http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/5996Subpoena Dick
by David Swanson | Mar 10 2007
I've spoken at impeachment forums, debates, rallies, strategy meetings, and workshops, but tonight's event in Washington, D.C., will be the first I've spoken at since the Vice President's Chief of Staff was convicted for lying to protect him. So, I'm going in expecting fewer objections and reservations about impeachment. Still, it's useful to yet again lay out all the familiar ones and why they are more wrong than ever.
I understand that Congressman Henry Waxman may have the prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald testify next week. That's an excellent start. But if Fitzgerald will not testify voluntarily, he should be subpoenaed, as should Libby, Rove, Armitage, Bartlett, Matalin, Fleischer, and Cheney. Each of these people needs to be put under oath and on camera and questioned.
We know from the Libby trial that they were led by Cheney in a campaign of retribution against Joe Wilson that included telling numerous reporters that Wilson was sent to Niger by his wife Valerie Plame, a CIA operative. Cheney was told by the CIA that Valerie Plame worked as a covert agent in the CIA's Nonproliferation Division, which is the critical division of the CIA responsible for stopping the spread of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. Cheney's efforts to expose Plame exposed her entire covert network. If Plame's work had been exposed by a double-agent in our government like Aldrich Ames or Robert Hanssen, that person would be facing prosecution for espionage and treason.
Cheney has announced that he will probably refuse to appear if subpoenaed. If so, he can be impeached (which is merely an indictment) and he will show up in the Senate for his trial or resign.
There are more than adequate grounds to impeach Cheney for quite a few different abuses. Cheney led not just a campaign of retribution, but the whole campaign to defraud the nation into an illegal war. Sworn testimony in the Libby trial revealed that Cheney's office managed the evidence of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, all of which proved to be lies. Cheney personally visited the CIA several times before the invasion to pressure the CIA to distort pre-war intelligence. And Cheney exerted "constant" pressure on the Republican former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee to stall an investigation into the Bush administration's use of flawed intelligence on Iraq, according to the new chairman, Senator Jay Rockefeller.
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