‘Totally anathema to a democratic society devoted to the rule of law’

July 14, 2007

The estimable Bill Moyers explored the “I” word on PBS last night, discussing George W. Bush’s “unique” approach to the presidency with conservative attorney Bruce Fein, Associate Deputy Attorney General under President Reagan, and The Nation’s John Nichols.

Here’s the money quote from Fein in the clip:

“[Bush’s crimes are more] worrisome than Clinton’s because he is seeking more institutionally to cripple checks and balances and the authority of Congress and the judiciary to superintend his assertions of power. He has claimed the authority to tell Congress they don’t have any right to know what he’s doing with relation to spying on American citizens, using that information in any way that he wants in contradiction to a federal statute called the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He’s claimed authority to say he can kidnap people, throw them into dungeons abroad, dump them out into Siberia without any political or legal accountability. These are standards that are totally anathema to a democratic society devoted to the rule of law.”

Truer words were never spoken.

I don’t think I moved a muscle or blinked during that interview, for fear that I would miss something. What both Fein and Nichols stressed is something I have been fearful of ever since it dawned on me what kind of power might be waiting for future presidents – ones we have no way of knowing whether we can trust, in times we cannot foresee.

If the legislative and executive branches cannot come to agreements on the limits of power by “ordinary” means, the Congress really has no choice but to begin impeachment proceedings. And I think that the less they can make it about Bush, per se, and the more they can stress that the democracy may depend on the Congress defining those limits in a way that cannot be overcome with signing statements and outright defiance, the better.

It is, of course, about Bush and about Cheney, but looking at the lengths the Republican Congress went to hold Clinton accountable for lying about a matter that had nothing to do with the country, I am appalled that Nancy Pelosi would even whisper that impeachment is not an option, much less state it in no uncertain terms.

I wonder if Pelosi realizes that she is acting much like an HMO gatekeeper, who is refusing to authorize treatment that affords the patient – in this case, the country – the best chance at survival.

  • Those of us who’ve been watching have known since early on that these guys in the WH gotta go! It’s one thing to destroy the business model of a major league baseball team or an oil firm, but to work to destroy my democratic ideals, well, them is fighting words. -Kevo

  • Agree with Anne above. Stumbled onto this discussion with Bill Moyers and was spellbound. Pelosi needs to watch it. These guys left nothing untouched and kept impeachment as a remedy and not a constitutional crisis. It was the remedy for such. It certainly expressed how I felt while making me feel hopeful.
    The legislative branch should be the most powerful as it is closer to and more representative of “the people”. This is why the power of impeachment was given to it.

    If it is not done then even if Pelosi and Conyers and the Dems win elections they will not get any respect. They will win only as the lesser of two evils. Not as those willing to defend the constitution but as those who ignore what the public wants and those who took impeachment off the table during the reign of the worst and the most corrupt and unpopular administration in our nation’s history because it’s “a waste of time” and may not be successful. How can you respect someone who refuses to fight because they may not win, especially when there are such high stakes on the table?

    Bill Moyers has a site where this discussion/interview can be seen in its entirety and it is definitely worth watching.

  • The video is here. Bill Moyers Journal on Impeachment Our “invertebrate Congress” should be made to watch this. Wake the F__K UP, NANCY PELOSI. Quit worrying about speeches to AIPAC about dog tags and do your goddamned job and uphold the oath you took.

  • Anne, I don’t disagree at all with your assessment of the danger, but I do disagree with your focus on Pelosi. She is extremely pragmatic, and she said what she felt needed to be said to get the Democrats back in charge. Without that, we would be in the same powerless and hopeless position we were in last spring.

    Having the Democrats in power has led to revelations and hearings and the like that have rubbed nearly all the remaining teflon off the Bush presidency. (Admittedly, they’ve been in the process of shedding quite a lot all on their own). This week even Diane Rehm was starting to challenge republican spokespeople when their talking points veered into total rubbish.

    Get more republicans to see the danger their politicians represent and get them hollering against Bush, and I think we’ll have a bandwagon that not even Pelosi can resist. Do you think that she couldn’t find (and wouldn’t want to find) a justification for bringing impeachment back onto the table if it seemed doable?

  • You all want to impeach the Chimp-monster?

    Really?

    I don’t know if I could survive not seeing another clip of him lecturing us in mock-serious academic tones about the improtance of the rule of law.

    Has there ever been anything more hilarious than that?

