Someone should be setting up a Replacement Government.

[Philosoraptor]

In other words, IF we theoretically did throw all the bums out, who would replace them? The next clowns in line?

If you ran a business and discovered you had unfit employees you'd fire them and replace them immediately, you hired them, you fire them. And you replace them with people who won't screw up just like the guy you just fired.

We need to think of replacing this crew as a reality, not some wacky daydream in a far away land.

If and when we the people actually did remove the corrupt maniacs as we are constitutionally instructed to do, we'd better have a better system to replace the old one, and a whole new crew, with a whole new understanding: THEY WORK FOR US, not the other way around.

[librechik]

1. They are the replacement government

the lunatics have taken over the asylum

[peacetheonlyway]

2. We have DROVES OF NEW Progressive candidates

that's what the grassroots progressive movement is about.

I see almost 20 of my progressive friends, folks I met in DC in January of last year at the anti-inauguration are running for office now..

but in general I agree with your point, do we have enough people to FLUSH the ENTIRE SENATE except for about 5 down the toilet and get new ones in?

and even then, would the new ones understand the complex machinery of government enough to operate the old dinosaur beast?

[Aiptasia]

3. You're assuming the incumbents will lose

Sure, people are all for "throwing those clowns out of congress, except for our clown." What is it about home state politics that blinds people to the fact that their own incumbents are just as useless as the rest?

Sure, throw the rest out. But our congressmen and senators here in our state? No way.

I know from whence I speak. If Strom Thurmond could run as a corpse, he'd get re-elected.

[jerry611]

4. 25th amendment makes it clear

1. Vice president
2. Speaker of the House
3. President of the Senate
4. Secretary of State
5. Secretary of Treasury
6. Secretary of Defense
6a. Secretary of Homeland Security (pending legislation)
7. Attorney General
8. Secretary of the Interior
9. Secretary of Agriculture
10. Secretary of Commerce
11. Secretary of Labor
12. Secretary of Health and Human Services
13. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
14. Secretary of Transportation
15. Secretary of Energy
16. Secretary of Education
17. Secretary of Veteran Affairs

[Philosoraptor]

5. That's only 18 people & their staffs.

That only comes to maybe 200...300 people? How hard could it be?

[Independent_Liberal]

6. The ENDGAME has begun. Here's what's going to happen next.

1. The Department of Justice, the FBI and Federal Prosecutors get some cooperation in the Abramoff case and the "Duke" Cunningham bribery case. Jack gives up all the information he has on everything including defrauded Indian tribes, gaming casinos, lobbying firms, illegal campaign contributions sent to GOP Congress people, foreign influence peddling, the American Turkish Council, the SunCruz investigation, Guam, Adam Kidan, Michael Scanlon, Grover Norquist, David Safavian, John Colyandro, Jim Ellis, Ernie Fletcher, Bob Taft, Tom Noe and Coingate, Ken Blackwell, Leandro Aragoncillo, the Gus Boulis murder case, Tom DeLay's misuse of the FAA and the DHS, his trips to Russia and the people who turned up dead in his district, DeLay’s ARMPAC, Bob Ney's golf outings in Scotland and his ties to Iran, New Hampshire phone jamming, stolen computers from the Ohio Democratic Headquarters, Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling, Enron espionage, CIA narco-trafficking, GOP prostitution rings and pedophiles, Wally O'Dell and Diebold, HAVA, Ralph Reed, etc. Randy gives up all info on Porter Goss, Kyle Foggo, Brent Wilkes, Mitchell Wade, defense contractors and hooker and poker parties at the Watergate hotel. They blow the whistle on several Republican leaders in the House, Senate and Executive Branch. All this doo doo hits the fan and Dennis Hastert, Bob Ney, John Doolittle, Dana Rohrabacher, Richard Pombo, Katherine Harris, Tom Feeney, Conrad Burns, John Cornyn, etc. are all indicted. And Bill Frist is indicted for his SEC violations.

2. Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald manages to obtain information from White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove in the CIA Leak investigation. This is related to missing emails from Cheney's office and White House documents requested by Federal Judge Reggie Walton.

3. Rove and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley are both indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice.

4. Fitzgerald indicts Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for obstruction of justice.

5. Some unsavory information about the deals with Halliburton and Carlyle comes out of "Portgate."

6. A few whistleblowers step forward at the open and closed door House and Senate subcommittee hearings on NSA domestic spying and the Pentagon's 9/11 "Able Danger" program and more interesting info is revealed.

7. More damaging info is revealed at the House and Senate Katrina hearings.

8. An Independent Commission to investigate the NSA wiretaps is set up. Whistleblower Russell Tice gives testimony before the Commission.

9. FBI translator and whistleblower Sibel Edmonds takes her case with the DOJ on FBI cover-ups to one of the Federal Courts. At the same time, New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer gets an independent grand jury investigation into the 9/11 events in New York City going. Some family members are alleging a government cover-up. An Independent Prosecutor is appointed to investigate the World Trade Center EPA case and other unsolved crimes relating to the events.

