Reply #74: We all have a choice: the right side of history or the wrong side. Win or lose.

[pat_k]

Nothing "magic" about it. It's called standing and fighting to defend the principles and institutions we established in the Constitution -- something that Members of Congress are sworn to do.

The Congressional oath to uphold the Constitution is not an oath to win -- it is an oath to fight -- to "support and defend."

The power to impeach is the weapon we gave them to fulfill that oath when the threat comes from within the halls of power.

If they do not accuse -- publicly and formally by introducing articles of impeachment -- they are handing the WH an unassailable argument. (Tony Snow: "If the actions of this President and Vice President violated the Constitution in any way, Members of Congress, who are sworn to defend the Constitution, would be pursing impeachment. Not only are they NOT pursuing impeachment (not one member has introduced articles)they have taken it off the table. Those charges coming from the nuts on the left are nuts.")

Their oath is an individual oath; their duty an individual duty. Each and every member has a choice. Keep impeachment "off limits" and give the War Criminals in the WH cover or stand up, accuse them of http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Senator/10">their crimes, and call on their colleagues to take up the fight.

At such critical junctures, we all have a choice: the right side of history or the wrong side. Win or lose.

History is a harsh judge. When we look back at the times that evil has won, the "winners" disgust us and we hold the ones who stood on the sidelines because they believed "We can't win this one so we'd better shut up" in contempt.

As Barbara Jordan reminds us, when the Constitution was completed on the seventeenth of September in 1787, she was not included in that "We, the people."

How could that happen when so many who participated in the creation of that document claimed to oppose slavery on principle? It happened because they choose to betray their principles and give up the fight -- and so they became complicit in the morally indefensible "compromise" that allowed our fellow human beings to be enslaved in the United States. Undoubtedly many believed they "couldn't win" if they drew a line in the sand and so did not draw the line.

We may never stop paying the price for that horrific compromise.

In more recent history, we have called on our so-called "leaders" to stand and fight for the principles they claim to be committed to. Over and over we have watched in horror and dismay as they fail us. There are so many heartbreaking examples, like. . .

• Failing to take up the articles of impeachment against Reagan that http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE0DB1638F935A35750C0A961948260&sec=&pagewanted=print">Rep. Henry B. Gonzalez introduced in March 1987 because the Democratic leadership had convinced themselves that conciliation would pave the way to victory in 1988;[/li>
  
• Submitting to the treasonous Bush v. Gore edict, instead of denouncing it and putting the decision to throw out the unlawful Florida electors in the hands of Congress, where it belonged;


• Failing to fight tooth and nail against Bush's Authorization to Military Force.
  
  ". . .the abdication by Congress of its constitutional power to declare war is a dangerous step toward a government in which one man holds in his hands the power to use the world's most powerful military force in whatever manner he chooses, whenever and wherever he perceives a threat against national security. and refused to abdicate their power to drawn a line in the sand and fought tooth and nail against Bush's Authorization to Use Military Force."
  --Senator Byrd


• Failing to join Rep. Tubbs Jones and Sen. Boxer in rejecting the unlawful Ohio electors on January 6th, 2005.


• Sending Alito, a key promoter of the fascist fantasy of unlimited ("unitary") authoritarian power, to the Supreme Court by voting to close debate because they feared being called "obstructionists," and then having the nerve to claim "opposition" by voting against him on the floor;


• Failing to fight tooth and nail against the War Criminals Protection Act of 2006;

Of all the rationalizations for inaction they invoke, some form of "Can't win; so don't fight" is perhaps the most insidious. Failing to fight because "it's futile" is a self-defeating prophesy. The things worth fighting for can never happen if nobody takes up the fight.

We can't know the road not taken, but we can see where their failures have taken us. Over and over, we have seen consequences far more dire than the worst they feared would result if they had acted. The price we are paying is higher than we could have imagined when they failed us in 2000 or when they failed us in 2002 or when they failed us in 2005. If they fail to impeach, even if it is the charge of the light brigade, the price could be unimaginable.