Left Coast Dreamers - or, why W ain't getting Impeached
Here we go again.
Today, the San Fransicko Board of Stupidvisors passed a resolution demanding that George Bush be impeached. Hehehehehehehehehe! I think this is really funny.
In fact, Di-Fi (former mayor of that city) was probably so embarrased that she essentially told them to shut up, do their job, and get back in their place. At least she knows that the top level of this government is now lost somewhere in la-la land.
Even Seattle's council members haven't gotten this silly (well, at least yet).
When a city council demands that a president be impeached, without any real hard evidence, and without the political reality to back it up, that basically shows a certain political immaturity. In fact, for some reason, major city politicians - who at one time, were senatorial hopefuls - now seem to be unable to do governing. At least in my experience. Hell, they are so embarassing, that sometimes the residents vote for a 20 year old for mayor and almost get him on the general election ballot - like my second cousin did when he ran against Vera Katz of Portland. Anyways, to get back to my point. Big city governments are like large corporations - and there is a lot to manage. They chief responsibility of any city government is to see that the municipal services function (that includes the police department). Then, probably the second responsibility is planning. Everything else is really irrelevant, except cheering it's sports teams and starring in that city's annual festival.
I guess I am biased by where I live, but it seems that, in my experience, council members of big cities like to focus on stupid stuff. To them, governance is secondary. So a council member goes to political rallies for Algore rather than attend council meetings (like Seattle in 2000). In the meantime, the City of Seattle governs City Light, the public power utility. And they go to the city council for setting rates. In times former, the councilmembers could grasp the economics behind rates. Thus, they would have an idea of what was too high for the consumer, and know what was too low for the utility (so it doesn't go out of business) - or know when the utility was truly gouging the customer. Today? Do you think these individuals really have any math skills?
I'm not affected by their power rates, by the way - my county gets PUD commissioners, who often are politicians who also don't understand rates, either (see the WPPSS controvery of 25 years ago).
Anyways, back to my subject matter. San Fransicko - the Venice of North America (meaning that some of it's suburban cities exceed it in population, just like Venice) - is now becoming politically irrelevant. And possibly economically irrelevant, too. If these goofballs have their way, businesses will not want to locate there, because of it's hostile business climate - and increased crime. They will locate elsewhere around the Bay area. It will be less and less important over time - just like Venice.
At one time, this town was the largest west of the Mississippi, and a major American city. Remember, the UN was founded here. This was also where all the big business in California was located. Over time, however, Los Angeles overtook it. Now, I think it is only the fifth largest city in California. And as it becomes smaller in proportion (and possibly in population), it becomes more intolerant. And one thing about intolerance is that it's practitioners become goofier the further away you get from tolerance. Look at the following: Neo-Nazi's, Animal-rights activists, gay-liberation practitioners, "patriots", Farrakhan, Pat Robertson. If you do not see any one of these things as goofy, then we have a bit of an ideological-blindness problem. And it is intolerance for which they elect mirror-images of themselves.
Now, this is what is driving this move toward impeaching President Bush. Of course, there is no reality to their dream, for which I will explain below, but they are so ideologically blinded and motivated that they fail to see how this is impossible. I will explain below.
First, impeachment is a political, rather than a criminal, act. Sure, the constitution states there must be "High Crimes and Misdemeanors," but if you have a President who is giving you everything you want, then you kinda ignore the fact that the President is committing high crimes and misdemeanors. In fact, Andrew Johnson was impeached even though he commited no crime - except for getting in the way of the extremists' ambitions. And when Bill Clinton kept blocking the reforms the Republicans wanted to put in place, then a relatively minor infraction such as lying under oath became a high crime and misdemeanor (although I believe that perjury would pass this constitional test). However, when Lyndon Johnson was engaging in massive corruption, ethical violations, acts of a sexually predatory nature, civil rights violations, these infractions were overlooked because, after all, he was getting the Great Society in place.
Thus, for impeachment to succeed, Congress must be controlled by the party opposite the President. Otherwise, individuals are party loyalists, and if the President's party controls Congress, they certainly do not launch impeachment proceedings.
Secondly, impeachment takes time. You have to get those charges in place, and have enough evidence to convict. Now, the charges that would lead to impeachment would be "Bush Lied," and for the really kooky, "Bush Knew." This has to be proven. And, to do so, the Democrats have to control both houses of Congress. Thus, if they finally take control back in 2006, they only have two years to convict Bush before he leaves office. Then again, there is a good chance the Republicans will be in control, which means impeachment will not go forward.
Along these lines, if the Democrats gain control of Congress, they need to get the ball rolling to investigate all this stuff. And maybe more things - I don't know, as I am not a consititional scholar. But I do not that it takes time to get these individuals in place. And the investigation takes time. Remember Iran-Contra? That investigation started in the second-to-last year of Reagan's last term, and did not conclude until the late 1990's - when Americans (even Democrats) no longer cared about it.
