• If we impeach Bush, we’ll get President
Cheney!
Initiating the impeachment process will lead to an investigation
that will implicate lots of people in the Bush administration
who are guilty of committing crimes, including Cheney.
In addition, no matter who we get to replace Bush, we’ll
be showing those in power that anyone who breaks the law will
be held accountable.
• Promoting impeachment will seem too “extreme.”
Demanding that crimes be investigated is NOT extreme. Some previous
impeachment attempts were considered extreme because they were
pursued for actions that didn't rise to the level of a Constitutional
crisis, which is what the impeachment tool is meant to be used
for. Nixon's impeachment, however, was bipartisan.
• We should wait to impeach...
Wait to impeach? We've waited 3 or more years too long already.
We had enough evidence to impeach years ago. Remember, an impeachment
only means you have enough evidence to warrant a trial, just
like an indictment. Our congress people didn't take an oath
to bipartisanship. They took an oath to the Constitution. Besides
which, our troops, Iraqi civilians, and our own civil liberties
are all waiting for this.
• Before we impeach, we should get some legislation
passed...
And with unconstitutional Presidential Signing Statements,
veto power, and the power of "Commander in Chief"
at his disposal, how do you think Congress is going to get ANYTHING
accomplished without first impeaching Bush?
If your tire blows while you're driving, do you stop to fix
it? Or do you continue driving on your rim because to stop would
take too much time?
• It hurts the democracy to go through a presidential
impeachment. And Bush is a lame duck anyway.
Holding government officials accountable for their actions strengthens
our democracy. Letting lawlessness stand weakens it.
Sometimes reprimanding a child (president) doesn't make the
family (Washington) a happy place. But you still have to do
it so the child and his siblings (future presidents) learn about
accountability. Impeachment is horribly UNDERUSED, which is
part of why there's so much corruption at the top. Politicians
must learn to fear it. People think things are better because
we improved the make-up of our law-making body, Congress. But
Bush is BREAKING LAWS. So, it doesn't matter how many laws Congress
passes if they don't serve their OVERSIGHT duties as well by
impeaching. They swore to defend the Constitution. What are
laws without enforcement?
Besides, Bush can still do a lot of damage. Our troops, Iran,
and our Supreme Court are all endangered so long as he remains
in office. Waiting until Bush is out of office will leave us
complicit in any further crimes he commits. The Union of Concerned
Scientists has estimated that the death toll from a "tactical"
nuclear weapon of the kind Bush is contemplating using in Iran
would be at minimum 3 million men, women, and children. The
path of death would stretch across country boundaries into India.
Perhaps worst of all, we set a terrible precedent by allowing
Bush to stay in office after he's broken so many laws. Impeachment
will stop future presidents from using Bush's actions as justification
for even more lawbreaking and erosion of civil liberties.
• I'm a Democrat/Republican. If we support impeachment
it will lower the chances of my party winning in 2008.
So, your party would rather win elections than do what's right
for the country? I hope you're wrong. I also hope the public
is willing to throw additional support to any party that holds
our elected officials accountable for their actions. This has
been historically true with every single impeachment effort
launched. And this impeachment effort would begin with majority
support (unlike most past impeachments including Nixon).
• Impeachment will never happen. The Republicans
will block it.
Well, all we need is a majority of support in the House. And
2/3rds vote in the Senate to remove Bush from office will happen
once the evidence
gets aired on the floor of the House, and subsequently the national
media outlets. The political pressure will become too great.
Today's impossibility is tomorrow's reality. Republican Congress
members will realize that tying their political future to Bush
reduces their chances of getting elected. Remember, one way
or another, Bush is gone by 2009— but members of Congress
may retain their offices beyond that date. Bush's poll numbers
are extremely low, and most Americans support impeachment. This
is a bipartisan movement. This means that if we make the pressure
unbearable for Members of Congress, they'll turn on him to keep
their own seats (like they did with Nixon). It's already starting
to happen. While many Members of Congress have behaved unethically
in the last few years, it's important to understand that this
is related to their warped view of what's in their self-interest.
