Constitutional Scholars: How close to an impeachable offense

[harrison]

is Bush? I believe the constitution calls for impeachment for high crimes and misdemeanors, but where are we on that scale? Is Bush even on the scale?

I guess that at worse, Bush is being portrayed as being negligent. However, how do you explain the fact that Ashcroft began flying private planes? How do you explain all the warnings?

As far as the Iraqi war, while no WMDs have been found, does the UN resolution give Bush cover, along with the resolution from the Congress?

It just seems that Bush is skirting close to the edge of constitutional criminal behavior, if not outright committing it?

Any scholars out there?

[Snow]

1. My readings over the past couple of years suggest that

the standard are really pretty ambiguous, and to some extent deliberately so. There doesn't really seem to be a point at which Congress is obligated to act.

[TankLV]

13. Not very - as long as the dems are in the minority.

Simple math.

But then again, I'm no "scholar" either. Just a simple observer.

Ain't gonna happen as long as this bunch is in power.

The repukes in power have a first loyalty to their party and a last loyalty to their country or Constitution.

Their actions, from Clinton's impeachment,to the CA recall, to Delay's redistricting disgrace, speak volumes about their priorities.

[Dookus]

2. an impeachable offense is

whatever the House of Representatives says is an impeachable offense. With a Republican House, he's nowhere close to it.

[swag]

3. I'm sorry, I'm no scholar

But I think one should also look quite carefully at the phony case for war on Iraq. The President and his people have been lying to Congress about a few things.

[whistle]

7. I agree and Richard Clarke made that point during his...

...testimony to the 9-11 commission when he said that Bush's decision to go to war with Iraq set back America's fight against terrorism. That created a 30 second silence among the commission, which I believe spoke volumes. Bush should be impeached.:wtf:

[kodi]

9. worse, he implies because of iraq al quida has metastisized beyond control

clarke is saying that we are now having to play at a different, more dificult level because of bush's decision to go to war in iraq, and that the next attack is on bush's head.

[alfredo]

15. I believe this is precisely what he wanted. I think his religion

and ideology demands a final showdown between good and evil. the jury is still out on who is good and who is evil. The winner gets to decide.

I see little difference between his foreign policy and domestic policy. Both are forcing a crisis we cannot ignore. Just as the war was on purpose, so is the financial crisis. Both crisis are forcing us to fight for survival. Armageddon is not just in Iraq, it is here on Main St.

[NV1962]

22. Exactly

What happened in Madrid is a case in point: an attack carried out by Al Q'aida wannabes.

Dick Clarke also spelled out that Bush has proven Osama bin Laden exactly right, as he predicted an invasion to occupy an oil rich Muslim country... Makes one wonder in how far ObL and W share an agenda.

[boobooday]

4. Republican Congress

They will never impeach, even though you would think committing war crimes would be impeachable.

Standards obviously mean nothing to these idiots.


http://www.wgoeshome.com

[The Lone Liberal]

5. About as close as I am to flinging a cow over the moon

As long as the house is controlled by Bush's party there is only a snowballs chance in hell of impeachment.

[mmonk]

6. I think misleading (sophisticated lying) concerning matters

of state (such as war) is exactly the kind of thing impeachment was designed for. Whether it be this or something like Iran/contra. Unfortunately, things have changed to where perjury over an affair has taken the place over matters of state as grounds for impeachment. It's all madness to me.

[kissmeimcajun]

8. I may be ignorant

Look, maybe since I'm new here, I may be playing "devil's advocate" and may draw alot of hatred, and while hate Bush's "I don't care what anyone thinks" attitude, when it comes to lying about the WMD's in Iraq, I face the same question about this quote from President Clinton: “The president warned that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had used biological weapons against his own people--and would likely use the weapons again unless he were prevented from doing so. “Hussein,” said the president “threatens the security of all the rest of us.” The president said Iraq still posed a threat to the national security of the United States and the ‘freedom-loving world.’”-CNN.com 02/17/1998

Can anybody help me with a response to this quote? I'm starting to think that both presidents lied to me.

