Rep. Robert Wexler

Bruce Fein

If you are not on the mailing list of the world's coolest Congressman, I encourage you to sign up now. But just in case you are not receiving emails from Robert Wexler (D-FL), here is the one he sent out today about the non-impeachment hearing held yesterday ...

Nate Silver wrote an incisive post yesterday titled "What Obama Needs to Win."  At its core, Nate's message was that Obama must shift towards a more traditional campaign and stop running like he is 10% ahead: start flame throwing at McCain; readily engage in a Clintinonian sludge-fest.  The post seemed persuasive upon first read.  

But this is not, and has never been, Obama's chosen path during the long campaign.  I'm not naive enough to believe Obama's above this realm of politics -- Presidential races are not for the faint of heart and Obama, like every other serious Presidential candidate, would zealously take a conventional approach if it offered the best path to victory.

Instead, Obama's approach is in many ways the antithesis of the Clinton model.  Obama's campaign is meticulous, shrewd, consistent, rigorous, and, above all, risk-averse when there is little to be gained.  Three specifics after the jump.

(from a previous diary of mine):

   Amendment 28

   "Section 1. The prerogative of the Executive to issue Pardons notwithstanding, no Pardon or Commutation shall be considered valid if issued to reprieve a current or former member of the Executive's Administration, or a current or former offical in his or her political party.

   Section 2. Any Pardon shall be valid only insofar as it applies to a specific conviction against an individual obtained in a Court of the United States."

(Note: I changed "President" to "Executive" in Section 1 in order to ramify the States.)

OK, if it's not obvious to "some" why I'm refloating this proposal now, consider this,

Testimony of Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson
Regarding Illegal Conduct and Other Egregious Abuses
by the President of the United States
and Other Members of His Administration
and Possible Steps Toward Accountability, Future Deterrence, and Reform

I am honored to address you today and am pleased that you are considering your solemn responsibility to ascertain and disclose to the American people the nature and scope of illegal conduct and other egregious abuses of power by the administration.  Ascertaining and disclosing the truth about these matters is vital in order to restore our constitutional democracy, the rule of law,  and the crucial role Congress plays in a system of checks and balances that has been utterly emasculated by members of the administration.

You've probably heard the quote of the day from Lamar Smith (disclaimer: I have chopped up this crap in no particular order):

Nothing is going to come out of this hearing with regard to the impeachment of the president... I know it, the media knows it, even the speaker knows it...  The Democratic leadership has said time and again they have intention of bringing any impeachment resolution for the president or the vice president to the House floor. Why? Because they know it wouldn't pass... These relentless efforts of some individuals to malign the outgoing administration only demeans and harms the institution of Congress...  This hearing will not cause us to impeach the president; it will only serve to impeach our own credibility...  It seems that we are hosting an anger management class...

He was singing a different tune in 1998.  Why?  Because Bill Clinton lied about getting a blowjob.  But don't take my word for it, read below:

You know what's funny? Republican congressmen, staunchly pro-Bush despite everything (insert endless list of crimes and misdemeanors here), moaning and whining throughout today's hearing, because the chair, or the witnesses, or the audience, weren't following the rules.

That is the fucking most ironic thing I have ever heard.

Today is was the House Judiciary Committee's Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitations.  Surprisingly enough, it wasn't dreadful in addressing its official purpose.    The takeaway is that if "impeachment is off the table," a President can do anything she/he wants to do and nobody can stop her/him.  Not that the word "impeachment" was to have been uttered during the hearing, but they cut everybody slack on that as long as they never said "impeachment of George W. Bush."  

How is it that a congressman feels perfectly OK to impugn and mock Congress but not the Executive?

Could it be because a congressman really is in the employ of the Executive and not the Congress?  Yes it could.

And if so, what might be the President's goal?  

Read on....

During Panel 1, Representative Kucinich (D-Ohio) presented his three bills regarding the articles of impeachment for Shrub for the consideration of the Judiciary Committee. He asked his colleagues in Congress to honor our oath to support and defend the constitution.