    Oh wait… there has been:

    Watching the American people and press sit in silent respectful awe as the chimp-monster mumbles and jumbles out that very point.

    It is so unbelievably surreal.
    If that scene doesn’t crack you up in a Monty Python way…
    Nothing ever will…

  • I was equally spellbound. Also agree with bjobotts above that the most important point was that impeachment is a remedy to a constitutional crisis, not a constitutional crisis itself. The framing by both Nichols and Fein was spot on perfect, and frankly convinced me (an impeachment fence sitter until that moment) that the process is not an option. It is necessary to prevent the powers that Cheney/W and crowd are accruing to themselves from becoming acceptable. A Congressional failure to act is tacit approval that these powers are appropriate for the President.

    Fein’s passion on this was stunning, and it would be perfect for him to write the articles of impeachment.

  • Everyone who votes should be required to WATCH THIS SHOW. I’m sitting with my mouth hanging open with Bill Moyers, John Nichols, and Bruce Fein agreeing on the need for Congress to act on now to restore our democracy.

    Is there any real comparison between what happened during the Clinton impeachment and what is happening now? The public outcry for impeachment FROM BOTH SIDES OF THE POLITICAL SPECTRUM should be a sign to Congress that WE THE PEOPLE recognize the outright danger we are in right now.

  • Until I saw Fein and Nichols on Moyers’ program, I was opposed to the idea of impeachment. But they made me see impeachment as about so much more than Bush and Cheney—it’s about the constitution, our principles, and our nation’s future. If W and Dick are not held accountable for their gross violations of the law and constitution, future presidencies will be able to use the same tools because the precedent has been set.

    Sure, the Dems might suffer politically, and the Broders and Ignatiuses of DC will throw hissy fits, but this is about the nation, not party.

    Will we ever see Fein or Nichols on Sunday morning talk shows? Or on O’Reilly? Or on H & C? I doubt it.

  • All the pundits can say is that the Democrats will never get the 67 Senate votes needed for impeachment (actually, it’s 2/3 of those voting).

    The bill of impeachment doesn’t even have to make it a Senate vote. It doesn’t even have to make it a House vote. All that has to happen is for the House hearings on impeachment to begin. So what if it takes the remaining 17 months of Shrub’s usurped term in office to fully document all the treason, bribery, high crimes and misdemeanors of Bush Crime Family? The hearings cannot be over-ridden, cannot be vetoed, cannot be pardoned. They will keep the Bush Crime Family tied up and unable to work more mischief (e.g., Iran). They may just convince several individuals to resign (as the never-opened hearings did for Richard Nixon).

    Pelosi, you must see this.

  • While it may have made some sense to keep impeachment out of the discussion as we were going into the mid-term elections, I truly can see no reason why it is still off-limits. Has it made the Republicans in the House and Senate more willing to take less draconian steps to rein in the president? No. Has it made them more cooperative in getting answers to important questions? No.

    Whatever tactical advantage Pelosi gained by keeping impeachment off the table has not resulted in any significant change in how the Republican administration is “governing” the nation. To refuse to adapt to increased defiance and the rule of law is to become part of the problem, and that is where I believe she is now hurting more than she is helping.

  • I had to go back through the transcript to find this quote that seemed pretty important:

    JOHN NICHOLS: Nancy Pelosi is wrong. Nancy Pelosi is disregarding her oath of office. She should change course now. And more importantly, members of her caucus and responsible Republicans should step up. It is not enough–

    IIRC and Pelosi is disregarding her oath of office then aren’t the other 400+ members of Congress doing the same? Maybe we should start asking our Representatives, en masse, whether they take their oath of office seriously?

  • If anyone wonders why the GOP went after Bill Moyers… well this episode ought to answer that question.

    What the panelists said about the American people is right on. If we don’t step up to the plate, if we don’t put down the crack pipe of modern infotainment, if we don’t stand up to defend what the founders died to create and left in our care, then we will complete this slide back into monarchy.

    Personally I doubt if Americans will put down the crack pipe. Our media has no use for an informed citizenry. On the contrary, they fear it. They profit greatly from our apathy and ignorance. And I doubt that Nancy Pelosi will be brave enough to pick up the axe and chop the roots of the vines that BushCo has wrapped around the throat of our democracy. I doubt if she has the courage to fight for us rather than her own power and party.

    I hope I am very wrong.

