A GRIM Report

Guest Post by Alan McSurely

Since the press reported the massive unconstitutional domestic spying program of President Bush and Vice President Cheney 2 months ago, a spontaneous grass roots impeachment movement has taken off. One poll showed over 53% of the American people favored an impeachment investigation, over 90% of African Americans were for such an investigation, and over 24% Republicans. This belief that our two leaders have committed crimes is well grounded. The men lied to Congress to give them authority to invade a sovereign nation. Their intentional lies, mixed with their massive ignorance of the Iraqi nation and stumblebum incompetence in handling basic governmental functions has led to the murderous mayhem in Iraq that has destroyed the Nation's leaders, its culture, and tens of thousands of its children. This is a high crime.

The carefully constructed plausible deniability of Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfield about U.S. intelligence forces torture program has been blown. They knew about, permitted, and ratified the most cruel and unusual punishments of prisoners including tying prisoners to waterboards for faked drownings, mocking prisoner's sexual mores and religious beliefs, and other cruelties that have been photographed and shown to the world. They have ordered prisoners held for years without hearings or charges. These acts have been outlawed by every civilized society, including the U.S. for centuries. Bush knew the poor Black neighborhoods of New Orleans would be wiped out when the dams broke. Bush fiddled on his Texas farm while Black people drowned. Intentional failure to provide equal protection to all citizens is a constitutional violation. These are high crimes.

Bush/Cheney set up a massive spying program that was specifically prohibited by the 4th Amendment and the Foreign Intelligence Security Act (FISA) after the unconstitutional abuses of the FBI, CIA, NSA, and the Defense Intelligence Agencies were exposed in the 1970´s Watergate inquiries. It is such a blatant violation that Republican Senators are trying to blunt the impeachment movement by talking about retroactively making the violations legal. This far-fetched fig-leaf will draw more attention to the impeachable crimes they have already committed.

If such convincing evidence were presented to a competent law enforcement official, prosecuting attorney, grand jury, or probable cause Judge, they would quickly file charges and set the trial date. Taken together the lies, spies, torture and ethnic cleansing in New Orleans is overwhelming. This is the basis for the grass roots impeachment movement.

BUSH AND CHENEY HAVE BEEN CAUGHT BLUFFING

Like poker players who have been caught cheating and who have nothing in the hole, Bush and Cheney's initial reaction is to bluff some more. Bush's handlers send him out to his vetted daily photo opportunities where he tries to impersonate his hero, Ronald Reagan, acting like his hero, the Marlboro Man. But as people jump his right wing ship daily, Bush's personal insecurities are beginning to take over. Compare his facial expressions when he lies now with how he acted say, six months ago. His frat boy cockiness covers a very short fuse.

As Scooter Libby can begin to hear the jail doors clanging, he and his lawyers are implying that Cheney directed Libby to out a CIA agent Cheney didn't like. This stressful news was on the Sunday morning talk shows two weeks ago, but Cheney got as far away from D.C. as possible, to a beer party at a Texas ranch with old friends. He was so relaxed he shot a friend in a bright orange coat about 30 yards away on Saturday about 5 p.m. Instead of reporting this shooting immediately, so he could be given a breathalyzer and the forensic and other material evidence could be preserved, law enforcement and the public were not given any facts until after the Sunday morning talk shows and the alcohol were past/passed. Cheney's psychological state was revealed by his hostess. She said her first thought, when she saw Cheney's secret service detail rushing toward him, was that Cheney had suffered a heart attack. Bush and Cheney´s psychological state is not our concern. Their corporate sponsors will pay for empathetic handlers to approach them with golden parachutes, as they did with Nixon when his lies and crimes became evident to everyone but himself.

The task of the Grass Roots Impeachment Movement (GRIM) is to make it clear to every politician, Republican and Democratic, that the criminal acts of Bush/Cheney must be tried quickly in the U.S. Senate. For this trial to take place, 218 members of the House of Representatives must file charges against them. We are working on the one member we have some control over, Cong. David Price.

