Yesterday, three votes took place on the floor of the House of Representatives after Representative Dennis Kucinich entered a priviliged motion to move HR 333, a bill containing three particulars calling for the impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney.
The first vote was taken when Steny Hoyer, the Majority Leader, moved to table the motion. THAT FAILED.
The second vote was also by Hoyer, this time moving to order the previous question and thus cut off debate. THAT CARRIED. 218 yeas, including 3 Republicans. 5 Democrats voted nay, 10 Democrats didn't vote!
The third vote was to refer the bill to the House Judiciary Committee, to open an impeachment inquiry. THAT CARRIED. 218 yeas, including 5 Republicans. 5 Democrats voted nay. 10 Democrats DIDN'T VOTE.
After the third vote, I cheered. I sat and counted the votes, waiting for the magic number, 218, that would ensure that the bill wouldn't be rendered "dead."
Immediately afterward, I flipped to CNN and MSNBC, expecting that, any second, there would be "breaking news," informing the citizens of the country that a majority of the House of Representatives voted to open an impeachment inquiry against Dick Cheney.
When several minutes passed, and the story was ignored, not even showing up on the crawl for either station, I turned to dailykos.
Two diaries were at the top of the rec list, "live blogging" the vote. They were reporting that the measure WAS DEAD.
So I wrote a diary. Real short. Didn't even qualify as a diary, really, but I felt that the error HAD to be corrected. Not only that, but I also felt that the fact that the MSM WAS IGNORING this vote had to be important to those of us who are interested in seeing the constitution restored.
Now, I like Kagro X. And I respect Kagro X a great deal. However, I cannot let his front page from yesterday stand as the final word on this issue. Kagro X argued that, since the measure was referred to the HJC, it was effectively, DEAD, and that's that.
I beg to differ.
A majority of the House has voted to open an impeachment inquiry. A majority of the House has directed the House Judiciary Committee to open an impeachment inquiry. If a majority vote by the House to open an impeachment inquiry means the inquiry is "dead," then a majority vote by the House on ANY issue has little meaning.
We pass laws by a majority vote in the House. Without a majority vote in the House, a bill doesn't become law. A bill that GETS a majority vote that isn't "dead," a bill that DOESN'T GET a majority vote is dead.
This is "schoolhouse rock" stuff, kids.
Yet, most of the coverage I have seen so far, is that the measure is "dead." We are being told that the way that the government has conducted our business for over two hundred years is "dead" by organizations, news media corporations, who derive their authority to tell us ANYTHING, from US.
Let's do a little survey of how this is being depicted, shall we?
CBS News:
An attempt by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) to impeach Vice President Dick Cheney through introduction of a privileged resolution spun entirely out of control today as Republicans crossed the aisle and tried to force an actual vote on the measure. After a scramble by an visibly irate Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), the Kucinich resolution was referred to the House Judiciary Committee, where it is expected to languish until dead.
OH REALLY? A majority of the House votes to open an IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY, and it's expected to "languish until dead?" EXPECTED BY WHOM? Not the majority, apparently, and that's my point. Apparently, the will of the majority isn't "expected" to be done! Might I remind everyone what the basis of our entire constitutional system is? Do I have to? REALLY?
The remainder of the CBS story babbles on about how "clever" the Republicans are, since they voted against tabling the motion, and thus "embarrassed" the Democratic Leadership!
How embarrassing! The Leadership doesn't want to open an impeachment inquiry that has 54% support among the public and majority support in the House! I heard this same line repeated elsewhere, saying how "clever" the Republicans were to force debate when the leadership wasn't prepared to debate! Ya know what? DENNIS KUCINICH and his supporters were prepared to debate the issue!
The votes I recounted above show just how transparently FALSE is the claim that impeachment is driven by "the far left." FIFTEEN Democrats don't want to do this. All but 5 Republicans don't want to do it. TEN of those Democrats wouldn't support the measure, but wouldn't go on record with a vote either. There is a HANDFUL, FIVE, Democrats who have been standing in the way this whole time, getting away with calling this a "far left" issue.
MSNBC:
The House has just voted to refer the Kucinich impeachment resolution to committee. That means it's dead.
CNN
Kucinich, who is vying for the Democratic presidential nomination, has tried to bring up the issue on three separate occasions. The House voted 218-194 to send it to committee, effectively killing it.
The link to this story, on CNN's political page, is titled "Cheney impeachment blocked." BLOCKED? I guess when the House votes, in a majority, to make a bill a law, that bill is thus, "blocked." That is the bizarro world interpretation of yesterday's vote being foisted upon us by "the best political team."
CNN goes on to quote Dana Perino's opinion that the House was "wasting time" with this vote. I disagree. I think we should have had this vote in January. We've BEEN wasting time until now.
I will say that ABCNews, and the Washington Post, are not parroting this outrageous line being taken by others. Anyone watch ABCNEWS yesterday? Did they cover the topic on the ten o'clock news? Though I commend the Post for NOT repeating the "dead issue" propaganda, did they front-page it? Not from what I see. Both the Post and ABCNEWS are reporting that the Republicans tried to force the debate, and they failed to do that.
As for CNN, MSNBC, I watched them for hours before the first mention of the vote was made, by Tucker Carlson, who had Dennis Kucinich on his show for an interview. If you saw that interview, and then had a WTF? moment, wondering why the major media was burying the story, you're not alone.
What goes completely unnoticed, apparently? The votes ARE THERE for impeachment. Had the vote to cut off debate failed, debate would have ensued AND THEN AN IMPEACHMENT VOTE. Rather than reporting what this REALLY was, a pretty damn close call for Dick Cheney, the news organizations are instead playing this up as a triumph for the Republicans and the House Leadership, both of whom are IN THE MINORITY, and both of whom LOST a vote to kill the bill.
Go ahead and search out "impeachement" and see what was written by The New York Times, USA Today, Fox news, etc. We are being fed a heaping pile of BS, and unless we fight it and insist that this issue gets the attention that a majority vote to open an impeachment inquiry deserves, we might as well act as if there isn't really a government anymore.
If bills that the majority votes for are "dead," then so is our Republic.