 and Gallup in 2006.

He then refers to the report The Progressive Majority: Why a Conservative America is a Myth, by the Campaign For America's Future and Media Matters. Highlights of this report include these numbers:

69% agree that "t is the responsibility of the federal government to make sure all Americans have access to health coverage," with 76% percent deeming it more important than Bush's tax cuts, and 60% willing to have their own taxes raised towards that end.

52% believe government investment in alternative energy sources is the best way to break our addiction to foreign oil, with 68% agreeing conservation is a better solution than production, and 64% willing to pay higher taxes for renewable energy research.

77% believe the minimum wage should be increased.

66% believe the wealthy pay too little taxes.

53% deem Bush's tax cuts a failure because of the increased deficit and cuts in government programs.

69% believe the government "should care for those who can't care for themselves."

62% believe undocumented workers should have the opportunity to "keep their jobs and eventually apply for legal status."

Perlstein believes Democrats fail by not identifying themselves more strongly as Democrats. Given the Party affiliation numbers, it's impossible to disagree. And he points to another telling conclusion of the CFAF/MM report:

(W)hen the GOP took over Congress in 1994, the New York Times front page claimed, "The country has unmistakably moved to the right." It hadn't; for an excellent study showing this wasn't so, see Ronald Rapoport and Walter Stone's Three's a Crowd, which shows how Newt Gingrich's Contract With America was tailored as an appeal to Perot voters, then retroactively spun as a mandate for conservatism. Ten years later, when Bush beat Kerry by three points, Katie Couric asked on Today, "Does this election indicate that this country has become much more socially conservative?" It was a rhetorical question, for the establishment had set the conclusion in stone long before. Three weeks before the 2006 election Candy Crowley of CNN said Democrats were "on the losing side of the values debate, the defense debate and, oh yes, the guns debate." After election day, Bob Schieffer of CBS said, "The Democrats' victory was built on the back of more centrist candidates seizing Republican-leaning districts." (Tell that to my favorite Democratic House pickup, Carol Shea-Porter, a former social worker who won a New Hampshire seat after getting kicked out of a 2005 presidential appearance for wearing a T-shirt reading Turn Your Back on Bush.) John Harris of the Washington Post, now of The Politico, said, "This is basically not a liberal country." Concludes the Media Matters/Campaign for America's Future report, "Democratic victories are understood as a product of the Democrats moving to the right, while Republican victories are the product of a conservative electorate."

There is much more to his article, including about media complicity in obfuscating the facts about the public's political beliefs; but his own conclusion is clear: Democrats need to stop compromising, they need to stop avoiding Party identification, and they need to stop listening to the corporate media's conventional wisdom. Democrats have been right all along- not Third Way, DLC Democrats, but traditional populist Democrats.

I will point to another issue. A May poll by the conservative InsiderAdvantage/Majority Opinion found that 39% favor impeaching Bush and Cheney. This was a poll taken in a vacuum, since no one in the corporate media, and no Democratic leaders are even discussing the possibility. It's telling that this poll was the only one recently taken on impeachment. The corporate media is, apparently, afraid to touch the subject. Why are the Democrats? This was a poll taken absent any public hearings laying out the extensive legitimate grounds for impeachment. It's also a poll showing stronger support for impeachment than for the Democratic Congress. What does that tell you?

It's time for elected Democrats to stop being afraid. Our core values are the nation's. The more elected Democrats stand up for our core values, the more elected Democrats there will be. Liberalism is ascendent. It's time to acknowledge it, act on it, and revel in it.

Cheney Placed At Center Of Domestic Spying Scandal!

Yesterday's Washington Post reports:

Vice President Cheney told Justice Department officials that he disagreed with their objections to a secret surveillance program during a high-level White House meeting in March 2004, a former senior Justice official told senators yesterday.

The meeting came one day before White House officials tried to get approval for the same program from then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft, who lay recovering from surgery in a hospital, according to former deputy attorney general James B. Comey.

