Impeachment?

Digby tests the impeachment climate against previous impeachment proceedings, and she isn't encouraged.

The executive privilege claims are going to take forever to litigate. And, of course, the conservative judiciary is likely to back them, if only by helping them run out the clock. During Watergate, the judiciary committee had the work of the Washington Post to go on ---- and then John Dean and the tapes --- in an easily understood narrative. Ken Starr gave Henry Hyde a nice little case about dirty sex all wrapped up in a pretty little pornographic package. Nobody had to do any investigation. The job of the congress, in both cases, was pretty much just seeing if impeachment applied to acts that had already been revealed. Things moved quickly.

This requires much more original investigation, particularly on those national security issues, which are going to be very touchy subjects and nearly impossible to get evidence or testimony on. (I think the national security stuff is going to have to be investigated in a different way, a la the Church committee, after Bush is out of office.)

Finally, there is the most important and indisputable fact that Bush and Cheney will never be convicted in the Senate. This isn't the GOP of 1974 and they will never cross over in enough numbers. They won't do it even if video tapes of Bush personally giving hush money to Scooter Libby turn up. Let's not kid ourselves about that reality. The fact is that impeachment will probably bring their caucus together.

I hate to say it, but I totally agree. One thing we've seen is that today's GOP is prone to rally around the lowest common denominator, even though they may talk big sometimes about change and bipartisanship. These politicians are incapable of standing against the reelection machine, and let's face it, there's still safety in numbers.

The best we can hope to do is further vote corrupt Republicans into the minority in 2008, and hope that another splash of cold water will sober up the GOP. In the meantime, I'm all for oversight and abuse of power investigations. I hope Democrats in Congress understand that, even if their investigations can't beat Bush to January 20, 2009, those investigations are nonetheless important to the rule of law and the integrity of the Constitution.

Tags: Impeachment