Cynthia McKinney, Jan. 30, 2009
On Thursday, January 29th, I sent President Obama this message:
"Mr. President: The Bush Administration lied to the people in pursuit of war. As a result, at least one million Iraqis and thousands of U.S. soldiers are dead. Thousands more are maimed. The stature of the U.S. is severely damaged. The U.S. Constitution is in shreds after signing statements, wiretaps, and torture. Your obligation is to investigate and bring to justice those who violated U.S. and international law, such as the torture treaty. Failure to do so makes you complicit in their crimes."
On Wednesday, January 28th, I sat in front of the television and I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Exactly what I've been saying, myself. But it was coming from an unexpected source: the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Manfred Nowak. I wrote down every word. He said that the United Nations has proof that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld knowingly approved of torture as a policy for the United States. He said that President Barack Obama has a responsibility to investigate and prosecute those who condoned, conducted, or approved of torture.
Further, Jonathan Turley, in an MSNBC interview stated that if Obama fails to investigate or prosecute that he would be an "accessory."
This is significant. It means that all of us, sadly, were right to pursue impeachment of the key figures in the Bush Administration. Impeachment was the Constitutional imperative; but the Constitution didn't mean anything to either the Republican or Democratic national leadership.
And to think, on this day filled with impeachment news, Nancy Pelosi took impeachment "off the table" for this cast of villainous characters. I never will forget watching Rocky Anderson, former Mayor of Salt Lake City, say on national television that Nancy Pelosi should be impeached for impeding impeachment. But Nancy Pelosi isn't the only one who obstructed justice.
In fact, how could Dick Durbin and Harry Reid, so voluble in standing up to Roland Burris because he was Governor Blagojevich's pick for Obama's vacated Senate seat, sit as quiet as church mice in the face of repeated calls for impeachment because of the reckless criminality of the Bush Administration?
And now, we have the United Nations tell us the equivalent of "Houston, we have a problem."
Some of us knew all along, from the very beginning, that the Bush Administration was the quintessence of election theft, graft, corruption, and war criminality. Some of us recognized early on that our struggle was "against principalities, against powers, . . . against spiritual wickedness in high places." It is impossible to "go along and get along" with illegal and immoral acts. But that is exactly what the national leadership of this country asked us all to do, and that is exactly what they did.
Dr. King was confronted with the expediency of staying on the civil rights track, remaining with his friends in the civil rights movement, or doing what his conscience impelled him to do. That's when he made his famous statement, that popular chroniclers of Dr. King seem to have forgotten:
"When I first decided to take a firm stand against the war in Vietnam, I was subjected to the most bitter criticism, by the press, by individuals, and even by some fellow civil rights leaders. There were those who said that I should stay in my place, that these two issues did not mix and I should stick with civil rights. Well I had only one answer for that and it was simply the fact that I have struggled too long and too hard now to get rid of segregation in public accommodations to end up at this point in my life segregating my moral concerns."
Dr. King had to leave behind some of his best friends in the movement when he decided to speak out against the Vietnam War. Dr. King could have bowed to the pressure and stayed in his "civil rights" lane. But he knew that the war was wrong and he had to use every fiber in his being to stop it. Even his life, itself.
One of the first underreported acts of President Obama was to sign an order continuing the drone airstrikes, resulting in at least 22 killed so far. For the dead children of Afghanistan or Pakistan or Gaza, it doesn't matter to their parents if the bomb was dropped by Bush or Obama or the client state they support. And President Obama has made it clear that the bombs will continue to drop; it is up to us--the people of the United States--to stop them. That's why it was on my birthday, in front of the Pentagon in 2007, that I declared my independence from every bomb dropped, every child killed, every veteran maimed in the name of U.S. wars. I said it, and I meant it, and I knew I was going to have to do something I'd never done before if I was ever going to have something I'd never had before. So I left the Democratic Party.
I don't regret my decision one minute. I draw my strength from Dr. King, who in his own way, did the same thing when he refused to segregate his moral concerns.
My neighborhood in Los Angeles, Watts and South Central, is already a police state. Tonight, 25 to 30 young black men, standing handcuffed, outside the barber shop. Every night, routine dehumanization is carried out in black and brown neighborhoods by LAPD. I see it. I never miss it. It's all around me.
Oscar Grant murdered in cold blood by law enforcement. Robert Tolan, murdered in cold blood by law enforcement, for driving his father's car, mistaken for stolen.
Filiberto Ojeda Rios assassinated by the U.S. government; I met his wife and heard the entire story of what happened as he was shot by the FBI and then bled to death.
Innocent black and brown and poor white men on death row. How many Troy Davises and Mumia Abu Jamals will we allow to exist in our country?
Native Americans trying to survive despite genocide and ethnic cleansing, struggle against drug and alcohol abuse and poverty, and try to keep their culture alive.
And yet the likes of Harry Reid, Dick Durbin, Nancy Pelosi, and now Barack Obama say nothing about the pain I see on the mean streets and reservations across our country, and the miscarriages of justice that are its regular feature, but they allow Bush and company to get away with the highest of crimes, involving millions of deaths.
In each of these writings, I ask you, too, to write to the White House and let them know that you exist. We didn't recruit President Obama to run, so I am clear on the limitations of a White House letter writing campaign. But trust me, our collective efforts will congeal into the movement for dignity, real peace, and true justice that we so desperately need for ourselves and the rest of the world.
Showing posts with label impeachment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label impeachment. Show all posts
We've Opened the Door, How Do We Keep It Open?
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet, July 27, 2008
Your hard work has resulted in Congress cracking open the door to impeachment, justice, and peace. How can you keep it open?
A lot of us have our own favorite impeachable offenses - mine is the Iraq war - but a lot of them are not about to go anywhere in Congress. The impeachable offenses that appear to have the most traction among congress members (i.e. very little) are:
1. The numerous violations of laws combined with the announcement of the intention to violate those laws through signing statements. (I say it in this longwinded way, because just abbreviating it to "signing statements" allows people to pretend to miss the point.)
2. The numerous refusals to comply with requests, subpoenas, and contempt citations.
It has always been predictable, and predicted, that these would have the most traction (because nonpartisan, non-controversial, no congressional complicity, no investigation needed, clearcut and simple), and it has become clear that - as predicted - they DO in fact have the most traction.
We'd all LOVE to nail these fascist bastards for our favorite offenses, but we'd also all HATE for them to get off scott free, thereby establishing a precedent for future presidents; and when they nailed Al Capone for tax fraud everybody understood exactly why they'd done so.
What is needed is pressure on every member of Congress to themselves pressure Conyers, including by signing Wexler's letter at http://wexlerwantshearings.com So, please call your Representative every day at (202) 224-3121, focus on the issues that have the most traction, and urge them to ask Conyers to hold a real impeachment hearing. Remember that in an impeachment hearing the excuse of "executive privilege" is not allowed. A subpoena must simply be obeyed or those who refuse to obey it can be impeached.
Of secondary value is trying to get your Representative to introduce new articles of impeachment or new resolutions calling for impeachment hearings. So, any lengthy communications with your Rep should include that ask.
The third most important thing to do is to contact media outlets and urge them to cover impeachment, and contact polling companies and urge them to poll on impeachment.
The fourth most important thing to do is to support pro-impeachment candidates for Congress and make certain the incumbents know about it. Don't just send a check. First send a photocopy of it to the incumbent letting them know why they aren't getting one.
Now is the time to move on this with everything we've got. We've opened the door and must not allow it to close again.
It might help to review what happened in the House Judiciary Committee hearing on Friday, by reading the following live blog from the bottom up:
Live Blogging Hearing on Impeachment (Not Yet Impeachment Hearing)
C-Span has video links to Panel 1 and Panel 2 at www.c-span.org.
In this hearing we heard the case for impeachment from Kucinich, Wexler, Jackson-Lee, Johnson, Baldwin, Ellison, Hinchey, Holtzman, Anderson, Adams, and even Barr. We heard general support in that direction from Scott, Lofgren, and even Nadler (almost). And we heard Pence's and Franks' laughable and inculpating defenses along the lines of "Bush is not a crook." Not bad for the first day's work of the 110th Congress! Now, how about an impeachment hearing? We saw a lot of interest from committee members in the offense of signing statements, and also in the refusal to comply with subpoenas. Those are the issues that seem to have the most traction (and the least congressional complicity).
Now would be the time for a little less talk and a lot more action! Please call your Representative at (202) 224-3121 and ask them to call John Conyers and ask for impeachment hearings to begin. Please ask everyone you know to do the same. Please call every morning until it happens.
4:10 Nadler points out that whereas evidence was nonexistant or disputed, Bush asserted repeatedly that it was absolutely certain. Lundgren claims that Bush based that on the wisdom of intelligence agencies around the world [sic!]. [Even if that were true, isn't it a problem that US intelligence was full of doubts and major counter-evidence?]
4:05 Lundgren claims Bush meant well. Nadler asks about evidence on edited NIE presented today. Lundgren dismisses it. Audience laughs. Lundgren asks for people to be removed. Conyers says that if anyone causes a disruption at the end of the hearing they will be forbidden to attend any more hearings.
3:58: Ellison is trying again to get Presser to agree there are grounds for impeachment on the matter of war lies. He agrees, only if Kucinich's case is "proved." Ellison asks Radkin too, but he pulls out the "they meant well and sadly turned out to be wrong, which is different from intentionally lying." I'd like Kucinich to make the overwhelming case that Bugliosi has been making that they knowingly lied, but he instead makes the reasonable case that if all the assertions turn out to be false that is sufficient grounds for an impeachment inquiry.
3:55: Ellison is giving Kucinich another opportunity to speak about his article of impeachment on war lies, which he is doing at some length. Lundgren is the only Republican member still here. Conyers, Nadler, Scott, Lofgren, and Baldwin are here, and everyone is awake.
3:54 After Fein suggests a law banning use of funds for anything signing statemented, Ellison asks why the president couldn't just signing statement that new law. Fein had no answer.
3:45 Red Debbie Wasserman-Schultz is here for first time and expressing concern of some sort about signing statements.
3:38 Rep Schiff wants a new Church Committee to last into the next Congress, and he wants to White House to notify the Congress in a timely manner when it is about to violate laws. (I do hope I am hallucinating now.) Schwartz points out that there is already a law requiring that the president notify Congress when he will use a signing statement to claim the right to violate a law, but Bush has used a signing statement to erase the requirement that he notify Congress about signing statements. Schwartz points out also that we should have no secret laws whatsoever.
3:34 Baldwin raises danger of leaving Bush and Cheney unchecked for seven more months, in particular the possibility of an attack on Iran. What impact would an impeachment inquiry have on the possibility of attacking Iran? Anderson: wants a bill passed! (???) Bugliosi refuses to speculate.
3:30 Baldwin is bringing up John Nichols' book and the Bill Moyers show he was on with Fein. She's quoting Nichols account of presidential toolbox passing from president to president. And the toolbox now has more powers in it than ever before.
Lundgren is asleep now.
3:25 pm Rep Brad Sherman shows up for first time and says Congress has become mere advisors to White House. President won't obey laws. Any law to fix the problem will be vetoed. To Fein: is nonfeasance an impeachable offense? Fein: the "take care that laws are faithfully executed" comes from English Bill of Rights ... meaning Yes. Sherman is talking about signing statements. Sherman asks Holtzman if a prosecutor should bring a case if virtually certain of not getting a conviction? She says maybe.
Kucinich has gone out and come back with what is probably a stack of petition signatures in support of impeachment. Ellison is talking with Kucinich.
3:19 p.m. Rep Hank Johnson asks Presser about his testimony back in the day that if Clinton lied he should be impeached: if a president lied about taking a nation into war, would that be an impeachable offense? Presser says "you'd have to look into the circumstances...." Johnson turns to Holtzman, which is much more productive.
Nadler and Scott are both sleeping. No joke.
3:13 Rep Cohen asks Holtzman about what branch Cheney belongs to. Fein points out that a Senator has been impeached, so Cheney can claim he's in the legislative branch and be impeached. Cohen asks Fein whether it would be socially beneficial to impeach, or more important to do other things as Rep Watt advises. Fein says that impeaching Nixon was greatly unifying. He also says that there is penty of time since no investigation is needed. The president has confessed to viiolating FISA (witnesses are now routinely accusing the president of crimes and calling him "the president" against the rules).
3:03 Rep. Wexler says that ignoring subpoenas, spying, and torture, are - pace Pence - not "mere policy differences". Wexler expands on the subpoenas topic. Barr has left. Wexler wanted to ask him about statements he made in support of the rule of law during the Clinton impeachment. (Wexler may have been out of the room today when Barr came around in support of impeachment.) Rocky Anderson says Wexler is right, that we're not just talking about policy, but about Constitutional issues. Now, says Rocky, is the time for Congress to assert its power. Wexler now asks Fein about Mukasey coming before the committee and refusing to honor subpoenas. Fein says that's a clear impeachable offense on its own. Popular government can't work if the public can't know what its government is doing. You don't need an investigation to impeach: you just vote. [Go, Bruce!] Liz Holtzman adds that the president [OOPS, WHO? Can you say that?] has refused to give Congress what it needs to do its job and obstructs the work of Congress. She recommends holding an impeachment inquiry, requesting the information again, and if it is not provided then impeaching.
NOTE: Pacifica is terminating its broadcast, but we all appreciate them carrying the hearing up to this point.
3:02 Rep. Pence appears to be filibustering on his opposition to impeachment, chewing up time for no apparent purpose, asking three-minute questions that get three-word responses because they are just obvious rants.
2:53 p.m. One of the Repubicans tried to cut Bugliosi off by claiming he was discussing classified information. (He was discussing the declassified 2002 NIE.) The groans from the audience shut him up. Nobody said a thing about the groaning. Bugliosi was permitted to keep speaking.
2:43 Sheila Jackson-Lee (I kid you not) is urging passage of a bill to correct the abuse of signing statements (who spots the weakness in this strategy?). But she's now asking Fein to speak on war lies, and she's suggesting it's treason. And now she's giving Bugliosi a chance to expand on his case (the familiar case in his book, which many in this room have never heard).
2:36 At request of a Republican Conyers asks staff to remove signs. Staff is asking vets to remove buttons.
Tarak Kauff shouts that it's a disgrace when Bush is responsible for so many murders to demand that vets take off buttons. He's hauled out by police.
TJ Buomo refuses to take off his button, shouts out his 1st Amendment right and is hauled out by police.
Lori Arbeiter also refused to comply and was hauled out.
Liz Cater spoke up and tried to go help Lori and was threatened with removal until a bunch of us shouted that she'd done nothing, and the police backed off and she sat down.
2:26 Lofgren is still pushing idea of a truth and reconciliation commission. And Schwartz is recommending the 9-11 Commission as a model [I may be tired but I'm not hallucinating this.]
2:25 OK I've covered up my IMPEACH shirt because a friend thinks they'll try to arrest me for wearing it.
2:16 Republican Rep. Louis Gohmert: The president is not a crook, really! And: Never trust a Muslim!
2:10 The Judiciary Committee staff is begging me to cover up my IMPEACH shirt, and I'm refusing.
2:08 Rep Mel Watt here now for first time today. He said "If attorneys general are protecting me against terrorists, who is protecting me against THEM?" [Loud applause.] He then refuses to support impeachment. [silence] Did Pelosi send Watt here??
2:02 Franks has interrupted this hearing on the abuses of Bush and Cheney to let us know that we should all be VERY VERY AFRAID of Muslim terrorists. Then Franks says that if there was a failure, it was in allowing 9-11 to occur. [Wow, it's almost as if he's read Kucinich's article of impeachment on that very point. Yes, I'm kidding. He wouldn't ever have done that.]
1:49 Bobby Scott: Are we necessarily talking about impeachment or something other than impeachment or must it be impeachment, what other tool do we have to enforce limitations on executive power? Fein says that under Nixon when he was in Justice Dept they concluded you could not prosecute a president while in office, and concluded that impeachment was the only remedy for an abusive president. Barr added that Congress can pass laws. Holtzman said that doesn't matter if president is not bound to obey the laws, and that the real remedy is impeachment -- there's no running away from that. Bugliosi added that president can be prosecuted from the day he leaves office.
1:46 Congressman Kucinich has never left the room and is still sitting in the front row. People are still coming in -- all of them impeachment activists -- whenever a seat opens up.
1:42 King is still talking about shopping for uranium. Essentially his case amounts to "Yoo Hoo, Look way over here away from the Constitution. I'm making a giant ass of myself! Look Look!" See evidence re uranium lies HERE.
1:37 Nadler suggests impeachment is virtually impossible because conviction requires support of president's party. Holtzman says that impeachment can be bipartisan, as in fact it was with Nixon. But the Democrats led in the beginning and did not do a headcount before proceeding. The process was made completely fair. Southern Democats and Republicans joined in because it was fair to parties and fair to the president. And when we started nobody thought it would work. It did.
1:32 Nadler questions Schwartz assertion that impeachment is not practical. But prosecution faces possible block by pardons. Do we need to change pardon clause of the Constitution? [IS HE SERIOUS? Amend the Constitution to explicity bar the outrageous absurdity of self-pardoning??] Fein jumps in to say that a statute could require that pardons occur 8 months before leaving office, therby creating political penalty for abuse of the power.
1:30 Nadler suggests that even though executive privilege should not apply in an impeachment hearing, Bush might STILL assert it. Fein replies that remedy wold be an article of impeachment, as with Nixon.
1:28 Nadler tears down rightwing strawman that impeachment is about using presidency for personal gain, it's about abuse of power! If the Pres lied to Congres, and I think there's good evidence he did [Nadler just violated the HOLY RULE against calling the king a liar], it's impeachable. This prez claims right to call anyone in this room an enemy combatant and lock them up forever. This has never happened since Magna Carta in English-speaking countries. They torture. they don't prosecute their own crimes. There's no remedy by the executive branch! We've got to figure a way around this. [HOW ABOUT IMPEACHMENT?]
