Why We Can't All Just Get Along

When, in the course of human events (no, not that Human Events), the members of an activist community decide to lose their minds and throw feces at one another with indiscriminate abandon, a reasonable respect for human dignity and sanity impels us to more thoroughly examine the causes of said monkey-like behavior. It is going to be practically impossible to make peace between the increasingly divided pro-impeachment crowd and the focus-on-other-priorities crowd without a basic understanding of what is even at issue, and what it is we're trying to fix. Markos' recent "Can't We All Just Get Along, or Else?" post is a noble sentiment, but it won't fix much until we dig to the structural root of what the community is trying to accomplish.

The problem with the impeachment debate is that both sides are talking past one another, and usually trying to accomplish either different goals without knowing it, or--worse yet--the wrong goal for the tool in question (be it impeachment or elections).

For the last many years leading up to the 2006 elections, progressives across the blogosphere have been fighting on many fronts: from human rights to civil liberties to defense of the Constitution to privacy rights to anti-war issues and everything in between. Some of us set out to most specifically focus on getting Democrats elected, as is the purpose here at DailyKos. Some of us set out to raise awareness of issues not on the Democrats' radar, even if it came at the temporary expense of Democratic electoral fortunes. Still others of us, like Chris Bowers & Matt Stoller at MyDD and now at Open Left, have set our sights on broader movement-building among progressives.

Almost all of us, however, had a fairly single-minded objective no matter the specific focus: to prove Karl Rove wrong about his math. Most of us remember Karl Rove's famous asserations that while the rest of us were looking at our silly polls showing Americans supporting Democratic positions and distrusting Republican "leadership," he had THE math. Karl Rove's delusional math told him that America is a fundamentally "conservative" country--a beliefshared by many top Democratic consultants in the DLC mold who continue to believe that 2006 was an exception, rather than a proper reflection of American sentiment--where progressive opinions are eschewed and the ultra-conservative base free to dictate policy with impunity. No matter whether we were getting specific Democrats elected, building a broader movement, or pushing the Overton Window even farther left, our fundamental goal was the same: kill Rove's math dead and prove that this is really a majority Progressive country after all, if people will only vote their beliefs rather than their fears.

Fortunately for us, there was a definitive accountability moment for Rove's Math: it was called Election Day. And while not everyone, of course, was completely convinced by the results, we have the opportunity to prove Rove's math wrong again and again every two years: 2008, 2010 and beyond. With each victory for Democrats (whether at the Presidential, Congressional, State or Local levels) and for progressive values (usually but not always one and the same), we can convince more and more of the country that Rove's Math is, will be, and was always wrong--so long as a cadre of progressives with a spine is willing to stand up to the corporatists, NeoCons and other Republican allies. Someday soon, perhaps even the recalcitrant David Broders of the world will be forced to acknowledge that the "reality-based community" is and was always respectable, correct, and on the right side of history and American opinion--disrespecable idiots like Bill Kristol notwithstanding.

But Rove's Math is not, now, the only force we must combat: now that we have our first major electoral victory in years under our belts, we also have to deal with something I like to call ROVE'S LAW (it's really more Cheney's law, but Rove also has a heavy hand in it, as with everything). Rove's Law is just as delusional and destructive to this country, if not more so, as belief and trust in Rove's Math. Rove's Law is not all that different from Nixon's Law: When the President Does It, That Means It's Not Illegal. We can see a clear-cut example of the thinking behind Rove's Law in former White House counsel John Yoo's editorial today in the WSJ asserting that Bush's only role from here on as President is to "protect" the "Constitutional rights of Executive Privilege for future presidents." Rove's Law states that the President is a Monarch elected on four-year cycles, able to do whatever he pleases without oversight or consequence beyond the next election.

Historians understand that demagogues who are allowed to take republican or democratic (note the small r's and d's) governmental systems and subvert them under the sorts of dogmatic executive rules being pushed by proponents of Rove's Law inevitably detach governments from the accountability of their people and lead to de facto dictatorships. Rove's Law must therefore be rejected just as explicitly as his math has been.

Unfortunately, however, unlike Rove's Math, there are no number of elections that will provide a rejection of Rove's Law. We can prove by means of elections that the American people are fundamentally progressive in their beliefs; we cannot prove by means of elections that Rovian theories of presidential power are illegitimate. And this is where the fundamental crux of the misunderstanding between impeachment advocates and impeachment opponents within the Progressive community comes.

All too often, those who promote impeachment do so as a means of getting rid of George Bush and/or Dick Cheney. That is, frankly speaking, deeply misguided and ill-considered. If you want to get rid of George Bush and people like them, there's an answer for that: it's called an ELECTION. Work to win the elections you can influence, or pipe down about it. On Jan. 20, 2009, either a Democrat or another Republican will take office--and no, the world isn't going to end in the meantime because Bush stayed in office.

Yet all too often again, those who oppose impeachment believe that we can reject Rove's Law by putting Democrats in power. That is also, frankly speaking, deeply fallacious and utterly naive. Without an explicit condemnation of and especially accountability moment for Rove's Law, this problem will never be truly resolved. As much as George Bush makes Richard Nixon look like Thomas Jefferson, so will the next Executive to use this authority make Bush look like Nixon--unless something drastic is done to thoroughly reject the premises of Rove's Law.