So, the Vice President was personally involved in authorizing Domestic Spying; and if you don't recall the macabre story about White House efforts to force ailing Attorney General John Ashcroft to override DOJ objections, and also sign off on this baltantly illegal program, the Washington Post's editorial board had this to say:

JAMES B. COMEY, the straight-as-an-arrow former No. 2 official at the Justice Department, yesterday offered the Senate Judiciary Committee an account of Bush administration lawlessness so shocking it would have been unbelievable coming from a less reputable source. The episode involved a 2004 nighttime visit to the hospital room of then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft by Alberto Gonzales, then the White House counsel, and Andrew H. Card Jr., then the White House chief of staff. Only the broadest outlines of this visit were previously known: that Mr. Comey, who was acting as attorney general during Mr. Ashcroft's illness, had refused to recertify the legality of the administration's warrantless wiretapping program; that Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Card had tried to do an end-run around Mr. Comey; that Mr. Ashcroft had rebuffed them.

Mr. Comey's vivid depiction, worthy of a Hollywood script, showed the lengths to which the administration and the man who is now attorney general were willing to go to pursue the surveillance program. First, they tried to coerce a man in intensive care -- a man so sick he had transferred the reins of power to Mr. Comey -- to grant them legal approval. Having failed, they were willing to defy the conclusions of the nation's chief law enforcement officer and pursue the surveillance without Justice's authorization. Only in the face of the prospect of mass resignations -- Mr. Comey, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III and most likely Mr. Ashcroft himself -- did the president back down.

Yesterday's Post article states that this disclosure places Cheney more at the center of this scandal than had been known. For the first time, Cheney is shown to have been personally involved in attempting to override the Department of Justice's own ruling that Domestic Spying was illegal; and it indicates that the urgency of the White House's attempt to bully Ashcroft into authorizing the spying was directly linked.

It's now very clear: the White House knew they were breaking the law. The Vice President knew he was breaking the law. They wanted to use Ashcroft to provide political cover for their knowingly breaking the law. They were so desperate to use Ashcroft as political coverage for their knowingly breaking the law, that they attempted to storm into his hospital room and force him to sign something he might not have even been coherent enough to know he was signing!

And, as all Bush Administration scandals do, it gets even worse. Also from today's Post article:

Comey said that Cheney's office later blocked the promotion of a senior Justice Department lawyer, Patrick Philbin, because of his role in raising concerns about the surveillance.

In other words, a career professional whose professional opinion didn't accord with the White House's desire to break the law was punished for wanting the White House to do so.

Alberto Gonzales, Andrew Card, and Dick Cheney are criminals. They know it. We know it. It's time for Congress to act like they know it!

Even The Washington Post Is Outraged!

Washington Post:

JAMES B. COMEY, the straight-as-an-arrow former No. 2 official at the Justice Department, yesterday offered the Senate Judiciary Committee an account of Bush administration lawlessness so shocking it would have been unbelievable coming from a less reputable source. The episode involved a 2004 nighttime visit to the hospital room of then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft by Alberto Gonzales, then the White House counsel, and Andrew H. Card Jr., then the White House chief of staff. Only the broadest outlines of this visit were previously known: that Mr. Comey, who was acting as attorney general during Mr. Ashcroft's illness, had refused to recertify the legality of the administration's warrantless wiretapping program; that Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Card had tried to do an end-run around Mr. Comey; that Mr. Ashcroft had rebuffed them.

Mr. Comey's vivid depiction, worthy of a Hollywood script, showed the lengths to which the administration and the man who is now attorney general were willing to go to pursue the surveillance program. First, they tried to coerce a man in intensive care -- a man so sick he had transferred the reins of power to Mr. Comey -- to grant them legal approval. Having failed, they were willing to defy the conclusions of the nation's chief law enforcement officer and pursue the surveillance without Justice's authorization. Only in the face of the prospect of mass resignations -- Mr. Comey, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III and most likely Mr. Ashcroft himself -- did the president back down.

When even the Washington Post is outraged at Bush's abuses, you know this is big. Here's the money quote:

That Mr. Gonzales is now in charge of the department he tried to steamroll may be most disturbing of all.

I'll go a step farther: Comey's testimony makes clear that Bush was directly involved. Think about what that means.

Shocking!

Washington Post:

Intelligence provided by former undersecretary of defense Douglas J. Feith to buttress the White House case for invading Iraq included "reporting of dubious quality or reliability" that supported the political views of senior administration officials rather than the conclusions of the intelligence community, according to a report by the Pentagon's inspector general.

Feith's office "was predisposed to finding a significant relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda," according to portions of the report, released yesterday by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.). The inspector general described Feith's activities as "an alternative intelligence assessment process."

If I'd been doing this longer, I'd have posted many more examples. The evidence piles on top of itself: the Administration deliberately manipulated intelligence. They lied us into war. It's not just impeachable, it's criminal!