1:18 Lamar Smith citing fact that most people have discussed impeachment in this non-impeachment hearing. Presser claims Clinton impeachment had nothing to do with lying about sex, and that he has heard nothing today to suggest impeachable offenses. [YES! More "I am not a crook" discussion from the Republicans.] Radkin joining in: "He did not lie us into a war." Plus: "Lots of other presidents have lied us into wars too!" [Derrida called this kettle logic: I didn't break your kettle, it was broken when I borrowed it, they always break, and I never borrowed it at all.]
1:18 Q and A beginning.
Elliott Adams: he joked and passed on commenting.
Schwartz: Abuses of this president are unique. He claims the right to break any law and to do so secretly. This doctrine needs to be "squashed, disagreed with, and exposed." [HOW ABOUT IMPEACHED?]
Vincent Bugliosi beautifully challenges Presser's contention that a lie about sex is worse than a lie about war. Now Bugliosi is citing the WHITE HOUSE MEMO. Cindy Sheehan shouted out "Thank you, Vince!" Conyers said that his colleagues were urging him to take action. Cindy said "I urge YOU to take action!" Conyers said, "Well then, Sheehan you're out." Cindy left. Other impeachment advocates immediately came in to fill her seat and those of people who left with her.
Bruce Fein: Executive ONLY has powers we the people give him. Do all presidents spy during wars? No, and this is worse because this war is permanent. Robert Jackson at Nuremburg says that an abusive power unrebuked will lie around like a loaded weapon.
Stephen Presser: right to hold this hearing, but there is no evidence of fraudulent motives, and minority report of this committee shows that the admin has cooperated and acted in good faith.
Rocky Anderson: impeachment appropriate now, including for fraud in taking us into war by the pres... oops I mean hight ranking official of the administration.
Bob Barr: Our bill of rights is vanishing. He holds up and displys the Bill of Rights with most of it blacked out. He submits it into the record. Not my job to choose impeachment, but if choice is constitutional inquiry or silence, I choose inquiry. [One rightwinger won over already today!]
Liz H: Admin will never prosecute itself. Truth Commission won't work. Only impeachment is practical and possible. It eliminates executive privilege. Somebody get this bit onto Youtube ASAP!
12:58 Conyers letting each panelist add something in response to other panelists.
*****
12:53 Elliott Adams' excellent testimony. He's reading it now!
12:48 Fred Schwartz opposes impeachment as too late (as if he ever lifted a finger for it) but wants a big whopping "investigation" (which of course actually does take time, unlike impeaching Bush and Cheney on the grounds established today and over the past years).
12:44: A staffer is trying to get me to cover up my IMPEACH shirt and I'm refusing.
12:41 Rightwing minority witness Jeremy Radkin says war lies is clearly most important charge, but claims its "wild conspiracy charges." And, so, all other charges should be ignored as less important, and then this charge should be ignored as crazy.
12:34 Bugliosi is giving abbreviated version of his usual powerful rap on Bush lying us into war. AND he's calling for referral of criminal charges to the Justice Department (are you kidding me, Vince? you were going to advocate impeachment, not futility). Great rhetoric, though. [Strong applause results in Republican call to clear the room and Conyers refusal but repeated admonition.
12:32 Conyers is introducing Vince Bugliosi, holding up his book "The Prosecution of George W. Bush for murder."
12:25 Bruce Fein is now reading his excellent statement, posted earlier on this website.
12:20 p.m. Rightwing lawyer Stephen Presser making case that his brain has been absent from the room for the past couple of hours AND that Bill Clinton was a president who really merited impeachment. He claims that stating a theory about "unitary executive" is not an impeachable offense, but he's the first today to have suggested that.
Note: more citizens (all for impeachment) are gradually filling in more seats as staffers grow tired and hungry.
12:13 Rocky Anderson wants investigation (as if we don't already know the crimes and haven't just heard about them for hours). He wants to know about the spying program. [Fine, but we know, as he says, that it's felonious. So is it appropriate to "investigate" with no subpoena power or to impeach?] "There has never been a more compelling case for impeachment!" [NOW YOU'RE TALKING!!] Rocky goes on to support legislation delegitimizing signign statements (as if that were possible). He wants legislation (which would be vetoed) to criminalize an illegal attack on Iran [I kid you not].
12:10 Bob Barr going on about wide variety of grave abuses, but not so much what to do about them.
11:58 Liz Holtzman gives prima facie grounds for impeachment: systematic refusal to obey the laws, spying, torture, signing statements, misuse of executive privilege, war lies, etc... we need an impeachment inquiry to educate the public and give members of administration facing accusations a forum in which to respond.
PANEL 2 BEGINS WITH NO QandA for PANEL 1.
11:49 Republican Rep. Walter Jones, in response to signing-statement announcements of intention to violate laws, wants the public to have easy access to the signing statements and Congress to have the right to ask the White House about its criminal announcements. [Now, how does this make more sense than renaming french fries? Well, at least it points to the problem and misses the solution so wildly that even a reporter could see it.] He wants his bill passed now (as if it wouldn't be vetoed!!).
11:45 Rep. Brad Miller discussing various abuses and various so-called legislative remedies.
11:30 Rep Maurice Hinchey: president dominates entire government. He focuses on "corruption and incompetance". [Huh? what about criminality and murder?] [He's going over all the old material in way too conservative a manner and putting me to sleep.] This is th emost impeachable administration in the history of America. [Hello! I'm awake!]
11:25 Kucinich has a written statement (Can somebody get a copy?) and focuses on destructive nature of Iraq war, including impact on US economy. Statements made to justify war were false. Congress members believed the lies. Rules of House prevent me using familiar terms. (DK introduces his three resolutions for impeachment into the record and asks that members read them.) Should we honor our oaths to support and defend the Constitution? Will Congress endorse with its silence the methods used to take us into the Iraq war, one of the greatest injustices imaginable? Act now! Right a very great wrong! Hold accountable those who misled this nation! [DK spoke less than 5 minutes and avoided the I word.]
Kucinich's Remarks.
11:22 PANEL ONE BEGINS WITH KUCINICH.
11:20 Keith Ellison has written statement (Can somebody get a copy?). Congress needs to maintain its power. Impeachment is only way to do it. [Yeah!]
11:15 Rep Tammy Baldwin submitting a written statement. This is about the conduct of future presidents for generations. This is not frivolous, but no task more important than to consider whether our leaders have violated their oaths of office. Public expects no less. After all, it is their Constitution. American people and nations around the world wonder whether US is going to illegally attack Iran, whether their conversations are wiretaped, whether people are being held in sectre prisons, who authorized torture. But attempt to investigate are blocked. List of ignored subpoenas is long. True accountability is impossible. In my judgment at least two high ranking administration officials have met the standard for impeachment [meaning Bush and Cheney] - I now firmly believe we must begin impeachment hearings.
11:08 Rep Hank Johnson: action must be taken.. prevailing view has been that impeachment should be off the table...and public would not approve, but impeachment would restore life and vitality to the system of checks and balances that is the hallmark of our system of government [yeah !] if lying about consensual sexual activity fits the bill, then surely lying to the American people about the invasion of Iraq, a sovereign nation, resulting in countless Iraqi deaths, 4,000 Americans, surely that qualifies as an impeachable offense [brief loud applause]. Kidnapping, detaining, torturing, selective prosecutions, etc, etc. Should consider impeaching. [Conyers again says not to clap.]
11:06 Rep Steve Cohen, freshman from Memphis: recounts Gonzales resigning as he and Bruce Fein were drafting articles of impeachment for him. Supports this hearing.
11:02 Trent Franks just said the word Impeachment repeatedly, requesting that the word never be mentioned. Then said Terrorist, Terrorism, and Terror many many times.
10:57 Rep Sheila Jackson-Lee quoting preamble to the Constitution and defending the importance of taking up impeachment hearings, without predicting the outcome. She is concerned about war lies, torture, possibility of treason, firing of US attorneys, signing statements (and she has legislation [I kid you not!] to address that abuse).
10:51 Republican Rep Pence wants to be sure this is not about impeachment and at the same time wants to argue against impeachment. [The Republicans are putting impeachment on the table AND making themselves look like McCain-style senile fools. Pence is arguing that Bush has not done things he's publicly on record confessing to, thus opening the door to the corporate media to cover these issues - if they dare.] "There have been no high crimes and misdemeanors!" ["I am not a crook!"]
10:50 Rep Jerrold Nadler saying the offenses now are far more serious than what Clinton was impeached for.
10:45 Republican Rep Dan Lundgren is disappointed. This is impeachment light. The allegations without real impeachment. [Exactly.]
10:43 Rep Zoe Lofgren urging further investigations like today's.
10:41 Conyers says it's not an impeachment hearing, and that that could only follow a vote in the full house [of which we have ALREADY HAD THREE SUCCESSFULLY FOR THIS PRESIDENT IN RESPONSE TO RESOLUTIONS FROM KUCINICH!!!]
10:37 Republican Rep King is pointing out that "power to remove" means impeachment - and he's shocked and scandalized, and he's seen no impeachable offenses. King is voluntarily bringing up the forged Niger documents and defending the lies about attempts to purchase uranium (as if that would have justified an aggressive war if true, which it wasn't). He's claiming to have new proof and introducing it into the record without explaining it.
10:35 Rep Bobby Scott made brief remarks in support of today's hearing, but did not mention impeachment.
10:31 Conyers introduced Robert Wexler, and the audience applauded him. He's laying out the case for impeachment powerfully. Never before has an administration so diminished the powers of the legislative branch....ordered officials to refuse to testify or even appear... unprecedented ... distorted executive privilege beyond recognition ... most appropriate response is to hold hearings for impeachment [applause, and staffer reprimanding those of us applauding]. We have to seek impeachment and removal from office... Delicate balance of power eviscerated... not a Democratic or Republican issue, This is an American issue. The only option left is impeachment hearings. In 1973 articles of impeachment were introduced against Nixon after he tried to use executive privilege ... we should look more deeply into what happened... We need to begin to take our government and our country back.
Conyers reminds audience that we can make no reactions.
Wexler's full statement.
10:26 Ranking Republican Lamar Smith: We recently hosted a book of the month club. Nothing is going to come out of this for impeachment. I know it, the media knows it, the speaker knows it ... there's no evidence for impeachment. You cannot impeach a president simply because you don't like him. No evidence of any criminal wrong doing. 9% approve of Congress, making Bush look good at 32%. Americans want "bipartisanship." Smith is now reading an excerpt from the House Rules: no personally offensive language toward the president, etc...
10:19 a.m. ET Conyers is speaking quite to the point on the power of the purse and the power of impeachment (he said the power "to remove" and avoided the I word). He's mentioning politicization of Justice Dept, signing statements, detention, rendition, "possible" manipulation of intelligence, retaliation including outing of Plame, excessive secrecy. Evidence is both credible and substantial and merits direct answers from "the most senior members of the administration under oath if possible" (by which he likely means Bush and Cheney, but how does he propose to put them under oath? We will struggle with this legacy regardless of electoral outcome. Some say we've done too little too late [damn straight]. I held hearings on Downing Street Memo and Ohio elections before being chairman, and as chairman I've held more than 45 separate public hearings on these matters [to what end?]. We've sent subpoenas and pursued criminal contempt [with what outcome?]. We expect to take action against Karl Rove for refusal to comply with a subpoena [what action, when?, and will it include impeaching his former boss?] We've held investigations and passed legislation and we're not done until we achieve accountability [how, without impeachment?].
10:08 Very noisy protests ongoing in the hallway, which can be heard in the hearing room. My internet connection is shakey and I hope it holds out. Hearing has not begun. A huge number of congressional staffers are here filling up seats.
10:02 Noisy standing ovation by some 20 people when Dennis Kucinich and his wife Elizabeth and dedicated scheduler Amy Vossbrink walked in.
9:57 a.m. I'm in the back row with a power outlet and a good connection online. They let a grand total of 17 members of the public into the room. A crowd of hundreds is in the hallway shouting "Shame! Shame!" despite being offered two large overflow rooms. The 17 of us include a bunch of people with IMPEACH shirts, after we won an argument in the hallway for the right to wear them -- led by Col. (retired) Ann Wright. At least half of us (not I) are members of Vets for Peace. [18 people: Dave Lindorff got in as press]
7:48 A Capitol Police officer is here, making everyone (including disabled vets) stand, not sit, and preventing me from having my computer near a power outlet, so I'm going to turn it off and save the battery.
7:38 About 60 or 70 people are here in line. We're all impeachment advocates. We've made our own numbered tickets. Cynthia Papermaster is 1. Cindy Sheehan is 2. I'm 7. We're in the hallway outside Rayburn 2141, and nobody official has shown up yet. We don't know how many people will get in, and how many will sit in overflow rooms. By the way, it is unheard of to have or to need overflow rooms, but they will today. I'll be on Pacifica radio at 9:30. Their broadcast starts at 9:00 a.m. ET.
Your hard work has resulted in Congress cracking open the door to impeachment, justice, and peace. How can you keep it open?
A lot of us have our own favorite impeachable offenses - mine is the Iraq war - but a lot of them are not about to go anywhere in Congress. The impeachable offenses that appear to have the most traction among congress members (i.e. very little) are:
1. The numerous violations of laws combined with the announcement of the intention to violate those laws through signing statements. (I say it in this longwinded way, because just abbreviating it to "signing statements" allows people to pretend to miss the point.)
2. The numerous refusals to comply with requests, subpoenas, and contempt citations.
It has always been predictable, and predicted, that these would have the most traction (because nonpartisan, non-controversial, no congressional complicity, no investigation needed, clearcut and simple), and it has become clear that - as predicted - they DO in fact have the most traction.
We'd all LOVE to nail these fascist bastards for our favorite offenses, but we'd also all HATE for them to get off scott free, thereby establishing a precedent for future presidents; and when they nailed Al Capone for tax fraud everybody understood exactly why they'd done so.
What is needed is pressure on every member of Congress to themselves pressure Conyers, including by signing Wexler's letter at http://wexlerwantshearings.com So, please call your Representative every day at (202) 224-3121, focus on the issues that have the most traction, and urge them to ask Conyers to hold a real impeachment hearing. Remember that in an impeachment hearing the excuse of "executive privilege" is not allowed. A subpoena must simply be obeyed or those who refuse to obey it can be impeached.
Of secondary value is trying to get your Representative to introduce new articles of impeachment or new resolutions calling for impeachment hearings. So, any lengthy communications with your Rep should include that ask.
The third most important thing to do is to contact media outlets and urge them to cover impeachment, and contact polling companies and urge them to poll on impeachment.
The fourth most important thing to do is to support pro-impeachment candidates for Congress and make certain the incumbents know about it. Don't just send a check. First send a photocopy of it to the incumbent letting them know why they aren't getting one.
Now is the time to move on this with everything we've got. We've opened the door and must not allow it to close again.
It might help to review what happened in the House Judiciary Committee hearing on Friday, by reading the following live blog from the bottom up:
Live Blogging Hearing on Impeachment (Not Yet Impeachment Hearing)
C-Span has video links to Panel 1 and Panel 2 at www.c-span.org.
In this hearing we heard the case for impeachment from Kucinich, Wexler, Jackson-Lee, Johnson, Baldwin, Ellison, Hinchey, Holtzman, Anderson, Adams, and even Barr. We heard general support in that direction from Scott, Lofgren, and even Nadler (almost). And we heard Pence's and Franks' laughable and inculpating defenses along the lines of "Bush is not a crook." Not bad for the first day's work of the 110th Congress! Now, how about an impeachment hearing? We saw a lot of interest from committee members in the offense of signing statements, and also in the refusal to comply with subpoenas. Those are the issues that seem to have the most traction (and the least congressional complicity).
Now would be the time for a little less talk and a lot more action! Please call your Representative at (202) 224-3121 and ask them to call John Conyers and ask for impeachment hearings to begin. Please ask everyone you know to do the same. Please call every morning until it happens.
4:10 Nadler points out that whereas evidence was nonexistant or disputed, Bush asserted repeatedly that it was absolutely certain. Lundgren claims that Bush based that on the wisdom of intelligence agencies around the world [sic!]. [Even if that were true, isn't it a problem that US intelligence was full of doubts and major counter-evidence?]
4:05 Lundgren claims Bush meant well. Nadler asks about evidence on edited NIE presented today. Lundgren dismisses it. Audience laughs. Lundgren asks for people to be removed. Conyers says that if anyone causes a disruption at the end of the hearing they will be forbidden to attend any more hearings.
3:58: Ellison is trying again to get Presser to agree there are grounds for impeachment on the matter of war lies. He agrees, only if Kucinich's case is "proved." Ellison asks Radkin too, but he pulls out the "they meant well and sadly turned out to be wrong, which is different from intentionally lying." I'd like Kucinich to make the overwhelming case that Bugliosi has been making that they knowingly lied, but he instead makes the reasonable case that if all the assertions turn out to be false that is sufficient grounds for an impeachment inquiry.
3:55: Ellison is giving Kucinich another opportunity to speak about his article of impeachment on war lies, which he is doing at some length. Lundgren is the only Republican member still here. Conyers, Nadler, Scott, Lofgren, and Baldwin are here, and everyone is awake.
3:54 After Fein suggests a law banning use of funds for anything signing statemented, Ellison asks why the president couldn't just signing statement that new law. Fein had no answer.
3:45 Red Debbie Wasserman-Schultz is here for first time and expressing concern of some sort about signing statements.
3:38 Rep Schiff wants a new Church Committee to last into the next Congress, and he wants to White House to notify the Congress in a timely manner when it is about to violate laws. (I do hope I am hallucinating now.) Schwartz points out that there is already a law requiring that the president notify Congress when he will use a signing statement to claim the right to violate a law, but Bush has used a signing statement to erase the requirement that he notify Congress about signing statements. Schwartz points out also that we should have no secret laws whatsoever.
