Call to Impeach

I'm beginning to feel like the guy on the bridge in the Edward Munch "Scream" painting.

On August 30th, six cruise missiles armed with nuclear warheads were "mistakenly" carried on a flight from North Dakota to Louisiana. Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell assured us that concerns about the error had escalated to the highest levels. In fact, it was considered "important enough" that the president had been notified. Imagine.

Read this for some terrifying rumination on what might actually have been happening there. Was someone moving nukes for a possible strike against Iran?

Our whole country is like Condoleeza Rice reading intelligence reports that Osama Bin Laden was planning to strike the U.S. using airplanes, then for some unimaginable reason ignoring, or at the very least minimizing, the intelligence. Later, she would whine, "But who would have ever thought of such a thing....?" Duh. Like, someone who had read those reports.

Well, aren't we ignoring a warning or two ourselves? Certain people keep hinting at attacking Iran (Pat Buchanan has said that "a U.S. attack on Iran is coming," and Joe Scarborough has suggested it would initially be a very popular move) -- but it's such an extreme, reprehensible, stupid, even insane idea that you can't really believe they would actually consider it. Then again, see the documentary No End in Sight and you realize that no move is too criminally insane for this administration.

How bad do things have to get before someone begins impeachment proceedings? If the Congress is spineless and the media is spineless, does it follow that we have to be spineless too? It's left to each of us to be our generation's Paul Revere. In his day, the message was that danger was coming. For us, the message is that danger is here.

If this feels true to you, I hope you'll make a constituent call to your Congressperson and Senators immediately, saying you want Bush and Cheney impeached before they can invade Iran. It's easy to do: call 202 224 3121 and ask to be connected to all three offices. Remember: they work for you, and should hear your opinion.

This president has said so many outrageous, even stupid things, that the American people have gotten used to laughing at him rather than actually feeling the fear that some of his comments might engender. That would challenge us, after all, to act.

As an American, consider yourself challenged. We are challenged by generations who came before us, who had the courage to do what it took to save this country. And we are challenged by generations who will come after us, to do what it takes to secure the blessings that are meant to be theirs someday. This is so not a joke now. There is peril all around.

Comments

[Anteater]

Future generations will wonder why we kept making appeals to leaders we knew were not listening and why we were absolutely convinced that the only way to get rid of one doofus was to replace him with another.
It's all about NUMBERS. Protestors of the status quo are running around like a disturbed anthill. We have to organize in ONE place with ONE goal....to take back our voice. Once achieving that, we can argue amongst ourselves about issues and solutions. Nothing will change until we stop supporting the partisan cigar puffers...­.Anteater

[Blurp]

They need to bomb Iran so they can warrant staying in the region for at least another 10 years, or until the oil dries up.

And what is the much-anticipated answer from Petraeus? This big time testimony everyone's been talking about for months? "It's too early to tell."

It's too early to tell?!?!

Do they think we're all morons?!

It's stall tactics til they can get their minions at Fox and CNN to ramp up the drum beats for an Iranian strike. Fox has been at it for weeks now, but it just ain't stickin'. Hmm... I wonder why this insane idea is not resonating with the American people? These people are SOCIOPATHS! This feels exactly like when they tried every sales pitch under the sun to drag this nation kicking and screaming into Iraq. And then they finally succeeded. They dispatched Colin Powell to the UN with a vile of white powder and a PowerPoint presentation orchestrated not for the UN but for the American TV audience at home.

Until we collectively AWAKEN and really see what has been in front of our eyes all along... And start to ask the questions that NOBODY has been asking (think about it, the mainstream media doesn't challenge this administration on ANY thing)... And realize we have to let the sunshine in on this criminal administra­tion... And impeach and imprison all of them and take back control, NOTHING will change.

[Parducci]

I think you have an impeachment confused with a recall.

[jhNY]

Yes, by all means, let's call up the very people who have exhaustively proved they will not respond to anything resembling the will of the electorate with anything beyond huffy platitudes and will-starved resolutions that die quietly on the floor of each house of our legislature. Maybe all the phones ringing will distract them momentarily from doing the work their sponsors in industry and commerce have commanded them to perform. But soon, it will just be more din in the background, like the voices of all the folks marching to protest the war, the loss of the republic, etc. It takes a cool head to operate under such conditions, but heck, they're political professionals, raising money for re-election the only way they know how: constantly.