These hearings are currently being shown on C-Span 1 TV

Links:C-Span 1 - follow link on home page

Other links

KPFA & Pacifica Radio will air Friday's hearing from 9:00AM - 1:00PM EDT streamed live at pacifica.org and kpfa.org and on the air at KPFA (Berkeley), KPFK (Los Angeles), KPFT (Houston), and others TBD.

Important Note: Please do NOT recommend this diary. Instead recommend the
Mothership here.

See Panel 2 speakers below the flip

This morning approximately 110 people lined up outside Rayburn 2141 hoping to get into the hearing. We were initially told that there were 40 seats available to the public, but ultimately only SIXTEEN people were allowed inside. There were two overflow rooms, both of which were rendered standing room only as staffers and interns also attended in force. There has been one hallway arrest so far. Here are Laurie Arbeiter from World Can't Wait and Jenny Heinz of CodePink, who both came down from NYC to attend the hearing.

During Panel 1, Representative Kucinich (D-Ohio) presented his three bills regarding the articles of impeachment for Shrub for the consideration of the Judiciary Committee. He asked his colleagues in Congress to honor our oath to support and defend the constitution.

These hearings are currently being shown on C-Span 1 TV

Links:C-Span 1 - follow link on home page

Other links

KPFA & Pacifica Radio will air Friday's hearing from 9:00AM - 1:00PM EDT streamed live at pacifica.org and kpfa.org and on the air at KPFA (Berkeley), KPFK (Los Angeles), KPFT (Houston), and others TBD.

Important Note: Please do NOT recommend this diary. Instead recommend the
Mothership here.

See Panel 2 speakers below the flip

Cross posted from Docudharma.

The fact that we welcomed Nancy Pelosi to Netroots Nation, purportedly a gathering of leftists and progressives, has to make you wonder.  For the most part we sat there with our thumbs up our asses, drooling like idiots and lapping up the ‘respect’ we were shown by the mere presence of this illustrious traitor to everything I thought we stood for.

Please note:  Ellicat's Live Blog 1 has more links, but I am streaming and to add the links into this diary is not feasible on a timely basis.  My apologies.

House Judiciary Committee Hearing on Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitations
10:00am EDT

This will be shown on C-Span 1 TV

 
From afterdowningstreet.org:

   KPFA & Pacifica Radio will air Friday's hearing from 9:00AM - 1:00PM EDT streamed live at pacifica.org and kpfa.org and on the air at KPFA (Berkeley), KPFK (Los Angeles), KPFT (Houston), and others TBD.

House Judiciary Committee Hearing on Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitations
10:00am EDT

This will be shown on C-Span 1 TV

Links:  C-Span 1 - follow link on home page
   From afterdowningstreet.org:

KPFA & Pacifica Radio will air Friday's hearing from 9:00AM - 1:00PM EDT streamed live at pacifica.org and kpfa.org and on the air at KPFA (Berkeley), KPFK (Los Angeles), KPFT (Houston), and others TBD.

The House is not in session today, but the big goings-on will be in the House Judiciary Committee.

• Watch online
• Listen online

Today's the day House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers has set aside for a hearing granted in response to the demands of Dennis Kucinich for hearings on the impeachment resolutions he's introduced over the course of the past few months: H. Res. 333 and H. Res. 799, impeaching Dick Cheney, and H. Res. 1258 and H. Res. 1345, impeaching George W. Bush.

The hearing, scheduled for 10:00 A.M. in Room 2141 in the Rayburn House Office Building, is not styled as an impeachment hearing. That's something Conyers and his staff have studiously avoided. It is instead titled a hearing on, "Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitations." As we'll see later, this designation could impose some real substantive limitations on the ability of Members and witnesses alike to discuss such critical matters as what constitutional provisions actually set the boundaries of executive power, and what Bush may have done to warrant their invocation. But other than that...

