Why IMPEACHMENT Is So IMPORTANT!!!!!

[dogday]

This aired last year, but it still applies today....


Bill Moyers talks with Bruce Fein and John Nichols


http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/video_popups/pop_vid_impeachment1-1.html">Watch Video

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/07132007/transcript2.html">Read Transcript



JOHN NICHOLS: Well, let's try a metaphor. Let's say that-- when George Washington chopped down the cherry tree, he used the wood to make a little box. And in that box the president puts his powers. We've taken things out. We've put things in over the years.

On January 20th, 2009, if George Bush and Dick Cheney are not appropriately held to account this administration will hand off a toolbox with more powers than any president has ever had, more powers than the founders could have imagined. And that box may be handed to Hillary Clinton or it may be handed to Mitt Romney or Barack Obama or someone else. But whoever gets it, one of the things we know about power is that people don't give away the tools. They don't give them up. The only way we take tools out of that box is if we sanction George Bush and Dick Cheney now and say the next president cannot govern as these men have.

[bdamomma]

1. this interview was excellent

one telling aspect of that interview: most Politicians do not know the meaning of the Constitution. hmm....that is very true.

[Prophet 451]

2. Problem with that is...

...the very split second President Obama tries to assert any of the powers that BushCheney have appropriated, the Republicans will be screaming to the high heavens about abuse of power and will have started impeachment hearings by that afternoon. Those extra-constitutional powers are only for use by a Republican president.

Yes, I'm pissed about it too. Remember when the Republicans threatened the "nuclear option" of removing the filibuster? Remember that there was a "compromise" reached which essentially said the Dems could keep teh filibuster as long as they promised to never, ever use it? The Rethugs were prolific filibusters when they were in the minority. That's what these thugs are all about, not just winning the debate, not even debating honestly but permanently tilting the playing field in their favour.

[bdamomma]

4. tilting things in their favor or althogether changing rewriting

and ignoring Rule of Law. God, I hate these people, I wish they would take a flying leap.

[dogday]

5. When Obama becomes President, I believe he will be

able to wield the same powers in that box.. The problem is, they are absolute powers and I am not sure I even want our President to have that much power....

[EFerrari]

3. This discussion offered the VERY BEST arguments for impeachment

that I've heard. :thumbsup:

[dogday]

6. Absolutely Right On

That is why I thought I would share with DU... even though this aired last year, it still applies even more so than before... I hope this will get the exposure it deserves....

[bdamomma]

7. one thing holds very true and scary.

they are rounding up people with funny names but Jones and Smith will be next.

[EFerrari]

8. Remember that kid from Marin Co that they grabbed, "The American Taliban"?

They even showed us tape of him undergoing interrogation -- drugged. We just didn't know what we were looking at at the time. (I myself thought the drugs were for his injuries. Nope.)

He was railroaded and his name was Walker Lindh. :shrug:

[dogday]

9. American Taliban everywhere

It is a freaking shame... I read today that the government has incorporated over 20,000 businesses to spy on us.... It made me ill....

[petgoat]

10. Republicans used to be sanguine about the Imperial Powers

They'd tell me "Oh don't worry, Bush is a good man, he won't abuse them."
(They don't say that any more)

My answer was always to ask them to imagine that in 80 years, a Communist
President has those same powers. That shuts them up.

[Mnemosyne]

11. KnR for courage and truth. n/t