Sure Nancy Pelosi assured the Republicans that the Democratic controlled Congress would not seek efforts to impeach Bush et al and sure, this can be perceived as taking the moral high road, but there comes a time to screw their courage to the sticking-place. There are a number of reasons why Bush and Cheney should be investigated, impeached and convicted for their crimes against humanity.

At a time when our Nation is profoundly divided over our involvement in Iraq and the culture of corruption brought by this administration, we find ourselves on the brink of a Nation and a world divided. The main reason we are in this mess is a direct result of the actions from one man and the consequences resulting from those actions. The difference between us and the Iraqi people today; the Iraqis are left with no options but to defend themselves and their sovereignty from our invasion and those who support our invasion. While we were led to think that Iraq was somehow involved in events that took place on 9/11 and we now are being led to believe that Iraq is in position of weapons of mass destruction.

When Bush took the oath of office, he vowed to uphold the Constitution - the highest law of the land. In school, we were all taught that our Founding Fathers put in place a system of “checks and balances” which is central to the American constitutional system. These principles are intended to prevent the excessive use of power by any one branch, or by any one person. One function within this system is Congress’ authority to remove the President whenever he or she has committed high crimes and misdemeanors. It is without a doubt; President George Walker Bush has abused his power by imposing a police state and a military dictatorship upon the people and Republic of the United States of America by means of “a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations” against the Constitution since September 11, 2001.

Reasons for Impeachment

Violating The Equal Protection Clause
As long as our troops remain in the Middle East and continue to be overwhelmingly poor white, black, and Latino, the President has violated the equal protection clause of the Constitution. Whether they joined by force or through volunteerism, both systems are based on a coercion of a system that continues to deny them viable opportunities to move up the socio-economic ladder. Soon after 9/11, this Administration has called on the poor and minorities to fight a war for oil to preserve the lifestyles of the wealthy is a denial of their equal protection rights guaranteed under the Constitution.

This is not a war against terrorism, but a war against the poor. While this Administration has conned the poor into believing they are in a war to protect the sovereignty of this Nation, in return, they have received nothing for their valor. The Bush Administration has repeatedly stabbed them in the back by cutting required funding to crucial social programs and diverting those funds to finance this unnecessary war.

Because veteran hospitals across the country are under-funded, a returning vet is forced to wait must wait an average of 165 days for a VA decision on initial disability benefits and if denied, an appeal can take up to three years.

Crimes Against Humanity
From the first day of the invasion to the present, the principles laid down in the Nuremberg trials have been violated. Their deaths are not only a moral outrage, but also a violation of domestic and international law.

On June 29, 2006, the Supreme Court ruled that President George Walker Bush overstepped his powers by creating a military commission set up to try detainees held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

The President has withdrawn both economic support and military assistance from the every country who have refused to sign an impunity agreement with the US - the agreement that states that a government will not surrender or transfer US nationals accused of genocide, crimes against humanity or war crimes to the International Criminal Court.

On 1 July 2003 the USA announced the withdrawal of military assistance to 35 states who are parties to the Rome Statute and have refused to sign an impunity agreement with the USA. On 8 December 2004, the USA went even further, withdrawing economic support from states that still refuse to sign impunity agreements. The withdrawal of this economic funding threatens to undermine counter-terrorism efforts, peace process programs, anti-drug trafficking initiatives, truth and reconciliation commissions and HIV/Aids education, and threatens states such as Jordan, Ireland, Cyprus, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela and South Africa.

The United States intentionally bombed indiscriminately throughout Iraq
The President has conspired to engage in a massive war against Iraq, employing methods of mass destruction that resulted in the killing of tens of thousands of civilians, many of whom will be children. As of this writing, the number of deaths reported by the Iraq Body Count (IBC) project stands at 54,266. These methods have included a threat to use nuclear and the use of indiscriminate weapons and massive killings by aerial bombardment on innocent civilians, which is a direct violation the UN Charter, the Hague Rules of Air Warfare, the Hague Regulations on land warfare, Geneva Conventions, the Nuremberg Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and US Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956).

Abuse of Power
President George Walker Bush has committed the United States in a war with Iraq by sidestepping the Constitutional powers of Congress as a means of securing power to commit crimes against peace, war crimes, and other high crimes. He deliberately misled, deceived, concealed and made false representations to the Congress to prevent its free deliberation and informed exercise of legislature power. As of now, the President has not received a formal Declaration of War by Congress as required by Article One, Section Eight of the Constitution. Although President Bush received authorization for the use force against Iraq through the War Powers Resolution, war was still waged over the objections to engage in combat voiced by the people of the United States.

