No Vice President Is Above the Law
For the first time since the Bush administration took office, three members of the House Judiciary Committee, Robert Wexler (D-FL), Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), are calling for hearings on the impeachment of Vice President Richard Cheney.
Their position, while courageous, is not surprising. What is surprising is that it took this long for members of Congress to invoke impeachment, and that even now, they do so against enormous political resistance and cynical indifference from the media.
No serious student of the Constitution would question that sufficient grounds exist to impeach both President Bush and Vice President Cheney. The Constitution provides that an Executive who puts himself above the law and abuses the powers of his office may be impeached, a point confirmed in the impeachment proceedings against President Nixon, for abuses such as illegal wiretapping.
There is little serious debate about whether Bush administration actions — wiretapping without court approval (violating the Foreign Surveillance Intelligence Act), authorizing and facilitating mistreatment of detainees (violating U.S. treaties and criminal laws), starting the Iraq war on a basis of lies, exaggerations and misstatements (an abuse of power) — meet the Constitutional standard.
So why hasn’t a majority of Congress supported it? Twenty members co-sponsored Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s resolution calling for the impeachment of Cheney, but bucked their leadership to do so. Democratic leaders took impeachment “off the table,” apparently fearing it could hurt their chances in 2008.
Does the leadership defend the administration, contend that its actions are unimpeachable, or argue they don’t rise to the level of abuse for which Nixon was impeached? Remarkably, no. They publicly say there is no time, and that impeachment proceedings would distract the Congress from other work and divide the country.
These arguments are laughable compared to the imperative to uphold the constitution. And even on their own terms, they are specious. Let’s take them one at a time:
Insufficient Time
In the case of Nixon, the House officially instructed the Judiciary Committee to act in early February, 1974; the Committee finished voting on Articles of Impeachment on July 29, less than six months later. No presidential impeachment proceeding had taken place for almost 100 years, so the Committee had to start from scratch, analyzing the constitution and developing procedures for the impeachment inquiry. Now the relevant legal spade work is done and a road map for proper impeachment proceedings exists, Congress could probably conduct them even faster than in 1974.
Distracting Congress
During Watergate, the House Judiciary Committee conducted the impeachment inquiry. It didn’t deter the rest of the House and the entire Senate from getting their work done, even with a war on. Even the Judiciary Committee also worked on other matters during impeachment, just as the Senate did during its trial of President Clinton.
Dividing the Country
Nixon’s impeachment united the American people. The process was bi-partisan, demonstrating this wasn’t just a Democratic ploy to undo an election. The fairness of the process, the seriousness of purpose, the substantial evidence all gave the public a strong sense that justice had been done. This reinvigorated the shared value that the rule of law and preservation of democracy are more important than any president or party.
Currently, this value is expressing itself in grass roots impeachment movements across America. The Vermont Senate, several state Democratic parties and many municipal governments have adopted resolutions supporting impeachment — more state legislatures would have acted except for pressure not to from Democrats in Washington. Multiple polls show a majority of Americans supporting the impeachment of Cheney (a November 13 American Research Group poll says 70 percent of Americans believe Vice President Cheney abused his office), and slightly less then a majority supporting the impeachment of Bush.
The Democratic leadership tactic of stonewalling this widespread public sentiment is itself divisive, leading at least half the country to frustration, disaffection and shaken faith in our democracy. Only a sober, serious airing of evidence in hearings would heal the split.
When Nixon’s impeachment process began, he had recently been re-elected with one of the largest landslides in history. No one made the calculation about whether impeachment was a political winner for Congress. Public opinion simply forced Congress’s hand after Nixon fired Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox. After the House Judiciary conducted impartial hearings and voted on impeachment, Congress’s approval soared. Republicans were swamped in the November 1974 elections.
Whether or not they bring electoral rewards in 2008, impeachment proceedings are the right thing to do. Regardless of outcome, they will help to curb the serious abuses of this administration, and send a strong message to future administration: the Constitution means what it says - no president or vice president is above the law.
Former Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman served on the House Judiciary Committee during Nixon’s impeachment. She co-authored the 1973 special prosecutor statute, and co-wrote (with Cynthia L. Cooper) the 2006 book, The Impeachment of George W. Bush.
Copyright © 2007 HuffingtonPost.com, Inc.
not in this article:
you can help support rep. wexler’s call for impeachment hearings for dick cheney by signing the petition at:
http://wexlerwantshearings.com/
nearly 100,000 signatures and not a SINGLE MENTION?
is this commondreams or fox news?
