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L. Neil Smith's THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE Number 305, February 6, 2005 "An Unhealthy Obsession"
Before Fall, Impeach 'em All!
Exclusive to TLE Were it possible, using my brand new Macintosh G5 Supercomputer (a few years back it would have been considered a military munition), to reach out and take charge of one of the NSA's spy satellites and train its hi-tech surveillance equipment upon Washington D.C., I would nevertheless fail at the disheartening task of locating a politician who did not richly deserve impeachment. Hell, some of them deserve actual criminal prosecution. There are reasons why some libertarians refer to Washington D.C. as the 'District of Criminals.' One very simple illustration why can be determined by the fact that we have been filing income tax returns for some 60 years now. The Bill of Rights [1] clearly states in plain English—English that is understandable to everyone except lawyers—that we are not to be compelled to be witnesses against ourselves and that we are to be secure in our persons, papers and effects. I am not aware of a single politician over the last 60 years who has attempted to remedy this obvious Constitutional abuse. They all deserve impeachment on these grounds alone. Regrettablely however, in this article we have bigger fish to fry. The dim bulb that is the current occupant infesting the White House and who is eclipsing Ronald Reagan's "shining light of freedom on the hill" is a national disgrace. The titular head of the political party that just loves to lecture everybody about "family values," "moral clarity," "the Rule of Law" and "setting the standards" deserves impeachment and prosecution as a war criminal. Try as I might, as Herculean a task as it is, I am totally unable to locate any "moral clarity" in the impenetrably dense fog bank that is the 'mind' of President Bush. Here we have a President who launched an unprovoked, not properly declared war against a non-enemy on the other side of the planet, following a campaign of lies. Not only that, but apparently Bush and his new Attorney-General Alberto Gonzales approve of torture. Here's a new book on the subject that I have not read: The Torture Papers: The Road to Abu Ghraib. [2] Further, American military death squads are OK, with these clowns, too. [3] Gonzales even wrote a memo informing Bush that as Commander-in-Chief he was above the law. Additionally, military and intelligence personnel have been informed that torture was OK as long as it didn't 'rise to the level' of loss of consciousness, or control of bodily functions and severe humiliation. What's a torturer to do, hook up his victim to some sort of tortureometer and when the needle pegs at a predetermined point on the dial, and the bells and whistles go off, only then call a halt to the proceedings? You know, anybody can go 'lawyer shopping' to find an attorney who will tell him what he wants to hear. After all, we are talking about the Corrupt Profession—the profession that refuses to properly read, understand and apply the first, second as well as the fourth through tenth amendments of the Constitution. Further, whenever government criminality is to be found, there is always a lawyer there to offer up all the needed excuses and rationalizations to make that criminality politically acceptable. [4] As I imagine it, Alberto Gonzales' job interview with Dubya went something like this:
But wait!—I pretend to hear Bush's supporters say: "Wasn't Saddam in violation of many UN resolutions and wasn't he in possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction and attempting to acquire more?" First, the US government is also in violation of many UN resolutions. So, should it attack itself? Second, UN inspector Scott Ritter told everyone in 2002 that Saddam was not longer in possession of WNDs, "I bear personal witness through seven years as a chief weapons inspector in Iraq for the United Nations to both the scope of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs and the effectiveness of the UN weapons inspectors in ultimately eliminating them."[5] Also, there is no credible evidence that he was attempting to acquire more. He was contained. The administration didn't want to believe Mr. Ritter. One of the principle reasons why was and is the on-going desire for oil companies such as UNOCAL, Chevron and AMOCO [6] to build a thousand mile pipeline over territory that, politically, is very unstable. This, naturally, they would be very reluctant to do. The undeniable truth is, from the get-go, Bush and the Neocons fully intended to invade Iraq. 9-11 gave them their excuse. Thus their first primary reason for invading Iraq was to stabilize the region. Another was to make the Middle East safe for Israel. For the record, today's Iraq civilian death count weighs in between 15600 and 17830. [7] A Lancet study puts the total near 100,000. [8] That's a lot of unnecessary blood on the administration's hands. The Constitution of the United States clearly states in Section 8 that the power to declare war belongs to Congress. Since I am a greater 'strict constructionist' than any Conservative I am aware of, I will state that nothing in our founding documents EXPRESSLY gives Congress the authority to cede its war making authority to the presidency. Thus, every senator or congressman who avoided his or her Constitutional responsibility of protecting the citizenry from unnecessary war also deserves impeachment. These wimps were 'whipped' by their respective party's whip and they must go. Scott Ritter also has this to say, "The apparent unwillingness of Congress to exercise its constitutional mandate of oversight, especially with regard to matters of war, represents a serious blow to American democracy. By allowing the Bush administration, in its rush toward conflict with Iraq, to circumvent the concepts of democratic accountability, Congress is failing those to whom they are ultimately responsible—the American people."[5] I say, "Let the impeachments begin!"
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