A couple days ago Ohio Democrat and former Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich introduced into the House of Representatives Articles of Impeachment for President George W. Bush. And the event passed with only a ripple in the blogosphere and virtually no mainstream media coverage.
How can this be? Out in public (and away from my coworkers) I have had volunteered to me by total strangers countless denunciations of this administration and its actions, and W's approval ratings are at historic lows--virtually as low as Richard Nixon when he was forced out of office in disgrace. And yet our elected officials--and now our media--would have us believe that there is no stomach for impeachment proceedings. I wonder at this, as I have always wondered.
Even granting that not all of Kucinich's 35 articles will hold water (there are several that seem a stretch to me, just as others seem inarguably correct), still taken as a whole these are infinitely more serious and substantial charges than any of those which motivated the Republican-led House to impeach Bill Clinton a decade ago. And unless we've been on a steady diet of Rupert Murdoch's "Fox" brand of misinformation these are charges of which I believe most citizens desire to know the truth as uncovered by a thorough investigation and hearings. At the very least it's a huge double standard--and yet that accusation entirely sidesteps the monstrosity of our government's rogue actions.
Sue me for being tiresome, but I'll say it again: we need a reckoning. The citizens of this country deserve it, and the sanctity of our great nation demands this ultimate act of democratic accounting. If it takes exhaustively re-introducing these articles again and again until they stick, so be it. These men must answer to us.
(At this point, any further mention by conservatives of the "liberal media" should trigger the suspension of habeas corpus and their immediate extraordinary rendition to a secure black facility in some unknown location. As far as I can tell, the mainstream media are letting Fox set the agenda in what amounts to a wholesale abdication of fourth estate principles.)
What a black and shameful chapter this has all been for us.
On the bright side, there are fewer than 220 days of this nightmare left. (We hope...)
4 comments:
All I've heard about it is there's no reason to do this because he's almost out. That's BS. I agree, he needs to stand accountable for his actions.
Don't even start me on Fox, what a sham of a network news channel, they should rename it the RNN.
One of my mom's caretakers always turns it on, and I come in and switch it to MSNBC.
218 days and counting now, and we better have a change come than, or I'm heading back to Australia for good.
I feel about Fox what the sensible British must feel about their rabid and out-of-control tabloid press: shame. The existence of the network is a neon sign for our tepid educational system. No educated person is happy with one part of one side of any complex issue.
Fox News is Joseph Goebbels' propaganda dream come true.
If we do not hold our leaders accountable, then there is no justice. The fish rots from the head down.
I agree that we need a reckoning. The country could really use a period of reflection on all that has gone wrong for the last 8 years and how it's happened. Who paid what to whom, and so on. If nothing else, it would prevent some of the Bush administration slimeballs from resurfacing in future administrations.
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