Confucius has a saying which goes something like: 'It's no good trying to carve rotten wood.' Here in the USA, I believe the rough equivalent of it is: 'You can't polish a turd', which in this case is unfair to turds, as turds are what remains after the useful business of rumination and digestion has ended, whereas our politicians as a group smell exactly the same, only they have done no useful business for us previously, nor will they in future. They belong to the corporate fascist state, which belongs to the corporate fascists.

[BadChristian]

If we can find a way to shut down the urban centers for commerce, our "Representatives" MIGHT get the hint, and do SOMETHING that isn't a waste of time.

But the citizens of the United States are not in the debate. We don't matter one little bit, and if you think Bush's Popularity is low, see if you can find out what his numbers are in urban centers. Remember, that twenty something percent is all suburban and rural... Bush is lucky to have a ten percent rating in urban America... We Hate him. But no one cares enough to ask that. We have to be split into a million little tiny pieces. Ethnicities, home prices, school districts.­..

Urbanites have been ready to dump this chump from the get go, what's in the well water outside of Cities?

[hopeless277]

The Republicans have been setting this up since Nixon. An all-powerful president so stupid that he thinks God wants him to wage war on non-threatening nations, a compliant media made up of corporations who MAKE MONEY OFF OF WAR, and an impotent public who cannot get within 2 miles of their own president. It's perfect. And we are helpless to but watch as millions of innocent human beings are vaporized in a mushroom cloud. Helpless. My senators are Kay Bailey and Box Turtle Cornyn. My Rep is Smokin' Joe Barton. All three would rather watch a child die from starvation than buck the Republican line. Cowards, all. That is why I am hopeless. That is why we are helpless. There is no force in the universe that can stop nuclear war with Iran. The barbarians have won. Again.

[jvarga]

What were the specific weapons that were moved? And would a strike on Iran somehow necessitate a bomber launch from Louisiana instead of North Dakota? Are none of the carrier groups currently stationed in the vicinity of Iran in possession of any nuclear armaments for their fighter groups? No subs hanging out anywhere that are carrying nukes? I'm guessing we wouldn't use ICBMs because it might freak out the Russians? In order to nuke Iran, the government HAD to move missiles from North Dakota to Louisiana, and then tell everyone about it?

Or is it more likely that this is just another sign of incompetence trickling down from the top?

[jvarga]

Good news is that after rereading I see that it mentions cruise missiles.

[krocklin]

rockymountain high: the trouble with your theory is that bombing them wont stop their program necessarily.
anyway, pakistan, india etc. all have nukes and we're merrily selling them more technology.
in pakistan's case, fighter planes for the first time that can actually deliver nuclear warheads. should we take them out too?
like it or not, massive military force just cant achieve what you'ld like.
were stuck with the alternative of having to discuss all this in a SMARTER way than the bush way, which im sure you are signed on to.

[kwright]

fyi,america armed the world. iran is part of the world. america installed saddam. he didn't want to give away iraqi oil so we got rid of him. similar events also happened in iran. we installed the shah of iran. look where that got us. heck look what it got him. it is not in the best interest of this nation to try to rule the world. heck we provided arms to bin laden to overthrow the russians. that worked out fine too. right? it is all about the oil. you can bet if the u.s. finds out there is oil in darfur we'd be there in a new york minute.

[KarlRoves3rdchin]

kwright -there is oil in darfur and our criminal government is involved without a doubt

[Brett Paatsch]

Rockymountainhigh imagine for a moment that you are not American (I'm not so I don't have that difficulty) and this alternative may not seem so strange to you.

The alternative to attacking Iran is not to attack Iran. Or not attacking Iran until Iran attacks you first and then reciprocate with the support of such allies as genuinely aggreived parties may find when multilateral treaties are broken.

So the Iranians are killing US troops in Iraq? Wow what a nerve they have to persue their foreign interests as they see it in America's client state. Who do those Iranians think they are to kill foreigners in someone else's county Americans, Dick Cheney even?

Personally as a non-religious person I don't find the notion of a nuclear Iran particularly disturbing. It might help to balance out the faith-based craziness if muslims had a bomb or their own to counter the religious right having a US President of its own. Perhaps we should have nukes all around to teach fledgling countries responsibility. The US has not yet invaded a nuclear power. Nukes are not weapons of conquest because of the radiation they are weapons of defence. And if the radiation of any particular discharge could be tracked back to a particular reactor then it would seem to be possible to strike back at any country that allowed its reactor-product to be used by so-called terrorists even if they did deliver it by hand rather than by leaving a returning to sender trace across the sky.