3:34 Baldwin raises danger of leaving Bush and Cheney unchecked for seven more months, in particular the possibility of an attack on Iran. What impact would an impeachment inquiry have on the possibility of attacking Iran? Anderson: wants a bill passed! (???) Bugliosi refuses to speculate.
3:30 Baldwin is bringing up John Nichols' book and the Bill Moyers show he was on with Fein. She's quoting Nichols account of presidential toolbox passing from president to president. And the toolbox now has more powers in it than ever before.
Lundgren is asleep now.
3:25 pm Rep Brad Sherman shows up for first time and says Congress has become mere advisors to White House. President won't obey laws. Any law to fix the problem will be vetoed. To Fein: is nonfeasance an impeachable offense? Fein: the "take care that laws are faithfully executed" comes from English Bill of Rights ... meaning Yes. Sherman is talking about signing statements. Sherman asks Holtzman if a prosecutor should bring a case if virtually certain of not getting a conviction? She says maybe.
Kucinich has gone out and come back with what is probably a stack of petition signatures in support of impeachment. Ellison is talking with Kucinich.
3:19 p.m. Rep Hank Johnson asks Presser about his testimony back in the day that if Clinton lied he should be impeached: if a president lied about taking a nation into war, would that be an impeachable offense? Presser says "you'd have to look into the circumstances...." Johnson turns to Holtzman, which is much more productive.
Nadler and Scott are both sleeping. No joke.
3:13 Rep Cohen asks Holtzman about what branch Cheney belongs to. Fein points out that a Senator has been impeached, so Cheney can claim he's in the legislative branch and be impeached. Cohen asks Fein whether it would be socially beneficial to impeach, or more important to do other things as Rep Watt advises. Fein says that impeaching Nixon was greatly unifying. He also says that there is penty of time since no investigation is needed. The president has confessed to viiolating FISA (witnesses are now routinely accusing the president of crimes and calling him "the president" against the rules).
3:03 Rep. Wexler says that ignoring subpoenas, spying, and torture, are - pace Pence - not "mere policy differences". Wexler expands on the subpoenas topic. Barr has left. Wexler wanted to ask him about statements he made in support of the rule of law during the Clinton impeachment. (Wexler may have been out of the room today when Barr came around in support of impeachment.) Rocky Anderson says Wexler is right, that we're not just talking about policy, but about Constitutional issues. Now, says Rocky, is the time for Congress to assert its power. Wexler now asks Fein about Mukasey coming before the committee and refusing to honor subpoenas. Fein says that's a clear impeachable offense on its own. Popular government can't work if the public can't know what its government is doing. You don't need an investigation to impeach: you just vote. [Go, Bruce!] Liz Holtzman adds that the president [OOPS, WHO? Can you say that?] has refused to give Congress what it needs to do its job and obstructs the work of Congress. She recommends holding an impeachment inquiry, requesting the information again, and if it is not provided then impeaching.
NOTE: Pacifica is terminating its broadcast, but we all appreciate them carrying the hearing up to this point.
3:02 Rep. Pence appears to be filibustering on his opposition to impeachment, chewing up time for no apparent purpose, asking three-minute questions that get three-word responses because they are just obvious rants.
2:53 p.m. One of the Repubicans tried to cut Bugliosi off by claiming he was discussing classified information. (He was discussing the declassified 2002 NIE.) The groans from the audience shut him up. Nobody said a thing about the groaning. Bugliosi was permitted to keep speaking.
2:43 Sheila Jackson-Lee (I kid you not) is urging passage of a bill to correct the abuse of signing statements (who spots the weakness in this strategy?). But she's now asking Fein to speak on war lies, and she's suggesting it's treason. And now she's giving Bugliosi a chance to expand on his case (the familiar case in his book, which many in this room have never heard).
2:36 At request of a Republican Conyers asks staff to remove signs. Staff is asking vets to remove buttons.
Tarak Kauff shouts that it's a disgrace when Bush is responsible for so many murders to demand that vets take off buttons. He's hauled out by police.
TJ Buomo refuses to take off his button, shouts out his 1st Amendment right and is hauled out by police.
Lori Arbeiter also refused to comply and was hauled out.
Liz Cater spoke up and tried to go help Lori and was threatened with removal until a bunch of us shouted that she'd done nothing, and the police backed off and she sat down.
2:26 Lofgren is still pushing idea of a truth and reconciliation commission. And Schwartz is recommending the 9-11 Commission as a model [I may be tired but I'm not hallucinating this.]
2:25 OK I've covered up my IMPEACH shirt because a friend thinks they'll try to arrest me for wearing it.
2:16 Republican Rep. Louis Gohmert: The president is not a crook, really! And: Never trust a Muslim!
2:10 The Judiciary Committee staff is begging me to cover up my IMPEACH shirt, and I'm refusing.
2:08 Rep Mel Watt here now for first time today. He said "If attorneys general are protecting me against terrorists, who is protecting me against THEM?" [Loud applause.] He then refuses to support impeachment. [silence] Did Pelosi send Watt here??
2:02 Franks has interrupted this hearing on the abuses of Bush and Cheney to let us know that we should all be VERY VERY AFRAID of Muslim terrorists. Then Franks says that if there was a failure, it was in allowing 9-11 to occur. [Wow, it's almost as if he's read Kucinich's article of impeachment on that very point. Yes, I'm kidding. He wouldn't ever have done that.]
1:49 Bobby Scott: Are we necessarily talking about impeachment or something other than impeachment or must it be impeachment, what other tool do we have to enforce limitations on executive power? Fein says that under Nixon when he was in Justice Dept they concluded you could not prosecute a president while in office, and concluded that impeachment was the only remedy for an abusive president. Barr added that Congress can pass laws. Holtzman said that doesn't matter if president is not bound to obey the laws, and that the real remedy is impeachment -- there's no running away from that. Bugliosi added that president can be prosecuted from the day he leaves office.
1:46 Congressman Kucinich has never left the room and is still sitting in the front row. People are still coming in -- all of them impeachment activists -- whenever a seat opens up.
1:42 King is still talking about shopping for uranium. Essentially his case amounts to "Yoo Hoo, Look way over here away from the Constitution. I'm making a giant ass of myself! Look Look!" See evidence re uranium lies HERE.
1:37 Nadler suggests impeachment is virtually impossible because conviction requires support of president's party. Holtzman says that impeachment can be bipartisan, as in fact it was with Nixon. But the Democrats led in the beginning and did not do a headcount before proceeding. The process was made completely fair. Southern Democats and Republicans joined in because it was fair to parties and fair to the president. And when we started nobody thought it would work. It did.
1:32 Nadler questions Schwartz assertion that impeachment is not practical. But prosecution faces possible block by pardons. Do we need to change pardon clause of the Constitution? [IS HE SERIOUS? Amend the Constitution to explicity bar the outrageous absurdity of self-pardoning??] Fein jumps in to say that a statute could require that pardons occur 8 months before leaving office, therby creating political penalty for abuse of the power.
1:30 Nadler suggests that even though executive privilege should not apply in an impeachment hearing, Bush might STILL assert it. Fein replies that remedy wold be an article of impeachment, as with Nixon.
1:28 Nadler tears down rightwing strawman that impeachment is about using presidency for personal gain, it's about abuse of power! If the Pres lied to Congres, and I think there's good evidence he did [Nadler just violated the HOLY RULE against calling the king a liar], it's impeachable. This prez claims right to call anyone in this room an enemy combatant and lock them up forever. This has never happened since Magna Carta in English-speaking countries. They torture. they don't prosecute their own crimes. There's no remedy by the executive branch! We've got to figure a way around this. [HOW ABOUT IMPEACHMENT?]
1:18 Lamar Smith citing fact that most people have discussed impeachment in this non-impeachment hearing. Presser claims Clinton impeachment had nothing to do with lying about sex, and that he has heard nothing today to suggest impeachable offenses. [YES! More "I am not a crook" discussion from the Republicans.] Radkin joining in: "He did not lie us into a war." Plus: "Lots of other presidents have lied us into wars too!" [Derrida called this kettle logic: I didn't break your kettle, it was broken when I borrowed it, they always break, and I never borrowed it at all.]
1:18 Q and A beginning.
Elliott Adams: he joked and passed on commenting.
Schwartz: Abuses of this president are unique. He claims the right to break any law and to do so secretly. This doctrine needs to be "squashed, disagreed with, and exposed." [HOW ABOUT IMPEACHED?]
Vincent Bugliosi beautifully challenges Presser's contention that a lie about sex is worse than a lie about war. Now Bugliosi is citing the WHITE HOUSE MEMO. Cindy Sheehan shouted out "Thank you, Vince!" Conyers said that his colleagues were urging him to take action. Cindy said "I urge YOU to take action!" Conyers said, "Well then, Sheehan you're out." Cindy left. Other impeachment advocates immediately came in to fill her seat and those of people who left with her.
Bruce Fein: Executive ONLY has powers we the people give him. Do all presidents spy during wars? No, and this is worse because this war is permanent. Robert Jackson at Nuremburg says that an abusive power unrebuked will lie around like a loaded weapon.
Stephen Presser: right to hold this hearing, but there is no evidence of fraudulent motives, and minority report of this committee shows that the admin has cooperated and acted in good faith.
Rocky Anderson: impeachment appropriate now, including for fraud in taking us into war by the pres... oops I mean hight ranking official of the administration.
Bob Barr: Our bill of rights is vanishing. He holds up and displys the Bill of Rights with most of it blacked out. He submits it into the record. Not my job to choose impeachment, but if choice is constitutional inquiry or silence, I choose inquiry. [One rightwinger won over already today!]
Liz H: Admin will never prosecute itself. Truth Commission won't work. Only impeachment is practical and possible. It eliminates executive privilege. Somebody get this bit onto Youtube ASAP!
12:58 Conyers letting each panelist add something in response to other panelists.
*****
12:53 Elliott Adams' excellent testimony. He's reading it now!
12:48 Fred Schwartz opposes impeachment as too late (as if he ever lifted a finger for it) but wants a big whopping "investigation" (which of course actually does take time, unlike impeaching Bush and Cheney on the grounds established today and over the past years).
12:44: A staffer is trying to get me to cover up my IMPEACH shirt and I'm refusing.
12:41 Rightwing minority witness Jeremy Radkin says war lies is clearly most important charge, but claims its "wild conspiracy charges." And, so, all other charges should be ignored as less important, and then this charge should be ignored as crazy.
12:34 Bugliosi is giving abbreviated version of his usual powerful rap on Bush lying us into war. AND he's calling for referral of criminal charges to the Justice Department (are you kidding me, Vince? you were going to advocate impeachment, not futility). Great rhetoric, though. [Strong applause results in Republican call to clear the room and Conyers refusal but repeated admonition.
12:32 Conyers is introducing Vince Bugliosi, holding up his book "The Prosecution of George W. Bush for murder."
12:25 Bruce Fein is now reading his excellent statement, posted earlier on this website.
12:20 p.m. Rightwing lawyer Stephen Presser making case that his brain has been absent from the room for the past couple of hours AND that Bill Clinton was a president who really merited impeachment. He claims that stating a theory about "unitary executive" is not an impeachable offense, but he's the first today to have suggested that.
Note: more citizens (all for impeachment) are gradually filling in more seats as staffers grow tired and hungry.
12:13 Rocky Anderson wants investigation (as if we don't already know the crimes and haven't just heard about them for hours). He wants to know about the spying program. [Fine, but we know, as he says, that it's felonious. So is it appropriate to "investigate" with no subpoena power or to impeach?] "There has never been a more compelling case for impeachment!" [NOW YOU'RE TALKING!!] Rocky goes on to support legislation delegitimizing signign statements (as if that were possible). He wants legislation (which would be vetoed) to criminalize an illegal attack on Iran [I kid you not].
12:10 Bob Barr going on about wide variety of grave abuses, but not so much what to do about them.
11:58 Liz Holtzman gives prima facie grounds for impeachment: systematic refusal to obey the laws, spying, torture, signing statements, misuse of executive privilege, war lies, etc... we need an impeachment inquiry to educate the public and give members of administration facing accusations a forum in which to respond.
PANEL 2 BEGINS WITH NO QandA for PANEL 1.
11:49 Republican Rep. Walter Jones, in response to signing-statement announcements of intention to violate laws, wants the public to have easy access to the signing statements and Congress to have the right to ask the White House about its criminal announcements. [Now, how does this make more sense than renaming french fries? Well, at least it points to the problem and misses the solution so wildly that even a reporter could see it.] He wants his bill passed now (as if it wouldn't be vetoed!!).
11:45 Rep. Brad Miller discussing various abuses and various so-called legislative remedies.
11:30 Rep Maurice Hinchey: president dominates entire government. He focuses on "corruption and incompetance". [Huh? what about criminality and murder?] [He's going over all the old material in way too conservative a manner and putting me to sleep.] This is th emost impeachable administration in the history of America. [Hello! I'm awake!]
11:25 Kucinich has a written statement (Can somebody get a copy?) and focuses on destructive nature of Iraq war, including impact on US economy. Statements made to justify war were false. Congress members believed the lies. Rules of House prevent me using familiar terms. (DK introduces his three resolutions for impeachment into the record and asks that members read them.) Should we honor our oaths to support and defend the Constitution? Will Congress endorse with its silence the methods used to take us into the Iraq war, one of the greatest injustices imaginable? Act now! Right a very great wrong! Hold accountable those who misled this nation! [DK spoke less than 5 minutes and avoided the I word.]
Kucinich's Remarks.
11:22 PANEL ONE BEGINS WITH KUCINICH.
11:20 Keith Ellison has written statement (Can somebody get a copy?). Congress needs to maintain its power. Impeachment is only way to do it. [Yeah!]
11:15 Rep Tammy Baldwin submitting a written statement. This is about the conduct of future presidents for generations. This is not frivolous, but no task more important than to consider whether our leaders have violated their oaths of office. Public expects no less. After all, it is their Constitution. American people and nations around the world wonder whether US is going to illegally attack Iran, whether their conversations are wiretaped, whether people are being held in sectre prisons, who authorized torture. But attempt to investigate are blocked. List of ignored subpoenas is long. True accountability is impossible. In my judgment at least two high ranking administration officials have met the standard for impeachment [meaning Bush and Cheney] - I now firmly believe we must begin impeachment hearings.
11:08 Rep Hank Johnson: action must be taken.. prevailing view has been that impeachment should be off the table...and public would not approve, but impeachment would restore life and vitality to the system of checks and balances that is the hallmark of our system of government [yeah !] if lying about consensual sexual activity fits the bill, then surely lying to the American people about the invasion of Iraq, a sovereign nation, resulting in countless Iraqi deaths, 4,000 Americans, surely that qualifies as an impeachable offense [brief loud applause]. Kidnapping, detaining, torturing, selective prosecutions, etc, etc. Should consider impeaching. [Conyers again says not to clap.]
11:06 Rep Steve Cohen, freshman from Memphis: recounts Gonzales resigning as he and Bruce Fein were drafting articles of impeachment for him. Supports this hearing.
11:02 Trent Franks just said the word Impeachment repeatedly, requesting that the word never be mentioned. Then said Terrorist, Terrorism, and Terror many many times.
10:57 Rep Sheila Jackson-Lee quoting preamble to the Constitution and defending the importance of taking up impeachment hearings, without predicting the outcome. She is concerned about war lies, torture, possibility of treason, firing of US attorneys, signing statements (and she has legislation [I kid you not!] to address that abuse).
10:51 Republican Rep Pence wants to be sure this is not about impeachment and at the same time wants to argue against impeachment. [The Republicans are putting impeachment on the table AND making themselves look like McCain-style senile fools. Pence is arguing that Bush has not done things he's publicly on record confessing to, thus opening the door to the corporate media to cover these issues - if they dare.] "There have been no high crimes and misdemeanors!" ["I am not a crook!"]
10:50 Rep Jerrold Nadler saying the offenses now are far more serious than what Clinton was impeached for.
10:45 Republican Rep Dan Lundgren is disappointed. This is impeachment light. The allegations without real impeachment. [Exactly.]
10:43 Rep Zoe Lofgren urging further investigations like today's.
10:41 Conyers says it's not an impeachment hearing, and that that could only follow a vote in the full house [of which we have ALREADY HAD THREE SUCCESSFULLY FOR THIS PRESIDENT IN RESPONSE TO RESOLUTIONS FROM KUCINICH!!!]
10:37 Republican Rep King is pointing out that "power to remove" means impeachment - and he's shocked and scandalized, and he's seen no impeachable offenses. King is voluntarily bringing up the forged Niger documents and defending the lies about attempts to purchase uranium (as if that would have justified an aggressive war if true, which it wasn't). He's claiming to have new proof and introducing it into the record without explaining it.
10:35 Rep Bobby Scott made brief remarks in support of today's hearing, but did not mention impeachment.
10:31 Conyers introduced Robert Wexler, and the audience applauded him. He's laying out the case for impeachment powerfully. Never before has an administration so diminished the powers of the legislative branch....ordered officials to refuse to testify or even appear... unprecedented ... distorted executive privilege beyond recognition ... most appropriate response is to hold hearings for impeachment [applause, and staffer reprimanding those of us applauding]. We have to seek impeachment and removal from office... Delicate balance of power eviscerated... not a Democratic or Republican issue, This is an American issue. The only option left is impeachment hearings. In 1973 articles of impeachment were introduced against Nixon after he tried to use executive privilege ... we should look more deeply into what happened... We need to begin to take our government and our country back.
Conyers reminds audience that we can make no reactions.
Wexler's full statement.
10:26 Ranking Republican Lamar Smith: We recently hosted a book of the month club. Nothing is going to come out of this for impeachment. I know it, the media knows it, the speaker knows it ... there's no evidence for impeachment. You cannot impeach a president simply because you don't like him. No evidence of any criminal wrong doing. 9% approve of Congress, making Bush look good at 32%. Americans want "bipartisanship." Smith is now reading an excerpt from the House Rules: no personally offensive language toward the president, etc...
10:19 a.m. ET Conyers is speaking quite to the point on the power of the purse and the power of impeachment (he said the power "to remove" and avoided the I word). He's mentioning politicization of Justice Dept, signing statements, detention, rendition, "possible" manipulation of intelligence, retaliation including outing of Plame, excessive secrecy. Evidence is both credible and substantial and merits direct answers from "the most senior members of the administration under oath if possible" (by which he likely means Bush and Cheney, but how does he propose to put them under oath? We will struggle with this legacy regardless of electoral outcome. Some say we've done too little too late [damn straight]. I held hearings on Downing Street Memo and Ohio elections before being chairman, and as chairman I've held more than 45 separate public hearings on these matters [to what end?]. We've sent subpoenas and pursued criminal contempt [with what outcome?]. We expect to take action against Karl Rove for refusal to comply with a subpoena [what action, when?, and will it include impeaching his former boss?] We've held investigations and passed legislation and we're not done until we achieve accountability [how, without impeachment?].
10:08 Very noisy protests ongoing in the hallway, which can be heard in the hearing room. My internet connection is shakey and I hope it holds out. Hearing has not begun. A huge number of congressional staffers are here filling up seats.
10:02 Noisy standing ovation by some 20 people when Dennis Kucinich and his wife Elizabeth and dedicated scheduler Amy Vossbrink walked in.
9:57 a.m. I'm in the back row with a power outlet and a good connection online. They let a grand total of 17 members of the public into the room. A crowd of hundreds is in the hallway shouting "Shame! Shame!" despite being offered two large overflow rooms. The 17 of us include a bunch of people with IMPEACH shirts, after we won an argument in the hallway for the right to wear them -- led by Col. (retired) Ann Wright. At least half of us (not I) are members of Vets for Peace. [18 people: Dave Lindorff got in as press]
7:48 A Capitol Police officer is here, making everyone (including disabled vets) stand, not sit, and preventing me from having my computer near a power outlet, so I'm going to turn it off and save the battery.
7:38 About 60 or 70 people are here in line. We're all impeachment advocates. We've made our own numbered tickets. Cynthia Papermaster is 1. Cindy Sheehan is 2. I'm 7. We're in the hallway outside Rayburn 2141, and nobody official has shown up yet. We don't know how many people will get in, and how many will sit in overflow rooms. By the way, it is unheard of to have or to need overflow rooms, but they will today. I'll be on Pacifica radio at 9:30. Their broadcast starts at 9:00 a.m. ET.
Hearing on Impeachment Videos
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, July 26, 2008
Kucinich enters hearing to cheers:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2MWTh0QF40
Rep. Robert Wexler:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_T1ojrKhp6E
Rep. Steve King:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eZxCloEbQk
Rep. Jerrold Nadler:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hL7259BAP9s
Rep. Dennis Kucinich:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRAcenaTVkQ
Bruce Fein:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80IphtHrFzg
Vincent Bugliosi:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDAFozFn4kU
Bruce Fein:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXyDK2-p4fU
Vincent Bugliosi:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q53p34yzZac
Vincent Bugliosi:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7abu9a0xtNI
Lamar Smith:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epf0QpeFcag
Rep. Baldwin:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFNmanXtZ9o
Maurice Hinchey:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CHKV-7vvYk
Rep. Dan Lungren:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKc5e0oAvYM
Protesters ejected:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uosDxv1bjCc
Rep. Walter Jones:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU5HKfes0cE
Congressman Steve Cohen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZezNyKmKF1M
Before the hearing Dennis Kucinich took calls on CSpan:
Part 1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5czQ9dmsG4
Part 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uRQeu_kHDc
Part 3:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3biwQ2D700
Support the Kucinich Impeachment Hearing on Friday
Tell your Representatives to support impeachment by cosponsoring H. Res. 1345:
Rep. Dennis Kucinich has led the fight for impeachment since April 2007, when he defied Speaker Pelosi and courageously introduced 3 Articles of Impeachment (H.Res. 333/799) against Vice President Cheney. On June 10, Kucinich defied Speaker Pelosi again and introduced 35 Articles of Impeachment (H.Res. 1258) against President Bush.
When Pelosi refused to allow hearings on any of the 38 Articles of Impeachment, Kucinich returned to the floor of Congress to introduce one more Article of Impeachment against President Bush (H.Res. 1345).
Thanks to massive pressure from Democrats.com and our pro-impeachment allies, Speaker Pelosi finally allowed Chairman Conyers to hold a hearing this Friday. Kucinich will finally get a few minutes to argue for impeachment, along with Rep. Robert Wexler, former Rep. Liz Holtzman, and former Salt Lake City mayor Rocky Anderson. Kucinich made a video to thank us for our efforts.
H.Res. 1345 focuses on Bush's ultimate crime - invading Iraq on the basis of lies. The evidence is overwhelming that George Bush, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice, Karl Rove, Andy Card, and other top officials deliberately manufactured those lies to "sell" an invasion whose real purpose was to gain control of Iraq's oil and establish military bases in the heart of the Middle East.
This was the agenda of the Project for a New American Century that Bush adopted after stealing the 2000 election. And it's the reason Bush and John McCain are determined to stay in Iraq forever, even though Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki supports Barack Obama's plan to remove all our troops by 2010.
When Kucinich testifies on Friday, he will naturally face hostile questions from rightwing Republicans who impeached President Clinton. But Kucinich will also face hostile questions from key Democrats who oppose impeachment.
Some of these Democrats supported the invasion of Iraq: Howard Berman (CA28), Rick Boucher (VA09), Adam Schiff (CA29), Brad Sherman (CA27), and Anthony Weiner (NY09).
But most of these Democrats oppose impeachment because they are cowering in fear of a counterattack from the White House and FOX News: John Conyers (MI14), Artur Davis (AL07), Bill Delahunt (MA10), Zoe Lofgren (CA16), Jerry Nadler (NY08), Linda Sanchez (CA39), Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL20), Bobby Scott (VA03), Betty Sutton (OH13), and Mel Watt (NC12).
Only a few Judiciary Democrats understand that the Founding Fathers gave Congress the power of impeachment as the only way to stop a President from defying the Constitution and becoming a dictator, as Bush has done: Robert Wexler (FL19), Tammy Baldwin (WI02), Steve Cohen (TN09), Keith Ellison (MN05), Luis Gutierrez (IL04), Sheila Jackson Lee (TX18), Hank Johnson (GA04), and Maxine Waters (CA35).
If anti-impeachment Democrats get their way, Friday's 2-hour hearing will be the only "impeachment" hearing for this entire Congress - and then Bush will try to pardon himself and everyone else before leaving office next January, just as his father pardoned six Iran-contra criminals.
So it is crucial for all of us - now over 500,000! - to tell our Representatives today to support impeachment by cosponsoring Kucinich's H. Res. 1345:
http://www.democrats.com/peoplesemailnetwork/142
And if you can do more, please make free calls to every Judiciary Democrat who opposes impeachment through CauseCaller:
http://www.causecaller.com/causes.php?c=House_Judiciary_Democrats_Impeachment
Simply enter your phone number and click the "Start Calling" button. (Click "Call me back if I accidentally hang up" in case you hang up by mistake.) In a few seconds, your phone will "magically" ring and CauseCaller will say the name of the first Representative on the list. Listen carefully for the name of each Member so you can repeat the name to the receptionist - or just say "The Representative." Don't hang up between calls - let the receptionists hang up and CauseCaller will dial the next Representative.
If you want to do even more, call your favorite radio or TV talk shows and tell them how important Friday's hearings will be, and how strongly you support impeachment for whichever reasons are most important to you. Prepare your thoughts in advance so you sound informed and determined.
And if you're near Washington DC, join Veterans for Peace to lobby Congress on Thursday and hold a pro-impeachment rally on Friday:
http://www.democrats.com/node/17211
Lots more details and actions here:
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/34943
Thanks for all you do!
Update 1: The evidence of Bush's war crimes and other impeachable offenses grows daily. Investigative reporter Jane Mayer's new book The Dark Side provides more evidence that Bush authorized torture. The British Parliament accused Bush of torture.
Yet Attorney General Mukasey told Congress he won't prosecute anyone who followed Bush's illegal torture orders. Even worse, Bush's rightwing supporters have begun a propaganda campaign for blanket pardons of everyone in the Bush administration!Ask Conyers to Allow Kucinich to Present Impeachment Articles to House Judiciary Committee
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet, July 10, 2008
On Thursday Congressman Dennis Kucinich, who had already introduced 3 articles of impeachment against Cheney and 35 against Bush introduced a single article of impeachment against Bush charging him with misleading Congress into a war on Iraq.
Also on Thursday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- FINALLY inching impeachment back onto the table -- told the media that she expected the Judiciary Committee to consider the matter.
And Kucinich held a press conference at which he said that what he wants is an opportunity to present his proposals to the Judiciary Committee.
Let's make sure that Committee Chairman John Conyers grants this request. Phone him now at 202-225-3951. Please post here what he tells you:
http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/34681
If you're able to speak with Conyers or his staff at any length, please remind them that Bush and Cheney and members of their administration are refusing to comply with numerous subpoenas and even contempt citations, as well as refusing to answer questions by claiming "executive privilege." During an impeachment hearing, there is no executive privilege. The Judiciary Committee should hold an impeachment hearing of Bush and Cheney on refusal to comply with oversight. It's the fastest way to justice and the only chance of establishing any oversight.
On Thursday Congressman Dennis Kucinich, who had already introduced 3 articles of impeachment against Cheney and 35 against Bush introduced a single article of impeachment against Bush charging him with misleading Congress into a war on Iraq.
Also on Thursday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- FINALLY inching impeachment back onto the table -- told the media that she expected the Judiciary Committee to consider the matter.
And Kucinich held a press conference at which he said that what he wants is an opportunity to present his proposals to the Judiciary Committee.
Let's make sure that Committee Chairman John Conyers grants this request. Phone him now at 202-225-3951. Please post here what he tells you:
http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/34681
If you're able to speak with Conyers or his staff at any length, please remind them that Bush and Cheney and members of their administration are refusing to comply with numerous subpoenas and even contempt citations, as well as refusing to answer questions by claiming "executive privilege." During an impeachment hearing, there is no executive privilege. The Judiciary Committee should hold an impeachment hearing of Bush and Cheney on refusal to comply with oversight. It's the fastest way to justice and the only chance of establishing any oversight.
Impeachment Article to be Introduced Thursday
From Congressman Dennis Kucinich
WASHINGTON, D.C. (July 8) -- Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) sent the following letter today to his colleagues in Congress:
July 8, 2008
WHEN THE COMMANDER IN CHIEF LIES TO GO TO WAR, HE MUST BE IMPEACHED
A SINGLE ARTICLE OF IMPEACHMENT WILL BE BROUGHT TO THE FLOOR ON THURSDAY; PLEASE CO-SPONSOR
Dear Colleague,
During the Fourth of July holiday a WWII veteran stood ram-rod straight in his crisp dress uniform and saluted our flag as it passed in a parade. His silent reverential stance was a powerful reminder of the love of country that is reflected in our veterans of all generations and all services.
It is also a powerful reminder of the responsibilities of the President of the Untied States in his capacity as Commander in Chief.
It is worse than heartbreaking that George W. Bush, as Commander in Chief, caused this country to go to war based on information which was false, and which he knew to be false. The consequences for our troops have been devastating. We have lost 4,116 of our beloved servicemen and women since the war began, with over 30,000 physically wounded and countless others emotionally wounded. The toll on the service persons and their families will be felt throughout their lives.
There can be no greater responsibility of a Commander in Chief than to command based on facts on the ground, and to command in fact and in truth. There can be no greater offense of a Commander in Chief than to misrepresent a cause of war and to send our brave men and women into harm’s way based on those misrepresentations.
There has been a breach of faith between the Commander in Chief and the troops. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 or with Al Qaeda’s role in 9/11. Iraq had neither the intention nor the capability of attacking the United States. Iraq did not have weapons of Mass of Destruction. Yet George W. Bush took our troops to war under all of these false assumptions. Given the profound and irreversible consequences to our troops, if his decision was the result of a mistake, he must be impeached. Since his decision was based on lies, impeachment as a remedy falls short, but represents at least some effort on our part to demonstrate our concern about the sacrifices our troops have made.
This Thursday evening I will bring a privileged resolution to the House with a single Article of Impeachment of President Bush for taking our nation and our troops to war based on lies. We owe it to our troops who even at this hour stand as sentinels of America because they love this country and will give their lives for it. What are we willing to do to match their valor and the valor of their successors? Are we at least willing to defend the Constitution from the comfort and security of our Washington, DC offices?
Sincerely,
/s/
Dennis J. Kucinich
Member of Congress
WASHINGTON, D.C. (July 8) -- Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) sent the following letter today to his colleagues in Congress:
July 8, 2008
WHEN THE COMMANDER IN CHIEF LIES TO GO TO WAR, HE MUST BE IMPEACHED
A SINGLE ARTICLE OF IMPEACHMENT WILL BE BROUGHT TO THE FLOOR ON THURSDAY; PLEASE CO-SPONSOR
Dear Colleague,
During the Fourth of July holiday a WWII veteran stood ram-rod straight in his crisp dress uniform and saluted our flag as it passed in a parade. His silent reverential stance was a powerful reminder of the love of country that is reflected in our veterans of all generations and all services.
It is also a powerful reminder of the responsibilities of the President of the Untied States in his capacity as Commander in Chief.
It is worse than heartbreaking that George W. Bush, as Commander in Chief, caused this country to go to war based on information which was false, and which he knew to be false. The consequences for our troops have been devastating. We have lost 4,116 of our beloved servicemen and women since the war began, with over 30,000 physically wounded and countless others emotionally wounded. The toll on the service persons and their families will be felt throughout their lives.
There can be no greater responsibility of a Commander in Chief than to command based on facts on the ground, and to command in fact and in truth. There can be no greater offense of a Commander in Chief than to misrepresent a cause of war and to send our brave men and women into harm’s way based on those misrepresentations.
There has been a breach of faith between the Commander in Chief and the troops. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 or with Al Qaeda’s role in 9/11. Iraq had neither the intention nor the capability of attacking the United States. Iraq did not have weapons of Mass of Destruction. Yet George W. Bush took our troops to war under all of these false assumptions. Given the profound and irreversible consequences to our troops, if his decision was the result of a mistake, he must be impeached. Since his decision was based on lies, impeachment as a remedy falls short, but represents at least some effort on our part to demonstrate our concern about the sacrifices our troops have made.
This Thursday evening I will bring a privileged resolution to the House with a single Article of Impeachment of President Bush for taking our nation and our troops to war based on lies. We owe it to our troops who even at this hour stand as sentinels of America because they love this country and will give their lives for it. What are we willing to do to match their valor and the valor of their successors? Are we at least willing to defend the Constitution from the comfort and security of our Washington, DC offices?
Sincerely,
/s/
Dennis J. Kucinich
Member of Congress
Local Official Caught Imprisoning Children
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, June 11, 2008
Ooops. Scratch that. It was not a local official. No need to get excited. No need to end the practice or hold the criminal accountable. No need to mention the scandal in news reports. It's actually President George W. Bush. There's nothing to see here. Move along. Shop. Eat. Vote. Sleep. Perish.
Or take seriously the following article of impeachment introduced on Monday evening by Congressman Dennis Kucinich:
Article XX
IMPRISONING CHILDREN
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, authorized or permitted the arrest and detention of at least 2500 children under the age of 18 as "enemy combatants" in Iraq, Afghanistan, and at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention relating to the treatment of "protected persons" and the Optional Protocol to the Geneva Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, signed by the US in 2002 .
To wit:
In May 2008, the US government reported to the United Nations that it has been holding upwards of 2,500 children under the age of 18 as "enemy combatants" at detention centers in Iraq, Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay (where there was a special center, Camp Iguana, established just for holding children). The length of these detentions has frequently exceeded a year, and in some cases has stretched to five years. Some of these detainees have reached adulthood in detention and are now not being reported as child detainees because they are no longer children.
In addition to detaining children as "enemy combatants," it has been widely reported in media reports that the US military in Iraq has, based upon Pentagon rules of engagement, been treating boys as young as 14 years of age as "potential combatants," subject to arrest and even to being killed. In Fallujah, in the days ahead of the November 2004 all-out assault, Marines ringing the city were reported to be turning back into the city men and boys "of combat age" who were trying to flee the impending scene of battle -- an act which in itself is a violation of the Geneva Conventions, which require combatants to permit anyone, combatants as well as civilians, to surrender, and to leave the scene of battle.
Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, to which the United States has been a signatory since 1949, children under the age of 15 captured in conflicts, even if they have been fighting, are to be considered victims, not prisoners. In 2002, the United States signed the Optional Protocol to the Geneva Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of children in Armed Conflict, which raised this age for this category of "protected person" to under 18.
The continued detention of such children, some as young as 10, by the US military is a violation of both convention and protocol, and as such constitutes a war crime for which the president, as commander in chief, bears full responsibility.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President and Commander in Chief, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Ooops. Scratch that. It was not a local official. No need to get excited. No need to end the practice or hold the criminal accountable. No need to mention the scandal in news reports. It's actually President George W. Bush. There's nothing to see here. Move along. Shop. Eat. Vote. Sleep. Perish.
