Impeach Cheney

We should impeach Dick Cheney! He has been the hub of the dishonest actions of our government, the war in Iraq and its false causes, the war on our environment and the opening up of more land for oil drilling even against the direction of the interior department, the war on the rights of all those not associated with Bib Business, and finally his recent outrageous assertions that he can maintain secrecy from congress because he is not part of the executive branch. These are just a few items and the list could go on, but the real purpose of this blog is to state the reasons impeachment is a good thing and not something we need to fear.


I will repeat my legal justification for impeachment.
The impeachment of a President or Vice President should never be treated lightly. Our constitution states that conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors may impeach a President. The original intent of the constitutional writers was that impeachment would only be undertaken for criminal behavior. However the two presidents who were impeached, both found not guilty by the Senate, Johnson and Clinton, were said to be guilty of breaking particular laws that I would not consider high crimes. Johnson was impeached for removing a cabinet member in violation of a new congressional law later determined to be unconstitutional, and Clinton for lying about an affair. The true reasons for the impeachments were political. Johnson was at odds with right wing republicans for his conciliatory actions towards the South after the civil war. Clinton impeachment was generated by the general political hostility of the Republican Party, fueled by his inability to keep his pants on.
While the original intent of the constitution was only to impeach a president for criminal activity; the actions of congress have been to use impeachment more for political gain than punishment for criminal behavior. George Mason, at the time of the writing of the constitution, actually favored impeachment for poor performance. The phrase high misdemeanor in early English law meant maladministration of high office.
Impeachment can be used as a method of removing a poor government from office before the four-year term is up. Since the house passes impeachment, it requires that a majority of the house be for the opposite party, and since impeachment is tried in the Senate, the same is true. The typical situation would be one where the current administration’s party would be soundly defeated at a mid term election. Following this defeat the administration usually would change its policies, if it doesn’t, then the impeachment process could get them out of office or cause enough of a threat to cause a change in policy. In a parliamentary form of government, the similar scenario would be a no confidence vote leading to an election would either cause the parties in power to change, or they would be voted out. Thus, in our two party, three branch form of government, the process of impeachment brings us closer to the more democratic parliamentary form of government.
`The case against Cheney versus Bush is simple. If congress impeaches bush, then Cheney is President. If congress impeaches Cheney, then Bush is left without the far right advisor who has the ear of a president without an ear of his own. We can always impeach Bush later.