  • Whatever tactical advantage Pelosi gained by keeping impeachment off the table was an unverifiable ingredient in the re-gaining of congressional majority. The fear appeared to have been of giving Rethuglicans a scare topic to divert and browbeat attention, when the issues needed to be kept clear and simple and unwaveringly in front of the electorate’s noses. She may have been right, we’ll never know. It was a pity though, and upset a lot of us.

    Now we have to live with it. Fein and Nichols are absolutely right in their analysis both of the disease and the cure. Very sharp, knowledgeable and persuasive — but, they’re not politicians. There are dynamics other than legal and constitutional certainties at play. These are the inertias, hurdles and procedures that have to be negotiated to reach the best long-term resolution of a crisis no one is doubting. The B-gang are throwing every obstacle they can lay their hands on into the path of investigation. They’re not fools and so they need to be handled with care and precision.

    Personally, I still see the relentless, systematic erosion of resistance as the best strategy. I believe that’s what the committees are doing, and I believe they’re doing it very well and competently. I have to say I’m impressed with what they’ve done so far and how they are progressing. This slow, steady disentangling of the webs of deceit and crime will have a far longer-lasting impact that a more glamorous showcase impeachment bonanza. That’s my opinion, still — but maybe it’s not the American way.

    They’ll be stripped, exposed and vaporized. Just wait and see.

  • It occurs to me that there will be a new dynamic next year relative to usual election years. Primary season generally sucks all the oxygen from November to the conventions, with respect to everything else in politics. This time round, however, there could well be two long periods with nothing to talk about: one in October-November given that we may well be bored silly with the candidates by then, and another in April-June, given that the whole primary season could effectively be over by March.

    For all of its biases and problems, the media is certainly consistent in pushing any on-going story that they think will sell papers and collect viewers. They might be as interested in talking about hearings and impeachment and Bush’s scandals and shortcomings in either the fall or late spring as they were in pushing for invading Iraq in the months leading up to March 2003. Democrats up for election are likely to be at least as eager to talk about what Bush and the Republicans did wrong as to talk about how they plan to clean up his messes.

  • Same goes with ignoring subpoenas, as I said the other day. If SCOTUS backs that shit up, we will have to scare them into rule of law. Anyone else smell smoke in the Reichstag these days? Fuck Godwin. The building is on fire.

  • I watched Moyer’s show last night. A compelling conversation through and through.
    Fein and Nichols were incredible, fantastic.

    I felt energized and hopeful, was sorry it had to come to an end.

  • As refreshing as the discussion was, there were elements that were extremely troubling that were barely addressed. Politicians that no longer do their jobs regardless of party (to support and defend the Constitution from enemies foreign and domestic), a lapdog press whom you would think would pounce on the extra income generated by scandals, conflict and controversy; obviously there is some other element in the complicity of media barons, and Bruce Fein’s suggestion that if Congress asserted itself and brought Bush and his misadministration back in compliance, all would be forgiven. This last part seems like so much nonsense in that violating the Constitution as agregiously as the thugs at ShrubCo have would be treated as “no harm, no foul.” I was under the impression that at some level, Constitutional violations become a criminal act, if not the acts themselves. WTF?

    One other thing that I do not understand is the contention that impeachment is only valid under established violations of the law rather than a method of uncovering and halting them when there is clearly a pattern of behaviors meant to hide illicit activity. The people, however slowly, seem to have come to the conclusion that something must be done to halt the cancer of untrustworthy leadership yet their representatives and the press meant to shine the spotlight on such things take no action. Add to that the ordinances put in place that will allow us to slide into a dictatorship at the drop of a hat (or false-flag attack).

    It’s coming and there’s not a goddamn thing we seem to be able to do about it. It was a nice experiment in freedom and liberty while it lasted. We’ve been sold out and the quislings are too powerful to dislodge.

  • I saw the last part of the Moyers show. Fein and Nichols were impressive and convincing, and Fein in particular touched on something that has troubled me for a long time.

    He pointed out that powers conferred on a president and passed along to the next president are rarely given up. The domestic spying, the Patriot Act stuff, the torture and prisons — all will be passed along intact IF there is no congressional intervention.

    I have long believed that the abuses wrought by Bush and Cheney need to be publicly cataloged and addressed BEFORE they leave office. I think they should be publicly discussed by congress. And whether it is impeachment proceedings or some other, more benign act, a lesson should be taught that America cannot survive and will not tolerate such abuse of the law by its leaders. If we don’t acknowledge the severe danger of Bush administration policies based on scare tactics and chickenhawk patriotism, we really will leave the door open for a despotic government.

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