Is there a special prosecutor looking into Iraq as yet? I really do not know. It took Ken Starr over four years to get enough evidence to get Clinton impeached. And there was evidence provided that he had in fact perjured himself - enough to impeach him. What matters will lead W to perjure himself - in time for a trial.
If the Democrats regain control of Congress, they will have to wait a couple of months to really get busy investigating. That is because they will not want to be seen as overly zealous. So it would not be until April 2007 that they would do this. That leaves really only 20 months until the end of Bush's term. Who already is almost a lame duck.
Thus, there is a good chance that they will not have enough hard evidence to convict W in time. Even if they manage to dig up enough hard evidence, it will be in 2008 - an election year. And they know that impeachment is political suicide to do in an election year.
Remember when Clinton got impeached? The Republicans lost seats when they should have won them. The only way for the Democrats to win Congress is with a positive program - like the Contract with America - and they will have to enact it. It takes time to enact a program, and if they instead focus on impeachment, then the words "Do Nothing Congress" will apply. Meaning the Democrats will have a hard time winning in 2008, and once again, snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Americans generally forgive politicians for adverse political decisions. Unless there is a huge disaster - like the Great Depression - they do not get too mad to demand impeachment. Even if Iraq goes bad, this does not constitute a huge disastor - except for those who lack historical perspective. And if the opposition party pours it on the President for doing moderately badly, even though he is trying his best to govern the country, then a backlash comes into play.
However, impeachment is accepted if the President abuses his powers for personal gain. This is what happened with Nixon and Clinton. Thus far, impeachment only works when the issue at hand is personal, not political. It is very difficult to prove that W liberated Iraq for personal gain. Except, of course, if you are politically immature and are tuned toward conspiracy theories.
And in fact, it can be argued that the Iraq liberation has resulted in better security. How many Islamofascist attacks have taken place since 9-11 in the United States? There is the argument that the terrorists we are fighting is in Iraq rather than the United States. We need not convince the left of this - which will not believe it anyway - but the people who need convincing, the middle, are who the arguments are aimed at. And any such move toward impeachment can bring up these arguments again, some people can be convinced, and the Democrats will be argued as a do-nothing party.
The best time to bring this up would have been in 2003 - had the Democrats one. I first heard of impeachment arguments in March 2002 - barely a year into W's term. So they were planning on it already. However, they did not have the levers of power, and their chance at impeachment was lost (because if the president won in 2004, he would win House/Senate seats, and 2006 would have been far too late to do this).
Those Democrats who have at least some political maturity understand all this, such as Di-Fi. They know that a. W is essentially a lame-duck President, so impeachment is essentially a waste of time, b. That focusing on impeachment will make them look like they are on a vendetta, resulting in c. a sympathetic public more willing to vote for Republicans out of sympathy, and partly because d. they focused on impeachment rather than promoting the positive agenda they promised in the 2006 election, resulting in e. a loss of the Presidency once again.
Remember, W is further into his term than Bill Clinton was into his when he made his famous "I did not have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky" remarks." Bill Clinton's impeachment barely made it on time, as it happened after the 1998 elections. The Republican Congress is certainly not going to impeach one of their own party.
If impeachment ever does take place, it would have to be at the very, very end of Bush's term - when we know who the new President is. Even on a fast track, it would take about 1 1/2 years to get an impeachment vote - and an angry electorate voting Republican because this is how the Democrats squandered their time in Congress. Which would mean it would take place in October - December 2008, when it is a moot point. Also, if the Democrats win the house, it will be by a very, very slim margin - such that the judiciary committee might not vote it out of committee, and if it does, there may be a few Democrats who will not vote to impeach - which is enough.
Then there is the matter of moving this to the Senate trial. This would take place in 2009. After W left office. Which means it would be a moot point. And it takes 2/3 vote of the Senate to convict - which the Senate will not be in 2/3 control of the Democrats.
In any case, even if W gets impeached by an infuriated Congress (over the fact they lost the election over impeachment zealotry), it ain't going anywhere. That is because the clock will have run out. And so many minutes have ticked away, that there is not a chance to do so.
Let me draw an analogy. Lets assume W impeachment were a football game. It is the R's vs the D's. If you get more points than your opponnent, you remove him from office. In terms of this analogy, it is toward the end of the third quarter, and the R's are leading the D's by a score of, oh, say, 82-10. Any reasonable person would assume the game were over.
However, not the anti-Bush zealots. They fail to see the realities of impeachment, and that the clock to do this has just about run out. And they look silly by demanding this. Any time my political opponents look silly, I want to promote that to make them look bad. And to those who wish to promote impeachment, I say - bring it on!