If more muslim countries had nukes then more muslim countries might have populations that would be less tolerant of extremists of their particular variety of faith.

[rockymountainhigh]

"Or not attacking Iran until Iran attacks you first and then reciprocate with the support of such allies as genuinely aggreived parties may find when multilateral treaties are broken."

We wait until we are attacked..­..genius strategy. Why don't you ask Neville Chamerlain how that worked out?

Should we have attacked Hitler before he was strong enough to roll over Europe? Seems like you would say no. Hindsight is 20/20, of course...

Other posters complain that our president is too rooted in his religious beliefs, yet they say nothing of the religious beliefs of Iran's president. He believes he will bring the 13th Imam to render Islam victorious and rule the world. He is just as much, if not much more of a religious nutjob than what you claim Bush to be.

For the record, I am not a religious person, and I find it kind of comical at how the Republicans pander to get the religious vote(just like the Dems pander to get the far left vote). Both groups are being used by the politicians to gain power. Hey looney left(and I am only calling out the real nutjob KOS kids of the left, not every left leaning person here)....i­s the war over yet? How does it feel to be used and then discarded like yesterdays trash? The dems say they will try and end it(the Repubs do the same thing with gay marriage and abortion), yet at the end of the day, it is the status quo.

[Brett Paatsch]

"We wait until we are attacked..­..genius strategy. Why don't you ask Neville Chamerlain how that worked out?"

Exactly right. If you act pre-emptively when you have promised not to act aggressively (like the US did when it ratified the UN Charter before Bush was born) and you get you facts wrong (like Cheney and Bush did about Iraq actually having WMDS) then you BECOME the AGGRESSOR.

BTW. Neville Cham-B-erlain is dead (so I can't ask him anything). Churchill his successor along with those other wimpy lefty peaceniks the US Presidents FDR and Harry Truman were instrumental in founding the United Nations in order "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war".

Bush and Cheney in breaking the law of the UN Charter (a treaty under the US Constitution) ARE part of that "scourge of war" not part of the solution to it.

What happened on 9-11 was not war it was a crime against humanity. What Bush did to Iraq in March 2003 was war. A war of aggression lauched in breach of Bush's duties under the Constitution of the United States and its laws.

If you are going to bait the so called 'looney left' why not come out from behind your adolescent pseudonym and give them a look at you? Do you doubt their pacifism?

If hindsight was 20/20 and sight was attached to a good working American brains then Bush would have been impeached already for invading a country to find weapons that didn't exist against laws he promised to defend by didn't understand and creating terrorists where there weren't any before.

[krocklin]

this is supposed to be such a stupid idea that they would never consider it?
i felt the same way about the invasion of iraq but was then surprised.
maybe the answer is they could but probably wont because of logistical and political reasons only.
on the other hand, buchanon says theyld like to, so do the rightwing nutcases who publish the magazines and are "hosts" (in the OPPOSITE sense that a carcass is a host)on radio, and scarborough said it would be popular.
would it? maybe. despite all the negative polls going against bush, aol posts 53% who "trust" petreaus in their poll.
far from being impeached, the bush junta seems still to have plenty of backing.

[jmpurser]

I personally think Cheney phoned in an order to nuke Louisiana.

[rockymountainhigh]

Oh my god, we're going to attack Iran(hyper­ventilate, hyperventilate), Oh my god, we're going to attack Iran(hyper­ventilate, hyperventilate),Oh my god, we're going to attack Iran(hyper­ventilate, hyperventilate),Oh my god, we're going to attack Iran(hyper­ventilate, hyperventi­late)....

I contantly hear this, but everyone who claims this is what we are going to do has yet to provide a viable alternative. Do I want to see us bomb Iran? No, I would prefer to see this problem resolved witout war. However, at what point to we say ENOUGH! They are killing our troops, they are arming Shiite groups in Iraq, and Hezbullah in Lebanon.

Will someone please provide a viable plan to deal with Iran? We can sit and talk all we want at the UN, which is exactly what Iran wants while they continue down the path towards becoming a nuclear power. It's been said those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it. Well, we went down this path in the 90's with Sadaam. We talked and talked and talked and talked to the tune of 17 UN resolutions against him. What did that get us? Next to nothing. Are you prepared to make the same mistakes again, or are you prepared to act?

[jmpurser]

Yeah, it was probably just another one of those things that can't possibly happen happening with nuclear weapons. No need to get excited. I mean, what's the worst that could happen?