All well and good reasons for impeachment, but I still don’t think anything’s going to happen. The DLC pretty much makes the rules when it comes to the Democratic Party and they have staked out such a centrist position that they will do anything in their power to eschew impeachment hearings for fear of them hurting the Dems chances in the ‘08 elections.
I commend those brave enough to take stands like Dennis Kucinich, Robert Wexler, Luis Gutierrez and Tammy Baldwin. They are the true patriots who are refusing to take impeachment “off the table” and instead are insisting on putting it back on the table. Yes, this administration doesn’t have much time left, but a message must be sent to future administrations that they must be made to be held accountable and they are not above the law.
The most important message that this can send is this: That our Constitution is still valid, that it still works and that it does contain corrective measures for when administrations do abuse their power. If nothing happens, if no impeachment hearings occur and if this administration is essentially allowed to go out having broken the law as they have, it will send entirely the wrong message to future administrations that Bush and Cheney have set a new precedent in what administrations are allowed to do, and that is a very dangerous precedent to set if we as a country are to survive into the future.
At the end of the day, that’s what this is all about, the future of our country. And if that doesn’t seem important enough for our elected representatives to consider, then they are as guilty of refusing to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution as Bush and Cheney are. The electorate will not forget that. We will send a powerful message when it comes time for them to be re-elected that we will not vote for people to represent us who will not stand up and protect our Constitution.
Gee, this morning the news reports that there’s black smoke pouring out of a window next door to Cheney’s ceremonial office in the White House complex. Guess that provides a “get out of jail free” card for any future requests for records — they must have been destroyed in that “unfortunate” blaze!
Why are we still concerning ourselves with impeachment? We are beyond impeachment, and need to prosecute Bush & Co. for war crimes and put them where they belong: behind bars!
The smell of sulfur is strongly evident across the Washington landscape this morning as the ceremonial office of Vice President Cheney is in flames. The mounting lies and deceptions have combusted. The illegality and corruption are fanning the flames to ever new heights. Unlike the Democratic Congress the Washington fire fighters have shown up and are risking life and limb to extinguish the fire. Cheney is said to now be packed in ice to prevent spontaneous human combustion. Bush is rumored to have a fever. Pelosi has applied her strongest perfume. Additioinally the male Democratic leadership’s sticks are still shrinking. Wow, what a Wednesday morning !
…”cynical indifference from the media”–there is the problem. The corporate media is a COLLABORATOR with government and we are in a different, more depraved era than 30-odd years ago. How do we ‘impeach’ the Media? Do that before Cheney!
Quit thinking that there are two political parties in D.C. There is only the Uncle Buck Party. Its membership includes our elected officials, lobbyists, and corporations. They have the mainstream media as their PR Department and are busy rewriting the Constitution under the guise of a war on terror.
The “Good” American can now take his place next to the “Good” German.
Hoa binh
So we have poked holes in their excuses, now what?
I’ll ask again: Who has the authority to arrest these people?
Is there no judge or cops willing to arrest them, or file whatever needs to be filed?
We can bring the situation to a head simply by moving to arrest.
Then we will see a military defense of the president and the white house and then veil will be fully removed.
Q: How many Democrats does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Well, 284 can’t manage it.
Q: What can stop a Democrat?
A: What can’t?
I heard that the Democratic Party got beaten up by an old woman. It would have been worse if she had gotten out of her wheelchair.
Q: You heard about the new Democrat M & Ms? All yellow.
I played Democrat scrabble last night. The letters to spell courage are missing.
Send white flags to the Democrats. They always need more.
Q: What’s the biggest growth industry in America?
A: Democratic apologists.
The Democrats have already wasted a year of America’s precious time.
We could already have a sane leader, mending what is broken, ensuring that the elections next November are fair.
But for the past year the Democrats have left 2 war-mongering monsters in charge, tryng their hardest to mis-lead America into another war, possibly ending civilization as we know it.
The Democrats have the same moral fiber as drunk babysitters.
Q: How do you confuse a Democrat?
A: Put them in an empty room where there’s nobody to surrender to.
During the Clinton Monicagate business, I had a feeling the Republicans were trying to poison the wells for future impeachment by discrediting the whole process. But the Democrats should have removed Clinton because lying under oath at a deposition was a felony, even if the Paula Jones case wasn’t particularly earth-shaking. And with hindsight, we would have been better off with incumbent President Gore running for re-election in 2000 and 2004.
satr9prodxns, Thanks for the link.
I hope that those of you who are so negative about the news will at least join the good fight and sign this declaration for Justice petition.
you can help support rep. wexler’s call for impeachment hearings for dick cheney by signing the petition at:
http://wexlerwantshearings.com/
Like I have been sayin We are winning so now is the time to quite whining like babies and gather your courage and do the right thing yourself…and don’t give up and cut the crap about how nothing can be done… You can help if you get out of your Funk.
militantliberal - Has anyone investigated your idea? The neocons had/have a long term plan. So trumping up Clintons impeachment on such silly issues, and thereby discrediting the process, sure smells like they knew Bush would be committing ACTUAL impeachable offenses. They pre-empted subsequent impeachments by making them seem nothing more than revenge.
I just don’t get it. Impeachment hearings would probably guarantee the election of a democratic president. What are they waiting for? I’m sick and tired of all of this.
i’ve been saying nice things about holtzman based on her serving on the watergate committee, and more recently her unceremonious dumping by the new york dem establishment in favor of hrc.
but then i read (CD newswire fri dec 14 12:01pm) about her starring role in the dem’s dirty tricks campaign against the greens.
better late to the truth than never, eh?
You’re hilarious, locust. Unfortunately, you’re also right.
So Cheney had a convenient fire. Sounds like panic to me.
Is there a significant Green here that would begin a petition:
I hereby pledge that unless Bush and Cheney are impeached and the Iraq War is ended by June of 08, I will have lost confidence in the Democratic Party and will cast my vote for the Green Party.
If progressives would sign such a petition it would clearly put direct and increasing pressure on the Democrats to take action, because it would provide a viable alternative to their false cloaked vision. Currently they believe that there is no alternative to voting Democratic. Let’s prove them wrong.
P.S. No I am not associated in any way with the Greens. I’m just an Independent who does not want to waste his vote in the next election.
Hazmat: You are correct. This is off-topic, but people should know about this person–a Democrat who hates democracy!
Elizabeth Holtzman is director of The Ballot Project. As a co-conspirator and defendant in Nader v Democratic National Committee, she knows a lot about rigging elections and using dirty tricks to disenfranchise voters and keep candidates–who dare to compete with the corporate Democrats–off the ballot.
DEMOCRATIC PARTY SUED FOR ANTI-DEMOCRATIC CAMPAIGN TO ILLEGALLY REMOVE THIRD PARTIES FROM BALLOT.
“After the Democrats’ defeat in the 2000 election, Defendants and their co-conspirators decided to try to prevent Mr. Nader from running for president if he announced his candidacy in 2004. Defendants had already settled on a strategy to accomplish this goal when Mr. Nader made his announcement on February 22, 2004. “Our intent was to drain and distract him,” The Ballot Project president Toby Moffett later explained to the Hartford Courant. Defendants agreed and conspired to launch a nationwide legal assault on Mr. Nader’s campaign, which would drain the campaign of money, time and other resources, in a deliberate attempt to use the sheer burden of litigation itself as a means to prevent Mr. Nader from running for public office. Defendants reached this agreement with wrongful intent, before they could possibly have any reason to believe litigation against Mr. Nader was warranted or justified, and before there was any colorable or potential legal basis for such litigation.”
This is just the tip of this ugly iceberg. To read the entire text of the complaint go to: http://www.newjerseyuntouchables.blogspot.com/
More info on Democracy Now!:
http://www.democracynow.org/2007/10/31/ralph_nader_files_lawsuit_accusing_democratic
And we thought only Republicans did this stuff. Right.
I truly stand with Ms. Holtzman when it comes to her framing of a Constitutional United States of America. Under that framing — these bastards (all of them) would be seeing light through the narrow windows of a jail cell. Just one problem — if you haven’t noticed, the entire governance plot has been reframed. We now live in Bush World — a combination of Brave New World and A New World Order. Simply observe and you will see that the rules are rewritten to serve the rulers. Due process is just about done! Habeas corpus is just another dead body. “The people” are excluded from consideration unless it is for the raising of taxes — or for some enlistment in a political or consumer campaign serving those who rule. Worst, they come for our children to fight and face the dirt and horror that results from their greedy deeds. I do stand with Ms. Holtzman and hope as many of us as possible will do our share to bring on turning point soon.
Don’t get all excited and wound up about Darth cheney. He is as dead as everybody else.
The constitution allows for citizens arrest.
If You guys go to arrest them, I’ll fly from Hawai’i to join You.
Once we have them rounded up, they are allowed to make one statement into the tv-cameras
before they get…
thanks satr. I signed the petition and forwarded it. Elizabeth is right on impeachment. How could she be so wrong on this? bildad said:
“Elizabeth Holtzman is director of The Ballot Project. As a co-conspirator and defendant in Nader v Democratic National Committee, she knows a lot about rigging elections and using dirty tricks to disenfranchise voters and keep candidates–who dare to compete with the corporate Democrats–off the ballot.”
Trust politicians?
A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.
Henry Louis Mencken
If a politician isn’t doing it to his wife, then he’s doing it to his country.
Amy Grant
One has to be a lowbrow, a bit of a murderer, to be a politician, ready and willing to see people sacrificed, slaughtered, for the sake of an idea, whether a good one or a bad one.
Henry Miller
A politician will do anything to keep his job - even become a patriot.
William Randolph
Politicians are a set of men who have interests aside from the interests of the people and who, to say the most of them, are, taken as a mass, at least one long step removed from honest men.
Abraham Lincoln
The ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen.
Winston Churchill
On qualifications desirable for prospective politician.
A politician … one that would circumvent God.
William Shakespeare
Hamlet.
A professional politician is a professionally dishonorable man. In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker.
Henry Louis Mencken
Bad politicians are sent to Washington by good people who don’t vote.
William E. Simon
He is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation.
Adlai E. Stevenson
I was really too honest a man to be a politician and live.
Socrates
We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.
Aesop
My choice early in life was either to be a piano-player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there’s hardly any difference.
Harry S. Truman
It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs.
Albert Einstein
Crime does not pay … as well as politics.
Alfred E. Newman
JaneM, there’s a big difference between impeaching Nixon and impeaching Bush and/or Cheney, and the difference is the difference between Vietnam and Iraq: Vietnam was a proxy ideological war between the US and the Soviet Union, with nothing real at stake, while Iraq is a war for something very real: oil.
The Democrats would rather lose the election than lose the oil, and that’s the real reason they won’t impeach. They’re not cowardly at all. Instead they’re quite courageous, courageous enough to be willing to look cowardly if it will serve the common political good: Controlling the oil and controlling the American people.
This whole problem would be a lot easier to resolve if the Democrats were, in fact, cowardly. Scares me that they’re not.
Satr9, thanks for the link. I signed the thing.
The Republicans could be forced to defend Cheney with cameras rolling when everyone wants to achieve escape velocity from planet Bush.
People are giving money to Ron Paul, for crying out loud. Hordes of bitter Republicans anxiously searching for a new leader to salute, anybody but another Clinton.
The military has said no to them, the intelligence outfits said no to them. The only ones defending the Republicans are the Democrats.
The Democratic party won’t even act in its own self-interest. We could already have a female incumbent Democratic President if they could only evict 2 bums from the White House (if they don’t burn it down).
The world would be safer and people might even (hold your breath!) start liking Americans again.
Imagine the history books, Ms. Pelosi. Hello…hello…hello
Americans want heroes. Americans wants stories. America gets the 284 stooges.
Democrats don’t make good cashiers. No matter how much money you give them you don’t get any change.
Okay, how about this one: I was almost mugged by a Democrat but I pulled out some change and she scurried away.
Too deep?
They won’t act in America’s interest.
Over the last year 2 maniacs have tried to kidnap America.
The Democratic response has been to whine that they don’t get to drive the get-away car.
locust December 19th, 2007 12:27 pm
Q. How do 284 Democrats get in a lightbulb!
or
Controlled Fire at White House Compound
The Associated Press - 4 hours ago
locust,
The Democratic Party IS acting in its self-interest as soon as one comes to the understanding that its leadership is comprised of crypto-neocons with the same Bismarckian Realpolitik agenda as in the other corporate party.
again,…. everybody walks. no accountability.
The author says that:
“Democratic leaders took impeachment “off the table,” apparently fearing it could hurt their chances in 2008.”
I think there is another likely motive: Pelosi is (likely) herself complicit in torture; in approving illegal coercive interrogations; and in illegal spying. (She was briefed about the interrogations that involved cruel, inhuman and coercive interrogations, right?) That could come out in the impeachment hearings. Real due process could lead to her own impeachment or resignation, denying her the presidency that would result from a conviction in the Senate or resignations of the president and vice-president. Hmmm. Off the table indeed. The motive could be much more sinister than tactics regarding the election.
Why Elizabeth Holtzman doesn’t bring this up, I don’t know.
Cindy, you win and remove Pelosi from office!
This vice president, Shotgun Dick is above the law up to this point. So far the entire Bu$h the inferior administration has been involved in a criminal enterprise starting before the fake election in 2000. Expecting a different result at this point is not logical.
satr9prodxns - I added my name to the list - your program accepts postal codes.