Today, the San Fransicko Board of Stupidvisors passed a resolution demanding that George Bush be impeached. Hehehehehehehehehe! I think this is really funny.
In fact, Di-Fi (former mayor of that city) was probably so embarrased that she essentially told them to shut up, do their job, and get back in their place. At least she knows that the top level of this government is now lost somewhere in la-la land.
Even Seattle's council members haven't gotten this silly (well, at least yet).
When a city council demands that a president be impeached, without any real hard evidence, and without the political reality to back it up, that basically shows a certain political immaturity. In fact, for some reason, major city politicians - who at one time, were senatorial hopefuls - now seem to be unable to do governing. At least in my experience. Hell, they are so embarassing, that sometimes the residents vote for a 20 year old for mayor and almost get him on the general election ballot - like my second cousin did when he ran against Vera Katz of Portland. Anyways, to get back to my point. Big city governments are like large corporations - and there is a lot to manage. They chief responsibility of any city government is to see that the municipal services function (that includes the police department). Then, probably the second responsibility is planning. Everything else is really irrelevant, except cheering it's sports teams and starring in that city's annual festival.
I guess I am biased by where I live, but it seems that, in my experience, council members of big cities like to focus on stupid stuff. To them, governance is secondary. So a council member goes to political rallies for Algore rather than attend council meetings (like Seattle in 2000). In the meantime, the City of Seattle governs City Light, the public power utility. And they go to the city council for setting rates. In times former, the councilmembers could grasp the economics behind rates. Thus, they would have an idea of what was too high for the consumer, and know what was too low for the utility (so it doesn't go out of business) - or know when the utility was truly gouging the customer. Today? Do you think these individuals really have any math skills?
I'm not affected by their power rates, by the way - my county gets PUD commissioners, who often are politicians who also don't understand rates, either (see the WPPSS controvery of 25 years ago).
Anyways, back to my subject matter. San Fransicko - the Venice of North America (meaning that some of it's suburban cities exceed it in population, just like Venice) - is now becoming politically irrelevant. And possibly economically irrelevant, too. If these goofballs have their way, businesses will not want to locate there, because of it's hostile business climate - and increased crime. They will locate elsewhere around the Bay area. It will be less and less important over time - just like Venice.
At one time, this town was the largest west of the Mississippi, and a major American city. Remember, the UN was founded here. This was also where all the big business in California was located. Over time, however, Los Angeles overtook it. Now, I think it is only the fifth largest city in California. And as it becomes smaller in proportion (and possibly in population), it becomes more intolerant. And one thing about intolerance is that it's practitioners become goofier the further away you get from tolerance. Look at the following: Neo-Nazi's, Animal-rights activists, gay-liberation practitioners, "patriots", Farrakhan, Pat Robertson. If you do not see any one of these things as goofy, then we have a bit of an ideological-blindness problem. And it is intolerance for which they elect mirror-images of themselves.
Now, this is what is driving this move toward impeaching President Bush. Of course, there is no reality to their dream, for which I will explain below, but they are so ideologically blinded and motivated that they fail to see how this is impossible. I will explain below.
First, impeachment is a political, rather than a criminal, act. Sure, the constitution states there must be "High Crimes and Misdemeanors," but if you have a President who is giving you everything you want, then you kinda ignore the fact that the President is committing high crimes and misdemeanors. In fact, Andrew Johnson was impeached even though he commited no crime - except for getting in the way of the extremists' ambitions. And when Bill Clinton kept blocking the reforms the Republicans wanted to put in place, then a relatively minor infraction such as lying under oath became a high crime and misdemeanor (although I believe that perjury would pass this constitional test). However, when Lyndon Johnson was engaging in massive corruption, ethical violations, acts of a sexually predatory nature, civil rights violations, these infractions were overlooked because, after all, he was getting the Great Society in place.
Thus, for impeachment to succeed, Congress must be controlled by the party opposite the President. Otherwise, individuals are party loyalists, and if the President's party controls Congress, they certainly do not launch impeachment proceedings.
Secondly, impeachment takes time. You have to get those charges in place, and have enough evidence to convict. Now, the charges that would lead to impeachment would be "Bush Lied," and for the really kooky, "Bush Knew." This has to be proven. And, to do so, the Democrats have to control both houses of Congress. Thus, if they finally take control back in 2006, they only have two years to convict Bush before he leaves office. Then again, there is a good chance the Republicans will be in control, which means impeachment will not go forward.
Along these lines, if the Democrats gain control of Congress, they need to get the ball rolling to investigate all this stuff. And maybe more things - I don't know, as I am not a consititional scholar. But I do not that it takes time to get these individuals in place. And the investigation takes time. Remember Iran-Contra? That investigation started in the second-to-last year of Reagan's last term, and did not conclude until the late 1990's - when Americans (even Democrats) no longer cared about it.