Or take seriously the following article of impeachment introduced on Monday evening by Congressman Dennis Kucinich:
Article XX
IMPRISONING CHILDREN
In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty under Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed", has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, authorized or permitted the arrest and detention of at least 2500 children under the age of 18 as "enemy combatants" in Iraq, Afghanistan, and at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention relating to the treatment of "protected persons" and the Optional Protocol to the Geneva Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, signed by the US in 2002 .
To wit:
In May 2008, the US government reported to the United Nations that it has been holding upwards of 2,500 children under the age of 18 as "enemy combatants" at detention centers in Iraq, Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay (where there was a special center, Camp Iguana, established just for holding children). The length of these detentions has frequently exceeded a year, and in some cases has stretched to five years. Some of these detainees have reached adulthood in detention and are now not being reported as child detainees because they are no longer children.
In addition to detaining children as "enemy combatants," it has been widely reported in media reports that the US military in Iraq has, based upon Pentagon rules of engagement, been treating boys as young as 14 years of age as "potential combatants," subject to arrest and even to being killed. In Fallujah, in the days ahead of the November 2004 all-out assault, Marines ringing the city were reported to be turning back into the city men and boys "of combat age" who were trying to flee the impending scene of battle -- an act which in itself is a violation of the Geneva Conventions, which require combatants to permit anyone, combatants as well as civilians, to surrender, and to leave the scene of battle.
Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, to which the United States has been a signatory since 1949, children under the age of 15 captured in conflicts, even if they have been fighting, are to be considered victims, not prisoners. In 2002, the United States signed the Optional Protocol to the Geneva Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of children in Armed Conflict, which raised this age for this category of "protected person" to under 18.
The continued detention of such children, some as young as 10, by the US military is a violation of both convention and protocol, and as such constitutes a war crime for which the president, as commander in chief, bears full responsibility.
In all of these actions and decisions, President George W. Bush has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as President and Commander in Chief, and subversive of constitutional government, to the prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States. Wherefore, President George W. Bush, by such conduct, is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office.
Anti-war Cindy Sheehan files to take on Pelosi
John Wildermuth, San Francisco Chronicle, April 26, 2008
Peace activist Cindy Sheehan wants to snatch House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's congressional seat from her in November, but first she's going to need the help - and signatures - of 10,198 friends and supporters.
Sheehan was at San Francisco City Hall on Friday to take out papers for her independent run for Congress, but without those signatures from voters in the district, her name won't show up on the ballot.
"It's an uphill battle," said Sheehan, who vowed to run against Pelosi in July after the speaker refused to start impeachment proceedings against President George Bush. "But I'm excited about the signature-gathering process. It's going to be an opportunity to talk to people about our campaign."
The 50-year-old Sheehan, whose son, Casey, was killed while serving in Iraq in 2004, became the public face of the anti-war movement when she mounted a demonstration outside Bush's Texas ranch that lasted from 2005 to 2007.
Even after pleading exhaustion and closing down "Camp Casey" in May, Sheehan was a regular speaker at anti-war gatherings across the nation. Since moving from Dixon to San Francisco's Mission District, she's been campaigning virtually full time.
To get the signatures, equal to 3 percent of the district voters registered for the 2006 general election, the campaign will have people setting up ironing boards and card tables on street corners throughout the city, seeking voters who want an alternative to Pelosi. Sheehan has until Aug. 8 to collect the needed signatures.
Getting on the ballot will be the easy part for Sheehan. If she becomes a recognized candidate, she'll be challenging one of the best-known and most powerful Democrats in the country in Pelosi, a 10-term incumbent who routinely collects around 80 percent of the vote in the San Francisco-only district.
Election challenges are nothing new to Pelosi, who has faced token Republican opposition in most of her November races, along with occasional primary challenges. But since she beat former San Francisco Supervisor Harry Britt in the 1987 special election to replace the late Rep. Sala Burton, Pelosi's political resume has been short of opponents anyone other than local political junkies has ever heard of.
Sheehan has name recognition, particularly for her Camp Casey crusade.
"I said last year that I was going to take a break (from the anti-war movement) and then come back," Sheehan said in an interview at her Mission Street campaign headquarters.
But when the president commuted White House aide Scooter Libby's prison sentence last summer, she said, she decided "that seeing George Bush impeached would be a victory for humanity."
Calls for impeachment from Sheehan and other progressives didn't move Pelosi, who already had declared that impeachment was "off the table" when it came to the Democratic congressional agenda.
"In this political environment, the speaker has to work for those things that are possible," said Brendan Daly, a spokesman for Pelosi.
An impeachment effort, he said, "would be divisive, we couldn't get the votes, and we would have to spend all our time on it."
There are plenty of congressional Democrats, especially in the Bay Area, who don't agree, including Reps. Lynn Woolsey, Barbara Lee and Pete Stark, along with other progressives, both in and out of office.
Impeachment isn't Sheehan's only concern. Pelosi's refusal to vote for an immediate end to the Iraq war and to support single-payer health care shows she's out of touch with San Francisco's progressive roots, Sheehan said.
"I'll represent everyone in San Francisco, not just the corporate elite," she said. "I'm working class, my family was working class, and we have struggled the same way our neighbors here in San Francisco have struggled."
There's nothing unusual about Pelosi taking fire from the left, said Daly, her spokesman, especially when the speaker has to be concerned not only about her district, but also about the party across the country.
Pelosi "has always been forceful about speaking her mind on issues like human rights in China and the war in Iraq," he said. "In San Francisco, there's always tension between the district and the leadership responsibility."
The speaker will get an early look at the unhappiness of the city's progressives, because she's being challenged by local activist Shirley Golub in the June 3 Democratic primary.
"I've just had the sense from people I've talked to that (Pelosi) hasn't done what people in the community want her to do," Golub said. "People now have a choice, and they haven't had a Democratic choice for a long, long time."
Despite the upbeat talk, Sheehan and Golub, along with Republican Dana Walsh and Libertarian Philip Berg in November, are the longest of longshots to give Pelosi even a moment's worry on election day. In a district where Democrats outnumber Republicans 56 percent to 10 percent and a state where incumbents almost never lose, a party leader like Pelosi has every right to be making plans for her next term in office.
The odds don't bother Sheehan, who has raised more than $100,000 for her race, most of it from outside the district.
"Even people who I won't represent are willing to back me, because they know what I'll do in office," she said. "Many people in San Francisco know me, and they know my persistence.
"If I get to Washington, I'll only be in office a couple weeks before Bush leaves, but I guarantee he'll know I'm there."
E-mail John Wildermuth at jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com.
Peace activist Cindy Sheehan wants to snatch House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's congressional seat from her in November, but first she's going to need the help - and signatures - of 10,198 friends and supporters.
Sheehan was at San Francisco City Hall on Friday to take out papers for her independent run for Congress, but without those signatures from voters in the district, her name won't show up on the ballot.
"It's an uphill battle," said Sheehan, who vowed to run against Pelosi in July after the speaker refused to start impeachment proceedings against President George Bush. "But I'm excited about the signature-gathering process. It's going to be an opportunity to talk to people about our campaign."
The 50-year-old Sheehan, whose son, Casey, was killed while serving in Iraq in 2004, became the public face of the anti-war movement when she mounted a demonstration outside Bush's Texas ranch that lasted from 2005 to 2007.
Even after pleading exhaustion and closing down "Camp Casey" in May, Sheehan was a regular speaker at anti-war gatherings across the nation. Since moving from Dixon to San Francisco's Mission District, she's been campaigning virtually full time.
To get the signatures, equal to 3 percent of the district voters registered for the 2006 general election, the campaign will have people setting up ironing boards and card tables on street corners throughout the city, seeking voters who want an alternative to Pelosi. Sheehan has until Aug. 8 to collect the needed signatures.
Getting on the ballot will be the easy part for Sheehan. If she becomes a recognized candidate, she'll be challenging one of the best-known and most powerful Democrats in the country in Pelosi, a 10-term incumbent who routinely collects around 80 percent of the vote in the San Francisco-only district.
Election challenges are nothing new to Pelosi, who has faced token Republican opposition in most of her November races, along with occasional primary challenges. But since she beat former San Francisco Supervisor Harry Britt in the 1987 special election to replace the late Rep. Sala Burton, Pelosi's political resume has been short of opponents anyone other than local political junkies has ever heard of.
Sheehan has name recognition, particularly for her Camp Casey crusade.
"I said last year that I was going to take a break (from the anti-war movement) and then come back," Sheehan said in an interview at her Mission Street campaign headquarters.
But when the president commuted White House aide Scooter Libby's prison sentence last summer, she said, she decided "that seeing George Bush impeached would be a victory for humanity."
Calls for impeachment from Sheehan and other progressives didn't move Pelosi, who already had declared that impeachment was "off the table" when it came to the Democratic congressional agenda.
"In this political environment, the speaker has to work for those things that are possible," said Brendan Daly, a spokesman for Pelosi.
An impeachment effort, he said, "would be divisive, we couldn't get the votes, and we would have to spend all our time on it."
There are plenty of congressional Democrats, especially in the Bay Area, who don't agree, including Reps. Lynn Woolsey, Barbara Lee and Pete Stark, along with other progressives, both in and out of office.
Impeachment isn't Sheehan's only concern. Pelosi's refusal to vote for an immediate end to the Iraq war and to support single-payer health care shows she's out of touch with San Francisco's progressive roots, Sheehan said.
"I'll represent everyone in San Francisco, not just the corporate elite," she said. "I'm working class, my family was working class, and we have struggled the same way our neighbors here in San Francisco have struggled."
There's nothing unusual about Pelosi taking fire from the left, said Daly, her spokesman, especially when the speaker has to be concerned not only about her district, but also about the party across the country.
Pelosi "has always been forceful about speaking her mind on issues like human rights in China and the war in Iraq," he said. "In San Francisco, there's always tension between the district and the leadership responsibility."
The speaker will get an early look at the unhappiness of the city's progressives, because she's being challenged by local activist Shirley Golub in the June 3 Democratic primary.
"I've just had the sense from people I've talked to that (Pelosi) hasn't done what people in the community want her to do," Golub said. "People now have a choice, and they haven't had a Democratic choice for a long, long time."
Despite the upbeat talk, Sheehan and Golub, along with Republican Dana Walsh and Libertarian Philip Berg in November, are the longest of longshots to give Pelosi even a moment's worry on election day. In a district where Democrats outnumber Republicans 56 percent to 10 percent and a state where incumbents almost never lose, a party leader like Pelosi has every right to be making plans for her next term in office.
The odds don't bother Sheehan, who has raised more than $100,000 for her race, most of it from outside the district.
"Even people who I won't represent are willing to back me, because they know what I'll do in office," she said. "Many people in San Francisco know me, and they know my persistence.
"If I get to Washington, I'll only be in office a couple weeks before Bush leaves, but I guarantee he'll know I'm there."
E-mail John Wildermuth at jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com.
Building an Activist Movement to End the Occupation of Iraq
Remarks at American University Teach-In on March 22, 2008
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, March 23, 2008
Robert Dreyfuss's presentation that I now have to follow was tremendous and I learned a lot, but I disagree with his pessimism. I am fond of the saying "Let's save our pessimism for better times." It's a choice to be a pessimist, and it is a wrong one, always.
So, here we are again, a crowd dominated by old white people on a college campus in a black city. But on March 12th and 19th in this city I watched hundreds of college students and African Americans put their bodies in the way of arrest and abuse for peace. If I had to choose, I'd rather have people in the streets than in a teach-in.
Still, I think this all-too-typical turnout suggests how segregation and civic weakness in this country allows mass murder to occur in other countries. We have long term work to do assuming we live long enough to do it.
Today was billed as a dialogue on the war, and I want to speak first and if there's time have a dialogue or a multilogue, but not about a war. A war is a contest between two armies, and can be won or lost, can end in victory or defeat, and is understood as intended to have an end some day. What we have in Iraq is an occupation of a people by a single foreign military force. It can never be won or lost and is not intended to ever end. The movement we need to build cannot, I think, most easily succeed by using language that defines our success as defeat. Instead our success should be understood as getting tough on crime, as the American people reining in the abuse of power of the least popular president and vice president we have ever known.
I know you may want to tell me that certain allegedly mainstream Americans cannot possibly think of their president as a war criminal and would be more likely to support a responsible and slow redeployment of part of the occupying army to elsewhere in the empire if we don't use the word crime - except, perhaps, in blaming the Iraqis for how they've handled our genocidal charity mission to their country. But I think you would be underestimating a sufficient number of Americans to make that the wrong approach, that you should recycle your television as soon as possible, that it is their posture toward Bush more than toward Muslims that makes the Democrats look like wimps and makes Congress so unpopular, and that only a reversal of our imperialism can leave us a sustainable world, so there's no time like the present to start working on it. We don't need to win over every last American; we just need a significant minority of the majority that is already with us TO ACT.
CNN says that in a poll of 1,019 adults between March 14 and 16, 52 percent said that the United States' action in Iraq is not morally justified. That's not a bad response for a question that's rarely been polled or discussed in the media.
We're also, according to today's agenda, supposed to base our movement for withdrawal on an analysis of failed policies, but I'm not going to do that because I don't see any failed policies. The Cheney-Bush gang intended to install a permanent occupation of Iraq, enrich oil barons and arms makers and disaster capitalists, win or steal elections, eliminate civil rights at home, transfer wealth upward, and transfer power from Capitol Hill to the White House. We've just heard how ignorant they are, but they are ignorant of things they do not care about. They may have had dreams of quickly pacifying Iraq and moving on to the next victim in Iran, rather than empowering Iran as they have done, and we in the peace movement and the counter recruitment movement and the independent media can share credit with the Iraqi people for having slowed things down. But I don't see any fundamental failure. The forces against which we need to build a movement are succeeding. And that is unequivocally BAD news. Their goals are murder and theft. The last thing we should be doing is wishing them success or lamenting their "failed policies."
We succeeded over five years ago in denying our U.S. warmongers U.N. authorization of the invasion, although they now try to claim that the occupation is legal. We have succeeded in slowing recruitment, although they've responded by stop-lossing those they've already recruited. We succeeded in 2006 in turning congressional elections into a referendum on the occupation of Iraq and won the Democrats probably 50 new seats to use in bringing it to an end. But election fraud left them with only 30 new seats, and their leadership immediately decreed that they would keep the occupation going in order to run against it again in 2008. We even elected some anti-war activists, like Carol Shea Porter, to Congress who immediately signed onto the plan to keep the occupation going for two years.
We have succeeded in making the American public extremely aware of the dishonesty used in promoting the invasion of Iraq, and that awareness has helped forestall an attack on Iran. But we have been less successful in communicating the dishonesty involved in promoting the ongoing occupation and in communicating the murderous costs of the occupation. The primary reason for this is probably activists' subservience to a political party and that party's misguided fear of the absolutely nonsensical accusation of not "supporting the troops". We're also up against the corporate media's complete lack of interest in Iraqis' deaths.
And we have failed dramatically in communicating the fact that the Democrats in Congress have the power to cease funding the occupation right now, as well as the fact that the next 10 months exist, that contrary to popular belief we will not have a new president tomorrow, but rather must survive 10 more months under the reign of the Decider and the Dark Lord.
It's very hard to build an activist movement without hope of quick success, but it's impossible to build an activist movement without the belief that success is at least possible and the willingness to endure the ridicule of those wise souls who claim to support us while telling us that failure is guaranteed. We have to be willing to endure that, and we have to find ways to provide solidarity and fun and other compensations for the lack of hope.
Look around at all of the people in this room. Now imagine a few thousand of these rooms, all with the same number of people. Now imagine all of those people dying. That is the result that will come from Congress handing Bush another $100 billion in the coming weeks. Over the next 10 months, Iraqis will die because of the occupation, and people around the world will die for lack of the resources we are pouring into the corporations profiting from the occupation. And many who do not die will consider the dead the lucky ones. When anyone tells you that they want to end the occupation but can't do it until 2009 because they're too smart and know better, question their wisdom. And especially do so if they work for the corporate media. Write letters. Call talk shows. When you read that the Democrats are helpless as babies because they don't have 67 senators, do not let that lie spread unchallenged. Let every producer and editor know that we know that it takes 41 senators to block a funding bill, or a simple majority of House members, or simply the leadership of the so-called leadership. Pelosi has successfully badgered progressive Democrats to vote for funding in the past and badgered rightwing Democrats to oppose telecom immunity. She could cut off the money right now and spare all of those lives. She and Harry Reid prefer to portray themselves as critics of an occupation for which they are responsible.
A number of very well funded peace organizations that have tended to put Democratic partisanship ahead of peace have finally just launched a new effort to urge Congress to stop funding the occupation. You can find it at Stand Up Congress dot org. I find this highly encouraging. However, these organizations, some of which are dumping tens of millions of dollars into partisan election ads in the corporate media, are not investing a dime in this new campaign. The campaign involves no on-the-ground organizing, no events, no advertising, just a website to collect our Email addresses. (Unless the answers that Tom Andrews gave to me and Ray McGovern in this room earlier today were honest and some money is put behind this.) But that doesn't mean we shouldn't overwhelm it with success. It costs us nothing to sign on and to urge real action and serious funding. We have to lobby our potential allies among the grassroots and astroturf organizations as well as lobbying Congress directly.
If we are going to change the public discourse and apply the necessary pressure to force an end to the funding, it will take a fair amount of energy and focus from a great many people. We cannot waste time on other things. That starts by making the area around you an election-free zone. We have an election DAY, and on that day you can vote for the least bad candidate. We don't need an election eternity. So, when people start talking to you about whether it's sexist to consider a female candidate's male supporters' statements racist always or only if those supporters are Latino, tell them to get you a candidate who will filibuster the occupation funding and a nonpartisan public hand counting of your paper ballots, but tell them that in the meantime you have important work to do.