Perhaps impeachment is not that rejection. Perhaps, as Digby said in the radio conversation with myself and clammyc, a failed impeachment drive would be worse for that accountability than doing nothing at all. But if impeachment is not answer, I have yet to hear anything coherent that would be a more significant or long-lasting approach to solving the problem.

We must be aware, of course, that there is a possible conflict between rejecting Rove's Law and rejecting Rove's Math--but we must also acknowledge that both are critically important and fundamentally separate.

When we take our positions on impeachment, we must be aware of which piece of delusional Rovism we are attempting to reject with what priority, and using what tools. We should acknowledge the progressive legitimacy of those who believe that Rove's Math is still a bigger problem than Rove's Law, and vice versa. We should acknowledge that impeachment is a bad way to get rid of Rove's Math (and Bush and Cheney), and that elections are no way to rid of Rove's Law (and the Unitary Executive theory).

Only then can we all begin to truly get along again.

Why Are Good Progressives At Each Others' Throats?

There comes a time when two parties, after arguing in earnest and with the best of intentions, find that all their superficial disagreements and conflicts of point of view are boiled down to irresolvable and fundamental philosophical differences about the nature of human events. Indeed, when two otherwise reasonable and strongly allied factions argue passionately at cross-purposes, it is essential to discover once and for all why they differ, and to resolve the philosophical differences that divide the parties.

There are few better examples of such an argument than today's conflict over impeachment, succinctly expressed in MissLaura's frontpage post today. After no fewer than six recommended diaries yesterday advocating impeachment (including my own) and a frontpage post by Meteor Blades, Digby laid out in her brilliant and incomparable fashion the best possible counterargument to those demanding this extroardinary political act.

Digby's argument is one that I made in poorer fashion many times prior to my conversion to the pro-impeachment camp. To quote Digby:

But even so, that's not necessarily a good enough reason not to do it. It could be useful, if only to tie the administration up in knots until they leave the scene. But the risks are high that if you don't have a specific (and somewhat simple) crime to point to and a good chance of at least getting a quick impeachment vote in the House, that it could blow back pretty hard on the Dems. This is not because people like Bush and don't want him out of office. It's because they see that the presidential campaign is in full swing and know that Bush will be out of office soon anyway. That means many of them will likely be susceptible to the inevitable GOP screeching that the petty Democrats are playing politics, going for payback, wasting time etc. And the media will be thrilled to help the Republicans make that case.

That's not the only case that can be made against impeachment. There are many other concerns as well, including that the future is more important than the past, that the public wants solutions rather than partisan recriminations, that we actually have an opportunity to frame ourselves for a change rather than let the public be told what we stand for by Republicans, and that Bush's/Cheney's replacement would likely be Republican--and that I wouldn't want Nancy Pelosi installed as president through impeachment. Finally, as MissLaura says:

When we remember that impeachment is a nuclear political act, also remember that nuclear explosions produce nuclear fallout. We need to know the winds before we launch. To me, it's too likely the fallout would blow right over our heads. Would that really be a defense of the Constitution?

So much, so good for the arguments against impeachment. The standard arguments for impeachment, meanwhile, are well-known to all. These include:

• That Bush/Cheney must be removed as soon as possible
• That history will judge poorly those who did not stand against criminal action
• That the Constitution is worth defending at all costs
• That justice itself demands prosecution for crimes
• That Dems will look stronger, rather than weaker, for having stood up to Bush

My intent here is not to advocate for or argue against any of these positions for or against impeachment. Some of them are well-considered; others less so (on both sides.)

My intent, rather, is to highlight why there can be such fundamental disagreement among these parties, and what the fundamental philosophical difference may be.

The answer, as it so happens, is not a terribly complex one--but it is an answer that goes to the very heart of what the Progressive movement at large and the Netroots in specific is attempting to accomplish. At the heart of the divide between the pro-impeachment progressives and those who remain skeptical of it is a fundamental dichotomy of trust. In the end, every argument for and against boils down to whether one trusts more in the power of individuals and ideologies, or in the power of structures and the constraints they place upon power itself.

Those who oppose impeachment are desperately afraid--and I don't necessarily blame them--that using up the oxygen of time, media coverage and political power on impeachment proceedings will harm Democrats irreparably as we enter the 2008 election season. They argue somewhat convincingly that all the strong stands against Bush/Cheney in the world will not serve anyone of any political stripe when Rudy McRomneyson takes the oath of office in January 2009, and the Bush/Cheney approach to governance receives a popular mandate. They argue, quite rightly, that a successful impeachment is unlikely--and that even if successful, it would be lengthy process that would not effectively cut short the rule of Bush/Cheney for more than a few months.

It is not my purpose here to poke holes in these arguments--though they are by no means unassailable. Certainly, the Republicans did not face dire electoral consequences for impeaching a very popular Bill Clinton. But let us instead take these arguments at face value, and take it as a given that Democrats will suffer somewhat electorally as a byproduct of a failed impeachment drive, while doing little to actually defray the consequences of Republican control of the White House.

