By Martin Bosworth
My particularly angry take on the daily mass exodus of Bush apparatchiks and what it means for our country can be found here. Warning: It’s not very nice or reasonable, which is why I posted it there instead of here.
Some days you just gotta let the wolf out the door.
Categories: Politics/Law/Government
Progressive Culture | Scholars & Rogues 
And that’s the sheer arrogance of it. These people believed they would rule forever, or at least assure continued GOP dominance of all three branches of government for a long time.
In fairness, I was beginning to think they were going to rule forever, too.
I won’t stop worrying about it until they are completely replaced.. by the next batch of politicians.
General comment about politics that the GOP seemed to have forgotten (and that I’m sure the Democrats will remind them of) – you will not always be in power, so don’t use tactics on your opponents that you wouldn’t want used on you.
The Golden Rule of Politics, perhaps?
Excuse the ignorance in this question, please, but I’m a politically naive Bush despiser (I’m the desp–oh, never mind), who just happened upon this post.
Why was Clinton impeached for lying about a blow job, yet dems can’t impeach (much less imprison) any or all of the outright criminals and liars in the top levels of the Bush admin? Is there an answer I could understand without getting another lousy master’s?
Technically, you can only be impeached for “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” This has generally been held to mean breaking federal law. Clinton was impeached for comitting perjury, lying under oath, not for the blowjob itself. I personally don’t feel that this rises to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors, but that’s IMO.
No-one has yet proven that Bush has broken federal law (although it certainly looks like he has in a couple of places), and most of the questionable actions he’s taken could, potentially, fall under his Constitutional executive authority. In the event of a disagreement between the President and the Congress regarding Constitutional authority, the Supreme Court is the adjudicator, and given the relatively conservative composition of the Supreme Court, it’s possible that the Congress has been unwilling to move too quickly in this regard.
While it may only take a majority of the House of Representatives to refer the President to the Senate for trial, it takes 2/3 of the Senate to convict, and once articles of impeachment hit the Senate, the Senate will effectively do nothing else until they’re resolved. Not only will the Senate not get a 2/3rds vote (too many of Bush’s supporters are still in power, and they’ll support Bush and party even if it means the nation collapses around them), but Congress wants to keep the pressure on Bush in more meaningful ways.
Quite frankly, pulling down the curtain from around Bush by taking down his advisors and operatives one by one is turning out to be very effective in eviscerating Bush. Probably more effective than even impeachment would be.
Brian is being generous with his explanation about Clinton’s impeachment. This was the line offered, yes. But the whole thing was a political put-up job. There was no underlying crime, merely a bogus civil suit on behalf of Paula Jones. Clinton was dumb enough to fall into the trap – his bad – but let’s not dignify that corrupt pack of jackals by equating even for a second that case and this one. A technically straight answer plays into a fake frame.
Ultimately, I’ve come to find that impeachment would just be useless at this point. All it would accomplish would be to get Darth Cheney occupying the seat he controls as it is. No real change of policy or practice.
Better instead to hound, harass, and harry them for the rest of their days.
Thanks guys, I really appreciate the answers.
My belief that the impeachment of Clinton was bogus Republican bullsh*t has been strengthened. I also feel better about laying off the impeachment push for the Bush leaguers.
I sure would like to see more of them go to prison, though. Even better, I’d like to see the Americans who support these idiots come to their senses. Would it be too greedy to want both?
Thanks again for your input.
RE: playing into a fake frame. That’s more an artifact of imperfect memory and inattention at the time (there are things in the news I try hard to ignore – Clinton’s impeachment was one of them) than any attempt to equate the two situations.
I’m with writers of the Constitution who wanted to add “maladministration” (carefully defined, of course) to the list of impeachable offenses. Yet another Amendment we desperately need….