AN INTERIM REPORT

The Carrboro Forum: Starting from scratch in mid-January, we held an overwhelmingly successful forum, ¨The Case for Impeachment¨ in Carrboro in late January. At the close of the presentations, Carrboro Alderman to be, Dan Coleman, asked the crowd of over 140 how many supported asking Cong. Price to be a sponsor of House Bill 635, that calls for a Congressional investigation leading toward impeachment. Practically everyone raised their hands, except for the two members of Cong. Price´s staff who were there. Coleman then asked how many people would support a candidate to run against him, if Price refused to sponsor the impeachment bill. Practically everyone raised their hand again.

1st Price Meeting: The following week, a dozen people who had attended the Carrboro forum met with Cong. Price and the two staffers who had briefed him on our agenda. He implied the impeachment demand was not “middle America” and said he was interested in requesting a special prosecutor, like Clinton had agreed to Kenneth Starr, to investigate Bush´s acts. Price said he got the idea from Al Gore´s recent speech. We asked him pointblank whether he would become the first white Southerner to sponsor Cong. John Conyers´ bill that had about 10 sponsors then. Price asked whether Cong. Mel Watt had signed it. (No.) Shortly after our meeting, Price and Watt had a meeting with a predominantly Black group at the N.C. Mutual Building in Durham. Watt said he thought talk about impeachment was premature. Professor emeritus Chuck Stone polled the crowd as to whether they favored impeachment and about half raised their hands. Stone chided the rest for being timid.

2nd Price Meeting: We met with Price again last week. He showed us a letter that he and another member had written Bush, asking him to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate himself. We asked, incredulously, did he think Bush would respond? He said no. We again asked him to sponsor the Impeachment Investigation Bill, which now has over 25 sponsors. The only southern sponsors are two Black members from Georgia, John Lewis (the “conscience of the House”) and Cynthia McKinney. We also suggested he and like-minded Members hold hearings throughout the South to educate the people about the crimes and the need for impeachment. He implied he believed coming out openly for impeachment hearings now would marginalize us. We left agreeing that there are many approaches to this constitutional crisis.

Other Developments

Mr. Kent Kanoy, from Carrboro, who works at Duke, filed in the Democratic Primary and is carrying the Impeachment Banner proudly. The Primary is May 2nd. According to experts, about 20,000 votes will carry the Democratic primary.

The first counterattack from Rove to the national Impeachment Movement is that the more we ¨extremists¨ talk Impeachment, the more it will mobilize the Republican right wing base for the off-year election. If every time Rove trots out one of his dirty tricks we play into it, we should hang it up.

We present the Case for Impeachment on Tuesday, February 28th at 7 p.m. at Chapel Hill Town Hall. Michelle Cotton Laws and Rev. Robert Seymour will participate, along with Prof. Dan Pollitt and myself. We will be announcing the formation of GRIM, and asking for your help to build the Movement.

Issues: 

Comments

"Nothing to see here, move along, move along..."

So, in your world Paul, it's better to not call for an accounting for all the many crimes of the Bush administration - to set a new historical standard rewarding corruption, crimes, Constitutional infringements - all so the Dems can retake the House?

And if the Dems retake the House? Will Price and his brethren use that subpeona power to root out the corruption, the criminals or will their fear of a being accused of "partisan vendettas" stay their hand?

I like Conyer's H.R. 635, which calls for an investigation of "the Administration's intent to go to war before congressional authorization, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, encouraging and countenancing torture, retaliating against critics", with the possibility of impeachment. Sounds reasonable.

I would expect that, when the Dems get the House, they whole-heartedly support HR635 but, based on the last 6 years, I don't hold out a lot of hope.

You've heard the financial commercials - "past performance doesn't guarantee of future results" - so maybe I should give those "who are fighting to help Democrats take over the House again a break."

As David Marshall likes to quote "Esse Quam Videri".

We'll see.

BTW, I think playing rhetorical whack-a-mole with your party's friendly critics is a poor strategy for folks want to win back the trust of the general public.

Will, first things first.

Unless and until we take back the House, there is nothing we can do that isn't just "mental masturbation."

An yes, I do think that Dems will use the supenoa power to hold hearings if we get the House back and they should.

But until we do, we are wasting time with something that will go nowhere.

Will it make us feel better? Probably. Bush is the worst President in the history of the US and having him out would please me immensely.

But, pray tell, would President Cheney be much better?

And what, again pray tell, is "whack-a-mole?"

And I just read Mark's comments again.

Please tell where the "friendly" criticism of the Democrats is in his post, 'cuz I certainly don't see it.