These arguments rest on one presumption and one alone: That the election of Democrats in 2008 is the paramount and highest political goal over the next 18 months. That we can do little to preserve our Democracy while Bush remains in power--but that once we get Democrats in power with the right governing priorities and ideological stances, we'll be back on track. It is the same idea as that presented on a DCCC fundraising request I received today in the mail from Nancy Pelosi:

Democrats are determined to end the war in Iraq, move forward on energy independence, address global warming, start tackling America's health care crisis, and take all the other long-overdue steps needed to lead our nation out of the Bush morass. But, the Bush Administration and its Rubber Stamp Republican allies in Congress are throwing everything they've got into holding onto power and putting the special interests ahead of the American people.

As Speaker of the House I am asking you to stay with us. Don't yield to cynicism or frustration, like the Republicans want you to do. Help us win the hard-fought struggles we need to win in the days and weeks ahead that can help us make lasting real change to take America in a New Direction.

We need your steadfast support as we confront an Administration that long ago lost touch with reality. And, even as we work side by side to force the Bush Administration to face the facts in 2007, we need you to help our Democratic candidates take their message to voters in 2008.

In other words, Democratic ideologues are being blocked by Republican ideologues; don't get angry with us because we aren't getting anything effective accomplished--just work with us to get rid of the Republican ideologues in '08 so we can move forward on Iraq, energy and healthcare. In sum, they say, put the right people in power with the right ideas, and everything will be fine.

Those of us who favor impeachment, on the other hand, find all such arguments utterly hollow and tragically misguided. We do so because we understand that this battle is not, fundamentally, a partisan one but rather a structural one. We believe that any individual--regardless of party affiliation or ideology--who usurps authority and obliterates balance of power as Bush/Cheney have done is just as dangerous to Democracy as Bush/Cheney themselves. As I said in To Impeach or Not to Impeach: That is Not the Question:

The question at hand is not "What Do We Do About Bush?" or "How Do We Move America Forward in a Progressive Direction?" or even "How Do We Put Bush Behind Us and Create A Lasting Democratic Majority?" The real question at hand is instead "How in the world did this happen in America--and more importantly, how do we stop it from ever happening again?"

As evil as the NeoConservative agenda has clearly been, as utterly deficient in competence and moral compass as the Religious Right has been, as predictably disastrous as placing a formerly cocaine-addicted sociopathic dry drunk with a silver spoon in his mouth and serious daddy issues has been, and as monumentally insane as having former Nixon protégés be in charge of Executive secrecy and power has been, it should still shock Americans with a sense of civics and history how easy it has been for a nutso Commander-in-Chief and his morally-challenged cronies to subvert the Consitution, the will of the American People, and the very foundations of Democracy in a few short years. Had you told me back in 1999 that this could have happened in America even with the worst of leaders, I would have laughed in your face. I had confidence in the power of our structural institutions back then that I utterly lack today. For me, the key question--indeed, the only question--is how to effectively stop even the worst of madmen from ever having the power to wreak such havoc again.

Now, while it is true that impeachment itself does not necessarily block Unitary Executive theories of governance in and of itself, it certainly is a step in the right direction. Specific legislation or even Constitutional Amendments clarifying once and for all the exact limits of executive power may be necessary. But any impeachment proceeding does far more to address these issues than simply standing by and hoping for the election of a Democratic President.

Many of us who support impeachment, indeed, would rather elect a Giuliani who does NOT use Unitary Executive powers than a Hillary/Obama who DOES use them. That is utter heresy to ears of many--especially at a site whose ostensible goal is getting Democrats elected. But history has seen far too many Republics fall into Empire for our taste: Augustus may have been a good Emperor, but it doesn't matter; Caligula's always right behind.

For structuralists like us, the election of the right individual or ideologue in the context of the erosion of limits on power themselves is but a salve on an open wound. For us, individuals will never salvage anything. Individuals are corrupt, weak and short-lived; ideologies come and go, mutable with the change of times, circumstances and public whim. The framers understood that structure was everything and trumped political ideology or factional affiliation--re-read the Federalist Papers if you don't believe this. Individual elections and individual officials are but tumbleweeds passing through the pillars of structure. Either this question of limits on executive power gets resolved permanently, or our Republic will have a dictator elected on 4-year cycles. Tyranny is only a short milepost ahead on this road.

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This question goes beyond impeachment. It is a fundamental divide that is at the heart of what it means to have a progressive movement. It is at the heart of many divides and bitter arguments between progressive blogger communities.

Are we a collection of activists dedicated to the maximum success of the Democratic Party at all costs, or do we seek to do what we believe necessary to preserve the Republic even at the price of potential electoral cost? Shall our calculus be only that of the impact on the next election, or shall it be on that of the impact on the nation at large? Do we believe that Republican rule is the greatest evil to be feared, or that unchecked power itself is the greatest evil to be feared?

