CosmeticDemocracy.com

No need for Participation–just ‘Cooperation’: On Your Knees!

Put on a uniform. Harden yourself to kill the enemies of democracy for the Homeland — just don’t expect to find much democracy when you come home. Not any more.

After one single person determined the outcome of the 2000 election in the United States (upholding a 537 vote margin for W), now the Supreme (sic) Court drops the other shoe: whatever was left of ‘the People’s Voice’ will in the future drown in a sea of corporate speech — again, by one vote.

Corporations deserve to be heard; it’s only fair, right? You can hardly hear what corporations want to say, what with all those public service messages and townhall meetings filling our airwaves. Right?

We send thousands to fight, kill, and perhaps die in foreign lands, and spend untold billions — to the detriment of our own peoples’ health, welfare, housing, education and economic future — ostensibly to bring to those abroad ‘the benefits of democracy.’ Even when joining that fight is voluntary (though via a socially skewed recruitment policy), thousands sign up to fight whomever they are told is amassing threats against the U.S.

Funny — why go to all that bother over there when it only takes apparently just one person to topple the democratic structure here…and no one even seems to notice!

Do we willingly stand by and give one person all that power, and simply obey their decision, even if it costs us all our voices? Have we given them such power? Or have they taken it? Do we simply accept passively that kind of abuse? Corporate America is chuckling … and sharpening their knives. Land of the Brave … or of the damned Foolish?

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I am no economist, but it seems to me that this “financial emergency” is fundamentally a CRISIS OF DEMOCRACY.There is nothing in this “bailout” scenario that has not been predicted and avoidable for decades. People with experience and sane and healthy analyses who spoke and wrote of the dangers were ignored, ridiculed or scorned. Certainly not given airtime nor column space in major media to explain their concerns or to connect the dots.There is absolutely NO intention of this “government” and the corporate lobbyists that fund and write the legislation for them, who influence and buy legislators, and who “regulate” their own ventures, to allow the People either:

1. first-hand, un”regulated” or uncensored knowledge of what actually goes on, or what/how/by whom decisions are made.

2. a free press that engages the public and discusses and questions situations as well as alternatives.

 3. a free electoral system that allows such a simple notion as alternative views and political organization (i.e. other parties) with both the right and “permission” to speak freely and in the open and with access to the public’s airwaves.

Forget Public Funding of Elections.The “Free Marketeers” who have so brazenly lied to us, lo these decades (centuries?), about their ideology and intentions, admit no Free Market of Ideas, eliminating candidates from National Debates, allowing no television time for smaller candidacies (as nations such as Brazil and Mexico somehow manage to do), preventing any real dialogue, exchange of ideas IN MUCH THE SAME WAY AS their Phony “Free Market” Rules and rigged games they play, that ALWAYS end up with us, the taxpayers, bailing out the failed “plans” (schemes?) AFTER the usually unpunished perpetrators have taken out and stashed away their private profits.It’s time to realize: this is a wholesale Criminal Enterprise masquerading as a government, while bad-mouthing ANYTHING representing truly democratic or representative ideas of the governed.The enemies of democracy are not conspiring to smash aircraft into our symbols of power. They are circulating freely in the corridors of our Capitol and White House. They sit behind microphones and in front of cameras that blanket the nation with innuendo, false images of humanity and science, disinformation, vitriol and hatred. They take what they want, prey on the weak, and plot to silence those who might object. They cover their actions and trails with emotional rhetoric spread by giant media networks with whom they share power.This is not democracy in ANY sense of the word. It is a Cosmetic Democracy at best where appearance deceives and illusions shatter if you look too closely.A Thousand Plagues, too, on the folks like Nancy Pelosi and her duplicitous and traitorous gang of enablers who use the romantic and nostalgic falsehoods of a supposed Democratic Party “legacy” of supporting working people to quietly shut up, shut down and neutralize the efforts of exactly those elements in our society (anti-war movement, veterans, women’s groups, labor, impeachment advocates, etc.) who actually WOULD stand up to defend our REAL democratic principles.We must also question the sense of all those people of good will, still IN the Democratic Party (or so self-identifying), who have willingly allowed themselves to be used and fooled time and time again, accepting “lesser-of-two-evilism” as the Norm and Rule, having demanded NOTHING of their duplicitous neo-liberal usurped “Leadership” Council of that political party, having lowered both their expectations and their pants to that “leadership”, without getting a single meaningful concession in return that supports the American People or our Constitution.This has gone on for decades now.Those of you who have tolerated and even supported this should be ashamed and embarrassed. You have willingly allowed the oligarchy of this nation to use the artifice of a “second flavor” of Capital, the Democratic Party, to fool, use and abuse both you AND this nation, wasting your time and our democratic potential.If you truly are progressive, it is time to take up the real and active defense of Democracy, insist on Impeachment (there is still time), restore the Constitution (there may be still time), and BAIL OUT of that phony Party to put your energies and resources towards building a new one that has its feet firmly planted in Democracy. This may hurt and sadden some to realize, but...it is too late for the Democratic Party — they have already effectively betrayed the nation. They have stood by and watched (when not aiding and abetting) the worst elements of our society rape and pillage our nation and ravage others across the globe — and done nothing — other than shout down those who begged them to act on behalf of the people.There IS NO legacy to save.This whole supposed “government,” propped up by officials of both “Official Parties” is really an illegal occupation of Governmental Positions and Roles by people who hate government, because when it works, it represents ordinary people. They work hard to see representative government destroyed and replaced by an oligarchic-corporate fiat in the guise of government, touting “freedom” and “democracy” as no more than brand names and slogans.