Elections may be the heart and soul of a republic, and we may have a handful of examples where election challenges, like Donna Edwards' challenge of Al Wynn, have reformed incumbent congress members. And Cynthis Papermaster's challenge led Pete Stark to sign onto impeachment, and now she's running against Zoe Lofgren, hoping for the same result. But elections in this country now serve primarily to dissuade activist organizations and individuals from lobbying elected officials. If we hadn't had any elections since 2003, we might have mobilized the public pressure to shut down this city and compel our government to end the occupation of Iraq. If no member of Congress belonged to any political party, we might have long since persuaded enough of them to listen to their constituents. One thing you can do is send checks to the campaigns of elected officials and challengers who get it right, and send photocopies of those checks to other key congress members, noting why they won't be receiving the same.
A serious movement to stop funding the occupation would include a filibuster strategy for the Senate and would think ahead to the next step following a refusal to fund by either the Senate or House. Almost certainly Bush would misappropriate funds to continue the occupation with a new level of illegality added. Congress would then have to impeach or whimper away with its tail between its legs. Taking the peace and impeachment movements in the opposite order might make more sense, however. Impeachment hearings might embolden congress members to end the funding, and Congress would be free to impeach for its top choice from the long list of Cheney's and Bush's impeachable offenses. There are nine Judiciary Committee members and dozens of other congress members urging John Conyers to hold hearings. Every one of you should phone John Conyers every morning to ask the same.
It only makes sense, of course, that an occupation we want to end involves actions we consider impeachable offenses. So we should be pushing for an end to the funding and a commencement of impeachment hearings. It is far from too late for either project. Impeachments and impeachment movements that accomplish worthy goals without reaching impeachment tend to happen late and to not take much time. The movements to impeach Truman and Hoover happened significantly later in their terms than where we are now with Bush and Cheney. Andrew Johnson fired Edwin Stanton on February 21, 1868. On March 2nd, ten days later, the House voted to impeach him for that action. No lengthy process is necessary.
Internet organizing, which is the only real organizing I do, is most effective if it inspires real world groups on the ground to take collective action and facilitates that action. Useful actions can be taken at any time, but can also gain strength through national coordination. One possibility that has been tossed around is to turn May First into a national strike day for peace, impeachment, and human rights. What if some funded organizations invested in that instead of in ads to fund the corporate media and make sure the last four people in the country know that John McCain likes wars?
As an individual, we can all take actions every day, including outreach to potential activists. Memorize (202) 224-3121 and phone your congress member and senators every day. Contact the corporate media and support honest independent media in some way every day. Work with local peace and justice groups in your area to plan fun and creative events to bring more people into the movement. Advertise your views on your clothing, start conversations, hand out flyers. Recruit people into local and national groups. Send them to impeachcheney.org or unitedforpeace.org or any of a thousand websites where they can get connected to a movement.
Plan local events and activities that apply pressure to your congress member and senators. Do what it takes to disrupt and attract attention, but have a good-cop on your team as well. Talk to your elected officials, but be aware that most of their excuses are simply excuses. Refuting them will just be an annoyance. What you need to communicate is the electoral advantage of doing what you ask.
If the Democratic leadership believed, as I do, that there was more electoral risk in not ending the funding than in ending it, the funding would stop. If they believed failure to impeach to be a greater risk for them at the polls than impeaching, impeachment hearings would be happening. There is no reason we cannot change their thinking quickly in both regards. The Republicans won after impeaching Johnson and trying to impeach Truman. The Democrats won after trying to impeach Nixon, but lost after failing to pursue Reagan. The Republicans, against the public will, impeached Clinton for a private non-offense and still took both houses of Congress and the White House. For an impeachment movement to succeed in restoring justice and succeed electorally, it need never reach impeachment. Impeachment hearings now on torture, detentions, spying, rewriting laws, lying to the public and Congress, etc., would compel John McCain to defend each offense even while campaigning against it. Impeachment would be a gold mine for a political party capable of thinking offense rather than only defense.
If enough of us choose to act in very easy ways, we can change the US approach to the world over the next 10 months. But what if we don't? Then would we be better off to have worked on the elections? I don't think so. I think the best way to help Obama and other Democrats get elected is to push them toward stronger clearer positions for peace and justice. Were Obama to lead the way with a filibuster of the funding of the occupation, he would look stronger and more decisive, and his supporters would be energized. And the best way to put ourselves in a position to accomplish our goals in 2009, no matter who ends up in the White House and Congress, is to try to accomplish our goals in 2008. If we educate the American public now on the fact that Congress can end the funding of the occupation of Iraq, we will be in a better position to make that happen in 2009 should we not succeed this year. And succeeding this year is entirely possible. New scandals we don't know about will emerge to assist us. New wars not yet launched will enrage those not yet taking action. And awareness will begin to penetrate the Democratic Party that the failure to act is a liability. Important victories never look likely until they happen, but they do happen. Let's keep our republic. Thank you.
--
To sign up for AfterDowningStreet Alerts go here: http://tinyurl.com/2jytct
David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, March 23, 2008
Robert Dreyfuss's presentation that I now have to follow was tremendous and I learned a lot, but I disagree with his pessimism. I am fond of the saying "Let's save our pessimism for better times." It's a choice to be a pessimist, and it is a wrong one, always.
So, here we are again, a crowd dominated by old white people on a college campus in a black city. But on March 12th and 19th in this city I watched hundreds of college students and African Americans put their bodies in the way of arrest and abuse for peace. If I had to choose, I'd rather have people in the streets than in a teach-in.
Still, I think this all-too-typical turnout suggests how segregation and civic weakness in this country allows mass murder to occur in other countries. We have long term work to do assuming we live long enough to do it.
Today was billed as a dialogue on the war, and I want to speak first and if there's time have a dialogue or a multilogue, but not about a war. A war is a contest between two armies, and can be won or lost, can end in victory or defeat, and is understood as intended to have an end some day. What we have in Iraq is an occupation of a people by a single foreign military force. It can never be won or lost and is not intended to ever end. The movement we need to build cannot, I think, most easily succeed by using language that defines our success as defeat. Instead our success should be understood as getting tough on crime, as the American people reining in the abuse of power of the least popular president and vice president we have ever known.
I know you may want to tell me that certain allegedly mainstream Americans cannot possibly think of their president as a war criminal and would be more likely to support a responsible and slow redeployment of part of the occupying army to elsewhere in the empire if we don't use the word crime - except, perhaps, in blaming the Iraqis for how they've handled our genocidal charity mission to their country. But I think you would be underestimating a sufficient number of Americans to make that the wrong approach, that you should recycle your television as soon as possible, that it is their posture toward Bush more than toward Muslims that makes the Democrats look like wimps and makes Congress so unpopular, and that only a reversal of our imperialism can leave us a sustainable world, so there's no time like the present to start working on it. We don't need to win over every last American; we just need a significant minority of the majority that is already with us TO ACT.
CNN says that in a poll of 1,019 adults between March 14 and 16, 52 percent said that the United States' action in Iraq is not morally justified. That's not a bad response for a question that's rarely been polled or discussed in the media.
We're also, according to today's agenda, supposed to base our movement for withdrawal on an analysis of failed policies, but I'm not going to do that because I don't see any failed policies. The Cheney-Bush gang intended to install a permanent occupation of Iraq, enrich oil barons and arms makers and disaster capitalists, win or steal elections, eliminate civil rights at home, transfer wealth upward, and transfer power from Capitol Hill to the White House. We've just heard how ignorant they are, but they are ignorant of things they do not care about. They may have had dreams of quickly pacifying Iraq and moving on to the next victim in Iran, rather than empowering Iran as they have done, and we in the peace movement and the counter recruitment movement and the independent media can share credit with the Iraqi people for having slowed things down. But I don't see any fundamental failure. The forces against which we need to build a movement are succeeding. And that is unequivocally BAD news. Their goals are murder and theft. The last thing we should be doing is wishing them success or lamenting their "failed policies."
We succeeded over five years ago in denying our U.S. warmongers U.N. authorization of the invasion, although they now try to claim that the occupation is legal. We have succeeded in slowing recruitment, although they've responded by stop-lossing those they've already recruited. We succeeded in 2006 in turning congressional elections into a referendum on the occupation of Iraq and won the Democrats probably 50 new seats to use in bringing it to an end. But election fraud left them with only 30 new seats, and their leadership immediately decreed that they would keep the occupation going in order to run against it again in 2008. We even elected some anti-war activists, like Carol Shea Porter, to Congress who immediately signed onto the plan to keep the occupation going for two years.
We have succeeded in making the American public extremely aware of the dishonesty used in promoting the invasion of Iraq, and that awareness has helped forestall an attack on Iran. But we have been less successful in communicating the dishonesty involved in promoting the ongoing occupation and in communicating the murderous costs of the occupation. The primary reason for this is probably activists' subservience to a political party and that party's misguided fear of the absolutely nonsensical accusation of not "supporting the troops". We're also up against the corporate media's complete lack of interest in Iraqis' deaths.
And we have failed dramatically in communicating the fact that the Democrats in Congress have the power to cease funding the occupation right now, as well as the fact that the next 10 months exist, that contrary to popular belief we will not have a new president tomorrow, but rather must survive 10 more months under the reign of the Decider and the Dark Lord.
It's very hard to build an activist movement without hope of quick success, but it's impossible to build an activist movement without the belief that success is at least possible and the willingness to endure the ridicule of those wise souls who claim to support us while telling us that failure is guaranteed. We have to be willing to endure that, and we have to find ways to provide solidarity and fun and other compensations for the lack of hope.
Look around at all of the people in this room. Now imagine a few thousand of these rooms, all with the same number of people. Now imagine all of those people dying. That is the result that will come from Congress handing Bush another $100 billion in the coming weeks. Over the next 10 months, Iraqis will die because of the occupation, and people around the world will die for lack of the resources we are pouring into the corporations profiting from the occupation. And many who do not die will consider the dead the lucky ones. When anyone tells you that they want to end the occupation but can't do it until 2009 because they're too smart and know better, question their wisdom. And especially do so if they work for the corporate media. Write letters. Call talk shows. When you read that the Democrats are helpless as babies because they don't have 67 senators, do not let that lie spread unchallenged. Let every producer and editor know that we know that it takes 41 senators to block a funding bill, or a simple majority of House members, or simply the leadership of the so-called leadership. Pelosi has successfully badgered progressive Democrats to vote for funding in the past and badgered rightwing Democrats to oppose telecom immunity. She could cut off the money right now and spare all of those lives. She and Harry Reid prefer to portray themselves as critics of an occupation for which they are responsible.
A number of very well funded peace organizations that have tended to put Democratic partisanship ahead of peace have finally just launched a new effort to urge Congress to stop funding the occupation. You can find it at Stand Up Congress dot org. I find this highly encouraging. However, these organizations, some of which are dumping tens of millions of dollars into partisan election ads in the corporate media, are not investing a dime in this new campaign. The campaign involves no on-the-ground organizing, no events, no advertising, just a website to collect our Email addresses. (Unless the answers that Tom Andrews gave to me and Ray McGovern in this room earlier today were honest and some money is put behind this.) But that doesn't mean we shouldn't overwhelm it with success. It costs us nothing to sign on and to urge real action and serious funding. We have to lobby our potential allies among the grassroots and astroturf organizations as well as lobbying Congress directly.
If we are going to change the public discourse and apply the necessary pressure to force an end to the funding, it will take a fair amount of energy and focus from a great many people. We cannot waste time on other things. That starts by making the area around you an election-free zone. We have an election DAY, and on that day you can vote for the least bad candidate. We don't need an election eternity. So, when people start talking to you about whether it's sexist to consider a female candidate's male supporters' statements racist always or only if those supporters are Latino, tell them to get you a candidate who will filibuster the occupation funding and a nonpartisan public hand counting of your paper ballots, but tell them that in the meantime you have important work to do.
Elections may be the heart and soul of a republic, and we may have a handful of examples where election challenges, like Donna Edwards' challenge of Al Wynn, have reformed incumbent congress members. And Cynthis Papermaster's challenge led Pete Stark to sign onto impeachment, and now she's running against Zoe Lofgren, hoping for the same result. But elections in this country now serve primarily to dissuade activist organizations and individuals from lobbying elected officials. If we hadn't had any elections since 2003, we might have mobilized the public pressure to shut down this city and compel our government to end the occupation of Iraq. If no member of Congress belonged to any political party, we might have long since persuaded enough of them to listen to their constituents. One thing you can do is send checks to the campaigns of elected officials and challengers who get it right, and send photocopies of those checks to other key congress members, noting why they won't be receiving the same.
A serious movement to stop funding the occupation would include a filibuster strategy for the Senate and would think ahead to the next step following a refusal to fund by either the Senate or House. Almost certainly Bush would misappropriate funds to continue the occupation with a new level of illegality added. Congress would then have to impeach or whimper away with its tail between its legs. Taking the peace and impeachment movements in the opposite order might make more sense, however. Impeachment hearings might embolden congress members to end the funding, and Congress would be free to impeach for its top choice from the long list of Cheney's and Bush's impeachable offenses. There are nine Judiciary Committee members and dozens of other congress members urging John Conyers to hold hearings. Every one of you should phone John Conyers every morning to ask the same.
It only makes sense, of course, that an occupation we want to end involves actions we consider impeachable offenses. So we should be pushing for an end to the funding and a commencement of impeachment hearings. It is far from too late for either project. Impeachments and impeachment movements that accomplish worthy goals without reaching impeachment tend to happen late and to not take much time. The movements to impeach Truman and Hoover happened significantly later in their terms than where we are now with Bush and Cheney. Andrew Johnson fired Edwin Stanton on February 21, 1868. On March 2nd, ten days later, the House voted to impeach him for that action. No lengthy process is necessary.
Internet organizing, which is the only real organizing I do, is most effective if it inspires real world groups on the ground to take collective action and facilitates that action. Useful actions can be taken at any time, but can also gain strength through national coordination. One possibility that has been tossed around is to turn May First into a national strike day for peace, impeachment, and human rights. What if some funded organizations invested in that instead of in ads to fund the corporate media and make sure the last four people in the country know that John McCain likes wars?
As an individual, we can all take actions every day, including outreach to potential activists. Memorize (202) 224-3121 and phone your congress member and senators every day. Contact the corporate media and support honest independent media in some way every day. Work with local peace and justice groups in your area to plan fun and creative events to bring more people into the movement. Advertise your views on your clothing, start conversations, hand out flyers. Recruit people into local and national groups. Send them to impeachcheney.org or unitedforpeace.org or any of a thousand websites where they can get connected to a movement.
Plan local events and activities that apply pressure to your congress member and senators. Do what it takes to disrupt and attract attention, but have a good-cop on your team as well. Talk to your elected officials, but be aware that most of their excuses are simply excuses. Refuting them will just be an annoyance. What you need to communicate is the electoral advantage of doing what you ask.
If the Democratic leadership believed, as I do, that there was more electoral risk in not ending the funding than in ending it, the funding would stop. If they believed failure to impeach to be a greater risk for them at the polls than impeaching, impeachment hearings would be happening. There is no reason we cannot change their thinking quickly in both regards. The Republicans won after impeaching Johnson and trying to impeach Truman. The Democrats won after trying to impeach Nixon, but lost after failing to pursue Reagan. The Republicans, against the public will, impeached Clinton for a private non-offense and still took both houses of Congress and the White House. For an impeachment movement to succeed in restoring justice and succeed electorally, it need never reach impeachment. Impeachment hearings now on torture, detentions, spying, rewriting laws, lying to the public and Congress, etc., would compel John McCain to defend each offense even while campaigning against it. Impeachment would be a gold mine for a political party capable of thinking offense rather than only defense.
If enough of us choose to act in very easy ways, we can change the US approach to the world over the next 10 months. But what if we don't? Then would we be better off to have worked on the elections? I don't think so. I think the best way to help Obama and other Democrats get elected is to push them toward stronger clearer positions for peace and justice. Were Obama to lead the way with a filibuster of the funding of the occupation, he would look stronger and more decisive, and his supporters would be energized. And the best way to put ourselves in a position to accomplish our goals in 2009, no matter who ends up in the White House and Congress, is to try to accomplish our goals in 2008. If we educate the American public now on the fact that Congress can end the funding of the occupation of Iraq, we will be in a better position to make that happen in 2009 should we not succeed this year. And succeeding this year is entirely possible. New scandals we don't know about will emerge to assist us. New wars not yet launched will enrage those not yet taking action. And awareness will begin to penetrate the Democratic Party that the failure to act is a liability. Important victories never look likely until they happen, but they do happen. Let's keep our republic. Thank you.
--
To sign up for AfterDowningStreet Alerts go here: http://tinyurl.com/2jytct
Interview: Cindy Sheehan in Egypt
Liam Stack in Cairo, aljazeera.net, Feb. 24, 2008
Cindy Sheehan, an American activist who was nicknamed the "Peace Mom" by the media for her criticism of the Iraq War, retreated from her public campaigns in 2007.
The death of her son Casey, a US soldier, in a Baghdad battle in 2005 had transformed Sheehan into a public figure in the US.
But she resurfaced in Cairo last week as a member of a delegation from the Muslim American Society which is in Egypt to protest against the military trial of 40 members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood.
She spoke to Al Jazeera about her journey from peace activist to Congressional candidate, her thoughts on Iraq and her experiences in Egypt.
Al Jazeera: You first became famous for your protests against the Iraq war in August 2005, but you have not been an active anti-war figure for a while now. What happened?
Sheehan: In May 2007, I decided to quit actually being the face of the anti-war movement in America. I quit and I have not gone back to that. When I left the movement I was broke, I was tired, I was sick – literally sick and in pain.
I wanted to just totally be out of the political realm and not have anything to do with it. The establishment that runs our country just disgusted me and I was tired of it. It is very corrupt and I definitely saw that when I was focusing on anti-war activism.