This argument to me is similar to that of the two protagonists in the outstanding film Crimson Tide: with hot nuclear confrontation looming between the United States and a crazed Russian coup leader, there is a power struggle on a U.S. nuclear submarine between the Captain played by Gene Hackman and the XO played by Denzel Washington. With orders in hand to fire nuclear missiles at Russia, the sub loses contact with Washington headquarters even as another aborted message was just arriving. Hackman's captain, looking to defend the United States at all costs against its enemy Russia and follow orders to the letter of the law, insists on firing the nukes. Denzel's XO insists that nuclear war itself is the danger to be feared, and demands that the sub do everything in its power to regain contact with the Pentagon--even at the expense of danger to the crew and to American lives at home. After twin mutinies on board and near catastrophe, Denzel wins and the final message arrives not to fire the nuke. While both men were right, both were also wrong--and it is a question that plagues anyone charged with the possible use of nuclear power to this day.

The similar question for Progressives is as follows: are Republicans the greatest danger we face? Or do we face an even greater danger in allowing Unitary Executive Power and utter disregard for the laws of the United States to go unchecked, unpunished and unrebuked?

It is a fundamental question that we must resolve--and quickly.

As the Curtain Falls, the Villains Exit Stage Right

With the breaking news of Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's sentence still rolling hot off the presses, the curtain has finally fallen on yet another depressing piece of Bush Administration kabuki theater. All that is left in this sordid spectacle is the predictable reaction of the audience: the outraged jeers and hisses from the left, the thunderous applause from the right, and the final, painfully evenhanded judgment from the pompous theater critics in the media.

The stage was set from the beginning, when the Administration's fatal character flaw set in motion a chain of events with predictably tragic consequences. Joe Wilson chose to try to set things right in Denmark insofar as he could, and stab through the veil of Administration secrecy and lies, only to be rewarded for his effort by treasonous blades and men poisoned by lust for power. An Administration that came to power through royal coup and was obsessed with invading Iraq at all costs has reaped the inevitable electoral consequences for their transgressions, but the career suicides under a river of evil and the poisoned bodies of betrayed heroes are already too heavy to bear and too numerous to undo. The law, embodied by Fitzgerald, did what it could to hold the guilty accountable--but no more. And in the final act came the inevitable and totally forseeable denouement: illegal obstruction of justice was commuted through the twisted power of legal obstruction of justice, as those who first conspired to pour toxic lies into the ears of the American People walk as free men.

Unfortunately, that will no doubt be the final scene in this foul drama: the villains will exit stage Right, still standing and taking bows to the clamorous approbation of their fans, as the majority of the audience looks on in shocked horror and disbelief, and a vocal segment of the audience makes its displeasure clear. And the critics will turn in their remarks on the whole business with typically dispassionate false objectivity.

The reason this play will end thus is that we have no Hamlets and no Horatios willing to take the risk of committing career suicide and taking arms against this sea of evil. Our Democratic princes and princesses see themselves in quick line for the succession to the throne of our criminally wanton King George; just a few more years, they tell themselves, and this nightmare will be over and all will be well in Denmark again. In the meantime, they would prefer to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous deeds than engage in the sort of swordplay that might endanger their precious political futures. And all the while, the people perish under the weight of abject lawlessness and blatant treason.

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It does not have to be thus, of course. A stark choice lies before each and every one of us--a choice by which we will be forever judged in the annals of history.

We can choose to ride out the Bush presidency, in the naive hope that the next Democratic nominee will be our Fortinbras to wipe away the darkness and make of these evil transgressions mere unpleasant memories of a bygone era, even as Claudius, Gertrude, Polonius and Laertes all walk free to wreak their havoc in other capacities.

Or we can choose to be heroes and rush headlong where angels fear to tread in defense of our honor, the Constitution, and the principles of freedom and justice to which our country is so famously and supposedly committed.

But please, elected Democrats, spare us your feigned outrage. All the soliloquies and well-publicized indignation in the world; all the legalistic and parliamentary motions of investigations, senses of the Senate, and no-confidence votes in the world accomplish exactly nothing without decisive action in their wake. Even little children know the difference between a hero and a bureaucrat.

One day those little children--the kids and grandkids of those of us young enough never to have lived in the decade of Vietnam--will ask us what we did, and what our parents did.

Long after the 2008 election is but a distant memory written about only in history textbooks, generations to come will ask not what strategies we used to achieve electoral victory in some House or Senate race somewhere, but rather what we did to stop these villains and hold them accountable for their crimes.

As a child of the Reagan years, I neither know nor care what was done in any given Senate race to win Democratic victory in the wake of Watergate. I neither know nor care how the House leadership chose to play the issue of Vietnam to achieve maximum electoral benefit.

I care instead about Bernstein. I care about Woodward. I care about Frank Church. Because those men were heroes unafraid to cross swords with the most powerful man on earth. Those are the men history will remember. Those are the men who defended America when it needed defending most.

At some point we must, as a Party and as a Movement, decide what is more important: simply winning elections, or being the extraordinary heroes that are required in these extraordinary times?

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The evidence is already patently clear enough to impeach Gonzales and Dick Cheney. The outrageous lies and clear obstructions of justice are bright as day. Perhaps Bush still has far too much plausible deniability--and if so, so be it.