Whack-a-Mole is a busy arcade game at the State Fair. When a mole pokes its head out of a hole, you whack it down with a mallet. Perfect metaphor in this context.

So, I guess that Mark is the mole and I'm the "whacker".

Fair enough. I whacked him.

At the beginning of this thread, Al posted that over half of Americans wanted impeachment proceedings to begin. I looked for a poll when that was posted and couldn't find any, but one did just come out and shows what I thought, which is that the majority DO NOT want impeachemnt.

Before I post it, I should say it was taken for FOX News by Opinion Dynamics and I know that may make it suspect in minds of some of you. However, consider that the same FOX poll has Bush's JA at 38%, consistent with other recent polls, so I do think this poll is valid, or at least as valid as any other national poll from a reputable polling firm.

Here is the question: "Regardless of how you plan to vote, if the Democrats win this year's congressional elections do you think it would be right for them to try to impeach President Bush over the Iraq war and weapons of mass destruction, or not?"

Right/Not Right/DKDC

ALL registered voters 30 62 7
Democrats 48 43 9
Republicans 9 88 3
Independents 31 60 9

Pretty clear, at least again from one poll only, that Americans DO NOT want impeachment at this point.

That doesn't mean it isn't warranted and doesn't mean there shouldn't be an investigation, there should be, IMHO. But at least for now, talk of impeachment seems premature to the voters.

Sorry, I should have posted that Al said that 53% wanted impeachment investigation to begin, not proceedings.

My bad. Sorry about that.

However, my point that the voters are in no mood for impeachment at this point is still valid, I believe, judge for yourself given the above poll results.

Well, Paul, despite the limited nature of the question, we can at least draw a couple of conclusions.

It looks like 48% of Democrats favor impeachment. So roughly half of the Democratic voters are out-of-touch with the real world of politics.

Also, it looks like the poll possibly quantified the relative number of "progressive" Democrats like yourself. it appears to be the 43% who oppose impeachment.

We could be looking at the first two woman ticket for President in U.S. history - Hillary Clinton (Rupert Murdoch's new Foxy Lady) with Alice in Wonderland as her running mate.

Well, that's still less than half the Democrats, Mark and only 3 in 10 Independents.

That's hardly broad-based support.

Nixon got impeached because Independents and Republicans became convinced it was merited on the facts, not on our wishes.

Bush may rise to that level too. But he hasn't yet, at least not in the minds of Independents, or even a majority of Democrats.

I know that the opinions of average voters don't matter to you, since you have those stone tablets under your desk with all the world's wisdom etched on them. We mere mortals lack such, so please indulge us.

I think the best thing we progressives can do is to try to elect a progressive President like Russ Feingold in 2008 and forget impeachment, at least for now.

Paul,

The main thing that i keep thinking is, if there is this much support for impeachment in a total leadership void, what would be the support if we had prominent national leadership who focused on the obvious crimes that have been committed?

I think it is absolutely phenomenal that so many citizens recognize that crimes have been committed when both wings of our national political party and the entire mainstream media continue to assert that evrything is fine.

What if the Foxic Snooze wetwork had asked:

Considering the Founding Fathers specifically placed in the Constitution a provision to start impeachment proceedings when ANY high official commits "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors", wouldn't it be wrong for the House of Representatives to NOT uphold their sworn duty to faithfully discharge their Constituional duties and NOT try to impeach President Bush over his on-air confessions of deliberately breaking Federal wire-tapping laws?

Or how about listing all the Federal, State and local laws the President probably violated (I imagine 10 or 20 pages worth), the 750+ waivers he gave himself as far as following laws he signed (isn't that a form of treason?) and then ask:

Do our law-making Representatives bear any responsibility for enforcing their own statutes when the highest officials in the Executive have so blatantly flouted them? If so, since the Founding Fathers anticipated this possibility and provided guidelines and a process to follow in Article 2, Sect. 4 and Article I, Sect 2 & 3 of the Constitution, and considering it is the sworn duty of those Representatives to uphold the Constitution, isn't it wrong for the House of Representatives tNOT to try to impeach President Bush ?

Mark, who is asserting that "everything is fine?"

Not I.

And while I think that your and Will's opinions matter and that we Democrats need to listen to Unaffiliated voters, I also wonder how much work either of you did to try to beat Bush in 2004.

