Reply #94: Irreconcilable differences

[pat_k]

Searching for "middle ground" can be productive in many contexts, but in this case, the differences between the "pro-impeachment" and the "anti-impeachment" people are irreconcilable.

This assertion is based on the following assumptions and definitions.

Definitions

• Pro-impeachment
  
  People who are calling on Members of Congress to
  1. take concrete action to formally and publicly accuse Bush and Cheney of their crimes against the Constitution;
  2. declare their intent to impeach both Bush and Cheney
     (e.g., by introducing articles and calling on the House to take them up);
  3. do whatever they can to see that Bush and Cheney are removed from office via resignation or impeachment.
  
  People who believe that the Democratic Party's failure to take up the fight for impeachment is symptomatic of a deeply ingrained pattern of self-defeating behavior that must be challenged. (We have seen the enemy, and it is us.)
  
  People who believe that Impeachment is a moral imperative; who reject "priorities" that call on the nation to ignore torture because it might "distract" from raising the minimum wage.


• Anti-impeachment (one or more of the following)
  
  People who defend the Democratic leadership's self-imposed "impeachment is off limits" edict.
  
  People who believe impeachment will make it impossible to "get things done" and that "getting things done" is a higher priority than rescuing the Constitution or taking the massive power of the American presidency out of the hands of war criminals.
  
  People who believe that that immediately and formally accusing Bush and Cheney is "jumping the gun" because Congress "must investigate first."
  
  People who believe that keeping impeachment "off the table" while the various committees pursue various open-ended investigation will eventually get the nation to impeachment "safely."
  
  People who would undoubtedly become truly "pro-impeachment" if the Democratic leadership took impeachment "out of the closet" by accusing Bush and Cheney of their crimes and declaring their intent to impeach.

Assumptions

• Assumption 1 -- When the Constitution is under attack, Congress is sworn to defend it. The question before members in the current crisis is this: "Are Bush and Cheney an intolerable threat to the Constitution?"


• Assumption 2-- Numerous charges against Bush and Cheney are well known to the public. Elected bodies, good government organizations, and countless individual citizens have examined the evidence and judged Bush and Cheney to be an intolerable threat to our constitutional democracy.


• Assumption 3 -- When charges that officials are abusing their power to subvert the Constitution are brought to their attention, Members of Congress have a duty to judge the charges -- to either dismiss the charges as baseless or take defensive action to remove the threat. They bear responsibility for damage done each day that they unnecessarily put off their duty to judge.
  
  The limbo of "I don't know" is not an escape. Vague claims to "need more information" are no better than the limbo of "I don't know." If they believe they need something more to make a judgment, they must actively seek it. If they are unable to get what they need, they must render judgment on the information at hand.


• Assumption 4 -- Members of Congress are aware of the most common charges against Bush and Cheney, the evidence cited, and the conclusions.


• Assumption 5 -- Everything necessary to unequivocally prove at least three of the charges is available in the public record. These charges are described in "Three criminal conspiracies committed in plain sight" below.


• Assumption 6 -- Any one of the crimes described in "Three criminal conspiracies committed in plain sight" is all that is needed to conclude that Bush and Cheney are an intolerable threat to the Constitution.


• Assumption 7 -- Calls for investigation say one thing: "We don't have enough information."


• Assumption 8 -- When the Constitution is threatened, their Congressional oath calls for Congressional action. For example, formally calling on the House to take up impeachment by introducing Articles of Impeachment for consideration.

Key irreconcilable differences

• Pro-impeachment people reject the rationalizations for inaction that are invoked by anti-impeachment people -- e.g., "the backlash beast will get us" or the self-defeating prophesy "can't win so don't fight." (For sample point-counterpoint see the exchange between longship and pat_k that that starts with this post).


• Assertions that the "silence is complicity" and that the choice is "duty or complicity" (pro-impeachment) cannot be reconciled with the assertion that avoiding feared negative consequences can excuse dereliction of duty (anti-impeachment).


• The assertion that we e know all we need to know (pro-impeachment) cannot be reconciled with the assertion that there must be investigations first (some anti-impeachment).
  
  {must investigation} = {don't have a case} = {nullify powerful case we have}


• The pro-impeachment belief that Democratic leaders could tap into a mother lode of public outrage if they became champions of impeachment cannot be reconciled with the anti-impeachment defense of Speaker to be Pelosi, an "anti-champion" who is doing everything she can to suppress outrage and "sit on" anyone in the Democratic caucus who looks like they might be on the verge of becoming a champion. (For more on champions, see this post)

. . .Let me put it another way. Certainly the “pro-impeachment” DUers recognize that investigation must precede a vote on impeachment. So it seems to me that almost all of us (both "anti-impeachment" and "pro-impeachment") are advocating investigations. . .

Saying "we need to investigate" is effectively an assertion that "we don't have a case." To effectively make the case, we must be crystal clear that we know all we need to know. This is tough for folks on "our side." We are very big on knowledge and often fail to realize that we know all we need to know as we unnecessarily seek to know all there is to know.

Investigations to determine the damage done and to root out co-conspirators can follow impeachment (or can go forward in parallel), but calling for open ended investigations to "set the stage" for impeachment negates the powerful case we have. Such open-ended investigations are a surefire way to get mired in unnecessary detail and irrelevancies.

Impeachment hearings to review the strongest articles and make the case to the public may or may not be necessary. Even with the 100% anti-impeachment propaganda coming from the establishment -- both Dems and Repubs -- Newsweek found that 51% want impeachment to be a priority, and only 44% believe "it should not be done." If they get serious about impeachment, the accusations will be the number 1 topic of public debate. The 51% is almost guaranteed to shoot up to more than 60% overnight. (For more on this, see the discussion in Results on Impeachment.