In forming a government, the Framers understood the inherent dangers of an unfettered executive prone to war, therefore, they had determined they would make it hard to go to war except to defend freedom. John Jay wrote in Federalist No. 4:

It is too true, however disgraceful it may be to human nature, that nations in general will make war whenever they have a prospect of getting anything by it; nay, absolute monarchs will often make war when their nations are to get nothing by it, but for the purposes and objects merely personal, such as thirst for military glory, revenge for personal affronts, ambition, or private compacts to aggrandize or support their particular families or partisans. These and a variety of other motives, which affect only the mind of the sovereign, often lead him to engage in wars not sanctified by justice or the voice and interests of his people. But, independent of these inducements to war, which are more prevalent in absolute monarchies, but which well deserve our attention, there are others which affect nations as often as kings; and some of them will on examination be found to grow out of our relative situation and circumstances.

But is was James Madison who said it best:

Of all the enemies of true liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.

War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.

In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people.

The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manner and of morals, engendered in both.

No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

The President’s conduct violates the Constitution and laws of the United States, which all are impeachable offenses.

The United States has violated and condoned violations of human rights, civil liberties and the US Bill of Rights in the United States by misusing the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Secret Service, and other executive personnel by directing or authorizing such agencies to conduct and continue electronic surveillance on the citizens of the United States for purposes unrelated to national security. Through the use of illegal surveillance, he has ordered and authorized the arrest and interrogation of innocent US citizens.

President Bush has systematically manipulated, controlled, directed, misinformed and restricted press and media coverage to obtain constant support in the media for his military and political goals. The American people were seduced into celebrating the slaughter of innocent by controlled propaganda demonizing Iraq and the Iraqi people who endorsed Saddam Hussein. He has repeatedly assured the world that no harm would come to Iraqi civilians but in reality, he has been deliberately manipulated the atrocities that are currently taking place. Like his father, the American people have been deprived of critical information to make a sound judgment about the condition that is taking place in Iraq.

If the purpose of the First Amendment is to assure a free press so the people can have adequate information in order to have the right to criticize our government with impunity, then the evidence at hand clearly shows those rights have been infringed upon by this Administration.

When Harry Truman was president of the United States, he famously displayed on his desk in the Oval Office a sign that read: “The buck stops here.” He understood the need to take responsibility not only for his own actions but also for those of his administration, and that this applied even to the toughest of decisions - such as dropping nuclear bombs. In January 1953, in his farewell address to the American people, President Harry Truman said, “The President - whoever he is - has to decide. He can’t pass the buck to anybody. No one else can do the deciding for him. That’s his job.” President George Walker Bush must be held accountable for the atrocities committed by him and his Administration

The American People and Congress must put the fear of impeachment into the highest levels of the Bush administration in order to prevent the next war of aggression that could immediately go nuclear.

If the United States of America is to set the moral and legal standards for the rest of the world, then we must do the same. If this means we must swallow the bitter pill to expose the American public to this Administration’s mismanagement and incompetence, than it must be done in order to save this country. We can no longer hide the skeletons that might embarrass this country; we can no longer sweep the atrocities under the rug. The buck must stop with Congress and Congress must begin examining the role of those at top of the atrocities committed against the United States and the hundreds of detainees held in US custody in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay.

Thirty years ago, a Republican president was forced to resign because of unprecedented crimes he and his aides committed against the Constitution and people of the United States. Facing an impeachment by the House of Representatives and conviction by the Senate, Richard Millhouse Nixon left office voluntarily. Ten years ago, the House of Representatives impeach a President for sex and lying about sex, crime far lesser than the ones committed by President Nixon. The House should and must impeach President George Walker Bush for committing us to an ill-considered war, conceived in ideological zeal and pursued with contempt for truth, disregard of history and an arrogant assertion of American power by threatening to engage in more wars.

By not pursuing impeachment, future leaders of our country will feel free to start other immoral wars while our hands and minds continue to be stained with the blood of humanity that will never wash clean and our integrity and our freedom will soon disappear.

And for the good of all humanity, we must terminate America’s Imperial Presidency and subject it to the Rule of Law.

“Hasta la victoria siempre!”

Technorati Tags: Nancy Pelosi, impeach, Bush, Cheney, Founding Fathers, checks and balances, President George Walker Bush, UN Charter, Hague Rules of Air Warfare, Hague Regulations on land warfare, Nuremberg Charter, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, US Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956), human rights, civil liberties, Imperial Presidency, Rule of Law

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