Will isle representatives vote to impeach Bush?
WILL you vote to impeach George Bush?" This is an appropriate question to ask all Democratic and Republican candidates running for Ed Case's seat in Congress. Case himself as well as Rep. Neil Abercrombie and Senators Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka also should have an answer ready. If elected, they may well have to cast a "yea" or "nay" on the issue of impeachment.
National polls show a majority of Americans now favor the Democrats. If Democrats take both houses of Congress in the November election -- an outside chance but a real possibility nonetheless -- Democrats will run the committees and wield subpoena power. Even if the Democrats take control only of the House, a motion to impeach Bush could well come forward. If it does, how should our representatives vote?
The constitutional description of an impeachable presidential offense is "treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors." What those "other" crimes and misdemeanors might be is for Congress to decide. Eight years ago, a Republican House voted that having a sexual relationship with a White House intern and lying about it was an impeachable offense. The Senate decided it wasn't, but the House vote set the height of the bar. It seems ludicrously low compared to what is before us today.
» Bush took the nation into war through lies or incompetence. His justification for going to war in Iraq was that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and ties to al-Qaida. Neither existed, so Bush either lied or was grievously incompetent. We've spent $400 billion on this war. More than 2,600 Americans are dead, tens of thousands more wounded, and Iraq today has more foreign terrorists, more insurgent attacks and produces less oil than it did two years ago.
» Bush ignored the threat of America's worst natural disaster and lied about it. He attempted to justify his administration's slow and incompetent response to Hurricane Katrina by saying that "nobody expected" the levees would breach. We later saw Federal Emergency Management Agency videotapes made prior to the hurricane's onslaught showing Bush being briefed on Katrina's probable effects, including the likelihood that the levees would breach.
» Bush violated the law. Guantanamo. Water-boarding. Secret prisons. Warrantless wiretapping. Recent lower court and Supreme Court decisions have confirmed what millions of Americans have been saying for some time. Torturing people, imprisoning them for years without proof or right to counsel, and eavesdropping on U.S. citizens without a warrant are unconstitutional and against the law.
If a sexual peccadillo like Clinton's qualifies for consideration as an impeachable offense, Bush's war, torture and lawless incompetence ought to be considered as well.
But impeachment is only partly about Bush. The higher duty of our representatives will be to consider the effects of a presidential impeachment on our nation. Knowing the deep partisanship that already divides the American people, we can be sure it will become even deeper and more bitter if the issue of impeachment is raised. It will consume Congress to the exclusion of all else and prevent much urgent legislative work from being done. Is it worth it? Wouldn't it be better just to wait it out for two years until a new president is elected?
In my view, impeachment should be considered for two reasons. The first is that two years is a long time. Bush is capable of doing the country mortal harm during that period. A new war with Iran is only one of the looming dangers he has put on our horizon.
The second reason is the desperate need to recuperate the American reputation abroad and our very soul here at home. We live in an age of terror, asymmetric warfare and the rise of nations with billion-plus populations far exceeding our own. In this brave new world, America's greatest guarantee of safety is not our nuclear arsenal; it is the respect of other nations and the willingness of the world's religions and peoples to support our efforts to defeat terrorism. The result of Bush policies like pre-emptive war and torture is that many nations hold us in contempt and millions around the world regard us as Satan. We can't bomb them all, but we can show them we are capable of change, that we can be redeemed.
Across broad swaths of the earth, George Bush has made the most recognizable icon of the United States in the 21st century not the Statue of Liberty, but the hooded torture victim at Abu Ghraib. His impeachment would be the first step on our road to redemption, both in the world's eyes and in our own.
Richard Tillotson is a writer who lives in Honolulu.
