Dangerous Times Ahead By Dave Lindorff

[Catherine Vincent]

http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff04242006.html

A Cornered Administration
Dangerous Times Ahead

By DAVE LINDORFF

The noose is tightening around George Bush and his gang of White House crooks and liars, with prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald reportedly getting closer to an indictment of Karl Rove, and now with the Illinois and California state legislatures considering resolutions that would have those states submit bills of impeachment to the U.S. House of Representatives--an alternative means of bringing an impeachment case against a president when, as now, the sitting members of Congress don't have the courage or conviction to do so themselves.

These are dangerous times, because the Bush family history, and the Rove M.O., are to attack viciously and without restraint when cornered.

At a book signing on Friday at Columbia University, a number of journalists told me they worried that Bush, Rove and Cheney, if they thought they were going to lose the House in November and face serious investigations into their crimes and deceits, would do something treasonous, like launching a war against Iran, or perhaps allowing another major terrorist attack against a U.S. target, so that they could then clamp down further on domestic freedom and ramp up jingoistic support among their wavering base.

The time for vacillating, cowering Democrats is over. The only way to defeat this threat is to warn about it and resist it openly now. Democrats also need to stop waffling about voter security and vote fraud. It is essential that all voting machines in November have paper records, and that an army of activists begin now preparing to block Republican efforts to confuse and intimidate progressive voters to keep them from even getting to the polls.

[MadMaddie]

1. No kidding...we have been saying that for the last 2 years...

They are finally waking up....this group is dangerous....to America!!

[endarkenment]

2. Your journalist friends are correct.

Assume that major crimes have been committed by the bush regime. How can they possibly allow either house to have a Democratic subpoena power? Look at the mess that the one independent investigation is causing. Imagine three or more congressional investigations with subpoena power looking into aspects of the last five years that are outside of Fitzgerald's charter. They simply cannot allow this to happen. They have no intention of going to jail.

[patrice]

3. We must take it to the streets.

We have to do this with our actions, with our money, with our talk, with all comers and with one another as individuals.

[RufusEarl]

4. So the jest of the this is, will the Dem's

take a stand and warn the country of what Bu$h & company might do if cornered by loosing the house or senate or by facing impeachment by state referendum?

We here at DU have been saying this for years, but haven't been able to frame it in such a way that outsiders would understand.

I see the same problem for the dem's, how does one frame this in such a way that it's not seen as a scare tactic?

[endarkenment]

5. I think you can't.

The real question is what will our opposition party do when the dictatorship is overt? How many of our leaders will stand up and call us out into the streets? Any?

I fear the answer is 'none'. I fear we are alone.

[RufusEarl]

6. Then i suppose we're DOOMED!

I don't completely disagree with you, but i have to keep faith that someone in power will stand up to this admin. And explain to the american people what is happening to there country, in a way the american people can understand.

[endarkenment]

7. I don't think we are doomed I just think the situation

is very very bad.


The question is will the regime overtly move to end the republic to save its own skin, and the answer is probably yes. In doing so they will use force and intimidation to repress opposition. They have organized their fundaloon base for years, so I think they believe they can count on that mysterious 34% for the goons who will enforce the new rules. We of course aren't organized at all, we never are. We are the people, the common ordinary working folks bumbling through our lives hoping to pay off our mortgages and get our kids through college and take care of our parents as they end their lives. We aren't ready for this shit, we never are. So the goons will have the initial advantage. What they won't have is the support of the vast majority of the people, the support of all of those alienated non-voters, the support of all the befuddled and confused suburbanites who have been going along with the horseshit because, well, they are befuddled and confused.

[RufusEarl]

8. I don't belong to and organized political party, I'm a Democrat!

I've been wondering for some time now, what this admin planned to do at the end of it's second term in office. It's obvious to me they can't just leave office like ever other past admin, they have to much baggage and most of it is criminal.

So i figure if given enough time this admin can screw this country into a one party rule cluster fuck, and they appear to be on the road to doing just that.

If you like me believe they can Die-bold most federal and state elections, then the game is over check and mate. I keep waiting for someone in the DNC to stand up and say something about the problems with E-voting, but i haven't heard a thing from anyone in authority.

So i figure you and i are both in the same boat, we know what's going on in our country and can't do a damn thing about it. If organizing and voting was all there was to it, then perhaps we would stand a chance. I will fight for my chosen cause, but it should be a fair fight!

[DemoTex]

9. Snarling, snapping, cornered hydrophobic curs.

No, much more dangerous than that. Now about those Halliburton-built detention centers .. the Vietnamese Communists, when they won the war, called detention centers "re-education camps." I fear we are going to have a whole lot of dissidents re-edjumacated, and soon.


(If it's not already too late.)