Why Not Censure George Bush? :Bill Press

[jbfam4]

http://billpress.com/columns.html

Why Not Censure George Bush?
March 16, 2006


It’s hard to argue with his logic: “When the President of the United States breaks the law, he must be held accountable.”

Yet when Sen. Russ Feingold spoke those words in introducing his measure to censure President Bush for ordering the NSA to spy on American citizens without a court order — and lying to Congress and the American people about it — Republicans reacted as if he’d ordered suicide bombers to crash the gates of the White House. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist insisted it sent the “wrong message” to terrorists. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich accused Feingold of “playing politics.” And conservative activist Paul Weyrich said it proved the Democratic Party was the “party of impeachment.”

Nonsense. Wrong message? There’s nothing wrong in telling the world we expect even the president to obey the law. Playing politics? Look who’s talking. Democrats, the impeachment party? That’s laugh-out-loud funny. Americans may have a short memory, but we still remember which party impeached Bill Clinton — and for what.

Once again, there’s more than a little hypocrisy at play. When Democrats proposed censure, rather than impeachment, as a more appropriate response for Clinton’s peccadillo, Republicans rejected it as “insufficient” and a “mere scolding.” Judiciary Chairman Henry Hyde dismissed censure as nothing more than “impeachment lite.” Yet if censure was so insufficient for Clinton’s lie about (legal) sex, why is it suddenly so unfair for Bush’s lie about (illegal) wiretapping, surely a more serious offense?

But here’s what I really don’t get. You expect knee-jerk Republicans to line up behind Bush and attack Feingold. What happened to his fellow Democrats? Once he called for censuring President Bush, Democrats ran away from Feingold faster than cockroaches running away from Tom DeLay.

[Dhalgren]

1. Democrats have become the "Do nothing" party. Why?

Well, some people on here say that everybody hates Democrats - that we're "damned if we do and damned if we don't". Well, I say, let's be damned for doing! You can't beat fascists by sitting on your hands and hoping it gets so bad that the voters will come to you by default - which is the way most Democratic "leaders" seem to think. "When it gets bad enough, the people will flock to the Democratic Party" is the slogan for losing against fascists. The fascists want to acquire and retain power, they give a good goddamn about anything else. They have pretty much acquired it all, so now it's just a matter of maintenance for them. Having a platform of "we could do what they are doing better than they are doing it" is no way to oust the fascists...

[Goblinmonger]

2. Who Knows

Maybe the impeachment of Clinton lead OBL to craft the 9/11 attack because he saw us as being weak :eyes:

[OrangeCountyDemocrat]

3. I Completely Agree....

And that just proves that Clinton was to blame for 9/11. If not for him, we wouldn't have looked weak, and the attack wouldn't have happened.

Guess there's no need for the "wot" since Bill's not president anymore.

[Cha]

4. Good analogy, Bill Press!

"Democrats ran away from Feingold faster than cockroaches running away from Tom DeLay."