Now, I did a lot and know most of the people who were involved, but not all, so both of you may have done yeoman's work and I was not aware of it and if so, I apologize in advance.

I also tend to take criticism of the party and its candidates MORE seriously if the critics are actually Democrats inside the tent pissing out, rather than Unaffiliated voters outside the tent pissing in.

Both of you are good critics, but critcism only goes so far.

And let me ask you this: if we impeached Bush, we'll get Cheney. Will that make you happy? I suppose you will then say "impeach Cheney" and then we'll have President Hastert. That'll be a big improvement. I guess then you'll want to impeach him and we'll have President Ted Stevens. Then President Condi Rice. Then President John Snow. Then President Don Rumsfeld.

We'll have a new President in 2009. My goal is to see that is a Democrat, hopefully Russ Feingold.

But first, we have to get our three excellent county commissioner candidates elected, as well as our outstanding state senator and our dedicated, committed, thoughtful congressman too.

Do either of you want to help with that effort? Let me know if you do.

Paul,

I'm not sure if you've been involved in local politics long enough to know that the 3 Democratic Party commissioners won the seats in the primary. No Republican has ever come close to winning a commissioner seat in Orange.

Mark, I know the history of OC Commissioners elections.

I also know that when you start to take things for granted, you get blindsided. To me, you should always run like you are behind.

I fully expect all three to win. But we're not taking any chances. The OC Dem party will be very active in this fall's contests.

Also consider that the GOP has only one candidate to focus its efforts on and that the referendum on changing the way the Commissioners are elected may bring a higher turnout than normal of Republicans and Jessecrats, of which there are many up here in northern Orange.

Again, I fully expect all three Dem candidates to win, probably easily. But we won't be taking anything for granted.

with apologies to barry goldwater :

moderation in the pursuit of taking back the house is no virtue; and extremism in the protection of our Constitution is no vice.

obviously, i share mark's disappointment re: the conyers op-ed. however, i think conyers makes it pretty clear in his opening lines that his piece is an attempt to defuse a pub campaign strategy to scare voters. that is, i believe that this "change" is tactical and does not represent a change in conyers' belief that bush/cheney have committed impeachable offenses.

perhaps paul and others are correct in their view that, by concealing a specific dem platform, the party can take back the house. can you say pyrrhic victory ? i am reminded of an old jerry seinfeld line about the team hopping done by nba players. jerry said that fans have to admit that they now are merely cheering for the jersey.

if the dems do take back congress, let's hope and pray that it amounts to more than a change of jerseys. if we take the national leadership at face value we have to wonder.

at this point the dem party has not called for a time table in ending the iraqi occupation. it has not advocated for national health care. it has not advocated for gay marriage. it has not condemned attempts by pubs/cons to demonize the latino community. it has been squishy on real lobby reform. and now it insinuates that bush/cheney MAY have committed impeachable offenses, but that's no real big deal at this point in time.

so i am forming a prayer group. i extend the first invitation to mark. hope and prayer...yeah, that's the ticket.

kent

I haven't been reduced to formal prayer yet, but not a day goes by that I do not sing to myself Elmore James' great song "Everyday I Get the Blues".

Kent, like Mark and Will, you are a great critic, but what are you doing to help change things? Until you ran for office, you did not participate in the electoral process that I can see.

In fact, unlike Mark and Will, you are not even a regular voter. You did not vote in the primaries of 2000, 2002 or 2004, nor did you vote in the general election of 2002, nor did you vote in the last two town elections.

You did manage to get to your polling place in November of 2000 and 2004, so we do thank you for that.

So, out of a total of 11 elections you could have voted in from 2000-2006, you voted in three, and one was the one you ran in.

And you wanted our votes for Congress?

Sorry, Kent, the Democratic Party is like the Catholic Church: we do accept converts, but we don't make them Pope the same day.

Paul,

It would be useful to know all that you have done, so we know what you consider be useful contributions.

I think it is a very interesting and legitimate question - what activities and contributions are worthwhile?

It would be very interesting to get a sense of what a wide range of people consider to be useful pursuits in the name of creating a better world.

Mark

Paul, your tactics exemplify why folk are fleeing the party.

Have you considered:

That Mark, kent and I see Bush's impeachable tresspasses as setting a significant historical precedent for Executive wrong-doing?

That, in spite of the political consequences, a countervailing historical precedent MUST be set establishing the defined limits of the Executive?

That we're concerned that our Representative, Price, swore to uphold the Constitution - the whole Constitution - but he, and many others, appear to have decided on the politically expedient course of piecewise enforcement?

And finally, most troubling, that when good men, like Price, don't rise to this challenge - to set this historical limit (when "good men do nothing") - that our country's foundations are eroded beyond repair?

So, instead of bashing the messenger - again, a strategy I think works against your stated desire for a broad, inclusionary party - why don't you argue the issues.

To wit, do you or don't you think that the Executive has crossed into impeachable territory?

Forget the arguments on succession, the political calculus, the timeliness - flat out answer the question.

paul,

i have a copy of my voting record,but it is not with me at this moment. when i return home i will post my complete voting record. my recollection is that, with the exception of the recent town election, your numbers are wrong. again, i will review my records and confirm.

i am amazed that you continue to fail to understand the purpose of my campaign. i did not want your votes for congress. i wanted to provide an opportunity to voters who wanted to express their concern about the bush/cheney administration and the perceived lack of dem leadership at the national level. my campaign was not about me wanting to be pope. it was about a point of view, a point of view shared by at least 2,479 voters in the district( almost 1000 in orange county).

you ask me what i am doing to change things. that cheap shot is not disimilar to the question asked of me by a caller when i appeared for a debate on wptf-radio--- "just what have you done to serve your country ?" i give you the answer i gave him.

i have been a social worker for over thirty years. i have worked in the public sector for most of that time providing protective services to children and mental health services to the severely mentally ill. i am also a registered financial consultant and provide financial counseling pro bono in order to help working class families better manage their financial lives. with all due respect,sir, i go to work each day and strive to change things, especially the lives of those who have been abused,exploited, and disenfranchised.

your efforts to discredit and marginalize me are beneath you...at least i hope that is the case. let us not stoop to the level of karl rove and his ilk. surely, we can do better than that.

kent

Mark, legit question.

I have voted in virtually every election in the last 30 years (I missed the second primary in 1996; one race was on the ballot, Sec. of State from what I remember and I thought both candidates were good).

In 2004, I coordinated 12 precincts in northern Orange and put in (conservatively) 500 volunteer hours in the campaign.

I now "coach" six precincts in northern Orange and helped get 5 of the 6 officially organized, two for the first time in a long while (and we're working on Caldwell).
None were officially organized even three years ago.

I worked all day at the polls May 5 trying to recruit volunteers and get votes for our Democratic judges.

I am vice-chair of the Efland precinct, an elected position, and as such a member of the County Executive Committee. I rarely miss a meeting. I have also gone to the last 3 State Exec Committee meetings (as a proxy) and helped elect Jerry Meek as our state chair, the first time in history the governor didn't get his choice for state chair.

I have attended the last three county conventions, the last three district conventions, the state convention in 2004 and I'm going to next one in High Point next month.

I was chair of the OCDP Platform and Resolutions Committee this year and we passed a strong group of resolutions, most of which passed the Fourth District convention. I serve as 2nd Vice-Chair of the 4th District Party, an elected position.

I went to and actively participated in the state platform committee meeting last year and I'm going again on May 31.

I won't go into my activities on behalf of the party and candidates in IN and WI, where I lived before I moved here 12 or so years ago.

I think that former party chair Barry Katz and current party chair Jack Sanders would vouch for my commitment.

And by the way, compared to them, I have done nothing. Our party has been very fortunate to have them both and we can't thank them enough, IMHO.

There are others too who have done more than I have: Nancy Park, Janet Thomas, Ann Demaine, Rosie Benzonelli, Pete MacDowell come to mind right away, I'm sure there are others.

But I'm doing my part, I think.

Thanks for asking.

Kent, I asked what you have done in the ELECTORAL arena to change things, which the arena we are discussing here, (this is orangepoltics.com, after all) not what you have done with other aspects of your life, which appear to be exemplary and I in no way meant to demean or devalue those contributions. The things you do are very important and you are making contributions through them that few people have (I certainly have not) but again, we are discussing electoral politics here, or at least I am.