[KenTao]

Here's the plan:

We begin to overthrow the fascists who have taken control of our country by impeaching Bush & Cheney. Hopefully, they will be given some prison time so the message will finally sink into the rest of the right-wing that enough is enough. Then we eliminate all money in our political system - corporate lobbyists will be expelled from both houses of Congress - political campaigns will be publicly financed. At that point we can finally begin to enact legislation and programs that benefit ALL Americans, not just the rich and (unhealthily) powerful.

The worldwide goodwill that will ensue when we take such actions in good faith will go a long way toward (1) calming the rhetoric and terrorist actions against us and (2) bring about a political atmosphere far more conducive to earnest negotiations with all our fellow Earthlings, particularly Iran.

Earthlings Unite!

[mommadona]

"We begin to overthrow the fascists who have taken control of our country by impeaching Bush & Cheney. Hopefully, they will be given some prison time so the message will finally sink into the rest of the right-wing that enough is enough. Then we eliminate all money in our political system - corporate lobbyists will be expelled from both houses of Congress - political campaigns will be publicly financed. At that point we can finally begin to enact legislation and programs that benefit ALL Americans, not just the rich and (unhealthily) powerful."

NOW YOU ARE TALKING THIS OLD LADY'S WALKING.

I do NOT understand why these thugs are allowed one iota of "politically correct" action.

[ethanthom]

I agree with you Ken Tao. We all need to stand up and say WAIT A FUDGE COVERED MINUTE!We refuse to be bullied any more.Impea­ch Bush & Cheney and begin to put things right.I sent an email and phoned my rep.and sen. We can win our country.

Long Live Evolved Humans

[Nommo]

Why do we have to deal with Iran at all. Nuclear power? What, like overnight? Nobody, but nobody has as many nuclear weapons as there are here. While we obsess over Iran, our infrastructure crumbles along with our dollar. We seem to be only adept, at this point, in doing ourselves in.
Hell, Mexican truckers on US roads is what you might call, a clear and present danger.
Bring the troops home. The Iranians are not killing our troops. WE are. We sent them there undermanned and under equipped. Ignorant of culture and language. We are asking them to perform above and beyond even as their families here are suffering beyond the call of duty. This is what needs to stop.

[dynadem]

Iran has not threatened to attack the United States. Iran has taken no aggressive actions against the United States. Reports that Iran is arming insurgents in Iraq are unsupported by anything remotely resembling evidence. (In fact, Iran and the United States both support the same party in Iraq - the al-Maliki government. It makes no sense that Iran would be providing weapons to insurgents opposed to the very government which Iran supports.) Claims to the contrary are manufactured by the Bush administration and its toadies in the military and the national media. Iran actively cooperated with the United States in its war against the Taliban.

Even if Iran were arming Shiite groups in Iraq, that would not justify war. The United States was arming insurgents in Afghanistan during the Soviet war there; was that an act of war against the Soviet Union? Furthermore, Hezbullah's disputes are with Israel. Hezbullah has no policy objectives directed at the United States. Iran's support for Hezbullah is not directed at the United States. Unsurprisingly, the only country in the world, other than the United States, which supports a strike against Iran is Israel.

Moreover, before the United States attacks Iran, it must consider two things: What are the costs of such an attack? And, what are the costs of not attacking? In the lead-up to the Iraq war, few voices were heard asking what were the potential costs of launching a unilateral war on Iraq. War tends to have vast unintended consequences. Now look where we are. And there never were WMDs, so I think it's more than fair to say that we are much worse off now than we would have been had we not attacked Iraq and allowed the UN inspection regime to continue its work.

Attacking Iran would be an act of sheer lunacy of the highest order. Even crazier than attacking Iraq because it doesn't even have a decent *false* rationale. Even crazier because after Bush's unbroken record of failure, it should be beyond question that Bush cannot be trusted to undertake a new military operation with competence.

[snaggster]

No, I'm not prepared to make the same mistakes again. You're Iraq example is the perfect example of what not to do. The war was an enormous mistake and most of us don't want it repeated with Iran. It is extremely arrogant and hypocritical for the one country that has actually used nukes to tell other countries that they can't have them. The lunatics we have running our country at present are precisely why our country is not to be trusted with them, either. And, on top of everything else, the nuclear proliferators are in Pakistan, not Iran. Why don't you want to attack them? Oh, I forgot. No oil.