[Sinistrous]

11. No lie there,

1. Historical fact: Saddam Hussein did use chemical weapons, I believe the year was 1988.

2. Re: threat to the US, etc.: That is a considered opinion.

3. Bill Clinton restricted his actions to (a) enforcing UN sanctions, (b) enforcing the no-fly zones, and (c) limited attacts against military targets. He did not invade and occupy a soverign nation.

[kissmeimcajun]

12. But....

But, how can I say Bush lied about Saddam's WMD's when President Clinton supported that theory? I don't want to be accused of a double standard.

[TankLV]

14. Hate to break it to you, but it's now 2004!

The UK attacked the USA in 1812, too. But it doesn't hold water anymore TODAY!

CLINTON successfully disarmed Saddam and kept him in check with the help of the whole world. Remember the no-fly zones and intermittant bombings?

CLINTON successfully PREVENTED other attacks from succeeding on US soil, all without our own version of Hitler's Gestapo and "Fatherland" departments.

Pretty successful policy. Without trashing the Constitution, too!

Funny that!

[kissmeimcajun]

17. True to that

I'll have to use that argument, however, I just don't think it'll keep the repub's off my back.

[interceptor]

18. Not really

I was enforcing those sanctions at the end of Clinton's Presidency and right at the beginning of *'s. The sanctions were a joke. We caught maybe 5% of the smugglers at best in 2000-2001, because the Iranians let everybody and their dog through their waters (where we couldn't go) for the right price. Saddam rebuilt his conventional military to pre-1991 levels despite sanctions, including anti-air weaponry and tanks. (For a number reference, the DoD estimated that Iraq needed 1000 tanks to defend themselves from their regional enemies. Saddam possessed 5000 before Gulf War I, less than 2000 afterwards, and was back up to 5000 before Gulf War II.) He also developed weapons not allowed by the UNSCR's, such as anti-ship and land attack cruise missiles. Throughout Clinton's Presidency and in the summer of 2001 Saddam regularly fired on allied aircraft enforcing NORTHERN WATCH and SOUTHERN WATCH. In 2001 alone, he fired on an E-2C HAWKEYE in Kuwaiti airspace of all places, and a U-2 flying an announced UN mission in search of WMD.

Intermittent bombings in response to AA missiles did nothing, either. In Middle East politics, we just proved Saddam's resolve against us and made him stronger to his non-Iraqi supporters. Furthermore, it wasn't with the help of the whole world. Sanctions enforcement was almost an all-US show. We had British, New Zealander, Australian ships or aircraft or whatnot from time to time, but the vast majority of UNSCR enforcing was done by us.

Anyway, certainly not defending the present administration, just correcting the inaccurate view of sanctions and containment of Saddam. The sanctions regime was retarded and everyone was losing. My opinion has been that we could have forced real change without war by hammering the nations we knew were breaking sanctions (there's a long list that's still not public of who we knew were being bad kids) and getting really, really serious about enforcing them. Every smuggler ship that we caught was back in Iraqi waters in two weeks after release - breaking sanctions wasn't even a criminal offense!

[mulethree]

21. hmm

Well all knew that the UN was doing intensive inspections there, and when we accused them of being idiots and told them exactly where to look, they still found nothing. I think these are the same folks we rely on to inspect nuke facilities in Iran, Lybia, Korea - but they couldn't be trusted in regard to chem and bio weapons? So we get to whack Iraq because they continued to defy the international community. This while Iraq was bending over backwards to get the sanctions lifted, and soon after they submitted a huge report on their weapons programs. I believe the report was complete and thoughrough, at least till the U.S. hijacked it on it's way to the U.N. and censured it.

We knew they had no means of delivering any kind of weapon to the U.S. and such were not an imminent threat to the U.S.

What they did do was move forces west with a potential to threaten Israel, whom way too many consider an ally.

The administration folks say they kept shooting at our planes that enforce the no-fly zone. But hey you fly foreign military jets over the U.S. and see if the government can keep everyone with a hunting rifle from shooting at them. While they might technically have endangered some of our pilots, I think thats an expected risk when you are doing essentially a military occupation of another country's airspace. I have always had the impression that we were flying a lot more missions than we were actually getting alerts from radar. A lot more than just interceptions which was our supposed purpose there.

