Thread: Remarks at Emergency Impeachment

http://www.freepress.org/departments/di ... /2007/2443

Remarks at Emergency Impeachment Conference in New York City, February 17, 2007
by David Swanson
February 22, 2007

It's an honor to be speaking with these panelists and it's great to be back in New York. But I want to ask you one thing about New York, because there's something I heard Senator Hillary Clinton say and I want to know if it's true. Is it true that if you live in New York you have to support this war? Can you live in New York and work for peace?

That's what I thought.

I got up at 2 a.m. this morning in Charlottesville, Va., my town and the town of Thomas Jefferson, the man whose greatest fear for our republic was of elected despotism. Jefferson and Madison and Mason and the others who drafted the most influential Constitution the world has seen, created a system of elections, but devoted much more attention and many more words to creating a system for maintaining our democracy in between elections. They gave this essential power to the House of Representatives, as the branch most subject to popular control, and they called this power impeachment.

The founders knew that democracy could only be maintained through eternal vigilance. But we – or perhaps more G.E. and Disney than we – have substituted for eternal vigilance an eternal election season. I don't know if the founders could have imagined the way in which elections are killing our democracy, but they certainly imagined that the loss of the power of impeachment would mean a return to tyranny.

No one can say exactly how long our window of opportunity is to get impeachment up and running before it's effectively blocked by the November 2008 election. Is it too late already? Do we have two months? Three months? Four months? Wiser minds than mine seem inclined to think we may have until roughly the end of April to get the impeachment process up and running. That doesn't mean we shouldn't keep pushing until January 2009 if need be. But it does mean that if you or your organization are on the edge of accepting the need for impeachment you should bear in mind that it will be much more helpful for you to make that decision right now than later this year or next year.

Seventeen Republicans took a tiny step forward against the war on Friday. They did that because Republican voters are turning against Bush and Cheney. Republicans should think very hard about something. Do you, as a Republican, want future Democratic presidents to have the ability to rewrite laws with signing statements? Do you want them to have the ability to spy on you with no legal oversight? I know Libertarians don't want that. Congressman Ron Paul says Bush should be impeached, but Congressman Paul has not found the nerve to do anything about it – yet.

The Green party publicly stands for impeachment. Every other party should join them.

Impeachment is not a means of empowering a party. It's a way to empower the American people and the first branch of our government, the Congress. But the fact is that if the Democratic Party takes a stand for impeachment, it will gain the respect and support of Americans and of people all over the world, and it will be rewarded. When the Democrats failed to impeach Reagan for Iran-Contra, thinking they could thereby win elections, they lost elections and put George Bush I in power – and we are suffering from that still. Americans do not vote for cowardice. They voted for Democrats post-Nixon, but not post-Reagan.

The current crop of Democrats has shown that it will not act to end the war without some sort of kick-start, something to strengthen the hand of opponents of Bush and Cheney. Impeachment is the one thing that might shift the balance.

A labor union member and peace activist sent me an Email yesterday that said: If the peace movement wants to succeed, we can't fail to employ the threat of impeachment any more than a union can promise never to go on strike.

Right now, unions are lobbying hard to pass the Employee Free Choice Act, which would restore the right to effectively organize unions in this country. But Cheney has promised to have Bush veto it. It is time for unions to threaten a strike. In politics a strike is called impeachment.

Environmental organizations are concerned that we only have to many years to reverse our energy policy if we are going to reverse global warming. But any bills to do that will be vetoed or signing statemented. You cannot tell me that you care about global warming and that you're willing to sit on your hands for two full years because impeachment is not your focus. It had better become your focus or the rest of us are going to learn about global warming the hard way.

Pick an issue, any issue, and a compelling case can be made that your priority for the next few months should be impeachment. Failing to pursue impeachment will mean two more years of war, detention, torture, and abuse, and the defunding of every useful public project. Two years is a quarter of the Bush, Cheney presidency. Pick any past two years of that presidency, and you have an idea of the catastrophe we're facing. The results of it will last well beyond the end of the two years.

To recognize the gravity of the impeachable offenses that Cheney and Bush have committed and yet not work to end them because your focus is elsewhere is, in many cases, to lose your focus. A citizen who does not work for impeachment when it is merited is a neighbor who watches a murder and does not intervene. We're all busy. We all have vitally important missions. But that's a murder outside the window. You wouldn't watch and do nothing. But the Bush Administration is killing hundreds of thousands of people every year by acts of commission and omission, people of Iraq, of Africa, of New Orleans, of the world. And if we fail to impeach, we will establish the precedent to allow future presidents to do the same and worse.

Impeachment is the nonviolent answer to this crisis. We should feel no animosity toward any human being, and we should condemn all acts of violence. This is absolutely essential if we are to succeed. But we should act with deliberateness and determination to restore the rule of law and hold accountable those who would place themselves above it.

But the Bush Administration is killing hundreds of thousands of people every year by acts of commission and omission, people of Iraq, of Africa, of New Orleans, of the world

What an idiot.

NOW they're worried about Africa & New Orleans? You've got to be kidding.

Klinton could sit by while almost a MILLION people got SLAUGHTERED in Rawanda? Not a word! Nothing!!

Gov of Louisianna can sink THOUSANDS of dollars into her new OFFICE....not a word!
She ignores the ILLEGALS taking the jobs from displaced New Orleanians....NOT A FREAKING WORD.
She refuses to put resources into New Orleans..........not a word!