Chairman Conyers wasn't originally inclined to hold any kind of hearing related to Kucinich's resolutions, but a combination of factors eventually made that an untenable position -- though unfortunately none of those factors likely reflect any newfound interest among most Members of Congress in actually impeaching either Cheney or Bush. But with three of Kucinich's four resolutions all referred to Conyers' committee by actual roll call votes on the floor rather than by the usual process of designation by the Speaker in consultation with the parliamentarian, treating those referrals as mere pro forma designations and letting the bills die of neglect (as is the chairman's prerogative) became more difficult to do.

In addition, the cosponsorship of some of those resolutions by members of the Judiciary Committee (Tammy Baldwin, Robert Wexler, Luis Gutierrez, Steve Cohen, Keith Ellison, Shiela Jackson-Lee, Maxine Waters), and especially the explicit pressure for hearings by Wexler, Baldwin and Gutierrez, made it impossible to maintain the position that there was no interest among the membership in having those hearings.

Finally, there was the tactic eventually employed to greater effect by Kucinich, taking advantage of the rules permitting any Member of the House to bring a resolution directly proposing impeachment to the floor at any time as a highly privileged motion, and forcing the Speaker to designate a time within two days after the motion is noticed for its consideration. That gave Kucinich the ability to threaten, after his Cheney resolutions were ignored by the Judiciary Committee, to follow up his first Bush resolution with a second one if the Committee didn't act within 30 days. In theory, he could have threatened an even shorter timeline for the second one, or indeed to bring one every single day until he got what he was looking for. But with that being clear to everyone, granting the hearing (but refusing to call it an impeachment hearing) must certainly have seemed the simplest solution. Especially if you can schedule them for a Friday when there are no votes in the House, so that fewer people will want to stick around to participate or follow along.

So who are the witnesses at this non-impeachment hearing?

Witness List

Panel I:

Hon. Dennis Kucinich
U.S. House of Representatives
10th District, OH

Hon. Maurice Hinchey
U.S. House of Representatives
22nd District, NY

Hon. Walter Jones
U.S. House of Representatives
3rd District, NC

Hon. Brad Miller
U.S. House of Representatives
13th District, NC

Panel II:

Hon. Elizabeth Holtzman
Former U.S. House of Representatives
16th District, NY
Department of Justice

Hon. Bob Barr
Former U.S. House of Representatives
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
7th District, GA

Hon. Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson
Founder and President
High Roads for Human Rights

Stephen Presser
Raoul Berer Professor of Legal History
Northwestern University School of Law

Bruce Fein
Associate Deputy Attorney General, 1981-82
Chairman, American Freedom Agenda

Vincent Bugliosi
Author and Former Los Angeles County Prosecutor

Jeremy A. Rabkin
Professor of Law
George Mason University School of Law

Elliott Adams
President of the Board
Veterans for Peace

Frederick A. O. Schwarz, Jr.
Senior Counsel
Brennan Center for Jutice at NYU School of Law

Interesting. Jeremy A. Rabkin is a Constitutional Law professor who doesn't appear to have a law degree. It's by no means impossible to teach ConLaw without one. But I wouldn't necessarily recommend it. GMU Law. Gee, I wonder who suggested him?

Panel I looks interesting too. Walter Jones is a name I wouldn't have expected to see there, though I know he's been both rather remorseful about the Iraq war and outspoken about it, since his long ago "freedom fries" days. Hinchey has been very vocal in the past with questions about the process by which DOJ claims to have "authorized" the NSA's illegal domestic spying program. Kucinich, of course, is Kucinich. And Brad Miller will be there to discuss two pieces of legislation he's introducing to address the Bush "administration" power grabs: one to authorize the Congress to ask the courts to appoint a special prosecutor in cases when the DOJ refuses to press contempt of Congress charges, and one to require notice to Congress when the DOJ's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) issues an opinion advising the executive that it may ignore statutory law (though I suppose we might wonder why they wouldn't ignore that law, too).

Finally, a note on what not to expect: the "L word." Many people watching the hearings will wonder at some point why no one is just coming out and saying Bush lied. There's extensive precedent in the House against "personal abuse, innuendo, or ridicule of the President."