10. The Democrats win back Congress and the Governorships in the November 2006 midterm elections. They get huge margins in both the House and Senate.

11. January 2007, the new Congress is sworn in (with Harry Reid as Senate Majority Leader, Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House of Representatives, John Conyers as House Judiciary Committee Chairman, Henry Waxman as House Government Reform Committee Chairman and Louise Slaughter as House Rules Committee Chair).

12. Cheney's former Chief of Staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby is convicted and he implicates Cheney. Cheney is indicted on charges relating to Plame, Halliburton, AIPAC, the Energy Task Force and Mexico influence peddling and is forced to resign. He claims he's leaving because of health problems.

13. Congress forces Bush to appoint John McCain as Vice President. Both houses of Congress vote overwhelmingly to confirm Vice President McCain.

14. Conyers sets up a House Select Fact Finding Committee to investigate everything (Downing Street Memos, Plame, White House Iraq Group, Larry Franklin and AIPAC, Niger forgeries, depleted uranium, Gannon, Abramoff, Sibel Edmonds FBI whistleblower case, NSA, Enron, Halliburton, Carlyle, Harken, Betchel, 9/11 cover-ups, election fraud, Coingate, FEMA's Katrina response, torture of prisoners, Pentagon psyops units, secret government propaganda operations, etc.). Hearings begin and subpoenas are issued. Several whistleblowers from the FBI, CIA, NSA, State Department and Pentagon step forward to testify. A few Independent Counsels show Congress their findings from grand jury investigations. And Waxman opens an investigation into Halliburton war profiteering and examines reports from the GAO.

15. The investigation into Senator Paul Wellstone's 2002 plane crash death is reopened.

16. The Senate sets up an Investigative Committee to investigate Iraq intelligence, Plame, NSA, 9/11 oddities and Energy Commission cover-ups and a Special Prosecutor is appointed. Senate hearings begin and Sibel Edmonds, Russell Tice, Richard Clarke and James Comey all step forward as witnesses.

17. All the corrupt Republicans are given thorough ethics probes.

18. Congress motions to impeach Bush. Impeachment proceedings and hearings begin. The House Judiciary Committee begins voting on articles of impeachment.

19. A small delegation of Congressional Republicans go up to the White House and urge Bush to resign.

20. Bush resigns to avoid impeachment. He fakes an illness.

21. McCain is sworn in as President. He appoints George Pataki as his Vice President and Rumsfeld is replaced with Joe Lieberman. And of course, McCain is Jerry Ford until January 2009.

I also predict that the Jefferson raid will be the Daniel Ellsberg incident for all of this.

[Independent_Liberal]

7. BTW...

I think Edmonds and Tice are our "John Deans." George Tenet is a potential "Deep Throat" for the Plame case. And I think Trent Lott is Howard Baker and Dick Lugar is Barry Goldwater.

[leveymg]

8. 22. McCain-Pataki-Lieberman bomb Iran. World War. End of story.

Wish there had been a happier ending to that American Tale.

[autorank]

9. Very nice...

This is some detailed thinking. As an "uncertified futurist" (which we all are), I'd say that this is about as close as you can get. I don't think McCain finishes the race, he'll stumble after he's selected. To volatile, he'll be gaited by someone hoping for chairs. The said part, just about anybody could rule given the quiescence of the institutions of commerce and government. They're the folks who should be in there getting rid of *.

[jerry611]

10. McCain doesn't stand a chance

The way he has gone against the conservatives on issues like immigration has all but killed his chances to get the nomination.

Also he may be too old. If elected in 2008, he'll be the oldest president in American history.

[autorank]

12. Gonzalez Indicted...how easily he could have avoided this fate.

I agree with your scenario down the line. I note that Gonzalez could have, at several points, followed his own inclinations and rejected the * tyranny agenda. He chose not to and made it clear that he was a "bitter ender" when he testified to Congress in behalf of domestic spying and the Patriot Act's most repugnant features. That was his personal Rubicon.

He is extremely intelligent, not in a flashy way, but in a way that allowed him to hustle the * organization, get all of their secrets, and start in the big leagues. That's quite an accomplishment since he wasn't a legacy admission to any establishment temple of learning and social certification.

His fatal flaw...well, we won't know for a while. It could be loyalty. Filled with self-importance and taking his rise as a "great honor," he may be so grateful to * that he can't bear to betray the clan. Alternatively, he may be so very deep in their activities, there is no way out except through Marion Fed. Or there may be some "little thing" that the "managers" of the operation have on him or someone unimportant to him that makes it impossible to turn.

I vote for the last explanation, damning or dangerous information on him that he cannot allow released. He can't really have pride in what he's doing. He is smart enough to know better than to think what he's done is anything other than criminal. As far as being in too deep, you always get a deal, an "offer" to turn. He surely has and refused it. There's something he just can't bear to see in the news...the winning explanation for actions we have yet to discover. Why not write history early, before it's made? I can't think of any reason for restraint;)

[hopeisaplace]

11. Calling the staff of 'The West Wing' as we speak

:applause: