I'm sure most of us are familiar with Senator Feingold's diary about impeachment, namely, that he is against it. In the diary he outlines some logical and intelligent reasons, and on its face, he has and makes excellent points. The time required for impeachment would negatively affect the Senate and the House's ability to function as they should. And it would probably delay their ability to undo the damage Bush has done to our country.
Even though his points and thinking are all sound, Senator Feingold is dead wrong.
Right now, our country is in a crisis. Bush's offenses are many and well documented, to the point where I'm not even going to waste time linking to the various sources and diaries outlining them. You can all count along with me.
Torture.
Illegal wiretapping.
Habeas Corpus, RIP.
The war.
Secret prisons.
Over-reaching Executive power.
The lies, always the lies.
Signing statements.
His clear announcement that he will break, ignore or defy laws as he sees fit.
More than I even care to list.
Bush and cowardly Republicans and appeasing Democrats have pushed this country to the edge of a cliff. It won't take much more for us to be pushed over the brink, pushed just far enough to collapse. Before the '06 elections it seemed like we were heading there and nothing could stop it, but we were saved. Just barely, but we survived.
Now, we're right at the edge, and instead of pushing us BACK towards safe ground, instead of doing what needs to be done, the Democratic Congress has plopped down and begun rebuilding the country.
RIGHT AT THE EDGE OF THE CLIFF.
Instead of getting to a safer foundation, we're all going to have a beautiful view of a huge God-damned drop off this cliff.
Senator, other Congressional Democrats.
What are you thinking?
The low approval numbers for Congress is certainly because the public doesn't see you pushing BACK. It doesn't see you defying Bush, throwing up restraint, working to stop the madness. And unless the public magically transforms into people like us, political junkies with CSPAN3 streaming on the computer while flipping between CSPAN and CSPAN2 on the TV, they never will see that you ARE trying, that you ARE working.
All they see are the headlines, almost without exception favorable to Bush and unfavorable to Democrats. You can't reach them with censures, with votes of no confidence, with lip-service efforts to reign in a power-mad lunatic like Bush. Right now, the public is shaking their heads at the Democratic Congress and saying, "Well what good are they?"
WE know what good you are, WE can see that you are indeed trying. But all the public sees is that huge drop off the edge and that you guys are starting to lay down a foundation to build right where we are.
Right at the edge.
We need to move back. We need to go back to safe ground before we start fixing our country, and we can't do any of that with Bush at the helm. He'll thwart everything you do, he'll continue to destroy our country, he'll almost certainly get us bogged down in another war, this time Iran.
He needs to go. Gonzales needs to go. Cheney needs to go.
If you really want to help rebuild the country, impeachment is the first step. Imagining that anything meaningful will get done with Bush in the White House is a fairy tale, Senators and Representatives. And to simply sit and let him run out the clock will say to the public that you are incapable of doing what needs to be done to help us and our country.
Impeach.
Now.
Help us.