July 31: Impeachment Coalition Taking Shape - American Freedom Campaign Launching

[Hissyspit]

http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=466

Impeachment Coalition Taking Shape
by: Matt Stoller
Sun Jul 29, 2007 at 02:30:39 AM EDT

The New York Times calls for Gonzales's impeachment. Chuck Schumer admits error on Alito, and calls for a special prosecutor to investigate AG Gonzales. Iraq is getting worse, and new strange allegations about Bush's spying program are emerging (and that's not including all the other criminal acts, Scooter Libby, reconstruction theft, etc). We're on a road that leads only to one place to the removal of an illegitimate and overreaching executive.

- snip -

This is why elite opinion is so important. Without that, these groups won't move on impeachment, because their resources - which could be used to insure poor kids - will be wasted. So the shifting of elite opinion, or at least the signs of it, are significant. Josh Marshall echoes elite opinion with this standard argument:

Without going into all the specifics, I think we are now moving into a situation where the White House, on various fronts, is openly ignoring the constitution, acting as though not just the law but the constitution itself, which is the fundamental law from which all the statutes gain their force and legitimacy, doesn't apply to them. If that is allowed to continue, the defiance will congeal into precedent. And the whole structure of our system of government will be permanently changed. Whether because of prudence and pragmatism or mere intellectual inertia, I still have the same opinion on the big question: impeachment. But I think we're moving on to dangerous ground right now, more so than some of us realize. And I'm less sure now under these circumstances that operating by rules of 'normal politics' is justifiable or acquits us of our duty to our country.

It is now conventional wisdom among elite mainstream and liberal pundits that Bush deserves impeachment, but that it 'can't' happen. That they won't write this is to their discredit, but hey, that's punditocracy for you. With Schumer and co. openly being laughed at by Gonzales, pressure is building in Congress as well to do something. Iraq is going to get worse, the conflicts are becoming uglier, and we're going to see more bitter fights over spending bills in the Senate.

Aside from elite opinion shifts, there's now a recognition that legitimacy in our political system needs an organized coalition to defend it. On Tuesday, there's a press call for this new coalition.

The Center for Constitutional Rights, Human Rights Watch, MoveOn.org and others are joining together to launch a campaign to help citizens defend democracy. The American Freedom Campaign (AFC), which will be launched with a teleconference call on Tuesday, July 31, is an online and offline effort to build grassroots support to restore checks and balances and reverse abuses of power by the executive branch.

A variety of pieces are snapping into place to have a real fight over Bush's future. I can imagine many ways that this plays out. When Bush refuses to heed Congress on a withdrawal bill, or should he attack Iran, it's going to come to a head. Essentially, Bush has figured out that he can govern by vetoing everything he doesn't like and refusing to obey the law. That's putting immense pressure on Democrats, who are being pushed to 'get something done' while having to deal with someone that will not sign anything that is not exactly what he wants. That's just not a stable situation.

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[bonito]

1. Good article

It couldn't happen soon enough.

[porphyrian]

2. Ugh, it's watching a train wreck in slow motion and it's killing me. - n/t

[Peace Patriot]

3. Bush/Cheney are acting exactly as if Pelosi had told them:

"You don't attack Iran, we won't impeach--and get rid of Rumsfeld."

Carte blanche to cover up their many crimes by stonewalling all Congressional subpoenas. They act like they have a "get out of jail free" card. One could figure they've got martial law in their back pocket, OR, one could figure that someone bargained away impeachment on Day One after the '06 elections put the House gavel in Pelosi's hand.

Then, Pelosi immediately went over to the Middle East, in a highly publicized trip, in the midst of the British sailors' capture crisis, to deliver the word to whoever she thought should know (she visited Israel and Syria, and others): attack on Iran is off.

I think this is a pretty good guess at what happened. It has a big upside--we don't start WW III. But it has one current downside, and several potentially serious long term downsides. The current downside is that the American people were not invited to the "table" that impeachment was taken off of. Combined with electronic voting machines, run on "trade secret," proprietary programming code, owned and controlled by rightwing Bushite corporations, it puts another nail in the coffin of our democracy. But then, the invention of the A-bomb may have done that six decades ago (presidential power to extinguish all life on earth--democracy cannot survive God-like power of the Executive). Long term, the War/Corporate Democratic plan may be to get some more ducks in a row before attacking Iran. Right now, China, Russia, India and others may have threatened to retaliate (economically, maybe even militarily), there aren't enough U.S. troops (need a Draft), Bush/Cheney have zero diplomatic credit to pull it off, and the American people have not been sufficiently kneecapped and waterboarded to quietly go along.

But the "fire" that the Democrats are playing with--IF this what is really going on--is that, after various shit piles hit various fans, under whichever Democratic "candidate" Diebold/ES&S decides to okay for the White House--such as U.S. economic meltdown, bread-lines, pension system collapse, Iraq vets and old grannies in wheelchairs getting teargassed, a couple more cities getting drowned or fried by the global warming we have done nothing about for six and a half years, gas hitting $20 a gallon, and...well, write your own U.S. internal Armageddon...we are then in "history repeats itself" mode, re Germany 1930. And guess what? Whoever "rises to power" in 2012, on the swell of all this impending chaos, has all sorts of handy Executive Orders and other precedents, pioneered by Bush/Cheney--none of which a Diebold/ES&S-selected president and congress will condemn, disavow, undo and rip to shreds before Jefferson's "altar of God," such as...

indefinite detention without charge
torture
confiscation of dissenters' property
total secrecy
the "unitary executive" (the president IS the law)
president decides who is an "enemy combatant"
pervasive domestic spying with no court review
corporate privatization of everything (fascism)
Guantanamo Bay (offshoring political prisoners)
outing CIA agents, i.e., punishing insider dissent is ok
huge military budget
huge "homeland security" budget
government establishment of religion
no fly lists (freedom to travel curtailed)
Congress a lapdog to the Executive
the press monopolized by fascist billionaires
the courts packed with Bushite fascist judges

Make your own list. All sitting there, waiting for the new Great Leader to "save us" from ruin.

Notice they are NOT undoing these horrible "laws" and precedents, nor are they acting to re-establish Congress as an equal branch of government, or to restore the "Fairness Doctrine" to our public airwaves.

Notice, in particular, how they completely agreed to "trade secret" vote counting by rightwing Bushite corporations.

That's what I mean by potential long term downsides to making "deals" with the likes of Bush and Cheney. This fascist coup is not over, and will not be over even if a Democrat is 'elected' next year, unless these precedents are smashed, our rights restored, and the "rule of law" enforced. They WILL be back. And, while I can sympathize with the dilemma that Pelosi and other leaders may have been facing--trying to forestall external Armageddon (if that's what occurred)--and I don't know what I would have done, in the same spot--I think that the answer is to restore democracy, not sign its death warrant.