I had always assumed that the administration must have shared some additional intelligence with congress in order to get them to approve that war authorization by 75%-25%. I wrote my congresspeople asking why they would vote yes on such a thing when they know warmongers are in office presenting irrational arguments for the war. They never wrote back. Oh wrong, I did get a "thanks for your concern" form letter from one and now get campaign literature from two of them.

Today a congressman mentioned they had been told that Iraq could launch unmanned drones from ships in the atlantic armed with WMD against east-coast cities. The congressman mentioned that the air-force had discredited that idea but that it was presented to congress anyway. Oh no! a plague infected rat tied to a helium balloon! Better wipe out their capability before they use it ....

[Loco_moco]

10. Ashcroft...

here's a link to another post here on DU...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x442067

<snip>
FBI translator, Sibel Edmonds, was offered a substantial raise and a full time job in order to not go public that she had been asked by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to retranslate and adjust the translations of subject intercepts that had been received before September 11, 2001 by the FBI and CIA.
<end>

"retranslate and adjust the translations..." ???WTF???

and when she refuses and take the matter up with her supervisors...

<snip>
Undaunted, Ms. Edmonds took her concerns to upper management. Soon afterward she was fired. The only cause given was "for the convenience of the government." The F.B.I. has not refuted any of Ms. Edmonds' allegations, yet they have accounted for none of them.

On the morning Ms. Edmonds was terminated, she said, she was escorted from the building by an agent she remembered saying: "We will be watching you and listening to you. If you dare to consult an attorney who is not approved by the F.B.I., or if you take this issue outside the F.B.I. to the Senate, the next time I see you, it will be in jail." Two other agents were present."
<end>

IMO, we need to retake control of our government this November before we can undertake any real or substantive investigations of this administration. The neocons strategy is now transparent.. by seeding the courts, committes and commissions with their own appointments, they give the illusion of legality to a generally unsuspecting and trusting public...

Only open and fair investigations will lead to justice..

peace;
rob

[BrotherBuzz]

16. Congressman Gerald Ford said it best in 1970

"An impeachable offense is basically whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history,"

[interceptor]

19. Good quote

The Rodino report is good reading too...

[BrotherBuzz]

20. I'm pretty shaky here...

Who's Rodino?

[Wapsie B]

23. Peter Rodino D-NJ

U.S. House of Representatives

http://law.shu.edu/orgs/rodino/page0003.htm

http://www.antonnews.com/roslynnews/1999/08/06/opinion/

[BrotherBuzz]

25. Thanks, and shame on lazy me...

Google is my best friend. I did find the Rodino report and it is, indeed, an interesting read on impeachment.

[strategery blunder]

24. Here is a draft of an impeachment resolution from a constitutional scholar

<http://www.counterpunch.org/boyle01172003.html>

[WhereIsMyFreedom]

26. Not this year

I just don't think that there is enough time left before the election for the House to bother trying to impeach him. We're still in the drip-drip-drip stage. If we had another year (or if he is reselected) then I think the drips could turn into a torrent and the Repubs in Congress will abandon him so as not to be taken down with him. In that case, I could see them impeaching him. They'd do it for their own self-preservation, though, not for the good of the country.

That's my non-scholarly opinion.

[Blue-Jay]

27. Pushing for a war based on nothing other than vendetta and profit

is not only impeachable, it's a war crime. Let's call a spade a spade. Bush should stand trial in The Hague for his crimes against humanity.

Yes, Saddam was a bad dude. Yes, the world could use fewer Saddams.

The result of Bush's elective war (he still calls it part of the "war on terra") is going to outlive all of us. Mark my words, terrorism is going to increase as a direct result of his (PNAC's) little crusade.

[anarchy1999]

28. So sad to have to agree with you on every point.

Most of the PNAC'ers hold dual citzenships with, guess what country?

I don't feel comfortable with anything my government is doing right now. Sorry, I just don't. I wish I had never taken that silly red pill.