RANT: Eighteen months until elections. Eighteen weeks until we nuke Iran?

[arendt]

Eighteen months until elections. Eighteen weeks until we nuke Iran

Most political observers miss the scale of the problem facing American democracy today. They think its simply a lack of political willpower on the part of the Democratic majority in Congress to hold the Executive accountable for a long string of usurpations, illegalities, and crimes.

But, those very usurpations, illegalities, and crimes have destroyed almost all of the ability of Congress to restrain the Executive. Today's headline is that, indeed, Executive agencies are obeying Bush's illegal signing statements and flat-out ignoring the laws passed by Congress. Last month's headline was that Bush had completely politicized the DOJ and the US attorneys, the enforcement arm of any law that Congress might pass. Last year's headline was that the Dem Congress caved on appointing theocrat judges Alito and Roberts to the Supreme Court, removing any semblance of impartiality from the body that might interpret the law. (Five arch-conservative, pro-corporate, Catholic fanatics laying down the GOP party line.)

So, Congress may have the theoretical power to pass laws; but the Executive will ignore them, the DOJ will refuse to enforce them, and the SCOTUS will eviscerate them. Bottom line: it is not that the Dems are paralyzed; its that they have had their arms and legs chopped off.

Beyond Congress being powerless, the Executive has grabbed more coercive power than ever before: they have the right to suspend habeus corpus indefinitely; to spy on citizens (and opposition politicians) for no cause without warrants; to declare martial law on a whim (NSD51); to send anyone they choose to Haliburton-built concentration camps inside the U.S; to torture anyone they please.

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Oh, but you say I am an alarmist. If things are so dire, why doesn't Bush just declare himself dictator?

Well, maybe he is waiting until the chaos that will ensue from nuking Iran before he pushes the martial law button. Do you think he has merely been amusing himself by kicking sane top brass out of the military to make room for fundie whackjobs? He needs those whackjobs in place to follow his insane commands. He needs those whackjobs to use the three carrier groups and the nuclear bunker busters he has sent to the Persian Gulf.

The Iraq "surge" is simultaneously a holding action, a provocation against Iran, and a distraction from the buildup against Iran. The new appointments are a final purge of resistance within the military leadership. But if Bush moves too soon at home, the military may rebel. However, if he puts the Borg helmet on the military and embroils it in Iran, he can declare martial law and wrap up all his enemies, civilian and uniformed, in the same sweep.

He just says: we are in a nuclear war; I am the commander in chief; I declare martial law. If you disagree with me, you go to jail. Anyone powerful enough not to simply "be disappeared" will get nowhere with a compliant SCOTUS and DOJ. Game over.

Given the current "business as usual", "patient", spineless Democratic approach to imminent dictatorship, Bush can take his good sweet time to implement the scenario above. He has almost a year and a half. He sits inside a bubble and cannot be touched for the reasons cited above. He must laugh himself silly watching the scripted farce of the Democratic candidates doing a poor imitation of Groundhog Day a year and a half before the election.

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Have I scared you? I sure hope so.

Now, there is ONE, and only one solution to this situation. IMPEACH THE MAN RIGHT NOW. Impeachment is an act of Congress alone. It requires no DOJ, no SCOTUS. The Congress is judge and jury. The Congress can demand evidence. If evidence is withheld, that will be taken into consideration by the court of the Senate. The Congress has its own policemen. It can send them to compel the testimony of witnesses.

The Dems have a majority in the House. That is all it takes to impeach. They have multiple credible charges: US Attorney firings, shredding of Presidential emails, signing statements, lying us into the Iraq War, breaking the military, outing Valerie Plame...and on and on. If Clinton could be impeached for a blow job, my God, we must impeach this dark blot on our nation, and Cheney and Gonzo, too.

A majority of the nation now favors impeachment. Bush's numbers keep sinking - the immigration debacle has even got the paleocons mad at him. Give people a target, an opportunity, and they will be in the streets. It will look like South America - banging on pots and pans, hanging him in effigy.

Once you get it into the Senate, you put the evidence out there. Then you make sure that the paleocons pressure the 17 most insecure GOP senators. You also tell slippery characters like Olympia Snowe that you can't pretend to be a moderate Republican and vote not to impeach. You can turn it into a media circus. You can blog it. You can go around the corporate media if you take the ultimate risk.

Yeah. This is desperate. But its the only shot we have got.

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Having said all that, I am sure that I will be pilloried as "a Nader lover", "a Hillary basher", "a loonie leftie". Fine. I have listened to enough pointless, repetitive posts about "Poll X says my candidate is up 2% in State Y". That is all rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, folks.

We need to have a substantive debate about how to save America from Bush. We can no longer afford the luxury of the toxic, horse-race framed, "nuanced" talking points, "only rich guys can play" campaign farce that passes for media coverage of politics (and amounts to a significant fraction of what gets posted on DU).

I refuse to buy into the "Democratic leadership" telling me "impeachment is off the table". It is eighteen months until the election. When does someone other than the leadership get to make their arguments, if not just after the previous election? I started ranting against this "permanent campaign", this "money primary" the minute it was foisted upon us by the corporate media.

Telling me that I can't criticize and must obey the Democratic leadership, even as they make a disastrous mistake in leaving Bush in power, is the equivalent of Bush, the GOP leader, telling the country they couldn't criticize Bush's lying drumbeat to War in Iraq. Don't like the analogy? Too bad. This is still a democracy - just barely.

Wake up, people. Elections in 18 months are no help when Bush starts a nuclear war in 18 weeks.

Impeach now.