I think we should consider impeaching Dick Cheney as a first step. The recent revelations in the Libby trial show that a lot of the prosecution’s case pointed to Cheney as the leaker-in-chief, and that he directed Libby and others to put out information to discredit Wilson (who was sent to Niger to investigate whether Niger in fact had attempted to sell uranium material to Iraq).
As part of the campaign to discredit Wilson, Cheney directed Libby to expose the secret that Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame, worked undercover as a weapons of mass destruction analyst at the CIA. Exposing an undercover agent is a serious felony.
In the PBS-Frontline documentary, "The Dark Side," you see Cheney playing the lead role in assembling the false information that led us into the Iraq war. The viewer is reminded of the dirty tricks leading to Watergate.
The Watergate chain of events is instructive.
Going back to the Watergate era that led to Gerald Ford becoming president and Nelson Rockefeller his vice president: Remember it was because Vice President Spiro Agnew was forced to resign when he was found to have been accepting bribes that Ford was first appointed vice president. At the time, he was the Republican leader in the House.
When Nixon resigned (to avoid facing impeachment) Ford became president. Nelson Rockefeller was appointed vice president under the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. As part of that process his appointment was ratified by the Senate. (Nixon wanted to appoint a Democrat, John Connally, but both Republicans and Democrats balked.)
So back to Cheney. Impeaching him would cause a new vice president to be appointed, but only with the ratification of the Senate. I do believe the Senate would be pretty careful here, maybe letting it be known that only a moderate Republican such as Chuck Hagel (Republican Senator from Nebraska and opponent of the Iraq war) would gain the required Senate ratification.
If that did not cause President Bush to change direction, well, he too could be impeached and a moderate would become President.
Petitions to impeach, however, have not seemed to garner much attention in Congress. Now that the Democrats are in charge of the House Judiciary Committee (John Conyers), I believe that he and the rest of the Democrats on that Committee will be more responsive when they see impeachment resolutions from locally elected officials.
To help this process along I drafted a resolution to be passed by my county’s Board of Supervisors. The Board of Supervisors needs some (actually quite a bit) of prodding to even consider such a resolution. So, I drafted a petition to urge passing the resolution. Both the resolution and petition are available at Election Reform Now Both can be adapted for use in any local jurisdiction.
The Vice President says the administration is not to be deterred from its stated course of action in Iraq.
It’s time to impeach. Cheney first.