The only question that remains is for the Democratic leadership: will you be the heroes your nation requires in its hour of need, or will you instead sell your birthright for the mess of pottage that is the next election cycle? Will you truly allow these villains to walk off stage without feeling the blade of their own karma?

The choice is stark, and your actions will be remembered for generations to come.

Why Impeachment Isn't Happening: It's Not What You Think

What do you do when even the boldest actions necesssary for the salvation of the Republic are seen as nothing more than banal political games?

It has become clear by now that there is currently an enormous groundswell of support for impeachment proceedings throughout the progressive blogosphere, as traditionally "pragmatist" opponents of impeachment are falling one by one by one. The shift in sentiment towards impeachment has been especially strong in the face of a couple of crystallizing events, most notably Cheney's late fourthbranch defense and the White House's adamant refusal to obey subpoenas.

Predictably, the failure of Congressional Democrats to make serious moves toward the submission of Articles of Impeachment--and no, neither Leahy's subpoenas nor the support of eleven representatives count as serious moves--has ignited a firestorm of criticism from all corners of the blogosphere.

Typically, the blogosphere's critiques of both our progressive and not-so-progressive Democrats in office focus on their supposed cowardice in the face of the Bush Administration and their Republican opponents. These Democrats are supposed to be risk-averse DLC-infested reeds in the political wind, taking the least controversial stands possible in the hopes of winning elections by the backdoor of the Republicans' own political suicide. And certainly, it would appear that this portrait of ineffectual and pusillanimous "leadership" was on full display during the so-called Iraq Supplemental battle in which Democrats pretended to stand against Bush's illegal Occupation, and then caved for fear of being seen as failing to "fund the troops." Our Democratic leadership does have a history of betraying its own base and even a majority of the American People in order, it would seem, to avoid making waves.

But there is another explanation besides simple weakness and aversion to risk that explains the Democrats' stance on both the Occupation of Iraq, and on Impeachment. Fear of the Bush Administration itself is hardly motivating Democrats: we know that Bush has lost all credibility with even his base, much less the American public. Fear of policy-centered counterattacks from Republicans in congress and their corporatist allies in the media is somewhat more compelling--but even this is not so scary, given that the public supports the Democratic position on every major policy issue. And Democrats like Rahm Emmanuel are not afraid to take otherwise strong stands against such abuses as Cheney's FourthBranch arguments with brilliant counterattacks.

More than anything else, it seems, the Democrats are afraid of being characterized as playing petty politics with critical issues of governance. When we distill the arguments against defunding the Occupation and against submitting Articles of Impeachment down to their core, the same fundamental arguments always rear their ugly heads. On Iraq, everyone knows that the Surge is a disaster; everyone knows that the public has soured against it; everyone knows that the "flypaper defense" is discredited. But the argument that stops defunding in its tracks is the one in which Democrats are accused of playing politics with the lives of our troops.

On Impeachment, it would seem that this argument would be harder to make. How, after all, could the grave and solemn process of the impeachment of a sitting Commander in Chief (and/or his Vice President and/or Attorney General) be seen as a game of petty politics? How could anything be more important and worthy of discussion than an argument over whether the nation's leading official and so-called Leader of the Free World has violated his oath of office and trampled our sacred Constitution? How could such a grandiose undertaking pale in importance compared with any other piece of business considered by the Legislature?

It is in the answer to this question that we see the rotten fruits of the Republican effort to impeach Bill Clinton for trivial sexual escapades based on a long-running and hugely wasteful investigatory witch-hunt. Just as the Ann Coulters and Bill O'Reillys of the world have soured the American appetite for political debate and lowered the bar for political discourse to nearly subhuman levels, so too has the Republican slash-and-burn way of doing politics trivialized and cheapened even the most monumental decisions made in representative government. Impeachment today is seen not as political capital punishment to be prosecuted only under the direst of constitution-threatening circumstances, but rather as just another toy in the partisan political sandbox.

American distaste not only for Republican rule but also for partisan games is at an all-time high right now. We have a record number of Independent-affiliated voters, while both the Presidency and the Congress both have shockingly low confidence ratings indicative of a broader crisis of confidence; meanwhile, the candidacy of a relatively unknown New York corporatist billionaire is attracting far more public support than it otherwise should--even as partisan members of both parties look to candidates not currently running (Gore, Thompson) to save them from the current crop on both sides. Obama's rhetoric of Purple Power is attracting otherwise non-political voters all across America.

It is the great tragedy of the Clinton years--and of the failure by Democrats to stand adequately strongly against Republican abuses of political processes during the '90s and beyond--that Impeachment itself has come to be seen not as an essential tool of accountability for an executive run amok, but rather as another distasteful partisan ploy.

Most incredibly, what we are seeing from various sources in conversation with officials ranging from Nancy Pelosi herself to House staffers is that Democrats see a greater opportunity for boldness and political impact in the passing of legislation--even in the face of vetoes from Mr. 26%--than in moves toward impeachment. To the minds of those who purport to represent the American People, actually passing effective legislation after years of Republican misrule is considered more novel and less like politics-as-usual than the most momentous actions possible in defense of the United States Constitution. Impeachment is not being avoided due to its boldness, but rather (shockingly enough) due to its banality.

