Impeach Bush and Cheney

The i-word is showing up more and more, and I plan to use it in post titles frequently. Given the nature of our digital information world, the more times we use the i-word in conjunction with the names of the Bushco leaders, the more the machines who crawl over Internet content will capture it, record it, and report it.

Didn't we just go through an impeachment? But what other recourse do we have to let the current White House occupants know that we, we the people of this country that we love, will not stand for their out-and-out lies, law-breaking, Bill of Rights-shredding and Constitution-rewriting?

For what egregious acts shall we call for Bush and Cheney's impeachment? Let's start with law-breaking because too many pod-people will shrug off lying as something common in politics.

• Law-breaking
  ...from International Law to the laws of our land: there are laws against invading countries when they've done nothing to you first and then torturing their citizens and incarcerating them indefinitely without charges, not to mention warrantless wiretapping on citizens of the United States. There's more, but nobody has spilled the beans just yet.


• Bill of Rights-shredding
  ...goes on daily when our 'government' secretly tramples on free speech, freedom of assembly, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures -- all in the name of prosecuting a war that isn't really a war, no matter how you look at it.


• Constitution-rewriting
  ...has been in the works since the founding of the Project for a New American Century. For centuries, pretty much everyone understood that our Constitution provides for three co-equal branches of government, guaranteeing a check against any one branch running amok. But these days we see signing statements attached by the executive that essentially nullify lawful Congressional bills; we see threats against the judiciary and bullying or simply ignoring the legislature; and we hear unbelievable protestations that the executive is so supreme that it does not need to answer to anyone. That is an interpretation of the Constitution that is brand new since 2001. Last I checked, nobody asked if 'we the people' approve of this Constitutional mutilation.

Isn't that enough to impeach with?

There's more, this is just what's become 'common knowledge' so far.

If we don't send this message loudly and clearly now, I don't think we'll see another election in 2008. Why would an omnipotent executive ever let democracy get in the way of ruling?

Hello Almighty?

What I Want to Hear

... from Democrats or Independents or anyone. The label doesn't matter. The not-so-embedded media recognizes that election season is upon us and the question of the month seems to be, "What IS the Democrats' message, anyway?"

Well, here's what I think it should be.

Respect.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

• Respect the laws of the land and the Constitution of the United States. That means no illegal spying, no signing statements negating congressional law, no outing undercover CIA agents as political punishment, no hob-nobbing with corrupt lobbyists.
  
• Respect our allies. That means no making fun of France or Europe in general, even when they try to act as a moderating influence on a runaway (and run amok) administration.
  
• Respect the international treaties that we've been party to, and those we should be party to. That means support an International Criminal Court, get on board with Kyoto, for God's sake follow the Geneva Conventions, don't toss the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty in the garbage for one country (India) and point to it as reason for sanctions against another country (Iran) in the next breath, and treat Israel the same as Iraq when it comes to "breaking" UN resolutions.
  
• Respect international law. That means no preventive wars (Iraq), no manipulating other countries (the list is too damn long to put here).
  
• Respect the peoples of every land, regardless of what ornery dictatorship leads them at the moment. That means no more military engagements founded in falsehoods that end up killing (with bullets, bombs, or white phosphorus) and poisoning (with DU and God knows what else) innocent men, women and children. (Need I say Iraq?)
  
• Respect the citizens of this country. That means no more lying, propagandizing, revising history, tampering with courts and vote-counting, fear-mongering, stonewalling FOIA requests, threatening, bullying, ignoring, or separating government from the people.
  
• Respect human rights and civil rights everywhere, including the right to be treated humanely, decently, honorably. That means stop the damn torture, stop exporting 'suspects' to countries where they will be tortured, stop supporting mega-corporations who thrive only because they enslave peoples to do their labor, stop propping up the dictatorships who do your bidding even if their human rights records are almost as abysmal as our own. That also means respect a woman's right to make decisions about her own pregnancy.
  
• Respect the basic needs of peoples everywhere. That also means fix New Orleans and the whole southern infrastructure, even though lots and lots of poor folks and folks of color live there. That also means, stop messing with the school systems by trying to replace evolution with a religious belief, by giving children subliminal reading material that discourages independent thought. That also means reverse the the flow of money that has been creating a super-wealthy upper class while squeezing the middle class and totally impoverishing anyone below that. Actually this category could go on and on...
  
• Respect our earth, the environment, Mother Nature. Hell, respect the scientists who know we are changing the earth's climate. Respect pristine wilderness (ANWR), respect our wetlands (think Katrina and the Gulf), our oceans and waterways and forests and mountains. We don't have to leave a barren landscape as a legacy for our children's children...

That's just a start. But it all comes down to respect. The current adminstration has none for anyone but its own "elite backers." Believe me, you 'pioneers' are just a tiny minority in this country.

It's time for someone to stand up and say they stand for respect for the rest of us, the rest of the world.