Tag: impeachment

Original article via counterpunch.com.

Over at Daily Kos, KagroX has a story up from ThinkProgress:

The Sunday Times reports Stephen Payne, a Bush pioneer and a political appointee to the Homeland Security Advisory Council, was caught on tape offering access to key members of the Bush administration inner circle in exchange for “six-figure donations to the private library being set up to commemorate Bush’s presidency.”

In an undercover video, Payne is seen promising to arrange a meeting for an exiled leader of Krygystan with Dick Cheney or Condoleezza Rice. (Not President Bush because “he doesn’t meet with a lot of former Presidents these days,” Payne says. “I don’t think he meets with hardly anyone.”) All it will take for him to arrange this high-level meeting, says Payne, is “a couple hundred thousand dollars, or something like that.”

Let’s take a little look at what bribery means in the context of High Crimes and Misdemeanors.

For those of you holding your breath, you can exhale now.  For all of us, I think we can take some cheer.  At 5:30 PDT, I got an e-message from Congressman Wexler:

Capitol Hill is buzzing today with major developments regarding our campaign for impeachment hearings for President George W. Bush and Vice Presideent Dick Cheney.  Just today, in what could be described as a perfect impeachment storm:

  • Karl Rove once again thumbed his nose at Congress and the American people by brazenly ignoring a lawful congressional subpoena to testify before the House of Representatives;

• Judiciary Chairman John Conyers indicated his willingness to use the power of inherent contempt against Rove if necessary;

• Rep. Dennis Kucinich introduced another article of impeachment on Bush’s lies regarding the Iraq war; and

• Speaker Nancy Pelosi was quoted today saying that the House Judiciary Committee should address the issues that Kucinich raises in the House Judiciary Committee.

After years of work by so many of you, the time appears ripe to finally hold Bush and Cheney accountable.

Reflecting on Wexler’s letter brought many thoughts — about blogs, the netroots, activism, but mainly about OTB’s ants and the Weapons of Blog Destruction.

We the blogging worker ants turned our powerful WBDs outward on the timid complacencies of the status quo.  It wasn’t just the blog, and it wasn’t just DD, but the collective forces of these and many others converged, through e-space and resultant phone calls to members of congress to form the perfect storm.  I say this with the humility of just one of the many, many worker ants.

Perhaps tahoebasha3 said it best in a comment on my original essay, after a couple of calls to Pelosi and much web search, tahoe found that a Pelosi spokesperson said Pelosi had never urged the Judiciary “not to pursue contempt charges against Rove”, that such a statement had just been a rumor floating around the blog.  So tahoe commented:

It’s possible she did say it, but the uproar has caused a total retraction — who the hell knows—tahoebasha3

UPDATE:  Link to the Article text on AfterDowningStreet.  

Dennis Kucinich plans to read a single article of Impeachment on the House floor today around 4 PM Eastern.   The Article of Impeachment is titled:  Deceiving Congress with Fabricated Threats of Iraq WMDs to Fraudulently Obtain Support for an Authorization of the Use of Military Force Against Iraq.  

The text of the article will be released at a Press Conference at 2 PM (see above).

Nancy Pelosi's Table reports that the Netroots Council of Elders is asking people to submit questions for Pelosi's “open” Q&A at Netroots Nation 2008 in Austin.

Please submits some questions for Pelosi to anwer at Netroots Nation.

Ask The Speaker!
Welcome to the Netroots Nation question submission page for the Saturday morning (July 19, 9:00am) keynote session “Ask The Speaker.” The event empowers citizens to engage America's current House Speaker in substantive discussion about current issues, the legislative process, and how citizens can participate in their government. Instead of simply giving a speech at a podium, Speaker Pelosi will be taking your questions and interacting with convention attendees. The 9 a.m. keynote will be moderated by Gina Cooper, Netroots Nation's Executive Director, and Jeffrey Feldman, author and blogger. But it all begins right now, right here, when you submit your questions and vote on questions submitted by others.

 

Go there Now and submit your own question or uprate others such as “Why is Impeachment Off the Table“.

or read more about Pelosi and Netroots Nation or find out more about impeachment

You may have heard that NY CD-08 resident Adam Sullivan is challenging Rep. Jerry Nadler in the Democratic primary, but you may not know why.

Why would someone challenge such a well-established and well-liked progressive like Rep. Jerry Nadler?  What could possibly be gained in such an audacious move?

Until this spring, Adam Sullivan had nothing but respect for the liberal Congressman, believing he was well represented by Rep. Nadler in his progressive voting record and outspoken criticism of the Bush administration.  However, after lobbying and then meeting with Rep. Nadler on the central issue of impeachment, Sullivan concluded it was time for the Congressman to face a challenge.

Adam Sullivan is calling into question Rep. Nadler’s intransigent refusal to support Rep. Robert Wexler’s call for impeachment hearings and Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s Articles of Impeachment on President Bush (H. Res. 1258) and Vice President Cheney (H. Res. 799/333).  Sullivan believes that Rep. Nadler, as the Chairman of the important Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties, is in a position of influence and should be working with his Judiciary Committee colleagues Tammy Baldwin, Steve Cohen, Keith Ellison, Luis Guttierez, and Robert Wexler to move impeachment proceedings forward.

By a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court has ruled unconstitutional the provision of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that suspended the use of habeas corpus by detainees in Bush’s “war on terror.” The MCA was pushed by Bush, and overwhelmingly approved by Congress, including both supposed anti-torture politician John McCain and many Democrats.

From Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion:

Security depends upon a sophisticated intelligence apparatus and the ability of our Armed Forces to act and to interdict. There are further considerations, however. Security subsists, too, in fidelity to freedom’s first principles. Chief among these are freedom from arbitrary and unlawful restraint and the personal liberty that is secured by adherence to the separation of powers. It is from these principles that the judicial authority to consider petitions for habeas corpus relief derives….

The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times. Liberty and security can be reconciled; and in our system they are reconciled within the framework of the law. The Framers decided that habeas corpus, a right of first importance, must be a part of that framework, a part of that law….

Congress has enacted a statute, the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (DTA), 119 Stat. 2739, that provides certain procedures for review of the detainees’ status. We hold that those procedures are not an adequate and effective substitute for habeas corpus. Therefore §7 of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (MCA), 28 U. S. C. A. §2241(e) (Supp. 2007), operates as an unconstitutional suspension of the writ. (Thanks to Phil at Daily Kos for the quotes)

Veterans For Peace presented 22,000 signatures calling for Bush impeachment to Rep. Conyers (D-MI)

The Real News Network Video

{They haven’t transfered the video over to their YouTube site as of yet}

Dennis Kucinich is making my Summer just a little bit more fun.

Today his 35 Articles of Impeachment against President Bush were referred to the House Judiciary Committee, where the conventional wisdom says they will languish without a hearing.

But the Committee’s expected inactivity isn’t stopping Dennis.

Kucinich said that if the Judiciary Committee does not act within 30 days, he intends to introduce another, longer version of the articles of impeachment, with 60 counts instead of 35.

“I am not going to let this go. I am not going to let it go. I’ll just keep coming back and they can pile these things up in committee but I’ll keep coming back,” Kucinich said. “I’ll bring it up again, and there will be more. There will be more.”