So what do we do?

With all due respect to Major Danby, a good friend whose opinion I greatly respect, a minimalist impeachment agenda is the worst of all possible worlds. It's not that the Overton Window doesn't need to be moved on the subject of impeachment; it does. But it needs to be moved in a way that most progressive bloggers aren't currently considering. The problem isn't that the American Public does not oppose the Bush Administration strongly enough to make impeachment politically viable; they do. It's that impeachment itself is seen as too petty and partisan for what currently ails the country. Attempting to make impeachment palatable to the American Public and to fence-sitting Democratic legislators through a gradual, minimalist stance focusing on obstruction of justice will not work, because impeachment is already seen as too petty and political an action for what ails our democracy. Moreover, a minimalist approach to impeachment will not serve as adequate warning to the next out-of-control President who chooses to arrogate to him/herself Bush's theory of Executive Power.

If we want impeachment to work, we have to throw the book at these people in a way that is not currently being done at the highest levels. If we want the public to understand that impeachment is a necessary duty to hold Bush and his allies accountable for deeply criminal actions rather than a cheap political ploy, our legislators must not be afraid to accuse them of deeply criminal action. We must make it clear to the American people that we are not defending some idealistic notion of the defense of Constitutional Principles, but rather opposing an Administration responsible for villainy and criminality unprecedented in modern American History. The Articles of Impeachment themselves must look less like Fitzgerald's case against Scooter Libby, and more like Thomas Jefferson's case against King George III.

Most importantly, our legislators must be made to see not only the necessity of impeachment itself, but of not mincing their words when it comes to describing Administration activities. They must not be afraid to use the words "liars", "blatantly illegal and unconstitutional", "criminal activity", "unprecedented abuses of power", or even "treason". Until we see our legislators actually using these sorts of words and phrases, we will know that they do not consider the state of affairs in America desperate enough to require impeachment. More importantly, the public will not be inclined to see the Bush Administration as dangerous enough to our way of life to merit the necessity of impeachment as a means of national self-defense, rather than as a petty partisan tool.

The hard work is just beginning. If we want to defend our Constitution and our country, the political discourse is going to have to get worse before it gets better. If we want our legislators and the American People to see impeachment not as a partisan move for naked political power but as a bold move for freedom, we must first convince them of its sheer necessity through some fairly ugly (if painfully accurate) words. If impeachment is to become extraordinary again rather than banal, we must convince the people that the times themselves are extraordinary.

Obviously, we still have a great deal of work to do.

Also at MLW

To Impeach or Not to Impeach: That is NOT the Question

As I have reluctantly stated before, I am in favor of impeaching the President, the Vice-President and Alberto Gonzales. Of course, I am not alone in this opinion; in fact, I came to it rather late. And certainly, it appears that more and more people are getting comfortable with the idea of impeachment--so many, in fact, that the impeachment drive can no longer be ignored by the traditional media. The Bush Administration's radical reinterpretations of the definitions of the Office of Vice-President as an island of government, and the range of authority of Executive Orders as not applicable to the Chief Executive will certain add even more fuel to what is becoming a raging Impeachment wildfire.

Of course, the "Impeach Now" crowd is not the only one capable of reasonable Progressive thought. Well-meaning, intelligent progressives may also come down on the side of what they see as Pragmatism; I myself was proud to be a member of this camp until not very long ago. Markos himself has been and may continue to be of this opinion (he hasn't written much on the subject lately). So-called Pragmatic arguments against Impeachment come in a variety of forms, including that:

• Democrats have a chance to frame ourselves and what we will do for the country--and that given a limited amount of media oxygen, the Party will not be able to walk and chew gum simultaneously.
• Partisan recriminations will only further divide an already deeply divided nation.
• Above all, bitter impeachment proceedings won't help accomplish the primary goal stated in the DailyKos FAQ: to help get more Democrats elected.

The oft-cited counterargument, of course, is that in the face of an out-of-control executive that believes it has imperial powers overriding all judicial and legislative authority, impeachment is the only pragmatic recourse. The counter-counter argument is that America has largely weathered the Bush storm; we only have 18 months of this bastard left; our democracy is largely intact and Democrats just need to prove themselves the competent party of adults who can get things done rather than play partisan games. And so the wheel of question-begging arguments turns round and round.

Both sides of this argument, however, are missing the only point that really matters. Both sides are right--right in the sense that impeachment is the only way to restrain the Bush Administration's mad lust for power, and in the sense that Bush is essentially a lame duck with little time left to play Oval Office demi-god, and is already being cast to the wolves by members of his own party, while Democratic victories in 2008 are the paramount objective. But both sides are also wrong. Both sides are wrong because they are both asking themselves the wrong questions. The question at hand is not "What Do We Do About Bush?" or "How Do We Move America Forward in a Progressive Direction?" or even "How Do We Put Bush Behind Us and Create A Lasting Democratic Majority?" The real question at hand is instead "How in the world did this happen in America--and more importantly, how do we stop it from ever happening again?"