Just below the yellow line near the top is where you will find some of the more obvious reasons Cheney should be impeached (a link to the video The Unauthorized Biography of Dick Cheney:
http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/dickcheney/halliburton.html
Anyone have the PBS video on Cheney?
I wonder if we ask Karlheinz Schreiber nicely whether he will give us something on Cheney. We know that GWB’s grandfather was involved with Thyssen.
We also know that around the time Reagan/Bush were president that Karlheinz Schreiber was taking (to hand out) money from Strauss to help get Conservatives around the world elected and to get contracts for Thyssen.
The fire in Cheney’s office this morning is most likely the result of the court ordering the “White House Visitor Logs” to be made public!
Think about all those overnight visits from Jeff Gannon(James Guckert), and all the religious leaders, and energy company ceo’s, and Abramof’s people. Scarey stuff!
Hey ticonderoga,
I hate to break it to you, but Vietnam was about oil too. The United States and the Soviet Union were vying for control of the oil resources in the Gulf of Vietnam.
But seriously, please pass the link around for Wexler’s petition. We’ve gotten over 100,000 signatures in just a few days after an original goal of 50,000, and Rep. Wexler has stated that he would like to have 250,000 to take to congress when sessions resume in January.
I think that, as the evidence has been trickling out little by little, that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz will turn out to be people who deserve a War Crimes charge. (But what about people like Richard Perle and the AEI? They had direct roles in this.)
But, western justice, let us not forget, has always been harshest on the nameless, the poorest and the weakest, while lightest on those of status, power and name.
I wounder if they still refer to Cheney as “BIG DICK. How would you think of your self if people kept calling you a BIG DICK. Freud wrote several books with this type person in mind.
Good stuff,Locust! Governor Hukaby said that the Mormons, that include Rommney, believe Jesus was a brother of Satan. Is it possible that a mistake was made, and our dear Veep Cheney was the one instead of Jesus? All of that smoke coming out of Cheney`s place makes one wonder who started that. It must have been someone that knows a lot about hot fires.
No vice president is above the law.John Yoo a lawyer in the justice dep’t thinks Cheney and Bush are! Suggest he testify to the Judicial Committees to prove that they have to be given royal executive power that makes them above the law in our democracy.
And the message to the people and to future presidents if the House doesn’t impeach is that government officials are not bound by the rule of law. That precedent will stand until the end of the republic, which is likely to come soon.
The permanent snarl on Dick Cheneys face comes from eating small children for breakfast.
My delight at our readers surpasses even my disgust of Congress. Keep it up, guys and gals, and we may yet restore democracy (please note the lower case “d”).
Re fire in VP’s office
Did anyone feel a slight bit of let down when you found out Cheney was OK?
I saw Holtzman speak last night at a rally in NYC for John Nirenberg, the hero who is walking over 450 miles from Vermont to Washington to try to persuade Pelosi to put impeachment back on the table (incidentally, those present were asked to call Pelosi–202-225-0100– to ask that she make the time to meet with John when he arrives in Washington). I was sad to hear about her involvement in the Nader election conspiracy, because she was absolutely fantastic and inspiring last night. Her reasoning was clear as a bell. She drove home the point that the founding fathers chose to place the power to initiate impeachment in the House because that is (supposedly) the branch of gov’t closest to the people. She acknowledged that the HOR is not listening to the people, and that we have CLAMOR for representation, lay the pressure on.
Sure Cheney is above the law. I used to think he wasn’t but I’ve watched our craven representatives pass up chance after chance to pursue the matter. There are no consequences for breaking the law if you’re in the administrative branch of government. I wish the new advocates for impeachment well, though they seem very late in waking up, but I will not hold my breath waiting for there to be actual legal procedings.
Condi is going to give a news conference on Afghanistan any minute.
ESPECIALLY this one!!!
Sageone:
Control of the oil in the Gulf of Vietnam versus the control of the oil in Iraq and Iran?
Sorry, but I have to disagree with you that oil was the major factor in the Vietnam War. Back then the US corporations (who controlled the government then, just as they do now) were far more terrified of the spread of communism than they were of losing control of oil.
But I can’t disagree with you on the importance of Wexler’s petition.
It is good to hear from Ms. Holtzman. I miss hearing from Sam Ervin, Barbara Jordan and Judge John Sirica. I would like to ask if there is no US jurisdiction where a grand jury, prosecutor or judge can address the actions of members of the Bush administration? Bill Clinton was prosecuted for lying under oath relative to a sexual harassment civil suit. The criminal and impeachable charges outlined by Ms. Holtzman and former prosecutor Elizabeth de la Vega make the impeachable offenses by Clinton and Nixon seem utterly trivial by comparison.
Ed