For those who feel impeachment is either unimportant or a distraction, to those who contend that impeachment is too late or too costly, irrelevant or merely vindictive, but especially to those in our Congress entrusted with making and preserving our laws, I write this letter. I believe you are missing some very important principles that just might save America’s legacy and soul.

To my dear, disenchanted fellow citizens,

1- America IS its Constitution. Without it, we have nothing special to offer this planet. It is what set this “land of the free” apart historically, why we call ourselves the “great experiment in democracy (laws made by the people)”. It is what spelled out the basis for a democratic society, a principle which George Bush claims to be sending people to kill and die for on the other side of the world.

2- Built into that Constitution is a self-defense mechanism — the process of impeachment (basically a congressional accusation, which could lead to a trial in the Senate). It was written there in order to prevent and deal with possible abuses of power or breaches of the Constitution. It is an indictment which, only if proven, could lead to removal from office.

3- The President, the Congress, and the Armed Forces ALL make an Oath to that Constitution, not to the president, not to a political party, not to a flag, but to the Constitution, to defend it against “all enemies, foreign and domestic.”

4- If an abuse to constitutional power even seems apparent, as many people contend in the case of the George Bush administration (whether you agree with that notion or not), impeachment is the means called upon to look into the case, to see whether such excesses have really gone on — or not.

5- The frivolous use of impeachment for political and vindictive reasons during the Bill Clinton presidency, caused much of the public to come to regard the impeachment process itself as a mere political, partisan tool. Sullied repeatedly and on television, impeachment effectively became neutralized as a serious means to investigate or to stop any possible excesses or crimes of the Executive.

We live with those consequences every day now. In the last few years, our Constitution has repeatedly and successfully been attacked and eroded because of the very reluctance to use impeachment as the safeguard it was meant to be. Today we can see this as a first step towards the imperial executive, and in dissolving the separation of powers.

6- If, in cases of seeming great abuse, impeachment is not called upon (as required by our Constitution), then:
a. our Constitution becomes “defenseless”, and loses its means of protection from abuse.
b. our Congress, by not invoking impeachment, violates its Oath of Office to defend that Constitution, and becomes complicit in possible wrong-doing.
c. The Constitution might never be protected again, and thus, effectively America, as we know it, will have DIED, never to be resurrected again as it was…and all our officials will have breached their Oaths by not defending it. The backbone of America will be broken.

So, those who say impeachment is wrong, or that there is not enough time, are effectively allowing America to commit suicide, never to have that Dream again. They will have done more damage to the US (and to the world) than any Al Queda or other foreign-based enemy ever could do. It wouldn’t matter any more what happens with America’s wars abroad. Our security (the constitutional basis for our society) will have been severely breached, and the war at home will be LOST, along with our freedoms.

Now THAT would be the destruction of America.

Spying, torture, removal of habeus corpus, preemptive wars, illegal unlimited detention, infiltration of civic groups, censorship, accusing political opposition of being “terrorists,” etc….does this sound like the USA you and I know? Sounds kinda like the ol’ Soviet Union, doesn’t it? I don’t know about you, but I don’t want a dictatorship implanted here. I want an ever-more-perfected democracy.

George Bush was quoted at a November 2005 White House meeting about the Patriot Act as having angrily referred to the United States Constitution “that goddamned piece of paper.” THAT UTTERANCE, alone, is a violation of the inaugural Oath of Office he took, and the document he swore to defend; it makes him unfit to continue in that office, and should land him in the street.

