What is the cost of a failed impeachment attempt, or of Congrssional investigations that don't adequately make a case for impeachment? The Iran/Contra affair offers an example.
Lawrence Walsh, the Independent Counsel for the Iran Contra Affair, wrote
The underlying facts of Iran/contra are that, regardless of criminality, President Reagan, the secretary of state, the secretary of defense, and the director of central intelligence and their necessary assistants committed themselves, however reluctantly, to two programs contrary to congressional policy and contrary to national policy. They skirted the law, some of them broke the law, and almost all of them tried to cover up the President's willful activities.
What happened as a result of Reagan's adventure?
From the conclusions section of the Independent Prosecutor's report on Iran-Contra:
Fundamentally, the Iran/contra affair was the first known criminal assault on the post-Watergate rules governing the activities of national security officials. Reagan Administration officials rendered these rules ineffective by creating private operations, supported with privately generated funds that successfully evaded executive and legislative oversight and control. Congress was defrauded. Its appropriations restrictions having been circumvented, Congress was led to believe that the Administration was following the law. Numerous congressional inquiries were thwarted through false testimony and the destruction and concealment of government records.
The destruction and concealment of records and information, beginning at the twilight of Iran/contra and continuing throughout subsequent investigations, should be of particular concern. Oliver North's destruction of records in October and November 1986 caused an irretrievable loss of information to the executive agencies responsible for regulating clandestine activities, to Congress, and to Independent Counsel. John Poindexter's efforts to destroy NSC electronic mail nearly resulted in comparable damage. CIA Costa Rican Station Chief Joseph F. Fernandez attempted to hide phone records that would have revealed his contacts with Enterprise activities.
This sort of obstruction continued even after Independent Counsel's appointment. In the course of his work, Independent Counsel located large caches of handwritten notes and other documents maintained by high officials that were never relinquished to investigators. Major aspects of Iran/contra would never have been uncovered had all of the officials who attempted to destroy or withhold their records of the affair succeeded. Had these contemporaneous records been produced to investigators when they were initially requested, many of the troublesome conflicts between key witnesses would have been resolved, and timely legal steps taken toward those who feigned memory lapses or lied outright.
Walsh, of course, complained that Congressional investigations, particularly blanket grants of immunity from prosecution to people like Poindexter and North, made it impossible to pursue effective criminal proecution of Reagan administration officials involved in Iran-Contra. He felt that the rush for Congressional investigations hindered the uncovering of evidence. Granting immunity from prosecution to key players in the scheme allowed those same people to take responsibilty for the entire enterprise, effective shielding top Administration officials.
Reagan was not impeached or removed from office, thanks in no small part to that Great American Hero Ollie North, in his pretty uniform with its shiny medals, and to Congress' interference in criminal investigations of the Reagan Regime. This only helped keep in power many of the same people we're dealing with today, including Gates, Bolton, and Negroponte.
The same thing will happen today if impeachment is pursued precipitously. If we don't root out the corruption in government, we're just going to see the same people, or their clones, in office in the future. We need investigations, criminal proceedings, convictions, and then, if there's time, removal of Bush. If we go after Bush first, all we can removal is the visible tip of a cancerous growth, if we can even get rid of him. If we go after Bush and fail, because of undue haste and incomplete investigations, then we just let this cancer continue to grow.