The leaders of both parties work together to keep normal people out of the process. In many ways the Democratic leadership, especially in Congress, has been complicit with George Bush, the US president, in his crimes against humanity.
How can [Democratic Speaker of the House] Nancy Pelosi say unequivocally that water-boarding is torture and that Bush and [Richard] Cheney, the US vice-president, should not only be impeached but they should be charged with war crimes when in 2002 she herself was briefed on water-boarding and shown video of the rendition places where water-boarding happened?
Impeaching George Bush was a popular demand among liberal Americans at one time, but very few people talk about it anymore. Is that what turned you into an activist again?
When George Bush commuted [vice-presidential aide] Scooter Libby's sentence, the Democrats in Congress didn't do anything about it. When the Administration said they would not cooperate with subpoenas against [presidential aide] Harriet Myers, the democrats didn't do anything about it.
That's what pulled me back into activism. I thought how can they do that? How can they say 'I'm just not going to come to your stupid trial,’ and no one will say anything about it?
When the Democrats took impeachment off the table, I decided enough was enough. On July 23, 2007, I officially announced that I was running for Congress against Nancy Pelosi.
Why the focus on Nancy Pelosi?
I decided if Nancy Pelosi wasn't going to put impeachment on the table then I would run against her.
You can't take any part of the Constitution off the table, even though they have rendered it almost meaningless between George Bush and Karl Rove. Since they came to power they have institutionalised torture and spying against Americans.
They have passed the Military Commissions Act and just done away with habeas corpus. They have practically rendered it meaningless. That is why I decided to challenge Pelosi for her seat. I always say if you want change you have to vote out the enablers, and Pelosi is the biggest enabler there is.
If your new focus is on unseating Nancy Pelosi, what are you doing in Egypt?
My anti-war work evolved into work for global human rights because I saw the problem was much deeper than just George Bush.
It's about militarism and violence, globalisation and free trade.
I decided I wanted to do human rights work on behalf of people around the world who have been harmed by US imperialism.
Part of why I am here, also, is to draw attention to the parallels between the military courts here and the same kinds of courts that are being used to try detainees at Guantanamo Bay by the US.
If this becomes the standard for the world, and there is no international outcry, then everyone is in big trouble.
But what does the US have to do with a military trial in Egypt?
Egypt is a major recipient of US foreign aid, and there is no relationship between American aid and human rights.
If we [America] really want to promote democracy in this region then we cannot silence the voices of the Muslim Brotherhood because they're the moderate voice here and they are the ones who are actually working for democracy.
Do you think your presence in Egypt will have an effect on the trial?
Well, we have been doing a lot of media work since we came to Egypt and we hope this will put pressure on the Egyptian government to treat the prisoners better and to also maybe alleviate their punishment.
Hopefully we will draw some international attention to what is happening here, too, and that will help the situation.
You also went to the National Council of Women in downtown Cairo to request a meeting with Suzanne Mubarak, Egypt's First Lady. How did that go?
I didn't really understand a lot of what was going on. There was a lot of yelling in Arabic. They weren't the right people to get us a meeting with Suzanne Mubarak ... I left a letter for Madame Mubarak and they promised that she would see it.
We thought it was important to go there because there are women and children who are being harmed by having their fathers and husbands detained, so I wanted to talk to Suzanne, mother to mother.
We brought along mothers and wives of the detainees and they were actually able to file complaints, and it was really great.
Have you spoken to many of the families of the defendants in the military trial? Have you spoken to many female members of the Brotherhood mother-to-mother?
My conversations with the mothers and children of the detainees have been really emotional. They told me about the hardships [the arrests and trials] have placed on their families, from financial hardships to emotional and physical hardships.
It is very emotional for me because my family has gone through the same things since my son died. It has been really hard for us.
People always say to me, 'Cindy, why do you always make everything personal?'.
But in the end, everything affects people, whether it's war or economics or human rights violations. I don't think politicians who make political decisions necessarily think about how they are going to affect people and their families.
That is why when I meet people who have been harmed by the policies of their own countries, or the policies of my country, it just makes me resolved to work harder to make the world a better place.
Cindy Sheehan, an American activist who was nicknamed the "Peace Mom" by the media for her criticism of the Iraq War, retreated from her public campaigns in 2007.The death of her son Casey, a US soldier, in a Baghdad battle in 2005 had transformed Sheehan into a public figure in the US.
But she resurfaced in Cairo last week as a member of a delegation from the Muslim American Society which is in Egypt to protest against the military trial of 40 members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood.
She spoke to Al Jazeera about her journey from peace activist to Congressional candidate, her thoughts on Iraq and her experiences in Egypt.
Al Jazeera: You first became famous for your protests against the Iraq war in August 2005, but you have not been an active anti-war figure for a while now. What happened?
Sheehan: In May 2007, I decided to quit actually being the face of the anti-war movement in America. I quit and I have not gone back to that. When I left the movement I was broke, I was tired, I was sick – literally sick and in pain.
I wanted to just totally be out of the political realm and not have anything to do with it. The establishment that runs our country just disgusted me and I was tired of it. It is very corrupt and I definitely saw that when I was focusing on anti-war activism.
The leaders of both parties work together to keep normal people out of the process. In many ways the Democratic leadership, especially in Congress, has been complicit with George Bush, the US president, in his crimes against humanity.
How can [Democratic Speaker of the House] Nancy Pelosi say unequivocally that water-boarding is torture and that Bush and [Richard] Cheney, the US vice-president, should not only be impeached but they should be charged with war crimes when in 2002 she herself was briefed on water-boarding and shown video of the rendition places where water-boarding happened?
Impeaching George Bush was a popular demand among liberal Americans at one time, but very few people talk about it anymore. Is that what turned you into an activist again?
When George Bush commuted [vice-presidential aide] Scooter Libby's sentence, the Democrats in Congress didn't do anything about it. When the Administration said they would not cooperate with subpoenas against [presidential aide] Harriet Myers, the democrats didn't do anything about it.
That's what pulled me back into activism. I thought how can they do that? How can they say 'I'm just not going to come to your stupid trial,’ and no one will say anything about it?
When the Democrats took impeachment off the table, I decided enough was enough. On July 23, 2007, I officially announced that I was running for Congress against Nancy Pelosi.
Why the focus on Nancy Pelosi?
I decided if Nancy Pelosi wasn't going to put impeachment on the table then I would run against her.
You can't take any part of the Constitution off the table, even though they have rendered it almost meaningless between George Bush and Karl Rove. Since they came to power they have institutionalised torture and spying against Americans.
They have passed the Military Commissions Act and just done away with habeas corpus. They have practically rendered it meaningless. That is why I decided to challenge Pelosi for her seat. I always say if you want change you have to vote out the enablers, and Pelosi is the biggest enabler there is.
If your new focus is on unseating Nancy Pelosi, what are you doing in Egypt?
My anti-war work evolved into work for global human rights because I saw the problem was much deeper than just George Bush.
It's about militarism and violence, globalisation and free trade.
I decided I wanted to do human rights work on behalf of people around the world who have been harmed by US imperialism.
Part of why I am here, also, is to draw attention to the parallels between the military courts here and the same kinds of courts that are being used to try detainees at Guantanamo Bay by the US.
If this becomes the standard for the world, and there is no international outcry, then everyone is in big trouble.
But what does the US have to do with a military trial in Egypt?
Egypt is a major recipient of US foreign aid, and there is no relationship between American aid and human rights.
If we [America] really want to promote democracy in this region then we cannot silence the voices of the Muslim Brotherhood because they're the moderate voice here and they are the ones who are actually working for democracy.
Do you think your presence in Egypt will have an effect on the trial?
Well, we have been doing a lot of media work since we came to Egypt and we hope this will put pressure on the Egyptian government to treat the prisoners better and to also maybe alleviate their punishment.
Hopefully we will draw some international attention to what is happening here, too, and that will help the situation.
You also went to the National Council of Women in downtown Cairo to request a meeting with Suzanne Mubarak, Egypt's First Lady. How did that go?
I didn't really understand a lot of what was going on. There was a lot of yelling in Arabic. They weren't the right people to get us a meeting with Suzanne Mubarak ... I left a letter for Madame Mubarak and they promised that she would see it.
We thought it was important to go there because there are women and children who are being harmed by having their fathers and husbands detained, so I wanted to talk to Suzanne, mother to mother.
We brought along mothers and wives of the detainees and they were actually able to file complaints, and it was really great.
Have you spoken to many of the families of the defendants in the military trial? Have you spoken to many female members of the Brotherhood mother-to-mother?
My conversations with the mothers and children of the detainees have been really emotional. They told me about the hardships [the arrests and trials] have placed on their families, from financial hardships to emotional and physical hardships.
It is very emotional for me because my family has gone through the same things since my son died. It has been really hard for us.
People always say to me, 'Cindy, why do you always make everything personal?'.
But in the end, everything affects people, whether it's war or economics or human rights violations. I don't think politicians who make political decisions necessarily think about how they are going to affect people and their families.
That is why when I meet people who have been harmed by the policies of their own countries, or the policies of my country, it just makes me resolved to work harder to make the world a better place.
Nader calls for impeachment & end to Palestine & Iraq occcupations on Meet The Press
msnbc.com, Feb. 24, 2008
MR. RUSSERT: ...Ralph Nader, welcome.
MR. RALPH NADER: Thank you.
MR. RUSSERT: Will you run for president as an independent in 2008?
MR. NADER: Let me put it in context, to make it a little more palatable to people who have closed minds. Twenty-four percent of the American people are satisfied with the state of the country, according to Gallup. That's about the lowest ranking ever. Sixty-one percent think both major parties are failing. And, according to Frank Luntz's poll, a Republican, 80 percent would consider voting for a independent this year. Now, you take that framework of people feeling locked out, shut, shut out, marginalized, disrespected and you go from Iraq to Palestine/Israel, from Enron to Wall Street, from Katrina to the bungling of the Bush administration, to the complicity of the Democrats in not stopping him on the war, stopping him on the tax cuts, getting a decent energy bill through, and you have to ask yourself, as a citizen, should we elaborate the issues that the two are not talking about? And the--all, all the candidates--McCain, Obama and Clinton--are against single payer health insurance, full Medicare for all. I'm for it, as well as millions of Americans and 59 percent of physicians in a forthcoming poll this April. People don't like Pentagon waste, a bloated military budget, all the reports in the press and in the GAO reports. A wasteful defense is a weak defense. It takes away taxpayer money that can go to the necessities of the American people. That's off the table to Obama and Clinton and McCain.
The issue of labor law reform, repealing the notorious Taft-Hartley Act that keeps workers who are now more defenseless than ever against corporate globalization from organizing to defend their interests. Cracking down on corporate crime. The media--the mainstream media repeatedly indicating how trillions of dollars have been drained and fleeced and looted from millions of workers and investors who don't have many rights these days, and pensioners. You know, when you see the paralysis of the government, when you see Washington, D.C., be corporate-occupied territory, every department agency controlled by overwhelming presence of corporate lobbyists, corporate executives in high government positions, turning the government against its own people, you--one feels an obligation, Tim, to try to open the doorways, to try to get better ballot access, to respect dissent in America in the terms of third parties and, and independent candidates; to recognize historically that great issues have come in our history against slavery and women rights to vote and worker and farmer progressives, through little parties that never ran--won any national election. Dissent is the mother of ascent. And in that context, I have decided to run for president.
MR. RUSSERT: As you know, Ralph Nader, they'll be Democrats all across the country who are going to find this very disturbing news, and they'll point again to 2000. This was the vote count. Al Gore winning the popular vote, but you've got 2.7 percent, nearly three million votes, in 2000. Then Florida, Florida, Florida. As you remember, George Bush won Florida by 537 votes. You've got 97,488. Democrat after Democrat says to this day, Ralph Nader, if your name had not been on that ballot, Al Gore would've carried Florida. Exit polls show he would've carried Nader voters 2-to-1. Gore would've been president and not George Bush. You, Ralph Nader are responsible for what has happened the last seven years.
MR. NADER: Not, not George Bush? Not the Democrats in Congress? Not the voters who voted for George Bush? But there were Democrats in Florida, 250,000 of them. You know, I wish we'd have Al Gore on this program someday Tim and ask him, "Why did you not become president in 2000?" And I think what he's going to tell you is he thought he did win Florida, but it was taken from him before, during and after the election from Tallahassee. Katherine Bush--you know the secretary of the state...
MR. RUSSERT: Katherine Harris.
MR. NADER: Harris, rather, and Jeb Bush, all the way to that terribly politicized Supreme Court decision. But the, the political bigotry that's involved here is that we shouldn't enter the electoral arena? We, all of us who, who, who think that the country needs an infusion of freedom, democracy, choice, dissent should just sit on the sidelines and watch the two parties own all the voters and turn the government over to big business? What's really important here is, if you want to look at it analytically, is there--Mr. Gore would, would tell you if he won Tennessee, anything else being equal, he would've been president. It's his home state. If he won Arkansas, everything else being equal, he would've been president. The mayor of Miami sabotaged the Democrats because of a grudge, didn't bring thousands of votes out. Quarter of a million Democrats voted for Bush in Florida. There is all kinds of thievery in Florida.
So why do they blame the Greens? Why do they blame the people all over the country who are trying to have a progressive platform, not just the environment. What was their crime? Why, why, why isn't there tolerance for candidates' rights the way there is a building tolerance over the last 50 years for voter rights? Because without voter rights, candidate rights don't mean much. And without candidate rights--more voices and choices--voter rights don't mean much. I--I'm amazed at the liberal intelligencia here. They are analytic and they deal with all kinds of variables, but when it comes to 2000 election, it's just one variable.
And I might add that Solon Simmons and other scholars--he teaches at George Mason--have shown that by pushing Gore to take more progressive stands, he got more votes than the votes he allegedly--were withdrawn from for the Green party. Twenty-five percent of my vote, according to a Democratic pollster, exit poll, would've gone to Bush. Thirty-nine percent would've gone to Gore and the rest would've stayed home. Every major--every third party in Florida got more votes than the 537 vote gap. So let's get over it and try to have a diverse multiple choice, multiple party democracy the way they have in Western Europe and Canada. This bit of, of spoiler is really very astonishing. These are the two parties who've spoiled our electoral system, money, they can't even count the votes, they steal--the Republicans steal the votes, and the Democrats knock third party candidates off the ballot. That's their specialty these days.
MR. RUSSERT: Barack Obama was asked about your announcement...
MR. NADER: Mm-hmm.
MR. RUSSERT: ...which you're going to--just made this morning on MEET THE PRESS and yesterday.
MR. NADER: Mm-hmm.
MR. RUSSERT: This is what Obama had to say. Let's watch.
(Videotape)
SEN. OBAMA: He had called me, and I think reached out to my campaign--it--my sense is that Mr. Nader is somebody who, if you don't listen and adopt all of his policies, things are not substantive. He seems to have a, a pretty high opinion of, of his, his own work. In many ways, he is a heroic figure, and I don't mean to diminish him. But I do think there's a sense now that, you know, if, if somebody's not hewing to the Ralph Nader agenda, then you, you must be lacking in some way.
(End videotape)
MR. NADER: Well, first of all, compare my Web site, votenader.org, and all the issues that Mr. Obama and Senator Clinton and Mr. McCain are not addressing that are supported by a majority of the American people. A majority of the American people support these issues. They want foreign and military policy not to just be an aggressive military situation.
But Senator Obama is a person of substance. He's also the first liberal evangelist in a long time. He's run a brilliant tactical campaign. But his better instincts and his knowledge have been censored by himself. And I give you the example, the Palestinian-Israeli issue, which is a real off the table issue for the candidates. So don't touch that, even though it's central to our security and to, to the situation in the Middle East. He was pro-Palestinian when he was in Illinois before he ran for the state Senate, during he ran--during the state Senate. Now he's, he's supporting the Israeli destruction of the tiny section called Gaza with a million and a half people. He doesn't have any sympathy for a civilian death ratio of about 300-to-1; 300 Palestinians to one Israeli. He's not taking a leadership position in supporting the Israeli peace movement, which represents former Cabinet ministers, people in the Knesset, former generals, former security officials, in addition to mayors and leading intellectuals. One would think he would at least say, "Let's have a hearing for the Israeli peace movement in the Congress," so we don't just have a monotone support of the Israeli government's attitude toward the Palestinians and their illegal occupation of Palestine.
MR. RUSSERT: But would you prefer, as an American citizen, to have Barack Obama or John McCain as president?
MR. NADER: What I prefer as an American citizen?
MR. RUSSERT: Yes.
MR. NADER: You're asking me? I'm running for president, for heaven's sake.
MR. RUSSERT: But as a citizen.
MR. NADER: I would prefer that the American people organize, that whoever is in president--is president, they give that person backbone.
MR. RUSSERT: How would you feel, however, if Ralph Nader's presence on the ballot tilted Florida or Ohio to John McCain and McCain became president, and Barack Obama, the first African-American who had been nominated by the Democratic Party--this is hypothetical--did not become a president and people turned to you and said, "Nader, you've done it again"?
MR. NADER: Not a chance. If the Democrats can't landslide the Republicans this year, they ought to just wrap up, close down, emerge in a different form. You think the American people are going to vote for a pro-war John McCain who almost gives an indication that he's the candidate of perpetual war, perpetual intervention overseas? You think they're going to vote for a Republican like McCain, who allies himself with the criminal, recidivistic regime of George Bush and Dick Cheney, the most multipliable impeachable presidency in American history? Many leading members of the bar, including the former head of the American Bar Association, Michael Greco, absolutely dismayed over the violations of the Constitution, our federal laws, the criminal, illegal war in Iraq and the occupation? There's no way. That's why we have to take this opportunity to have a much broader debate on the issues that relate to the American people, as, as, as a fellow in Long Island said recently, Mr. Sloane, he said, "These parties aren't speaking to me. They're not speaking to my problems, to my family's problems."