Personal abuse, innuendo, or ridicule of the President, is not permitted. Under this standard it is not in order to call the President, or a presumptive major-party nominee for President, a "liar" or accuse him of "lying". Indeed, any suggestion of mendacity is out of order. For example, the following remarks have been held out of order: (1) suggesting that the President misrepresented the truth, attempted to obstruct justice, and encouraged others to perjure themselves; (2) accusing him of dishonesty, accusing him of making a "dishonest argument", charging him with intent to be intellectually dishonest, or stating that many were convinced he had "not been honest"; (3) accusing him of "raping" the truth, not telling the truth, or distorting the truth; (4) stating that he was not being "straight with us"; (5) accusing him of being deceptive, fabricating an issue, or intending to mislead the public; (6) accusing him of intentional mischaracterization, although mischaracterization without intent to deceive is not necessarily out of order. [Notes omitted]

And here's something that may cause a bit of trouble:

Although wide latitude is permitted in debate on a proposition to impeach the President, Members must abstain from language personally offensive; and Members must abstain from comparisons to the personal conduct of sitting Members of the House or Senate. Furthermore, Members may not refer to evidence of alleged impeachable offenses by the President contained in a communication from an independent counsel pending before a House committee, although they may refer to the communication, itself, within the confines of proper decorum in debate. [Notes omitted]

I'm not sure what kind of latitude is permitted in a hearing that's convened solely because of a pending proposition to impeach the president, but which purports not to be on that subject, but even the above rule doesn't appear to leave a lot of room for, you know, actually discussing what it is that people will be there to discuss.

All of these precedents, though intended to govern debate on the House floor, will likely be applied similarly to questioning and testimony in the Judiciary Committee. So you may have to get your fix of the "L word" from the press conferences afterward. And depending on what kind of stink, if any, Republicans raise and how Conyers deals with it, most of the other words you want to hear, too. Fair warning.

The hearings will be available via streaming video at the House Judiciary Committee website, and Pacifica Radio's coverage begins at 9:00 am EDT, and will be streamed live at pacifica.org and kpfa.org and on the air at KPFA (Berkeley), KPFK (Los Angeles), KPFT (Houston), WBAI (New York), and others TBD.

In the Senate, courtesy of the Office of the Majority Leader:

Convenes: 9:15am

9:15 am Immediately following the prayer and pledge, the Senate will proceed to up to 2 Roll Call Votes in relation to the following:

• Motion to invoke cloture on S.3268
• If cloture is not invoked on S.3268, motion to invoke cloture on the House message with respect to H.R.3221, the Housing legislation.

10:00am Filing deadline for all 2nd degree amendments [see this discussion of the different types of amendments] to S.3268, the Energy Speculation bill.

The Senate will likely stay in session over the weekend to finish any post-cloture debate on the above bills, and perhaps begin the process of getting the "Coburn Omnibus" (S. 3297) to the floor for next week.

No matter what Judiciary Chairman John Conyers calls it.  The semantic battle over the name of this hearing is the true indicator of its importance.  Even though the resolution HR 1345 that the full House voted to refer to Judiciary for today's hearing is entitled "An Article of Impeachment of President George W. Bush," Conyers is bending over backwards to call it anything but.  The reason is that they are afraid if the word "impeachment" gets out, the natives will get restless, and start demanding the return of the rule of laws, not men.  Let's see if they'll settle for a show trial and go away.  We're counting on you John.  Love, Karl.

The witness list is impressive, and includes Liz Holtzman and Bruce Fein.

What happens now is up to you.  Reach out and speak not as a member of any party, but as an American who grew up loving that you were a citizen of a country where the law was enforced equally among rich and poor, to the extent possible in any democracy yet created.  Call your Republican uncle who would love to see Bush impeached and tell him what's going on.  Contact the media and...

The House Judiciary Committee today, Friday, July 25th, will put Impeachment squarely back "on the table" and restored to its prominent place in our Constitution.

Wednesday 07/25/2008 - 10:00 AM
2141 Rayburn House Office Building
Full Committee
By Direction of the Chairman