Nagan and gang can divert TAXPAYER MONEY .........not a word!
Nagan hides the enormous crime & murder rate by ILLEGALS.........not a word!!
The hospitals about to explode with ILLEGALS and their raping of tax dollars............NOT A DAMNED WORD.

Graft and theft everywhere..........NOT A WORD.

By blaming the world's ills on bush, they sunk to the depths of deception & politics at it's dirtiest. And they would rather sacrifice our Troops for their own, greedy, fraudulent gains.

The GREENS? Backed by communist entities.
Yes, let's listen to the very people who are trying to disassemble our nation as an arm of the United Nations of Theft & Genocide.

Never are these people FAIR. They lose every shred of credibility by ignoring every other travesty being perpetrated by their pals.

What a bunch of horse droppings.

More pontificating without actually specifying a valid impeachable offense. This sort of enpty rhetoric makes me tired.

Look, I know this might be difficult to see and maybe I'm wrong. I don't think so.

I firmly believe, now, that the hullabaloo over impeachment is being done as a DIVERSION. Specifically, to push through AMNESTY.

Take the people's attention off of the real ball and put it on an intangeable.

Impeachment, in itself, means nothing. It couldn't get out of square one as the "court" jesters are mostly involved with the SPP/NAU.

They'd never, ever do anything more than a monkey court just as they did with Klinton.

I firmly believe, now, that the hullabaloo over impeachment is being done as a DIVERSION. Specifically, to push through AMNESTY.

That wouldn't surprise me, Sis. They probably figure if signing impeachment petitions makes us feel better, alleviates our stress a little, then fine, they'll play along with it.

I believe i Amnesty is the diversification and not the way around.
The unification of the Americas under one goverment is the most serious empreemdiment.
Amnesty is part of the plan, and it has been implemnted not onli by KLlinton but by Carter also, and these wars , as much people worried to win booshes "war" more they can implemnt their plan.(than you mix Ana Nicole, American Idle, Britney Spears, Oscar night)lol
This is the objective for a lonf long time and it's in its final achivemantes.
Boosh wants to be in history as the one who got the implementation of this One World Order.
We have so many Globalists on key positions that is almost impossible to avoid putting them in office or the implementation of their rules.
The Demorats, talked and talked and now we are worse than we were....As I said all flour from the same bag.
If the people don't start taking more actions ("We the people", programed a reunion, made a reservation for 350 rooms and the people didn't make enough reservations (see the email at the botton)
If the organizations continue to have so little support form at least 200 millon people in this country , what can anyone do...

February 23, 2007


$159.00
GML 2007 Update
WTP needs your help.
GML 2007 is being held at the Hilton Hotel in Alexandria, Virginia, Thursday-Saturday, March 29-31.

We contracted with the hotel for 350 room-nights spread between Wednesday night, March 28 and Saturday night, March 31. We guaranteed payment for 80% (280) rooms at $159 each, plus 10% in taxes. As of today, the number of room reservations for GML 2007 at the Hilton is well below 280, meaning WTP is now faced with having to pay a very stiff penalty unless we come up with a solution to the problem.

The feedback we are receiving from our supporters is that the overall cost of transportation, lodging and conference registration is too high-- enough to discourage attendance.

In addition, we are finding that some people who have registered early for the conference found they could obtain a package including air transportation to DC and lodging at another hotel for a total cost just above that we had arranged for the cost of the rooms alone at the conference Hilton.


Our $159.00 Solution
In order to resolve this dilemma, we have developed a solution that we hope will enable many more people to attend the conference and also give those that help us the opportunity to participate in the conference.

Our solution is this: For every supporter that sends us at least $159, the Foundation will pool those donated funds and use them to directly pay for hotel rooms at the conference Hilton. We will then make those fully-paid (or heavily subsidized) rooms available for our supporters who would otherwise not attend due to the expense of lodging in DC.

For every $159.00 donation received by WTP for this project, WTP will send a password, enabling the donor to watch the entire 3-day conference, broadcast live over the Internet at NO COST. In addition, WTP will send the donor a video and audio recording of the entire conference (approximately 20 hours of video content) on either DVD or CD-ROM at NO COST, (subject only to a nominal shipping and handling charge.)

I AM NOT RICH BUT IF WE NEED TO CONTRIBUTE TO SAVE OUR COUNTRY 200 MILLIONS HAVE TO DO

I love this phrase, MINNIE........how astute!

all flour from the same bag.

What is "GML"? For that matter, what is "WTP"?

BTW - I note that the conference in question appears to be a Green Party forum. Anyone worried about globalism would be daft to join the Green Party, which is America's only major international party other than the Socialists and the American Communist Party. The Green Party is itself a stealth socialist instrument which uses the buzzword "democracy" a lot, but is in reality all about massive redistribution of wealth, which it sells as "social justice." The Green Party has provided a vehicle for Marxists and other radicals unifying under a common yet relatively anonymous banner. The charter is built around the buzzwords "sustainable development, social justice, non-violence (pacifism) and environmental responsibility" - all of which are sweet in the mouth but bitter in the belly, especially considering that these are the exact same buzzwords used by the UN and other instruments of the New World Order. You see, supposedly the only way that you can meet these lofty goals is with a global socialist system overseen by a massive central bureaucracy - presumably the UN.

What I'm saying here is that you should consider the AGENDA of a group before you sign on to its processes.

I've been very disapointed, we are comming to a point of no more return and the most of the people are worried about entertainment

I realize now that the Senators and the representatives they don't believe in the power of the people, they think the majority is too dumb to realize what is going on . Whn you talk about Nau they even try to show they don't know what are you talking about...