And you ran for Congress but didn't want votes?

That strikes me as strange.

As far as your voting record, that is what the BOE has. If it is wrong, I suggest you contact them.

Will, I have no problem with you advocating your position on the issues.

I DO have a probelm with your attitude that those who don't support them have somehow "sold out" and are not as "pure" as you.

And regarding impeachment, I can't give you a flat out yes or no, because I don't know if Bush crossed the line or not. We need hearings first to find out what REALLY happened in the run up to the Iraq war and more info on torture and wiretapping. These COULD in fact be impeachable offenses, but I am not going to rush to jedgement.

Much as I dislike Bush, I want to hear the facts before I make up my mind.

Impeachment is very serious matter and can't be rushed into with many more steps first and to even BEGIN, we have to have the Democrats in control of Congress.

You have to crawl before you can walk, but you want us to run a marathon right now!

Sorry, I meant to say 200 hours above at 12:27pm, not 500 hours.

I also meant May 2, which was the date of the primary, not May 5.

I guess I'm getting my 2s and 5s mixed up today!

I really should proof these posts better before I send them.

Paul, you have to understand that only the voting record of "some" people creates a dust-up here, just as "some" people accepting campaign contributions from out of the jurisdiction does too.

Paul, never proof-read before sending. It is so much more fun to read the Freudian slips before they are corrected. (For instance, I'm sure you WISHED you worked 500 hours... :)

I hope it's clear that my previous post was totally just a joke not intended to be meanspirited in any way - just to provide some levity. Upon re-reading it sounds sorta stupid (proving again the need for proof-reading...) I'll shut up now.

I think voting is the probably the least important contribution you can make to your community. Just to be clear, it is obviously a postive contribution, but it ain't much really. The powers that be would much rather have everyone consider that voting is their contribution to democracy and then go back to sleep.

Paul - I don't think it's realistic to consider "electoral" contributions to be any more important than other contributions. It's all part of the Big Situation we're in. Certainly alleviating the stress of low income or mentally ill people is a great contribution to the greater good and quite possibly worth way more than putting in hundreds of hours trying to elect one mediocre pro-war, corporate candidate who eschewed progressive leadership (Kerry) over another pro-war, corporate candidate albeit more vulgar (Bush). History could show that billions of hours were wasted in this decade trying to keep the Democratic Party on life-support. At least when somebody feeds a hungry person, they know things have improved.

paul,

i went back and checked the boe records for my voting history. your numbers are not accurate, but the jab you are making isn't really compromised by your inaccuracy. according to the boe my history from 2000-2006 is:

5/06 primary
11/04 general
11/03 municipal
11/01 municipal
11/00 general

i have voted in 10 of the past 13 november elections. that's as far back as the record shows, but i know my local voting was more frequent in the 70's and 80's.

you have probably already checked it out,but just in case you haven't gotten around to it, let me assure you that i have never been deliquent in paying my taxes, and i have no outstanding arrest warrants(that i know of)...

kent

So you have voted in 5 of the past 13, not three out of past 11, as I claimed.

But no primaries except for when you ran and not in the 2002 general, when NC elected Liddy Dole.

But I indeed was wrong and I apologize.

Kent, you seem to be somewhat thin-skinned. I have never said you were not a good citizen and not a good social worker, in fact, I said just the opposite, if you look at my posts last night.

My whole point in raising this issue is that you did not particiapate at all in electoral politics before you ran yourself, not even voting reguarly.

By the way, I looked up the voting records of all the commissioner candidates who ran on 5/2 and David Price.

With the exception of missing a second primary here and there, where the typical turnout is less than 5%, they are all regular voters. Barry Jacobs missed none, even second primaries (I will proudly say I didn't miss any either). Barry also participated in the 2004 caucus for President, I know for sure and some others may have too, I don't have access to those records.

Mark Marcoplos thinks that voting is the "least important contribution" one can make.

I respectfully disagree.

I should add that the records I have access to only go back to 2000 and do not include the 2001 and 2003 local elections, which is why I was wrong about Kent's participation in those and I again apologize for my error.

For the record, there were 3 elections in 2000, 2 in 2002 and 3 in 2004, total of 8; Kent voted in 2.

Paul, you're at the bottom of the hole, I suggest you stop digging.

paul,

no need to apologize. you made an honest mistake. i was going to let it go,but i did say i would check my records and get back with you. just wanted to keep my word.

kent

Thanks Kent.

And you're right Will, I've made my point, so you'll hear no more from me about this.

Paul,

Just to get a better idea of how your local political leadership will manifest itself here, who are you pulling for in the Connecticut Democratic Party - Joe Lieberman or Ned Lamont?

Thanks,
Mark

Mark,

Lieberman.

Thanks,
Paul

That mole whacks itself.

Lieberman is one of Bush's favorite Senators and arguably the least "progressive" Democrat in Congress.

Well, gosh Mark, I guess I failed the Mark Marcoplos political leadership manifestation test.

I would guess that if and when I ever run for Democratic Party office outside my precinct that I won't have your support.

I guess I'll just have to muddle through.

I believe that:

1.) A campaign to stop inspiring terrorists would be infinitely more effective than declaring a ‘War on Terror' which invigorates them.
2.) If you find yourself in a war against a belief instead of a country, you cannot win that conflict.
3.) If you find yourself in a war against an entity that has nothing to surrender [like control of their territory] and hasn't even the capacity to surrender, you cannot prevail.
4.) Removing soldiers from a battleground in which the enemy can become invisible whenever they want is ‘backing the troops' in the best way possible. Being willing to expose your troops in such a shooting gallery is treasonous.
5.) Getting your soldiers out of a conflict against forces that have no obligation to follow any laws or conventions, while your soldiers are required to follow international law, is ‘backing your troops' to the fullest. Being willing to put your troops into such an impossible situation is treasonous.
6.) Although I'm 60 years old, short, overweight, slow, and can't jump; five of me could whip the L.A. Lakers if we could become invisible to the Lakers players at will, the Lakers had to follow rules, and we had no rules to follow. Similarly, our mighty armed forces are no match on the ground for the sometimes invisible, completely lawless foe they have been thrust before.
7.) Continuing to send our troops to Iraq is unforgivable—treasonous! We must withdraw the ones who are there, ASAP!
8.) When you kick in a door and find a man with a rifle you can't be sure if he's a terrified father desperately trying to defend his family or a ‘holed up' enemy combatant—especially if you can't even speak his language to interrogate him.
9.) We have no way to know which of the Iraqis we train and arm this month will be shooting at us next month.
10.) Many of the weapons killing our soldiers were made in Iran; many were made in the US.
11.) Our president and vice president are selfishly willing to sacrifice more and more of our troops and treasure in a desperate, last ditch attempt to salvage something for their legacy.
12.) There is a way that the United States can get out of Iraq within several months with minimal residual violence there.
13.) This can only be done with an unprecedented amount of international assistance—both from the Muslim community and the non-Muslim community.
14.) Our current administration has so enraged almost every sector of world society that the only way we will get international help is to pursue it without our current ‘regime'—not in spite of our current ‘regime'. If we wait 2 more years, the situation will undoubtedly worsen, probably exponentially. We have to be proactive NOW!! The clock is ticking.
15.) Our country has screwed up on a colossal scale! We have to prove ourselves worthy of forgiveness and then ask for it—and the only way to do that is by taking real action that convincingly expresses our true remorse—not by merely voicing disapproval of our current, misguided and questionably motivated ‘leadership'.
16.) Our country was led into the Iraq war through deliberate, deceitful tactics by our president and vice president.
17.) Some of the actions, or inactions, of George Bush and Dick Cheney are nothing short of treasonous.
18.) Through hearings to investigate what wasn't said in the Scooter Libby trial, treasonous activity will be revealed.
19.) Investigating into the forged documents used to build the case for invading Iraq should prove revealing as well.
20.) Treason is an impeachable offense.
21.) We have to set the wheels in motion for the impeachment of Dick Cheney, then George Bush—now!
22.) Only democrats can initiate this process. It'll take a lot of guts for us to get this started; but it would be almost impossible for even the most openly disgruntled republicans to do it—though some may silently want to—their assistance would be most welcome.
23.) If we don't show the courage to do this, then we deserve our fate.
24.) Impeaching Bush & Cheney for vindictive reasons would further split our country.
25.) Impeaching them for productive reasons—opening the door and setting the path for restoring world respect for our great country and a resolution to the Iraq fiasco—would be a very honorable thing to do. It would give us all a cause to unite behind. [Punishment for the perpetrators is no part of the motivation here. Their punishment will have been self inflicted when all is said and done.]
26.) Our present course does not need ‘tweaking'; we need to make dramatic changes, starting at the top.
27.) The actions of George Bush and Dick Cheney have been the best recruiting tool ever for terrorists worldwide—including in the US.
28.) Ten times as many people worldwide hate the USA than 6 years ago. It's not because of us; it's because of the Bush administration.
29.) Every innocent death attributed to our aggression breeds at least 5 more easily recruited terrorists.
30.) Most people worldwide thought we didn't deserve 9/11. Most of them think, now, that we deserve anything bad that comes to us.
31.) It's been the pattern of George Bush to create diversions to take the focus off his blunders. His next diversion could be Iran.
32.) The United States has no credibility under the current ‘leadership'.
33.) Diplomacy has been an abandoned tool for six years.
34.) As long as Bush & Cheney are the ‘deciders', one of two things will happen: A.) Democrats will let them continue on their bungling, disastrous path of destruction; > B.) Democrats can take what very limited action is available to us to try to curtail their course [as in ‘de-funding']. If Democrats choose the latter option, then Bush & Cheney are off the hook—everything bad that happens from that point on, [they'll claim] happened because of the Democrats' ‘interference'. Many voters will be duped, again, into buying into their clever rhetoric—and the cycle could be non-ending!
35.) We, the people, must become the deciders. We tried in November, apparently to no avail. We can't afford to stay on the sidelines any longer as the ‘requesters', ‘disapprovers', and ‘complainers'. Democratic politicians owe it to the voters who expressed themselves last November to initiate radical change.
36.) Despite his claim that he'd try to work in a bipartisan way following the November election, Mr. Bush has become even more of a dictator—continuing to disregard the advice of almost every advisor, counsel, & study group. The only thing he has done in a bipartisan way since the election is to disregard the wishes of both parties. This dictator must be overthrown!
37.) George Bush and Dick Cheney are a cancer on our country and they must be removed—the sooner, the better. We can't wait two more agonizing, divisive, demoralizing, and destructive years to start the treatment. The malignancy will continue to spread.
38.) We must take substantive action NOW that will put our country on a path toward recovery.
39.) We should all be outraged at the number of politicians who continue to allow our brave, young [and unfortunately misled] troops to risk their lives and the future of their families for the deadly, chaotic, downwardly spiraling fiasco in Iraq. At the same time, those politicians aren't even willing to risk their jobs by doing or saying something that could possibly hurt them in their next election. I've heard that the recovery rate of non-re-elected politicians is much higher than that of dead or maimed soldiers and civilians.
40.) WORTH REPEATING: If we don't show the courage to do this, then we deserve our fate.