. . .I would rather see impeachment "out there on the table and visible for all to see", but if that’s going to hurt Democrats (which I'm not convinced of) then I agree that it would be best to keep talk of impeachment "off the table" until we see what the investigations turn up. . . .

Your doubt about the validity of their fear of "backlash" is well-found. Like so many other urban myths, the existence of the "backlash beast" isn't supported by logic or evidence, nevertheless, "everybody knows" its lying in wait.

But, even if we could prove the existence of the mythical backlash beast, it wouldn't matter. Outcome expectations are irrelevant. When principle demands action, you act or betray principle. We take oaths and make commitments to do hard and frightening things in advance so that when the time comes, we Just Do It, win or lose, however scary or difficult "It" may be.

If we expected it to be a cake walk for Members of Congress to "support and defend" we wouldn't ask them to swear to do it.

What is so heartbreaking and infuriating is that addiction to risk avoidance and dereliction of duty appears to be rampant among the DC Dems. Over and over, their failure to act leads to consequences far more dire than the worst they feared would result if they had acted.

They seek their escape from duty in tactical analysis that focuses almost exclusively on the "certain" negative consequences of action.. For example, in the current crisis, "opinion makers" and party insiders alternate between assurances that the nation wants Democrats to work with Bush and his toadies in Congress and warnings that the public will blast them if they impeach. The moral and political benefits of impeachment (e.g., exploding the "weak Dem" image), the enormous risks of failing to impeach, and the recent polls (e.g., Newsweek's) that find a majority of Americans want impeachment to be a priority in the new Congress are conspicuously absent (i.e., willfully ignored).

. . .I consider impeachment to be essential to our country.

Absolutely, positively, essential!

I've summarized my "top three" in the following section, but there are so many crimes to choose from and there is so much outrage percolating out here, it doesn't really matter which charges they decide are the most powerful. Keeping it simple should be the guiding principle. The crimes that don't end up in the articles will always be part of public debate and criminal prosecution of those crimes must follow, but you don't need "everything" to get Bush and Cheney out of there. (People were happy to see Capone convicted on tax evasion. Knowledge of "uncharged" crimes colors judgment. While this is to be avoided at all costs in a criminal trial, this is a political process in which there no such prohibition.)

Three criminal conspiracies committed in plain sight

1. Bush and Cheney did not simply "lie" the nation into war -- they terrorized us with threats of "Mushroom Clouds over our cities in 45 minutes."
   
   Whether or not the White House "knew" that the "16 words" were a fantasy, no amount of "stretching" can support the notion that Iraq had the capability to drop a nuclear bomb anywhere within the United States -- not in 45 minutes; not in a year; not in 5 years.
   
   When Bush and Cheney and their minions threatened the nation with "mushroom clouds over our cities in 45 minutes" they knew they were making the most colossal bomb threat in our history.



2. Bush's criminal surveillance of Americans without warrants continues. The unconstitutional claim that they have a "get out of jail" free card (unitary authoritarian power) is laughable, and they know it. If they actually believed their own claims they would not currently be mounting a final, desperate push to "make it legal."



3. When the Supreme Court ruled that the operations and procedures ordered by the White House and implemented at Gitmo violated Geneva, they found Bush, Cheney, and those who colluded in the violations to be War Criminals.

Until they declare their intent they are derelict in their duty

There are no half-measures that satisfy their oath.

The charges against Bush and Cheney are hanging out there. They are not going to magically "disappear." Democratic control of Congress can not defend against the Bush administration's continued abuse of power.

As described in Assumption 2 and 3 at the start of this post, members of Congress cannot escape their duty to pass judgment on the charges.

Every day that they do nothing they betray their oath and demonstrate contempt for the concerned citizens who are calling on them to act. The citizens who are taking up the fight for impeachment are a very active bunch who will not quietly accept the dismissive contempt of their elected officials for long.

Every day that they do nothing effectively exonerates Bush and Cheney. If exoneration is their intent, then they should do it honestly by telling the nation why the abuses that a majority of Americans can see are not abuses in their eyes.

Dereliction through in action is bad enough, but those who are mindlessly balking with claims that the impeachment of Bush and Cheney is "it's off the table" (no reason or justification, it's just off, period) are declaring their intent to betray their oath. (Throwing away the only weapon you have to defend against presidential abuse of power is "pre-emptive" surrender.)

The price of delay could be unimaginable

Time Is NOT on our side.

The price of delay could be unimaginable.⁽¹⁾ Any day we could see another terrorist attack; Bush could declare war on Iran or Syria or North Korea or Venezuela or even Haiti; or some completely unforeseen event could make it impossible to rescue our national soul for a long time to come.

_______________________________________________________

(1) Even when we move full steam ahead, we can be thwarted by events.

On September 10, 2001, there were many signs that sanity was returning. The number who believed Florida was stolen had passed 50%. Bush's approval was continuing the steady downward slide that started the day he was inaugurated. A coalition led by Democrats.com that included the National Lawyers Guild and Vincent Bugliosi was about to announce their "fall offensive" -- a campaign that that included the effort to see Scalia et al. impeached for Bush v. Gore.

Bush's claims to any semblance of legitimacy were crumbling fast.

Then the sun came up on 9/11/2001. In the weeks that followed, the countless people who were horrified by the stolen election and Bush's incredible abuses were silenced in a nation that had seemingly gone mad.

Sanity is once again returning, but we must recognize how fragile the moment is.