By David Swanson, 7/21/07
House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers has said that if
three more Congress Members get behind impeachment he will start the
impeachment proceedings.
I was a guest today on Bree Walker‘s radio show. She’s the progressive radio host from California who purchased Cindy Sheehan’s land from her in Crawford, Texas.
Bree attended an event on Friday in San Diego at which Congressman
Conyers spoke about impeachment. Her report was extremely interesting.
I had already heard reports that Conyers had said: “What are we waiting
for? Let’s take these two guys out!” But, of course, what we’re waiting
for is John Conyers. Is he ready to act? It was hard to tell from that
comment. In January, Conyers spoke at a huge rally on the National Mall
and declared “We can fire them!” but later explained that what he meant
was that we could wait for two years and Bush and Cheney’s terms would
end. Was this week’s remark just more empty rhetoric?
It appears to be more than that. Bree Walker told me, on the air,
that Conyers said that all he needs is three more Congress Members
backing impeachment, and he’ll move on it, even without Pelosi. I asked
whether that meant specifically moving from 14 cosponsors of H Res 333
to 17, or adding 3 to the larger number of Congress Members who have
spoken favorably of impeachment but not all signed onto bills. Bree
said she didn’t know and that Conyers had declined to take any
questions.
Either way, this target of three more members seems perfectly
doable. It’s safe to assume, I think, that we’re talking about
impeaching Cheney first. But, even if Conyers is talking about Bush,
the target is perfectly achievable.
First, there are Congress Members like Jesse Jackson Jr. who have
spoken out for impeachment but not signed onto H Res 333. They should
be urged to act now! Second, there are dozens of members
who signed onto H Res 635 a year and a half ago, Conyers’ bill for an
investigation into grounds for impeachment, who have not signed onto H
Res 333 yet. Third, one of the excuses citizens often hear from lots of
Congress Members for not signing onto articles of impeachment is that
not enough of their colleagues have signed on and therefore “we don’t
have the votes.” Well that just changed. Now three more votes is all
that’s needed to get this machine rolling. Fourth, many of the 14
Congress Members backing H Res 333 have used similar excuses to justify
refraining from lobbying their colleagues to join them. That can now
end. Our 14 leaders can do more than just put down their names.
Now, if Conyers begins impeachment proceedings in the House
Judiciary Committee, we should all be clear on what that will mean. If
it is serious, it will not mean sending any subpoenas or contempt
citations to the emperors’ court. Bush and Cheney have already
repeatedly refused to comply with subpoenas.
President Richard Nixon did the same, of course, and his refusal to
comply with subpoenas constituted the offense cited in one of the three
Articles of Impeachment approved by the House Judiciary Committee on
July 27, 1974 as warranting “impeachment and trial, and removal from
office.” But Bush and Cheney have gone further, ordering former
staffers not to comply with subpoenas, and announcing that the Justice
Department will not enforce any contempt of Congress proceedings.
What the impeachment of Cheney or Bush will be is very, very fast.
It will not disrupt or distract from the important business of passing
nonbinding resolutions and holding all-night gripe sessions over bills
destined to be vetoed. Impeachment in the case of Dick Cheney need not
take the three months it did for Nixon or the two months it did for
President Bill Clinton. In fact, it could take a day. Here’s why:
Bush and Cheney’s lies about Iraqi ties to al Qaeda are on videotape
and in writing, and Bush and Cheney continue to make them to this day.
There was no al Qaeda in Iraq until the invasion.
Their claims about Iraqi weapons have been shown in every detail to have been, not mistakes, but lies.
Their threats to Iran are on videotape.
Bush being warned about Katrina and claiming he was not are on videotape.
Bush lying about illegal spying and later confessing to it are on
videotape. A federal court has ruled that spying to be a felony.
The Supreme Court has ruled Bush and Cheney’s system of detentions unconstitutional.
Torture, openly advocated for by Bush and Cheney and their staffs,
is documented by victims, witnesses, and public photographs. Torture
was always illegal and has been repeatedly recriminalized under Bush
and Cheney. Bush has reversed laws with signing statements.
Those statements are posted on the White House website, and a GAO
report found that with 30 percent of Bush’s signing statements in which
he announces his right to break laws, he has in fact proceeded to break
those laws.
For these and many other offenses, no investigation is needed
because no better evidence is even conceivable. This impeachment will
be swift. And it will require only a simple majority. We already know
that the Democrats can vote as a block if they want to, and that a few
brave Republicans might join them.
Whether the Senate will then convict Cheney will depend on how much
pressure citizens apply and how much information the House manages to
force onto television sets. The latter could be surprisingly large and
substantive, since the conflict of an impeachment is certain to
generate incredible ratings.
But even an acquittal would identify the Senators to be removed from
office by voters in 2008. And Cheney (or Bush) would still have been
100% impeached. Al Gore didn’t run for president pretending he’d never
met Bill Clinton and pick Senator Joe Lieberman as a running mate
because the Senate convicted Clinton (it acquitted).
The timing of Conyers’ remark may be related to the steps the White
House has recently taken to assert “unitary executive” dictatorial
power. Bush has commuted the sentence of a subordinate who obstructed
an investigation into matters involving Bush and Cheney. And, as
mentioned above, neither subpoenas nor contempt citations will go
anywhere. Impeachment is no longer merely the appropriate step that it
has been for the past six years. It is now the only tool left to the
Congress for use in asserting its very existence as a functioning body
of government.
But the timing is also quite helpful to the grassroots movement for
impeachment, and rather symbolic. Five years ago this Monday, the
meeting was held at #10 Downing Street that produced the Downing Street Minutes.
Over two years ago, then Ranking Member Conyers held a hearing in the
basement of the Capitol, the only space the Republican leadership would
allow him. At that hearing, several Democratic Congress Members for the
first time began talking about impeachment. The witnesses at the
hearing were Ambassador Joseph Wilson, attorney John Bonifaz, former
CIA analyst Ray McGovern, and a then unknown gold star mother named
Cindy Sheehan. They discussed the evidence of the Downing Street
documents, which added significantly to the growing body of evidence
that Bush and Cheney misled the Congress about the case for war.
This Monday, Sheehan and McGovern and a great many leaders of the
movements for peace and impeachment will lead a march at 10 a.m. at
Arlington National Cemetery. We will march to Congressman Conyers
office and ask to talk with him about impeachment. We will refuse to
leave without either a commitment to begin at once the impeachment of
Cheney or Bush or both, or our arms in handcuffs. The same day, groups
in several states around the country will be sitting in and risking
arrest for impeachment in the district offices of their congress
members.
Not everyone will be able to take part.
But everyone can take two minutes on Monday and do two things: phone
Chairman Conyers at 202-225-5126 and ask him to start the impeachment
of dick Cheney; and phone your own Congress Member at 202-224-3121 and
ask them to immediately call Conyers’ office to express their support
for impeachment. Your Congress Member might just be one of the three
needed, not just to keep us out of jail but to keep this nation from
devolving into dictatorship.