I see IMPEACHMENT as the only way we'll get the much needed support from the world community in order to allow us to get our troops safely out of Iraq—without an ensuing total collapse of that country—a country we've come so close to completely destroying already. Please, let's put our outrage to work. Critics keep saying things like "Ok, so what's the Democrats' plan" or "why don't the Democrats actually do something instead of just complaining". Well, by all means, let us not disappoint them! Let's really do something. Let's impeach the 'delusional duo' of the 'amnesia administration' and prove to our country and the rest of the world that we really are serious about taking our country in a completely new direction. We are virtually helpless as long as Bush & Cheney are the ‘deciders'. Let's impeach the bastards and give our country back to the people, Iraq back to the Iraqis, and our brave soldiers back to their families.

Jim Lindsley; Durham, North Carolina

There are reports that Dick Cheney will be speaking on the UNC Chapel Hill campus the day after the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. According to an article in the Greensboro News and Record he will be speaking at Memorial Hall on September 12th at 7:00 p.m. I hope there are protestors. But I believe any such protest should not question the right of Cheney to speak on campus. True liberals support freedom of speech, even for people like him. I'd like to be there with a sign that reads, on one side "I am not here to protest Cheney's freedom of speech," and on the other "I'm here to protest Cheney." I wish he had been impeached.I also think people should be reminded of all the confident statements he made about WMD in Iraq. It does not matter that it happened years ago. His lies sent so many to their deaths. The thought of him speaking on campus turns my stomach.James Coley

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