As evil as the NeoConservative agenda has clearly been, as utterly deficient in competence and moral compass as the Religious Right has been, as predictably disastrous as placing a formerly cocaine-addicted sociopathic dry drunk with a silver spoon in his mouth and serious daddy issues has been, and as monumentally insane as having former Nixon protégés be in charge of Executive secrecy and power has been, it should still shock Americans with a sense of civics and history how easy it has been for a nutso Commander-in-Chief and his morally-challenged cronies to subvert the Consitution, the will of the American People, and the very foundations of Democracy in a few short years. Had you told me back in 1999 that this could have happened in America even with the worst of leaders, I would have laughed in your face. I had confidence in the power of our structural institutions back then that I utterly lack today. For me, the key question--indeed, the only question--is how to effectively stop even the worst of madmen from ever having the power to wreak such havoc again.

Because, you see, impeachment does not answer that question. If that blessed day does finally come when Bush, Cheney, Rove and/or Gonzales are finally held to account for their crimes in House and Senate impeachment proceedings, it will not stop such abuses from happening again. As much as we would like to throw the entire book at President George just as Thomas Jefferson did to King George before him, that is not likely to happen. Instead, impeachment is likely to hang on some relatively minor crime of obstruction or other. In the context of an administration that has deceived the American people into the disastrous military occupation of a non-threatening nation, obliterated checks and balances, eliminated habeas corpus, enshrined torture into our interrogation practices, and assumed the ability to invade privacy without a warrant (among a host of other crimes), nailing George Bush for covering up the real political reasons for the firing of a few U.S. attorneys he appointed (a crass, damaging and unprecedented though not illegal move in and of itself) would seem even more hollow and anticlimactic than jailing Al Capone for tax evasion.

Most importantly, impeaching Administration officials for one offense or another will only serve to warn the next administration to avoid that offense on which the impeachment proceedings were based, rather than the entire Unitary "we create the history you'll write about later" theory of Executive Power that is the source of the trouble. Instead, rightly or wrongly, the next Administration is likelier to learn in the wake of consecutive impeachments of Clinton and Bush that an Executive who loses control of Congress is at risk of losing his/her job in an overtly rancorous and hostile political climate--perhaps leading to increased attemnpts at Executive power consolidation.

Neither, however, does the anti-Impeachment side have any better answers. Even the most optimistic political observer knows that there is a pendulum in American politics that usually works in fairly regular cycles: Democrats and Progressives won't be in control forever. God forbid, in fact, that we should create permanent institutional majorities, else we would soon need yet another revolution to rid ourselves of the Pigs who took over Manor Farm. Further, authoritarianism comes not only in the red flavors of fascism, but in blue Stalinist ones as well. Simply ensuring the election of Democrats does not and will not ensure that Bushist theories of executive power will not rise from the dead yet again.

Preventing the nation from being torn asunder through vicious partisan strife will not rescue us from an actually competent Straussian Philosopher-King removing our liberties for own good in his/her infinite wisdom.

And finally, enacting progressive policies such as guaranteed universal health care, publicly financed elections, marriage equality, progressive taxation, corporate regulations, privacy protections and the like, will do nothing to prevent the next authoritarian freak and his merry band of cronies from replaying this sordid history like an unwelcome recurring nightmare.

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No, the great challenge for American democracy is neither impeachment nor corporate corruption: it is the curtailment of the power of the executive branch itself. America can survive the depradations of Republican legislators and jurists; it cannot so easily survive many more years of maniacally out-of-control chief executives and their lieutentants. That challenge will remain with us regardless of whether Democrats win in '08, or whether George Bush is impeached before then.

From this moment onward, the Presidency of George W. Bush must serve not only as a monstrous enemy to block and stymie at every opportunity, but more importantly as an object lesson: What we have witnessed here must never happen again so long as we have memories to share, eyes to see, and the will to fight.

From this moment onward, our primary political focus must not only be on passing progressive legislation in the traditional sense, but more importantly on codifying the balance of powers in such a clarion way that not even the love child of Samuel Alito and Dick Cheney could possibly mistake it for a fragile bird to shoot down with a stroke of their "Unitary Executive" pen.

From this moment onward, the specter of George Bush must hover over our government as an ever-present reminder of the frailty of our institutions, and the clear and present danger imposed not only by Republican ideology, but by unchecked Executive Power itself.

From the 2008 election onward, Progressive Policy must be defined as much by its explicit curtailments on executive power as by its work on behalf of the beleaguered middle-class and underclass.

Let us, therefore, impeach if and when we can. Let us work to elect Democrats. Let us work to pass progressive legislation.

But let us also remember that to impeach or not to impeach is not the question over which our slings and arrows should fly at one another. Because the question that should drive us, keeping us awake at night on our computers, is instead How do we stop even a mad hatter like Bush from ever sending us down this rabbit-hole again?

Get Every Candidate On Record NOW

As we all know by now, President Bush (not to mention his lackey Alberto Gonzales) is incontrovertibly guilty of an obviously impeachable offense in light of Comey's testimony yesterday. Bush can attempt to deny recollection of the damning phone call to Mrs. Ashcroft if he pleases; Mrs. Ashcroft can deny recollection of it if she pleases, though how she could do that without obviously perjuring herself since she had banned all callers and visitors to Ashcroft's room is unknown. Perhaps she could say that the call came directly from Gonzales or Andy Card.

