JMO - Impeachment

After watching the PBS Frontline show Bush's War, and reading the views on the impeachment against President Bush and Vice President Cheney, I have to agree, both should have been impeached and convicted in 2005, and definitely in 2006, but the the Republicans controlled Congress. When the Democrats took over Congress in late 2006, they should have impeached and convicte them in 2007, but they used the wrong argument to defend the reasons not to.

Despite the rhetoric about what it would do to this country in a time of war, and especially the war on terroristm, I agree with those that said it would have been the best thing for this nation, to see all the information about the leadup to and the implementation of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. The Frontline show clearly provided the framework to the story and insights into the complete manipulation or distortion of the evidence against Saddham Hussein.

Those that are old enough remember the impeachment proceedings against President Nixon. He wasn't impeached, let alone convicted, but it was clear the House would have impeached him and the Senate convicted him. He resigned from office before the House could vote on the articles of impeachment.

Many remember the discussions and eventually the articles of impeachment against President Clinton, and the close vote by the Senate. That clearly was a political impeachment. The whole thing was about sex with a White House intern. And as was said, if other presidents had been put under that scrutiny, a lot of them would have been impeached and convicted, including President Kennedy.

But now we have a President and Vice President who arranged the evidence against the leader of another soverign nation and lead this country into an invasion and occupation of that nation. And as we now know, all the evidence was fabricated, manipulated or distorted, and many of the sources were known liars or discredited later. Even in mid-2007 Bill Moyers reported 45% and 54% of American wanted an impeachment of the President and Vice President, respectively.

We want the truth to see the light of day, and not hidden under veils of White House administration secrecy, much of it also withheld from Congress. Congress said it wasn't the right time and would take too long considering the time the President had left in his term. What didn't they understand we, the people, wanted the truth and people be held accountable. We didn't want politics as usual.

And we know he may have been impeached but not convicted. So be it. It would have marked his term as President as flawed and had the Senate done their job, removed both the President and Vice President for "high crimes and misdemeanors" as defined by the Constitution. It worked in 1975, the country and nation didn't collapse, and proved to be stronger than we imagined.

And the same can be said here. We need a change of direction in the management and politics for the war in Iraq. We're in a long, almost endless war, of attrition depending on which side finally runs out of resources, namely people and national will. Both sides never run out of money as well as arms and weapons. It's likely, because of the simplicity and abundance of weapons used by the insurgents and the expensiveness of US technological weapons, the US will begin to blink first.

We can't sustain 200,000 troops and 100,000 contractors in Iraq with all the other global interests for US forces. Since the "surge" now is near-permanent, we're looking at a slow escalation of involvement because it takes troops to sustain the ever slowing losing civil war and this will require additonal surges of troops. And anything approaching disengagement or withdrawal only leads to a worsening.

But I wander. I want a public viewing of the evidence the President used in his 2003 State of Union address. I want a public discussion about the President and Vice President's conduct from 2001-2008 along with all the other people who helped. I want them before a House committee answering questions to the American people. Now we have to wait for history.

That's my view. Bush will leave office thinking he won. But I hope he lives a very long time and comes to the realization, as history will show, what a real screwup he really is and the damage he has done to the country and nation. I want him to see the history which he didn't see then.