The Impeachability of the Bush Administration

Introduction
First off, I’d like to
start by saying that this isn’t about impeaching Bush. The subject is
clearly about the Impeachment of the Administration. The entire
administration, even those who we may find more politically palatable
than the rest, need to go given the recent findings in the numerous
leaked minutes, reports and internal secret communications of the
British government.

Secondly, it is obvious, someone high up
in the British government has the moral fortitude, bravery and
patriotism to do what’s right, not just for Great Britain, not just for
the American people, but for the entire free world as we *used* to know
it.

Let us address the validity of the documents, for we must
have authentic documents to be considered evidence. No government
officials, British or U.S., have denied the authenticity, despite what
party leader, Mehlman, has said. Any statements that have questioned
the authenticity of the document have been soundly defeated, at times
by the press directly addressing the point during questioning.
<5> British and U.S. officials have passively acknowledged the
validity of the documents, and instead have only tried to question the
contents of the documents, saying either they represent opinion, are
out of context, or mean something completely different. This is a weak
argument at best and demands *and* requires an investigation to get to
the truth.

Impeachment
Now, let’s move on to the
question of impeachment. I will say that there is now plenty of hard
evidence now to proceed. The leaked internal secret communications of
the British government corroborate the testimony of Richard Clarke
<1>, the statements in Clarke’s <2>, Woodward’s <3>
and Senator Graham’s books <4>, that had been dismissed by the
administration as invalid due to the limited access given to these
people. I will remind the reader that Clarke *never* gave testimony
that the Bush administration was pre-occupied with Iraq prior to 9-11
or in the summary of 2002, but only testified to the effect that Bush’s
re-allocation of resources to Iraq instead of focusing on Al Qaeda have
only caused more terrorism against the U.S. and its allies:

"
Hostility toward the US in the Islamic world has increased since 9-11,
largely as a result of the invasion and occupation of Iraq."

Clarke’s
testimony, while damning the incompetency of the administration, in and
of itself does not constitute an impeachable offense. And that is why,
until the leaked secret communications of the British government, there
has not been enough evidence to impeach.

What is required for impeachment? Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution states <6>:

"The
President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States,
shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of,
Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."

I’d
like to also note that Section 3, Clause 1 also states that a
conviction of impeachment is an exception to the executive branch’s
power of pardon.

We start with bribery and treason. No evidence
to date demonstrates the crime of bribery. Let’s consider treason.
Section 3, Clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution states:

"Treason
against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against
them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No
Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two
Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court."

If
the contents of the Downing Street Minutes <7> and the newly
leaked set of secret communications that shows the British Ministers
being requested to create reasons for war <8>, then one could say
that creating reasons to bring the U.S. to war is in effect ’levying
War’ against the U.S. If you cause someone to pick a fight with the
U.S., by proxy, you are fighting the U.S. This is in effect what was
done by the Bush Administration. They colluded with Britain <7>,
bombed Iraqi targets in 2002 <10> in an effort to provoke Iraq
into U.N. Security Council resolution violation and furthermore asked
the British government to create justification for war <8>. This
again is corroborating evidence for other challenged testimony that’s
out there, specifically the statement that the Administration illegally
re-allocated $700 million dollars from the war in Afghanistan to the
War in Iraq in July of 2002! <11> It’s not what many would argue
as direct treason (aiding and assisting the enemy), but then again,
that definition is being pushed by the republican party recently with
respect to Mark Felt, a.k.a. "Deep Throat". In fact, Attorney General
Gonzales contemplated charging Mr. Felt with treason <9>. What
the administration has done is no less than directly cause the deaths
of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians, 1700 American soldiers and
the wounding of tens of thousands of American soldiers to the point
permanent disability.

If treason can not be successfully argued
as a result of the secret communications of the British government,
surely, there are high-crimes here.

Constitutional Attorney John
Bonifaz makes the case for these high-crimes in his letter to
Congressman John Conyers <12>. At a minimum he calls for an
investigation, but lays the case for the following potential crimes:

A.
"Conspiracy to deceive and mislead the United States Congress and the
American people as to the basis for taking the nation into war against
Iraq"

C.
"George W. Bush, President of the United States, has committed a felony
by submitting a false report to the United States Congress on the
reasons for launching a first-strike invasion of Iraq"

Others
have been calling for the impeachment of the Bush administration, but
now their articles are much more credible given the continuing stream
of secret communications leaking from the British government. One
particular site that includes violation of the Geneva convention and
the use of torture to obtain false statements for continuing attacks
and warfare is the "Vote To Impeach" site. Their articles are at: http://impeachbush.pephost.org/site/PageServer?pagename... .

Feasibility of Impeachment
Many,
including bloggers here at Democratic Underground, have argued that
even if there is massive support by the public to even bring articles
of impeachment to the table, the articles will never leave the House
Judiciary Committee due to partisan politics. Given the recent actions
of Congressmen Sensenbrenner, there is very little chance that in spite
of massive and mounting evidence against the administration, that these
republican congressmen will allow an investigation, let alone articles
of impeachment, to leave committee. This is the shame of our nation,
that we have become a state ruled by one party that holds its agenda
and politics above that of the American people. What is required is
massive outrage by the public to demand an investigation and a hearing.
If we don’t we are passively approving of these crimes by the
administration. If we do mount a successful public pressuring of the
Congress, then any who thwart that effort would likely have stood by
Hitler when he gassed millions of innocent people.

Sources
<1> 911 Commission hearings, Richard Clarke’s testimony: http://www.9-11commission.gov/hearings/hearing8/clarke_...

<2> Clarke, Richard, "Against All Enemies", ISBN: 0743260244

<3> Woodward, Bob, "Plan of Attack", ISBN: 074325547X

<4> Graham, Bob, and Nussbaum, Jeff, "Intelligence Matters", ISBN: 1400063523

<5> The Washington Post, June 7, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...

<6> The U.S. Constitution Online: http://www.house.gov/Constitution/Constitution.html

<7> The Times Online: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1593607,00...

<8> The Times Online: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1650822,00...

<9> http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph... (original link on Newsday is no longer available).

<10> The Times Online: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1632566,00...

<11> http://www.buzzflash.com/analysis/05/06/ana05019.html

<12> http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/modules.php?op=modloa...

http://www.democraticunderground.co...

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