But the mafia-like circumstances of this amazing story cannot be denied: the rush to be first to the ill attorney general's room; the courageous stand of FBI chief Mueller--a story I am certain he would corroborate--in insisting that Comey not be removed from the room; Card and Gonzales blowing past Comey with an executive order for Ashcroft; Ashcroft's improbable and amazing lucidity in remembering his conversation with Comey--another point I am certain that Ashcroft would corroborate--and denying the order; the cloak and dagger 11PM White House meeting in which Comey insisted on having Olsen as a witness--a fact I am certain Olsen would corroborate; the denial of entry to Olsen for the first 15 minutes; the courageous stand of Comey in continuing to refuse; the emergency approval of the illegal program over the head of the Office of Legal Counsel and the DOJ the very next day.

It reads like the plot of a cloak-and-dagger mafia thriller, with the President as the heavy, with Card and Gonzales as his goons.

It is so undeniably, egregiously illegal in a way that even John Q. Public can really get a grip on, that it would truly require that the President be caught eating puppies or raping babies for it to get much worse.

And yet, in the face of such radically dramatic illegality, I cannot seem to find any Presidential candidate from either party with a statement on the issue--despite its being yesterday's news at this point.

Go to Hillary Clinton's site: Nothing. Go to Barack Obama's site: Nothing. John Edwards: Nothing. Bill Richardson: Nothing. And hardly surprisingly, nothing from Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney or John McCain or any of the rest of the jokers on the other side of the aisle.

More importantly, even when they do make statements I expect to see the pablum answers showing their "grave concern", the need for "full investigations" and "strong regret" at the actions of the Administration. But while just that much would be nice, such generalities won't go nearly far enough.

No, I want each and every candidate--especially the current and former Senators to answer the following question: "If President Bush authorized the continuance of the warrantless domestic spying program even though his own Justice Department and Office of Legal Counsel said it was illegal and refused to sign off on it, would you vote to impeach him or call for his impeachment?" It is critically important that they do so, because this is about a fundmental respect/disrespect for the rule of law in the United States of America.

Because let us all remember this simple fact: The President obviously did not believe that he could unilaterally allow this program to continue through his power as Commander in Chief--otherwise he would not have been so desperate to get Ashcroft's approval. He KNEW that what he was doing was illegal and not within his rights. He knew it, and he didn't care. This goes beyond the President's belief that he can act like an Emperor with legal cover: this goes straight to whether he can do somethign he KNOWS is illegal and still get away with it, even though the entire world knows as well.

Those Democrats who are trying to walk the "centrist" line in this election should let us know whether their centrism overrules their respect for equality and the rule of law.

Those Democrats who believe that we must all come together in one big, purple hug and focus on the future rather than the past, should let us know if they would disrespect the foundation of our Constitution in the name of forward-thinking optimism.

Those Democrats who would play the role of elders and statesmen should let us all know if their years of experience tell them that sociopathic, Constitution-trampling illegality is OK in this particular case.

Those Democrats who would carry the progressive mantra should let us know if they believe that electability trumps their principles when it comes to blatant law-breaking by the Commander in Chief.

Above all, those Republicans who would seek to follow in Bush's footsteps must let us all know just how closely they intend to follow--and how much respect they intend to give our broken democracy and disdained laws.

Because this issue is beyond politics at this point. The political arguments against impeachment are always there, and they are compelling: I've spouted them myself many a time. But this issue is not subject to gentleman's disagreement: this is a matter of principle so momentous that political considerations simply must be put aside (though I don't believe that they would be as politically damaging at this point as some think.)

Those who would be our future Commanders-in-Chief must make their stands and show us where their principles truly lie. I therefore call on every person who reads this piece to email and call every Presidential Candidate and get an answer to this important question.

I will be doing so myself, of course--and I urge anyone who gets a coherent answer from any one of the declared candidates to email me with it to isnospoon-at-gmail-dot-com, and I will include it in a follow-up to this post.

Let them take their stands, and let the chips fall where they may.

Markos sez...

Markos Moulitsas, proprietor of Daily Kos, has not exactly been a big proponent of impeachment. He has, in fact, stood against impeachment for over a year now even as most of his community has clamored and screamed for it. I myself jumped on the impeachment bandwagon a few months back in the face of Bush's belligerence on signing statements. Markos, however, has stood firm--even though it meant alienating much of his community, thereby endangering his livelihood.

So you know we've started to reach a tipping point when, in reaction to the mid-November to early-December gap in DOJ communication records reported by Politico, you see this from the big man himself:

The Bush Administration is working overtime to make this attorney scandal look more and more like Watergate by the day...Expect the phrases "constitutional crisis", "impeachment", and "inherent contempt" to start making the rounds.

Some of the last and most significant progressive holdouts against impeachment are falling by the wayside in the face of Bush's sheer brazenness and outright corruption. Watch for the political conservation in this country to turn ugly very quickly.

There is an epic battle on the horizon, and it's coming with greater haste than most realize.