As has been covered very well by my fellow kossacks, we now have overwhelming proof that George Bush has committed a felony. The revelation about
spying on americans is just the latest in a
series of impeachable offenses.
Whether Bush gets impeached and removed from office, of course, is another matter. Certainly with a republican majority in both houses, it appears unlikely. If he wasn't impeached for lying to congress or treason, why would we expect them to impeach him for a simple felony? With the republicans in office, the only thing we can hope for is a video of a Bush/Gannon affair during one of Gannon's stays in the White House. Or maybe Condi will leave behind a stained blue dress while she and bush are having a bathroom break.
And if widespread voter outrage swept democrats into majorities of both houses? Due to the influence of the
Spineless Coward Wing of the Democratic Party, it is a good bet Bush is going to remain in office until
at least '08 (with his
admission recently that the constitution is basically "A goddamn piece of paper",
he could be president even longer).
No, there appears to be little chance that the fascist currently occupying the office of the presidency will be going anywhere anytime soon. It is also quite clear, based on his
defiance in recent speeches, that Bush is capable of anything. Indeed a check of
the 14 characteristics of fascism, we better be ready for anything, especially martial law.
So since congress will not remove him, what legal and peaceful means do we have to drive Bush out of office?
One legal and peaceful solution that jumped out at me right away would be for the "blue states" to secede from the Union. This is an attractive solution. California has the 5th largest economy in the world, New York is not far behind. Of course, we would only have one state with a significant farm economy, Illinois. But one advantage would be that since we would be our own "Blue country", we would not be saddled with the mountain of federal debt, most of it accumulated while Bush has been in office. That is definitely positive.
But let's be frank, this is a complicated solution. Plus, I currently live in one of those "red states".
Is there another option for the peaceful removal of George W. Bush?
One model would be what has recently happened in Bolivia.
To paraphrase, here is the wikipedia entry to the major events that led up to Evo Morales' overwhelming victory in the recent elections to become the first indiginous president of Bolivia.
In September 2001, following the advice of the World Bank, the Bolivian government declared that all water was to become corporate property, so that even drawing water from community wells or gathering rainwater on their own properties, peasants and urban dwellers had to first purchase and obtain permits from International Water Limited (a multinational largely owned by the Bechtel Corporation).
The government, however, retracted and abolished the new water privatization rules following wide-scales uprisings and riots in protest of the legislation.
During, February 2003, four-year economic recession, tight fiscal situation, and longstanding ethnic tensions mounted again in a police revolt that nearly toppled the government of President Sánchez de Lozada; several days of unrest left more than 30 persons dead. The government stayed in power but remained unpopular. Widespread protests broke out in October and revealed deep dissatisfaction with the government. Approximately 80 people died during the demonstrations which led President Sánchez de Lozada to resign from office on October 17. In a constitutional transfer of power, Vice President Carlos Mesa assumed the Presidency and promised to hold a binding referendum on the export of Bolivian natural gas. The referendum took place on July 18, and the electorate voted overwhelmingly in favor of development of the nation's hydrocarbon resources. Mesa planned to detail the government's development plans in legislation to be introduced to Congress. Mesa enjoyed popularity with the Bolivian public, but he faced the same difficulties -- social divisions, a radical opposition committed to extra-parliamentary action, and an ongoing fiscal deficit -- as the previous administration.
On June 6, 2005, President Carlos Mesa was forced to enter his resignation as over 80,000 protestors surrounded the presidential palace and congress demanding nationalization of the gas industry. The indigenous protestors argued that indigenous communities, two thirds of Bolivia's population, were not adequately represented in government. Consequently, the campesinos and indigenous population, angered by the inequitable dividends paid by the multinational petroleum companies, set up roadblocks throughout the country and placed all the major cities under siege. With Carlos Mesa stranded in the Palace of Plaza Murillo, the congress and senate closed, protestors roamed through the streets of La Paz threatening to drive the "corbateros" (those clothed in suits and ties) from the country.
A civil war was averted when, on June 9, 157 members of congress converged on the Casa de La Libertad in Sucre and nominated Eduardo Rodríguez, then serving as President of the Supreme Court, to the Presidency of the Republic. President Rodriguez, to avert a civil war, promised to hold new national elections in December 2005.
Regardless of what we do to peacefully take back our country, we will need a Declaration of Independence.
As luck would have it, there is one that was used in 1776. And wouldn't you know, most of the reasons given in THAT declaration seem to apply today (with the jingoistic reference to "savage" removed as one of the reasons for declaration, and free trade clause will have to be clarified).
When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. -- Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King George is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refuted his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of American Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Neo-conservative brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred. to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to King George Bush's Crown, and that all political connection between them and the former United States of America, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. -- And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.