Is there a special prosecutor looking into Iraq as yet? I really do not know. It took Ken Starr over four years to get enough evidence to get Clinton impeached. And there was evidence provided that he had in fact perjured himself - enough to impeach him. What matters will lead W to perjure himself - in time for a trial.
If the Democrats regain control of Congress, they will have to wait a couple of months to really get busy investigating. That is because they will not want to be seen as overly zealous. So it would not be until April 2007 that they would do this. That leaves really only 20 months until the end of Bush's term. Who already is almost a lame duck.
Thus, there is a good chance that they will not have enough hard evidence to convict W in time. Even if they manage to dig up enough hard evidence, it will be in 2008 - an election year. And they know that impeachment is political suicide to do in an election year.
Remember when Clinton got impeached? The Republicans lost seats when they should have won them. The only way for the Democrats to win Congress is with a positive program - like the Contract with America - and they will have to enact it. It takes time to enact a program, and if they instead focus on impeachment, then the words "Do Nothing Congress" will apply. Meaning the Democrats will have a hard time winning in 2008, and once again, snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Americans generally forgive politicians for adverse political decisions. Unless there is a huge disaster - like the Great Depression - they do not get too mad to demand impeachment. Even if Iraq goes bad, this does not constitute a huge disastor - except for those who lack historical perspective. And if the opposition party pours it on the President for doing moderately badly, even though he is trying his best to govern the country, then a backlash comes into play.
However, impeachment is accepted if the President abuses his powers for personal gain. This is what happened with Nixon and Clinton. Thus far, impeachment only works when the issue at hand is personal, not political. It is very difficult to prove that W liberated Iraq for personal gain. Except, of course, if you are politically immature and are tuned toward conspiracy theories.
And in fact, it can be argued that the Iraq liberation has resulted in better security. How many Islamofascist attacks have taken place since 9-11 in the United States? There is the argument that the terrorists we are fighting is in Iraq rather than the United States. We need not convince the left of this - which will not believe it anyway - but the people who need convincing, the middle, are who the arguments are aimed at. And any such move toward impeachment can bring up these arguments again, some people can be convinced, and the Democrats will be argued as a do-nothing party.
The best time to bring this up would have been in 2003 - had the Democrats one. I first heard of impeachment arguments in March 2002 - barely a year into W's term. So they were planning on it already. However, they did not have the levers of power, and their chance at impeachment was lost (because if the president won in 2004, he would win House/Senate seats, and 2006 would have been far too late to do this).
Those Democrats who have at least some political maturity understand all this, such as Di-Fi. They know that a. W is essentially a lame-duck President, so impeachment is essentially a waste of time, b. That focusing on impeachment will make them look like they are on a vendetta, resulting in c. a sympathetic public more willing to vote for Republicans out of sympathy, and partly because d. they focused on impeachment rather than promoting the positive agenda they promised in the 2006 election, resulting in e. a loss of the Presidency once again.
Remember, W is further into his term than Bill Clinton was into his when he made his famous "I did not have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky" remarks." Bill Clinton's impeachment barely made it on time, as it happened after the 1998 elections. The Republican Congress is certainly not going to impeach one of their own party.
If impeachment ever does take place, it would have to be at the very, very end of Bush's term - when we know who the new President is. Even on a fast track, it would take about 1 1/2 years to get an impeachment vote - and an angry electorate voting Republican because this is how the Democrats squandered their time in Congress. Which would mean it would take place in October - December 2008, when it is a moot point. Also, if the Democrats win the house, it will be by a very, very slim margin - such that the judiciary committee might not vote it out of committee, and if it does, there may be a few Democrats who will not vote to impeach - which is enough.
Then there is the matter of moving this to the Senate trial. This would take place in 2009. After W left office. Which means it would be a moot point. And it takes 2/3 vote of the Senate to convict - which the Senate will not be in 2/3 control of the Democrats.
In any case, even if W gets impeached by an infuriated Congress (over the fact they lost the election over impeachment zealotry), it ain't going anywhere. That is because the clock will have run out. And so many minutes have ticked away, that there is not a chance to do so.
Let me draw an analogy. Lets assume W impeachment were a football game. It is the R's vs the D's. If you get more points than your opponnent, you remove him from office. In terms of this analogy, it is toward the end of the third quarter, and the R's are leading the D's by a score of, oh, say, 82-10. Any reasonable person would assume the game were over.
However, not the anti-Bush zealots. They fail to see the realities of impeachment, and that the clock to do this has just about run out. And they look silly by demanding this. Any time my political opponents look silly, I want to promote that to make them look bad. And to those who wish to promote impeachment, I say - bring it on!
posted by EricMatthew at 11:09 PM
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