Let's wake them up to their true self-interest (impeaching the
president), by showing them our support for impeachment.
And even if we only impeach, and the Senate fails to do their
duty and remove him from office, it will only implicate the
Senators who fail to do their sworn Constitutional duty.
• But Speaker of the House Pelosi said that Impeachment
was "off the table."
Pelosi most likely said this to remove any appearance of conflict-of-interest
that would arise if she were thrust into the presidency as a
result of the coming impeachment. What we need to do is to pressure
Pelosi not to interfere with impeachment maneuverings within
her party. Sending her Do-It-Yourself impeachments legitimizes
her when she joins the impeachment movement in the future.
• But the public doesn't support impeachment.
Newsalert: Newsweek's
recent poll shows 51% support for Impeachment. Not
to mention that support for Bush's impeachment is more than
it was before Nixon's investigation.
• You're just angry at what happened to Clinton
Impeachment is a nonpartisan issue. It's not about Clinton,
Lincoln, or any other president. Some previous impeachment attempts
were considered a waste of time because they were pursued for
things that didn't rise to the level of a Constitutional crisis,
which is what the Impeachment tool was intended for. The argument
that we can't impeach Bush because there are previous presidents
who also did bad things is the same as the argument you might
hear from your child that you shouldn't punish him because the
neighbor's kid did the same thing and didn't get punished. We
don't want a presidential rush to the lowest common denominator.
We have a duty to hold THIS president to the Constitution.
• If we don't support our president, we aid the terrorists.
We support terrorism when we fail to deal with its root causes
(poverty, lack of education, support of dictatorships, etc.).
We also support it by enabling a president who creates breeding
grounds for terrorists — like Iraq has now become, thanks
to our invasion and occupation.
Middle Eastern countries are upset with the oppressive international
policies of the past and current administration. We might develop
more healthy relationships with these countries if we appeared
to learn from our mistakes by impeaching a president who has
been so instrumental in that oppression.
• Impeachment is the wrong approach. Our government
is tyrannical, and needs to be violently overthrown through
a popular revolution.
What makes you think that if our government fell today, the
U.S. population would replace it with something better? Violent
revolutions are bloody business, and there’s absolutely
no guarantee that even with the best of intentions the resulting
new government would be an improvement over the current one.
Indeed, it could be much worse. This is because revolution only
makes sense once the people understand the problem. Thanks to
a complicit media, most people don't have the information they
need to fully understand what’s currently happening in
the U.S., so before we can create positive change, we must help
them to understand the situation we're in. We don't do that
by pushing them away with what appears to be extremism. We must
use skillful means to reveal the tyranny of this administration
(and government in general). We can do this by making reasonable
demands (for instance, that suspicious activities become subject
to investigation). Each time we're denied, more and more people
will see the injustice (especially when we take to the streets
each time!). Slowly we’ll get enough people on board to
create the changes we need, whether our goal is gradual repair
of the system or revolution. But either way, the path is the
same: First, we try to change the system. When the system shows
itself to be tyrannical and unwilling to change, the people
will move closer to revolution. If instead, the system allows
the demanded changes, then we’ve won a victory —
and maybe the theory that the system is hopelessly tyrannical
is flawed. The real point is that political change is a process,
and we need to have the resolve to see it through. Demanding
immediate perfection is unrealistic and counterproductive, and
too easily turns into a cop-out for failing to do the hard work
of creating meaningful change.
Side note:
Some Democratic Members of Congress have indicated that they're
not currently pursuing Bush's impeachment. While this is upsetting,
they percieve it to be in their (and the Democratic Party's)
political best interest, at least until the political pressure
builds. There are other reasons they're waiting as well, and
one of those things is us. They (as well as Republican members)
need us to legitimize their support for the process. Having
millions of ImpeachForPeace.org's "Do-It-Yourself
Impeachment" arrive at their door is one powerful tool
toward making that happen.
"I just want you to know that, when we talk
about war, we're really talking about peace."
-Bush, June 18, 2002
"War is Peace"
-Big Brother in George Orwell's 1984