Our solemn duty
There simply is no higher political or moral duty at this time for real patriots, than to impeach this president as it is required by law, by our Constitution. There simply ARE NO higher priorities than to save America’s Laws and Life.

To pretend that there are more important things to do in Congress during Bush’s last six months, is to willingly stick one’s head in the sand while America dies an ignoble death. Do you want that on your conscience? Is THAT the legacy you wish to give your children? Or might you rather have them be proud to be part of a nation that knew how to REALLY defend itself from abuse–and not just with bombs and bullets–but rather, with the Supreme Law of the Land, the US Constitution.

Before you jump to conclusions and make emotional charges against those who care deeply about the future of our nation, I suggest you actually READ the 35 charges (now 36) by Kucinich, and be able to deny all 36 of them. In any case, America has the right, the need, the Constitutional obligation, to look into such allegations for their merit. Any single one of them, if proven true, is grounds for impeachment as written in our Constitution, which, the last time I looked, still reigns as the supreme law in our land.

Yours, with due respect and with hopes for the future of our nation.
For those who feel impeachment is either unimportant or a distraction, to those who contend that impeachment is too late or too costly, irrelevant or merely vindictive, but especially to those in our Congress entrusted with making and preserving our laws, I write this letter. I believe you are missing some very important principles that just might save America’s legacy and soul.

To my dear, disenchanted fellow citizens,

1- America IS its Constitution. Without it, we have nothing special to offer this planet. It is what set this “land of the free” apart historically, why we call ourselves the “great experiment in democracy (laws made by the people)”. It is what spelled out the basis for a democratic society, a principle which George Bush claims to be sending people to kill and die for on the other side of the world.

2- Built into that Constitution is a self-defense mechanism — the process of impeachment (basically a congressional accusation, which could lead to a trial in the Senate). It was written there in order to prevent and deal with possible abuses of power or breaches of the Constitution. It is an indictment which, only if proven, could lead to removal from office.

3- The President, the Congress, and the Armed Forces ALL make an Oath to that Constitution, not to the president, not to a political party, not to a flag, but to the Constitution, to defend it against “all enemies, foreign and domestic.”

4- If an abuse to constitutional power even seems apparent, as many people contend in the case of the George Bush administration (whether you agree with that notion or not), impeachment is the means called upon to look into the case, to see whether such excesses have really gone on — or not.

5- The frivolous use of impeachment for political and vindictive reasons during the Bill Clinton presidency, caused much of the public to come to regard the impeachment process itself as a mere political, partisan tool. Sullied repeatedly and on television, impeachment effectively became neutralized as a serious means to investigate or to stop any possible excesses or crimes of the Executive.

We live with those consequences every day now. In the last few years, our Constitution has repeatedly and successfully been attacked and eroded because of the very reluctance to use impeachment as the safeguard it was meant to be. Today we can see this as a first step towards the imperial executive, and in dissolving the separation of powers.

6- If, in cases of seeming great abuse, impeachment is not called upon (as required by our Constitution), then:
a. our Constitution becomes “defenseless”, and loses its means of protection from abuse.
b. our Congress, by not invoking impeachment, violates its Oath of Office to defend that Constitution, and becomes complicit in possible wrong-doing.
c. The Constitution might never be protected again, and thus, effectively America, as we know it, will have DIED, never to be resurrected again as it was…and all our officials will have breached their Oaths by not defending it. The backbone of America will be broken.

So, those who say impeachment is wrong, or that there is not enough time, are effectively allowing America to commit suicide, never to have that Dream again. They will have done more damage to the US (and to the world) than any Al Queda or other foreign-based enemy ever could do. It wouldn’t matter any more what happens with America’s wars abroad. Our security (the constitutional basis for our society) will have been severely breached, and the war at home will be LOST, along with our freedoms.

Now THAT would be the destruction of America.

Spying, torture, removal of habeus corpus, preemptive wars, illegal unlimited detention, infiltration of civic groups, censorship, accusing political opposition of being “terrorists,” etc….does this sound like the USA you and I know? Sounds kinda like the ol’ Soviet Union, doesn’t it? I don’t know about you, but I don’t want a dictatorship implanted here. I want an ever-more-perfected democracy.

George Bush was quoted at a November 2005 White House meeting about the Patriot Act as having angrily referred to the United States Constitution “that goddamned piece of paper.” THAT UTTERANCE, alone, is a violation of the inaugural Oath of Office he took, and the document he swore to defend; it makes him unfit to continue in that office, and should land him in the street.

Our solemn duty
There simply is no higher political or moral duty at this time for real patriots, than to impeach this president as it is required by law, by our Constitution. There simply ARE NO higher priorities than to save America’s Laws and Life.

To pretend that there are more important things to do in Congress during Bush’s last six months, is to willingly stick one’s head in the sand while America dies an ignoble death. Do you want that on your conscience? Is THAT the legacy you wish to give your children? Or might you rather have them be proud to be part of a nation that knew how to REALLY defend itself from abuse–and not just with bombs and bullets–but rather, with the Supreme Law of the Land, the US Constitution.

Before you jump to conclusions and make emotional charges against those who care deeply about the future of our nation, I suggest you actually READ the 35 charges (now 36) by Kucinich, and be able to deny all 36 of them. In any case, America has the right, the need, the Constitutional obligation, to look into such allegations for their merit. Any single one of them, if proven true, is grounds for impeachment as written in our Constitution, which, the last time I looked, still reigns as the supreme law in our land.

Yours, with due respect and with hopes for the future of our nation.

Alan Kobrin

————–
Alan Kobrin is an activist, web consultant, educator, and writer, who seeks a re-dedication to democracy through participation; he co-founded FloridaImpeach.org and is a spokesperson for the Green Party of Florida.

See the letter to Miami Herald about impeachment and censorship in the US” letter published in the Miami Herald which gave rise to this article, “Impeachment 101″

“It’s your baby.”

With these words, Condolleeza Rice reportedly told the CIA that they could go right ahead and break US and International Law, by using torture and a series of extreme measures to gain confessions from detainees with no respect for their human nor legal rights. All this with apparent disregard for any potential negative consequences to our nation from such actions. It was done in secrecy, and if somehow discovered, would, as we have seen, be blamed upon “a few bad apples.” Thus was the undermining of a pillar of US legal and moral structure conceived in our White House.

If there ever were a case for legal abortion, this is IT.

This “baby” must not reach full term. It puts the mother in extreme risk of her life. It is seriously deformed by any standards. Were this baby to somehow survive, and grow to adulthood, it would bankrupt the family and leave an enduring wake of pain and sorrow.

Ms. Rice holds the position of US Secretary of State. Many say she is on the short list for Republican VP candidates. Her cavalier attitude and disrespect for our own and international norms of law and propriety make her unfit to represent a nation that would like to consider itself both democratic and humane. It is past time for her to go now, and no longer create risks for her family, her community and her neighbors. All who love and respect our Constitution should insist she resign or be impeached — as should any others who participated in this orgy of deceit and decadence.

It’s barely 4 pm EST on Super Tuesday™ and today I get to play pundit by calling the election hours before polls close, even on the east coast.

For me it is clear: the results are in, and America has lost.

2000.
Seven years ago we had what amounts to a coup in the United States, not just a local finagling of votes by a party boss, but a spectacularly mounted calculated and managed effort to ensure who would get to occupy the Oval Office, with players in a number of state houses, in the media and in the Supreme Court.

The country has since gone down a road of increasing isolation, lawlessness, concentration of wealth and power, and colossal abdication of responsibility for the well-being, safety and future living conditions of its vast population.

2001.
The brazen and deadly attacks of September 11, 2001 on symbols of American power, instead of fortifying our resolve to be a strong nation of laws, served instead as a facile excuse for the marketing of fear, burgeoning militarization, increased secrecy, and further concentration of powers in the Executive branch. The fact that the cast of characters involved in this venture had been trying to achieve just that for decades, seems to have fallen on deaf ears.

We have seen the gutting of national founding documents and principles, lies and distortion in nearly every realm of daily official business of state, a growth of secrecy and and the resultant intimidation and shutting down of anything resembling balance of power in our branches of government. Affirmation and repetition have replaced truth and news. Civility has given way to aggression, peace has become unfashionable.

The nation is at the brink of economic collapse, yet continues to borrow to pay for wars which its leaders deem necessary for our security and indeed for the survival of civilization as they know it. They have put our grandchildren into debt for this adventure. By any social measure, we are worse off than before, whether it be the percentage of people with true and essential healthcare, wages, educational level, true participation in decisions and voting.

2004.
Against all odds people fought back. Groups formed to bring the power, potential and awareness of the internet into the fray to disseminate information, dissent, organizing information, and create the beginnings of a resistance to the further hijacking of our state. There were forums, debates, discussions, rallies and marches. New candidacies emerged, millions of dollars were raised. In 2004, the voter fraud was repeated as was the betrayal to the people by the supposed defenders of our vote.

2005.
Katrina devastates the Gulf Coast. A major US city, New Orleans, is ravished through major neglect, and condemned through avarice to be re-organized without its citizens and communities’ presence nor input. The”shock doctrine” at play in the US, with over a thousand dead, many missing and American refugees with not right to return nor to vote. Congress does not speak out the horrors, nor press the Administration to remedy the situation.

2006.
Dazed and bewildered, the defeated defenders of the Constitutional Order fought back yet again with renewed fervor, to gain a foothold in the 2006 elections. New but fragile more liberal radio networks began. In the end they found their efforts produced no tangibly different results.

As though none of these easily documentable events had occurred, the lies, the fraud, the crimes against Humanity and our Constitution begun in 2000 produced precious little notice and voice among our entire elected body in Washington, DC.

2007.
Americans outraged at the brazen wrenching from our hands of our national treasure, traditions, character, and lives fought back yet again with ever-louder calls for the ending of war funding and for the impeachment of the president and vice president for numerous crimes of spying, lying, abuse of power, crimes against humanity, war profiteering, violations of laws and the Constitution.

It seemed at last that America was fighting back not only to regain it’s voice but its soul and destiny as well.

2008.
Now comes the expanded 2008 election season. Begun in earnest in late 2007, we heard a few voices among the official ones describing and denouncing the multiple continuing crimes perpetrated by this nation in our names.

By the end of the first month of the year, no one publicly recognizing the gravity of what has happened to America lo these last seven years and seeking to unite its people in redress and rebuilding was permitted to continue participation in the “election” process.

Anyone who strayed from the permitted narrative (Good American Power with a Few Flaws to be Corrected) was gone. Gone by the Rules of the Game.

BEFORE most Americans got to cast ballots, no one willing to speak out against the outrageous attacks on our system and on our sovereignty, no one willing to fight for the best wages and healthcare for working men and women, no one willing to take on the corporate hijacking of nearly all our major institutions and decisions was left in the race.

Come January, there will most likely be a new face in the White House, and that is all most folks seem to want. Like battered spouses, the worse they treat us, the less we need to be content.

Super Tuesday™
People today are lining up today to vote, with new enthusiasm we are told, because of the barely described “changes” promised in the 24/7 rhetoric being spewed from the Media Machine.

Not one of the candidates on the major party ballots has recognized the true danger this nation is in, nor points out the causes, nor names names. Only so-called “third party” candidates like Cynthia McKinney (seeking Green Party nomination) shine light on difficult truths and are ironically called “spoilers” of the election.

Major party candidates dare not mention the hijacking of our nation and of its votes, nor dare to stop the made-in-America carnage abroad or offer lasting remedies to the destruction of our middle class, the destitution of the poor and the gutting of our democracy. Yet, we are told they are the best we have, and that the System is working. Oh, is it ever…

Too few have noticed, it seems, that Corporate America which pays for the campaigns and controls our airwaves, had ALREADY voted: and they allowed us our choices.

In today’s vote, the coup was completed, the theft papered over, shoved under the rug, unquestioned. Corporations won, and America lost.

“They” are beating us down.The real danger here is that whatever good has been capable of manifesting itself lately, whatever good sense, caring, honesty is beaten to the ground by sheer power of the corporate coffers and its ability to control the Word and the Airwaves.You and I know that well over 50% of this country wants Impeachment of at least Cheney. You and I know that over 50% want this war over yesterday. A much higher percentage of the nation wants no part of torture.High percentages want single-payer health insurance even though we don’t really get to hear details and comparisons of this very often.None of these things seem to matter.What people want and what the “vote” produces are completely different animals.Our expectations have been dashed. We keep accepting less and less. THAT is why our democracy is going (if not yet gone).Look at this nonsense called the political primary process with its phony debates.BEFORE even half of the country gets to “vote,” this silly game (whose rules people accept for no reason that I can fathom), any and all candidates with ideas related to the truth or reflecting the Majority opinions, have been winnowed out already — by the media and the high finances. No “opposing” thought, puh-leez!We are PERMITTED (oh, thank you, thank you, sir!) to choose from Hillary or Obama…OR, one of the others — I can’t even go there.They ALLOW us this. PRE-chosen, pre-vetted, bought-and-paid-for personalities, but will not allow rocking of the boat. Most folks act grateful for this, and now seriously jump into the debate of: “change” vs. “experience” like choosing features of a car. There are only so many times you can ask yourself if you want leather trim or not. Perhaps a more apt metaphor would be choosing which model electric chair we want: ohhh, this one is more comfortable, but THAT one is more powerful, quicker…..You could say our “election process” does not permit us to rock any boats — even if that is what the majority clearly wants. It has too many strings attached, too many tricks, and when even those tricks don’t work, well, you still have Diebold and others (plus the Supreme Court) to pick op the slack.What is NOT permitted is getting the population really informed or (heaven forbid) expressing an informed opinion in a way others could hear about it. Witness FTAA meeting, Miami FL, 2003: eight million dollars of Iraq funding to arm our police against dissident thought.We get pissed when corporate media does not give coverage to impeachment or to hundreds of thousands protesting the war, or to Dennis Kucinich’s platform. We get pissed when neocons play fast and loose with the nomination of judges to get those willing to use restrictive voting laws.So why aren’t folks getting pissed that media — and the other “democrats” — allowed legitimate candidates (and, more importantly) their IDEAS get eliminated so early, well before over half of America gets to even give their opinion. It’s like on fifth of the country gets Election A, while the rest get Election B. Why do voters become so docile and compliant, so obedient when it is soooo clear the game is rigged.Who was it then, who silenced Kucinich, if not the Democrats themselves? Why didn’t they stand tall and together to say in Iowa: “if Dennis can’t speak, then NONE of us will speak”? Does this differ much from how they silenced Dean in 2004 and Michael Moore when he tried to help? Now the DLC is running and encouraging candidates against Dennis in Ohio. An accident? You tell me. They did the same to McKinney in Georgia. No one who questions the game or the rules is allowed in.Why doesn’t anybody notice that year after year in spite media silence and of having election after election stolen, does no one complain bitterly that virtually none of our elected officials have lifted even ONE FINGER to remedy the causes — or even examine — what happened to — those elections, much less examine or change election laws or election funding.A few short months ago (weeks, really) many of us and people throughout the country were rightly pissed at our Congress for enabling the War machine, and allowing the most crude of appointments to the Bush Crime Machine. Where are they now? In Hillary-Obama,,,Hillary- Obama la-la land. And what happened to their complaints and concerns? What about the people dying every day? The torture? The spying? The….Constitu…wha …oh THAT %@#$! piece of paper?The only thing that shores up the fortunes of cowardly enabling Democrats is the SAME thing that we so easily blame the Republicans for sowing: FEAR. Fear that Republicans might win again.What a game! Ping-pong, with our heads as the ball. Fear-change-fear-change…what about what the public WANTS??! Sorry, not available, make another choice.They BOTH use FEAR to support in essence an agenda which cannot be questioned. This agenda MUST be given an air of democratic acceptability…at least, for the time being.NONE — I repeat — NONE of the most pressing issues of our time are being mentioned, much less addressed by ANY of these so-called “candidates” — the ones that are left.So, if Obama, for example, represents “change” or “hope” and gives inspiring speeches that make people feel all warm and teary, which of these things has he (or ANY of the others) addressed, or is likely to address:

• an illegal, immoral war
• torture, rendition
• tax-paid mercenary armies
• destruction of our Constitution
• destruction of the Treasury
• destruction of the Currency
• at least 2 rigged, stolen elections
• stacking of the judiciary
• the Project for the New American Century which advocates the points above
• getting and funding free health care for everyone
• hidden agenda North American Union being put together behind closed doors
• end of Bill of Rights
• Executive Orders allowing the President to take your property if you oppose his Iraq policy
• Executive Orders allowing the President to suspend (what’s left of ) the Constitution in an “emergency”
• Executive signing orders (over 800 of ‘em) negating laws passed by Congress
• 935 published lies leading us to war
• tremendous loss of credibility and security
• the growing cult of secrecy
• privatization of:
  • our elections
  • the election debates
  • our vote count
  • our military
  • our schools
  • police forces
  • our community services
  • health insurance
  • “public” media
  • information systems
  • retirement
• massive outsourcing of prime jobs
• need to replace corporations with citizen representation and participation in highest level domestic and foreign policy decisions
• multiple question about 911 (building 7, destruction of evidence in all 3 sites, etc.)
• crying need for IMPEACHMENT

They are silent — and have silenced those who were not.The candidates we are given and all the surrounding media apparatus successfully ignore the massive hijacking of our nation, its institutions, its agenda, and its credibility.Tell me again how this “two party” system serves us democratically?? Sure, the parties are different: they each have select portions of the society they are responsible for silencing (while making them feel good). Oh, there may be thousands of individuals within who do seemingly important and legitimate things (the Kucinich and Dean people, etc.), but in the end, after all the hoopla and confetti, it boils down to keeping their “assigned” folks in line.GATT, WTO, NAFTA, CAFTA, FTAA, IMF, World Bank, all are “shock doctrine” long-term programs to make countries’ economies buckle under to corporate demands by using fear and intimidation. The wars of Afghanistan and Iraq (and soon possibly Iran) are mere extensions of that policy. War is what you do when a nation has the goods CorporateOneWorld wants, and it won’t sign an agreement. Those nations, too, like us, are “given a choice”: in their case, sign here, or kiss your ass good-bye.Make no mistake about it: the 90’s “dot-com bubble” may have been fun for a while, but Bill Clinton’s push for NAFTA, etc. got this nation ready for Iraq; and the Big Media concentration wet dream he oversaw helped put Fox and Murdoch (among a very few others) more firmly in the driver’s seat. Any surprise that Murdoch is bankrolling Hillary? Or that ALL remaining candidates have cold-warriors as “advisors”?This business of accepting “the least worst” is precisely what is killing us. We expect less, accept more crap every four years, and those with any power at all walk all over us. They TELL us what our choices are, never ASK us what we want.If we are feeling down, somewhat used, a bit dirty and discouraged, I’d say there are reasons for it. Our work: drip, drip, drip, in the bucket, while they harness tsunamis of spin.Huge forces have been at work on us to dismantle our thoughts and opposition, while making us feel as though we are still deciding something. Ya’ gotta hand it to ‘em, Quite a game they pull off!Impeachment could yet go a long way in waking America up. It may still be the last best hope to get some truth out before it gets swept under the Rug of the “08 Election.OK. We can’t stop working at cleaning up the elections, but that is not enough.About elections: they must be respectable, COUNTABLE, legitimate and free from Big $$, but mere participation every 2 or 4 years not only won’t get us out of this mess, it is what CAUSES much of it in the first place: only citizen participation and organization can pull us out. If you think organizing through “get out the vote” campaigns, or distributing candidate literature is sufficient participation I am referring to, then you ought to re-read all the above. We need dissemination of alternative media sources, and house parties and discussion groups to keep aware and informed. Citizenship is too much work? OK, then let them steal our national treasure, silence us, put us into debt to build larger killing and imprisonment machines. We can become the “good Americans” who let it all happen.Even David Swanson and John Nichols seemed a bit deflated on their radio talk the other night. It’s not easy.Talk to people who have expressed their desire for impeachment before. Shake them from the Primary-Induced haze.We still represent a Majority, even if our system now systematically denies it. While it may not be easy, at least we represent Reality.Charlotte and Diane have listed some things yet to be done and disseminated.We should be ramping up, not giving up. Put our heads (and hearts) together. To do this we have to function as a REAL Coalition (not just a handful of folks): each organization has to come in with its own handful of organizers to take on responsibilities (then we have dozens), and commit to reaching specific measurable goals that spread the word, get media, and bolster Wexler and company.Let’s pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and get about the business saving our Constitution. What is the alternative?

By Alan Kobrin

One thing everyone has to agree that this Administration certainly gets right: our national honor is at stake.

Our ability to to create and implement successful strategic policies that address urgent issues such as institutionalized violence and terror, nuclear proliferation, and global climate change is on the line. We are at risk of losing respect and goodwill. Much of this will be determined by how our nation deals with the difficult and dangerous situation in Iraq.

We will see the worst of this fallout, however, not because of seeking a rapid end to US troop involvement in Iraq. U.S. prestige, honor and credibility will be damaged for the foreseeable future if we do not hold accountable those people who used every artifice, true or not, legal or not, to get our nation into an unnecessary and illegal conflict no one wanted except a small circle of ideologues with illusions of grandeur and little concern for the lives of others.

At the center of this ideological operation sits Dick Cheney whose disdain for public participation in governance goes back decades when he and Donald Rumsfeld tried to deep-six the Freedom of Information Act during the Ford Administration. As he himself admits, he feels it is time to “work in the shadows.” His taste for an authoritarian “imperial presidency” that scuttles any real balance of powers dates from Nixon’s days.

When it is one day revealed through the use of that very Freedom of Information Act, it is likely we will see that he personally gathered such responsible and democratic stalwarts as Enron’s Ken Lay to lay out, in secret, what he euphemistically called a national energy policy–otherwise known as the War on Iraq.

Enough evidence already exists that at least some of those closed-door “energy policy sessions” had to do with maps of Iraqi oil fields and the doling out of oil concessions to various companies. Nice turn of American Ingenuity to resolve our problems without having to leave the lucrative hydrocarbon business behind. It just happened to involve someone else’s oil. No problem for Mr. Cheney.

Getting into the White House has its perks. Like moving with real soldiers around on a map, or writing no-bid contracts to friends.

Did we remind everyone yet of Cheney’s Halliburton background? Well, these things mentioned here alone should be enough to question not only Dick Cheney’s dedication to and passion for democracy, but also his, shall we say, cool and neutral examination of the circumstances in the Middle East that might require urgent military action because of perceived threats from the Saddam Hussein regime. I would say minimally that his judgment on the question at hand might have been clouded.

There is every reason to believe he was never straight forward with the American people about a real justification for war with Iraq. All announced threats were unproven innuendoes, pushed hard by the White House in spite of contrary information coming from onsite inspectors and our best intelligence. The climate of fear which resulted from 911 was steadily nourished by this Administration to get support for their planned invasion of Iraq. Rational thinking, any thorough investigation and openness were tossed into the trash heap.

Our nation’s security, contrary to Cheney’s assertions, has never been so compromised, as it is now, whether by creation of new enemies through preemptive use of force, the use of torture, the stretching thin of our military including the use of our National Guard abroad, or by the obscenely expensive and morally outrageous privatization of vital military services.

Yes, this nation faces a crisis of credibility and honor.

We will further erode an already badly battered image abroad, lose allies, escalate military confrontations, recruit anti-American forces, create a global distrust and distaste for American-styled “democracy”, and deal a terrible blow to the rule of law both here and abroad if we do NOT impeach Mr. Cheney for all that he has done to seriously and deeply damage this nation, its people and its Constitution because of his own hubris and narrow exploitative view of human life.

It is therefore in the highest interest of this nation to go forward with the articles of impeachment brought about by Rep. Dennis Kucinich.

Impeach? Yes, of course. Anything less would make this Congress and the American people complicit in all that has gone on to damage the national fabric and our place in the world.

Impeachment has to happen for at least two reasons.

First, it is the appropriate remedy called upon to redress crimes that have likely been committed by high elected officials.

Secondly, it may be the last best defense for our nation to avoid the all-out unthinkable catastrophe that would be a strike (nuclear or otherwise) against Iran in the coming days by an increasingly unstable and cornered Administration.

Questioning the “political expediency” of impeachment always seemed disturbing because it permits our elected officials discretion to go after potentially serious crimes—or not—as the electoral calendar, but not the public interest, dictated. Law applied only when convenient, ceases to be Law. If We, the People, through our representatives, allow the most serious crimes committed in the history of our nation to go unexamined, much less unpunished, we will have no legacy to pass on to our children. Effectively we will have allowed America to die.

The current moment makes this remedy even more urgent. As important as impeachment would be to re-establishing the ground rules of civilized behavior in our nation, and as much as it already can be seen as a question of life and death for countless future victims, it has now become a tactical move for the very survival of the United States as many of us would like to see it.

Impeachment may well be the only means left for an immediate shift in momentum. The movement of personnel and materials into a new theater of war in the Mideast gives the Administration clear inertia for carrying out its plans. There is little time to alter any course through normal voting channels, even if it is to cut off funding. That takes time and the Administration has already declared itself ready and able to proceed with or without funding cuts.

It is no longer a question of whether this Administration acts from serious intelligence-gathering or from listening to experts, or even listening to the people it legally represents. It clearly marches to the beat of its own drummer, to a cadence we are not privy to hear. We cannot count on either their good faith or their good sense. In this constitutional crisis of power, all available means are called for to restore Constitutional Balance of Power, to keep this Administration busy explaining, and move them into a more defensive posture, running to their lawyers, and ducking cameras and subpoenas.

This may be the last chance the American people have to use our available legal powers to stave off an unprecedented catastrophe. Time is running out. This unresponsive and largely irresponsible Administration seems determined and desperate to act out the Plan they have never bothered to disclose to us, mere citizens.

If there were ever a time for national resolve, this is it. Starting the impeachment process now—independent of the chances of its successful passage—will give courage to the beleaguered and bewildered 70% who want this war to stop. It gives breathing room to develop an appropriate exit strategy from Iraq. It will renew US stature in the eyes of the world. It means America at last will be standing up together and fighting to redeem its heritage as a democratic republic of the People, and secure its future from threats, be they foreign or domestic.

We must get our Congress & People to act NOW as if our lives depended on it–for they do.

Spread the word — time is running out.

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Alan Kobrin