Is it time to begin Impeachment hearings for Bush?

That's a tangential question to this thread but while its very likely that a US pullout would create a lot of chaos the problem is whether the US presence is really preventing any and how much is the US presence contributing to chaos in Iraq since without the US there is little impetus for the Sunnis to tolerate Al Qaeda. At the same time the US presence gives both Sunnis and Shiite an extremists an excuse to not cooperate with each other.

In the end we might have to let them fight it out before they can develop a stable society.

They could both be impeached but not removed from office but if they are the Speaker of the House is the next in line of succession behind the President and VP. Given that there are already a lot of Democrats running to be President I doubt many of them are eager to see Pelosi become President, even for a few months, ahead of them which is why it is unlikely that if they were impeached the Senate might still not remove them from office.

 

Being an unpopular idiot is not grounds for impeachment.

 

Lets see what the accusations would be

1. Lying us into a war
debatable. No one really knows what Bush knew or didn't know.
2. wiretapping
debatable. The shrill raised on this one is just an exaggeration by the left.
3. torture
debatable again. there really isn't any clear cut definition of what passes for torture and what goes beyond that.
4. mishandling a war and being an a-hole about it to everyone?
guilty as charged, but he'd hardly be the first president to do that.

Not gonna happen. Nothing is clear cut. People who want to start them just don't like Bush because he has an R next to his name

Don't you go kid yourselves..... if Bush was a democrat he could fight all the stupid inane wars he wanted (in places like Darfur) and the left would be all for it.

 

take cover! you've been targeted

 

Good, a list:
1. Lying us into a war
I agree that's not easy and I'm not even sure if I'd call it impeachable if it were true.
2. wiretapping
Wiretapping would be a subset of a larger violation-of-civil-liberties-of-citizens charge that would also include things like denial of fair trial. I think there is something worth pursuing here.
3. torture
I don't think definitions should be a problem here. Defenders may hide behind what the definition of 'is' is, but I think unpartisan observers could easily tell what is and isn't torture.
4. mishandling a war and being an a-hole about it to everyone?
Not an issue.

I would add other things to the list, like Extraordinary Rendition, violations of the Geneva Conventions on treatment of POWs, etc.

 

Impeachment is for whatever Congress deems it is. The President could be impeached for picking his nose or not be impeached for publically killing someone.

Everyone seems to forget that impeachment is much more a political exercise than a legal one.

 

Can I vote to remove every elected official on the federal level and start over?

 

That's too politically self-serving to fly, because Democrat Pelosi becomes prez, as a result of impeachment proceedings over which she would initially preside. If Pelosi agrees to step down at the same time, would the Sec'y of State then automatically take it, or does the House get to elect their new Speaker->President first?

Maybe we don't want to do this every ten years.

 

Well, we survived third-world colonialism and the Cold War (when half the world hated us), so the year-and-a-half of Bush we have left shouldn't be too bad.

 

Intent. Sabotaging a Presidential Election (a-la CREEP and Watergate)? Subverting a sexual harassment lawsuit?

 

i bow to you sir.

 

what is selfish is to continue to occupy a country where the majority its people want us the hell out.

i do argree though that we really screwed up the region - no matter what we do it is going to be bad - whether or not it is intentional on our governments part is another thread, i suppose.

obviously, the whole administration needs to go - they are all criminals. but i think the speaker of the house is #3 - not candy.

 

but engaging in criminal behavior and committing felonies is.

 

at this point the evidence is overwhelming that they did lie us into an unnecessary war. we dont know what bush knew or didnt know, but we do know that they lied and fear-mongered us into iraq ("mushroom clouds") and then lied about how long we would be there ("6 days, 6 weeks, i doubt 6 months").

wrong - there are laws on the books about wiretapping american citizens and this administration broke those laws. they committed felonies. furthermore, bush lied to the american people when he said that they were not doing wiretapps at the time that they were. you need to get over the b.s. "left" vs. "right" stuff - its got nothing to do with that. i am independent, but have cast my vote for far more republicans than democrats over the years.

wrong again - there are very clear-cut definitions of what passes for torture - there are federal laws defining it and this administration broke them. that would be a felony. actually, by u.s. law those responsible for the death of detainees are subject to the death penalty - just some food for thought!

this is not an impeachable offense, but committing felonies are and this administration has committed a multitude of them.

yes, that is it - it has nothing to do with the fact that this administration has broken the law and done much damage to this country.

aside from the things you mentioned i would also point out that this administration paid off reporters to write fake news stories. that is against the law too.

also, moving this country into the north american union is a violation of the sovereignty of this country - bush should be impeached for this too, just like clinton should have been impeached for nafta (among other things).

 

The whole impeachment over lying about a consensual blow-job completely unrelated to Presidential duties cheapened greatly the whole idea of impeachment. We don't want to get into impeaching virtually every President.

So I have been less than enthusiastic about doing it, though Bush clearly deserves it for lying us into war, illegal wire tapping, etc. etc.

When you throw in the fact that the impeachment if done over the lying us into war, it might actually make us safer from terrorists by being a step towards actually apoligizing for the unjust Iraq War, and saying to the world this is not what American is really about, I say go for it.

Engaging in an active coverup, excuse me "commuting" and therebye allowing him to take the 5th to avoid testimony while his appeal is pending is the last straw.


Impeachment for the right reasons would do much to make this a better country.

 

As I said before impeachment is for pretty much anything but if Congress were to impeach Presidents for trade treaties they would have to impeach themselves for ratifying them.