Also at Daily Speech
As much as this site indicates how much I despise George W. Bush and his horrendous use of the presidency of the United States, I have resisted favoring the impeachment and removal from office of the President. My primary reason was you need 67 Senators to convict the President, or he remains in office even if the House impeaches him (Remember Bill Clinton - he was impeached, but not removed from office).
Despite the success of Democrats in the November 2006 election where they now control both chambers of Congress, albeit just barely in the US Senate, I remain unconvinced we can successfully get 16 Republican Senators to agree to convict George W. Bush let alone get all 51 Democratic Senators to convict (we probably would not have "independent" Joe Lieberman). And of course the last thing we want to do is try and throw George W. Bush out of office and have President Richard B. Cheney - a mentally deranged man with brains. No folks, we would need to impeach and convict both George W. Bush and Richard B. Cheney. Then we would have President Nancy Pelosi.
I remain concerned that if Democrats in the House were to try and impeach Bush and Cheney, now, they might succeed (although the Senate would not convict and therefore Bush and Cheney would remain in office), that Democrats would look like nothing more then the revenge party, and not interested in truly governing - especially if it is clear Bush and Cheney cannot be convicted in the US Senate, then an impeachment vote is merely symbolic.
But, with all that said, a time may be approaching where even a symbolic impeachment that might hurt the Democratic party in 2008 becomes a moral imperative. And if such a move is recognized by the majority of Americans as such, a courageous moral move to attempt to use the only real power the Congress has against an out of control Chief Executive, even if it has a high hurdle (need 67 Senators to convict), maybe, just maybe the Democrats will gain further support from Americans in 2008 and maybe, just maybe, the impeached President might temper his behavior a bit. At the very least, the Democratic Congress would have exercised their strongest response to a totally criminal President and done their duty, even if there are political consequences for them.
So why the change of heart?
The President's planned escalation in Iraq - the so-called "surge". As former Reagan Administration official, Paul Craig Roberts, suggests, this military surge idea is nothing more then political cover to buy time for a horribly failed "policy". The President of the United States, George W. Bush, like the insecure frat boy that he is in the shadow of a much better father, has decided to tell his senior generals to go to hell, that he is the "decider" and he has decided to hang unto his delusion and send up to 20,000 more precious American lives into hell itself and risk their blood for a mission that will fail.
The 25% or so Bush ass lickers that still exist in this country will say such statements prove we leftists want America to be defeated. Bullshit!!! I am a very patriotic American and despite my rhetoric, I am uneasy about pulling our troops out of Iraq percipitiously even though I opposed this War in Iraq (not to be confused with the so-called War on Terror) from day one.
Bush got us into a war that was not needed, the war in Iraq. As a result, we have replaced a secular despot who kept sectarian strive under wraps in a country with the 3rd largest oil deposits in the world with a blood revenge civil war between the formerly oppressed majority Shites who are in a battle to the death with the formerly in power minority Sunnis. And the Shites are aligning with the Iranian Shites and will setup a theocracy in Iraq. So Bush's war has actually made things much worse in the Middle East and exposed western democracy to even greater danger.
But can the American military, at this point, make a positive difference? Can they stabilize Iraq? It appears the answer is no. What will happen if the American military redeploys to the parameters of Iraq and let Iraq play out their civil war? Will Iraq's civil war spill into Saudi Arabia? Jordan? Syria? Egypt? Will Iraq's civil war result in a regional collapse of governments that do not support radical Islamic theocracies? It might.
Even if it does, is the American military capable of quelling an Iraq civil war and preventing a regional conflagration? I say no, not the current American military, and possibly not any American military. If this country is serious about using military force to force a political outcome in the Middle East, the Congress should re-institute a mandatory military draft of ALL US citizens between say 18 and 35, men and women, with virtually no deferment opportunities - certainly not a college deferment. The country needs to mobilize like it did during World War II and not only re-institute the draft, but increase taxes to support the war and force sacrifices on all Americans such as energy rationing. I personally would hate to see this because I have a 22 year old daughter. But without this, we a blowing in the wind, and not really serious about Iraq or the so-called War on Terror.
The cynical White House and the Republican party has used Iraq and the so-called War on Terror for pure political maneuvering and are quite insincere.
Without a MASS mobilization of Americans with real sacrificing, our efforts in Iraq will fail, as well as our War on Terror, and Americans of all political persuasions will have no one to blame but themselves. As long as our politically cowardly President only uses window dressing, a fig leaf, to "look like we are doing something", but in reality spilling American blood for no good reason, that President deserves to be removed from office along with his Vice President.
And this article does not even address the President's numerous egregious abuses of power over the last few years including a recent signing statement where he claims the right to open mail without probable cause or a warrant.
It is time to open an investigation against this administration and build a case for Articles of Impeachment against George W. Bush and Richard B. Cheney. It is our moral duty to do so.