MR. RUSSERT: But you do see differences between Barack Obama and John McCain on the war, on tax cuts, on the environment, on a lot of issues?
MR. NADER: Yeah. There are differences, obviously. The question is not whether their differences verbally or what they put on their Web site, the question is what is their record? Senator Obama's record has not been a challenging one. He's not been a Senator Wellstone or Senator Abourezk or Senator Metzenbaum by any means. He has leaned, if anything, more toward the pro-corporate side of, of policymaking. The issue is, do they have the moral courage? Do they have the fortitude to stand up against the corporate powers and get things done? Yes, get things done for the American people?
1950, President Truman proposed universal health care. We still don't have it. We have the worst tax system, perverse incentives that rewards the speculators on Wall Street. Why aren't we taxing speculation on Wall Street instead of heavily taxing human labor and sales taxing necessities like food and appliances and furniture and clothing? There's no debate on this. William Hartung, the independent military analyst, wrote an article the other day saying there's no debate on the bloated military budget, on how best to defend this country without breaking the federal budget and putting huge deficits on the backs of our children and their grandchildren. We need to shift the power from the few to the many. And always in American history, every social justice movement was a shift of power from the few to the many. Maybe the slogan should be "Power to the babies."
MR. RUSSERT: On Wednesday it's your birthday. Happy birthday.
MR. NADER: Thank you.
MR. RUSSERT: You'll be 74 years old. You would be the oldest man ever elected president of the United States. You're older than John McCain.
MR. NADER: Thank you very much, Tim. I really like that.
MR. RUSSERT: It's an issue that has been discussed about John McCain, and I'm presenting it to you.
MR. NADER: First of all, I thought David Letterman was very unfair in the way he made fun of John McCain's age. Very, very--I mean, really overboard. I mean, humor has no limits, obviously. But second, someone once said the only true aging is the erosion of one's ideals, and I want the people out there just to look at our Web site and see how exciting it's going to be. I've been assured by my computer/Internet literate associates--I grew up in the Underwood typewriter age, you know--that this is going to be the most exciting, informative, participatory Web site of any presidential campaign, votenader.org. And on that Web site now, Tim, is a declaration that we will receive no money from commercial interests, no money from political action committees, only from individuals. And I'll take it from any individuals--Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, independent, Green party. And, and we are very frugal. They've labeled me Mr. Frugal, my, my associates. We know how to use it. None of this huge waste on political consultants who have really messed up Hillary Clinton's campaign.
MR. RUSSERT: You heard Barack Obama say that in many ways, you're a heroic figure. You were first on MEET THE PRESS in 1966, you said that you would never run for elective office back then. This is your third run for the presidency. Are you concerned now, when people look back at Ralph Nader, they'll consider him the Wendell Willkie of his generation, someone who kept running and running for president with no chance of winning, which will diminish the legacy that you tried to carve out as a consumer advocate.
MR. NADER: No, Tim. My concern doesn't proceed from that. I came to Washington over 40 years ago to help improve my country and, and started a lot of citizen groups who did that. That was a time you had a hearing in Congress, regulatory agencies like the Food and Drug Administration would be more responsive--Auto Safety Agency, EPA. That's a time Nixon, because he heard the rumble of the people, and he was the last president to really fear liberals enough to change his position, signed OSHA, signed EPA, had a health plan that he didn't really believe in, had a minimum income plan to abolish poverty, and then it started. Around 1979, the doors started closing on the citizen groups. So my concern, Tim, comes from, to give you statistics quickly, 58,000 workers who die every year from work-related diseases and trauma on the job; 65,000 people according to EPA who die from air pollution; over 100,000 people who die from adverse effects of medicines; 250 people a day who die from hospital-induced infections; and all the fraud, waste and abuse that's eating at the heart of the family budget, aggravating them. They can't get answers to their questions. They're thrown into huge debt. Now they're losing their houses while White House--while Wall Street speculators laugh all the way to the bank. That's where my concern comes from. And I hope it's shared by a lot of people around the country. I hope a lot of people will be gathered around the country to establish Congress watchdogs in every district, a thousand people--we want to hear from very congressional district--to show the American people how easy it is to turn the Congress around if people are organized. Fifteen hundred corporations get their way by--from a majority of 535 members of Congress. We're millions of people out there, and we simply have to, for the sake of our children and grandchildren, and the state of our nation in the world, we have to mobilize in that manner, and that's what that, that Web site is all about. It's not just a Web site. It's a gathering center, votenader.org.
MR. RUSSERT: Ralph Nader, we thank you very much for joining us, making your announcement and sharing your views.
MR. NADER: Thank you very much, Tim. Thank you.
MR. RUSSERT: ...Ralph Nader, welcome.
MR. RALPH NADER: Thank you.
MR. RUSSERT: Will you run for president as an independent in 2008?
MR. NADER: Let me put it in context, to make it a little more palatable to people who have closed minds. Twenty-four percent of the American people are satisfied with the state of the country, according to Gallup. That's about the lowest ranking ever. Sixty-one percent think both major parties are failing. And, according to Frank Luntz's poll, a Republican, 80 percent would consider voting for a independent this year. Now, you take that framework of people feeling locked out, shut, shut out, marginalized, disrespected and you go from Iraq to Palestine/Israel, from Enron to Wall Street, from Katrina to the bungling of the Bush administration, to the complicity of the Democrats in not stopping him on the war, stopping him on the tax cuts, getting a decent energy bill through, and you have to ask yourself, as a citizen, should we elaborate the issues that the two are not talking about? And the--all, all the candidates--McCain, Obama and Clinton--are against single payer health insurance, full Medicare for all. I'm for it, as well as millions of Americans and 59 percent of physicians in a forthcoming poll this April. People don't like Pentagon waste, a bloated military budget, all the reports in the press and in the GAO reports. A wasteful defense is a weak defense. It takes away taxpayer money that can go to the necessities of the American people. That's off the table to Obama and Clinton and McCain.
The issue of labor law reform, repealing the notorious Taft-Hartley Act that keeps workers who are now more defenseless than ever against corporate globalization from organizing to defend their interests. Cracking down on corporate crime. The media--the mainstream media repeatedly indicating how trillions of dollars have been drained and fleeced and looted from millions of workers and investors who don't have many rights these days, and pensioners. You know, when you see the paralysis of the government, when you see Washington, D.C., be corporate-occupied territory, every department agency controlled by overwhelming presence of corporate lobbyists, corporate executives in high government positions, turning the government against its own people, you--one feels an obligation, Tim, to try to open the doorways, to try to get better ballot access, to respect dissent in America in the terms of third parties and, and independent candidates; to recognize historically that great issues have come in our history against slavery and women rights to vote and worker and farmer progressives, through little parties that never ran--won any national election. Dissent is the mother of ascent. And in that context, I have decided to run for president.
MR. RUSSERT: As you know, Ralph Nader, they'll be Democrats all across the country who are going to find this very disturbing news, and they'll point again to 2000. This was the vote count. Al Gore winning the popular vote, but you've got 2.7 percent, nearly three million votes, in 2000. Then Florida, Florida, Florida. As you remember, George Bush won Florida by 537 votes. You've got 97,488. Democrat after Democrat says to this day, Ralph Nader, if your name had not been on that ballot, Al Gore would've carried Florida. Exit polls show he would've carried Nader voters 2-to-1. Gore would've been president and not George Bush. You, Ralph Nader are responsible for what has happened the last seven years.
MR. NADER: Not, not George Bush? Not the Democrats in Congress? Not the voters who voted for George Bush? But there were Democrats in Florida, 250,000 of them. You know, I wish we'd have Al Gore on this program someday Tim and ask him, "Why did you not become president in 2000?" And I think what he's going to tell you is he thought he did win Florida, but it was taken from him before, during and after the election from Tallahassee. Katherine Bush--you know the secretary of the state...
MR. RUSSERT: Katherine Harris.
MR. NADER: Harris, rather, and Jeb Bush, all the way to that terribly politicized Supreme Court decision. But the, the political bigotry that's involved here is that we shouldn't enter the electoral arena? We, all of us who, who, who think that the country needs an infusion of freedom, democracy, choice, dissent should just sit on the sidelines and watch the two parties own all the voters and turn the government over to big business? What's really important here is, if you want to look at it analytically, is there--Mr. Gore would, would tell you if he won Tennessee, anything else being equal, he would've been president. It's his home state. If he won Arkansas, everything else being equal, he would've been president. The mayor of Miami sabotaged the Democrats because of a grudge, didn't bring thousands of votes out. Quarter of a million Democrats voted for Bush in Florida. There is all kinds of thievery in Florida.
So why do they blame the Greens? Why do they blame the people all over the country who are trying to have a progressive platform, not just the environment. What was their crime? Why, why, why isn't there tolerance for candidates' rights the way there is a building tolerance over the last 50 years for voter rights? Because without voter rights, candidate rights don't mean much. And without candidate rights--more voices and choices--voter rights don't mean much. I--I'm amazed at the liberal intelligencia here. They are analytic and they deal with all kinds of variables, but when it comes to 2000 election, it's just one variable.
And I might add that Solon Simmons and other scholars--he teaches at George Mason--have shown that by pushing Gore to take more progressive stands, he got more votes than the votes he allegedly--were withdrawn from for the Green party. Twenty-five percent of my vote, according to a Democratic pollster, exit poll, would've gone to Bush. Thirty-nine percent would've gone to Gore and the rest would've stayed home. Every major--every third party in Florida got more votes than the 537 vote gap. So let's get over it and try to have a diverse multiple choice, multiple party democracy the way they have in Western Europe and Canada. This bit of, of spoiler is really very astonishing. These are the two parties who've spoiled our electoral system, money, they can't even count the votes, they steal--the Republicans steal the votes, and the Democrats knock third party candidates off the ballot. That's their specialty these days.
MR. RUSSERT: Barack Obama was asked about your announcement...
MR. NADER: Mm-hmm.
MR. RUSSERT: ...which you're going to--just made this morning on MEET THE PRESS and yesterday.
MR. NADER: Mm-hmm.
MR. RUSSERT: This is what Obama had to say. Let's watch.
(Videotape)
SEN. OBAMA: He had called me, and I think reached out to my campaign--it--my sense is that Mr. Nader is somebody who, if you don't listen and adopt all of his policies, things are not substantive. He seems to have a, a pretty high opinion of, of his, his own work. In many ways, he is a heroic figure, and I don't mean to diminish him. But I do think there's a sense now that, you know, if, if somebody's not hewing to the Ralph Nader agenda, then you, you must be lacking in some way.
(End videotape)
MR. NADER: Well, first of all, compare my Web site, votenader.org, and all the issues that Mr. Obama and Senator Clinton and Mr. McCain are not addressing that are supported by a majority of the American people. A majority of the American people support these issues. They want foreign and military policy not to just be an aggressive military situation.
But Senator Obama is a person of substance. He's also the first liberal evangelist in a long time. He's run a brilliant tactical campaign. But his better instincts and his knowledge have been censored by himself. And I give you the example, the Palestinian-Israeli issue, which is a real off the table issue for the candidates. So don't touch that, even though it's central to our security and to, to the situation in the Middle East. He was pro-Palestinian when he was in Illinois before he ran for the state Senate, during he ran--during the state Senate. Now he's, he's supporting the Israeli destruction of the tiny section called Gaza with a million and a half people. He doesn't have any sympathy for a civilian death ratio of about 300-to-1; 300 Palestinians to one Israeli. He's not taking a leadership position in supporting the Israeli peace movement, which represents former Cabinet ministers, people in the Knesset, former generals, former security officials, in addition to mayors and leading intellectuals. One would think he would at least say, "Let's have a hearing for the Israeli peace movement in the Congress," so we don't just have a monotone support of the Israeli government's attitude toward the Palestinians and their illegal occupation of Palestine.
MR. RUSSERT: But would you prefer, as an American citizen, to have Barack Obama or John McCain as president?
MR. NADER: What I prefer as an American citizen?
MR. RUSSERT: Yes.
MR. NADER: You're asking me? I'm running for president, for heaven's sake.
MR. RUSSERT: But as a citizen.
MR. NADER: I would prefer that the American people organize, that whoever is in president--is president, they give that person backbone.
MR. RUSSERT: How would you feel, however, if Ralph Nader's presence on the ballot tilted Florida or Ohio to John McCain and McCain became president, and Barack Obama, the first African-American who had been nominated by the Democratic Party--this is hypothetical--did not become a president and people turned to you and said, "Nader, you've done it again"?
MR. NADER: Not a chance. If the Democrats can't landslide the Republicans this year, they ought to just wrap up, close down, emerge in a different form. You think the American people are going to vote for a pro-war John McCain who almost gives an indication that he's the candidate of perpetual war, perpetual intervention overseas? You think they're going to vote for a Republican like McCain, who allies himself with the criminal, recidivistic regime of George Bush and Dick Cheney, the most multipliable impeachable presidency in American history? Many leading members of the bar, including the former head of the American Bar Association, Michael Greco, absolutely dismayed over the violations of the Constitution, our federal laws, the criminal, illegal war in Iraq and the occupation? There's no way. That's why we have to take this opportunity to have a much broader debate on the issues that relate to the American people, as, as, as a fellow in Long Island said recently, Mr. Sloane, he said, "These parties aren't speaking to me. They're not speaking to my problems, to my family's problems."
MR. RUSSERT: But you do see differences between Barack Obama and John McCain on the war, on tax cuts, on the environment, on a lot of issues?
MR. NADER: Yeah. There are differences, obviously. The question is not whether their differences verbally or what they put on their Web site, the question is what is their record? Senator Obama's record has not been a challenging one. He's not been a Senator Wellstone or Senator Abourezk or Senator Metzenbaum by any means. He has leaned, if anything, more toward the pro-corporate side of, of policymaking. The issue is, do they have the moral courage? Do they have the fortitude to stand up against the corporate powers and get things done? Yes, get things done for the American people?
1950, President Truman proposed universal health care. We still don't have it. We have the worst tax system, perverse incentives that rewards the speculators on Wall Street. Why aren't we taxing speculation on Wall Street instead of heavily taxing human labor and sales taxing necessities like food and appliances and furniture and clothing? There's no debate on this. William Hartung, the independent military analyst, wrote an article the other day saying there's no debate on the bloated military budget, on how best to defend this country without breaking the federal budget and putting huge deficits on the backs of our children and their grandchildren. We need to shift the power from the few to the many. And always in American history, every social justice movement was a shift of power from the few to the many. Maybe the slogan should be "Power to the babies."
MR. RUSSERT: On Wednesday it's your birthday. Happy birthday.
MR. NADER: Thank you.
MR. RUSSERT: You'll be 74 years old. You would be the oldest man ever elected president of the United States. You're older than John McCain.
MR. NADER: Thank you very much, Tim. I really like that.
MR. RUSSERT: It's an issue that has been discussed about John McCain, and I'm presenting it to you.
MR. NADER: First of all, I thought David Letterman was very unfair in the way he made fun of John McCain's age. Very, very--I mean, really overboard. I mean, humor has no limits, obviously. But second, someone once said the only true aging is the erosion of one's ideals, and I want the people out there just to look at our Web site and see how exciting it's going to be. I've been assured by my computer/Internet literate associates--I grew up in the Underwood typewriter age, you know--that this is going to be the most exciting, informative, participatory Web site of any presidential campaign, votenader.org. And on that Web site now, Tim, is a declaration that we will receive no money from commercial interests, no money from political action committees, only from individuals. And I'll take it from any individuals--Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, independent, Green party. And, and we are very frugal. They've labeled me Mr. Frugal, my, my associates. We know how to use it. None of this huge waste on political consultants who have really messed up Hillary Clinton's campaign.
MR. RUSSERT: You heard Barack Obama say that in many ways, you're a heroic figure. You were first on MEET THE PRESS in 1966, you said that you would never run for elective office back then. This is your third run for the presidency. Are you concerned now, when people look back at Ralph Nader, they'll consider him the Wendell Willkie of his generation, someone who kept running and running for president with no chance of winning, which will diminish the legacy that you tried to carve out as a consumer advocate.
MR. NADER: No, Tim. My concern doesn't proceed from that. I came to Washington over 40 years ago to help improve my country and, and started a lot of citizen groups who did that. That was a time you had a hearing in Congress, regulatory agencies like the Food and Drug Administration would be more responsive--Auto Safety Agency, EPA. That's a time Nixon, because he heard the rumble of the people, and he was the last president to really fear liberals enough to change his position, signed OSHA, signed EPA, had a health plan that he didn't really believe in, had a minimum income plan to abolish poverty, and then it started. Around 1979, the doors started closing on the citizen groups. So my concern, Tim, comes from, to give you statistics quickly, 58,000 workers who die every year from work-related diseases and trauma on the job; 65,000 people according to EPA who die from air pollution; over 100,000 people who die from adverse effects of medicines; 250 people a day who die from hospital-induced infections; and all the fraud, waste and abuse that's eating at the heart of the family budget, aggravating them. They can't get answers to their questions. They're thrown into huge debt. Now they're losing their houses while White House--while Wall Street speculators laugh all the way to the bank. That's where my concern comes from. And I hope it's shared by a lot of people around the country. I hope a lot of people will be gathered around the country to establish Congress watchdogs in every district, a thousand people--we want to hear from very congressional district--to show the American people how easy it is to turn the Congress around if people are organized. Fifteen hundred corporations get their way by--from a majority of 535 members of Congress. We're millions of people out there, and we simply have to, for the sake of our children and grandchildren, and the state of our nation in the world, we have to mobilize in that manner, and that's what that, that Web site is all about. It's not just a Web site. It's a gathering center, votenader.org.
MR. RUSSERT: Ralph Nader, we thank you very much for joining us, making your announcement and sharing your views.
MR. NADER: Thank you very much, Tim. Thank you.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)