Don’t Impeach Bush, but Debate on all Issues is Part of Democracy

I agree with Obama that it’s not all Bush’s fault. I always opposed the war, but don’t remember ever early on thinking that the Iraqi Congress in exile was lying. How do we know Bush did?

In Fuluja (October 2004) an Iraqi go-between arranged for Fulujans to accept nominal Baghdad authority and US troops pulled back. Locals cheered but not the US peace movement. When Bush apologized for Abu Ghraib abuse in front of the King of Jordan, instead of the antiwar movement cheering this first step, a general said Bush looked small and joined the Kerry campaign to the cheers of the antiwar movement.


Uniting to Impeach Bush Isn’t the Panacea Many Think It Might Be

Much of the world resents the US and since Bush has become President, oversees and domestically more and more are deciding President Bush is the reason why. The US has been resented since becoming the only superpower, and the US putting its nose where its doesn’t belong or tripping over what it is trying to accomplish is an old story. But suddenly everything is supposedly wrong because of Bush. President Bush isn’t particularly assertive, and “hands on” the way Nixon was, but there is a misguided believe that the world would be fine, if he wasn’t messing it up. Not only Iraq, but messing up science as well. People who pay attention to what is going on overwhelmingly believe that he is messing up stem-cell research, but there is more than one side to every issue.

Stem-cells connects to other moral issues. Morality used to be simpler. Traditionally, the world believed that a baby born out of incest or rape was an utter horror and punishments were inflicted to try to prevent this from happening. Now, thanks to birth control and moral changes, we have vaguer and vaguer definitions voyeurism, sexual harassment, and child porn. Today, thanks to modern science, there are custody battles over the contents of sperm and egg banks; bitter court fights over whether a particular sperm sample should be discarded, much less implanted. Soon, despite President Bush’s position of stem-cell research, the world will have to decide if a scientist or researcher has committed a major crime by refusing, at a certain point, to kill a developing fetus. In my mind, being punished for not killing something, is almost like, evil being redefined, by circumstance, as good. Perhaps there could be a way to develop a compromise where only tissue which couldn’t possibly, on it’s own, become a baby, could be used for research. President Bush seemed to explore this compromise by allowing research on preexistent stem-cell lines.

Bush isn’t noted for believing in open government, but is the first President since Ford to declassify a major section of the national archives, but under the present circumstances, no one thinks he deserves any praise.

When George Bush at first aided the Northern Alliance, instead of sending ground troops, he was getting in the way of al Qiada’s efforts to bait the US into giving moderate Muslims good reason to become militants.

Bush began apologizing for Abu Ghraib abuse in front of the King of Jordan. Then Republican Majority Leader Bill Frist was going to call for bipartisan detention reform, while making grim Congressional Report of the additional Abu Ghraib photos Congress privately viewed. But al Qaida worried that change in US policy might lead to less influence over moderate Muslims. Nick Berg got beheaded, cutting Frist’s report off the air. Then, a general said how small Bush looked when groveling before the King of Jordan, and joined the Kerry Campaign to the cheers of the antiwar movement. So change in US prison detention policy didn’t occur.

Some critics claim that Bush is cleverly putting on a friendly face to disarm critic and make this a more conservative harsh world, but bombs went off in Turkey ruining the aura of Britain’s largest peace march. When bin Laden demanded that Iraq’s not vote, it got in the way of the peace claim that the war in Iraq had nothing to due with fighting terror. I contend that bin Laden not Bush is being clever and maniputive in pushing everyone toward war.

In Fuluja, October 2004, an Iraqi go-between arranged with commanders in the field for the insurgents to accept nominal Baghdad control. US troops pulled back to the cheers of the those in the street who thought the war was over. But a Kerry campaign ad complained of terrorists hiding in Fuluja, and Bush demanded Al Sadr’s arrest, and things degenerated.

After 9/11 Bush urged people not to deface Muslim businesses, humbly visited a mosque, made a particular point to include Muslims in the faith-based initiative. Remember his interdenominational New Year’s card some Christian Fundamentalists found insulting? How can we be sure that any Democrat would be better able to resist al Qaida’s attempts to encourage total war between the West and the Muslim world, and between Hindus and Muslims as well?

And In 2001, skirmishes broke out between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan following a bin Laden inspired attack on the Indian Parliament, which President Bush, then Secretary of State Colin Powell and others around the world successfully mediated. Now a major part of al Qaida’s agenda, war between India and Pakistan, has been prevented despite provocations far more emotional than 9/11, such as very crowded trains and funeral processions. In America, Europe and the Middle East, al Qaida’s efforts to permanently divide, is right on track for its thirty, or 300-year goal for the future, but as soon as it became clear that peace might actually become permanent between India and Pakistan, they starting initiating extreme provocations.

Bin Laden according to the Saudi Government picked mostly Saudi’s for the 9/11 attack, in order to create tension between the US and the Saudi government. Al Qaeda warned Britain that those who heal you will kill you back in April, but patiently didn’t attack until Britain got a new Prime Minister. Al Qaida also tried to use professional doctors for the attack rather than more competent explosive experts in order to stop the west from importing foreign talent and thus screw up our economy the way airport hassles are limiting US visitation by high spending tourists.

Obviously, if President Bush was to announce, that he was appointing John Murtha to be Secretary of State, to figure out the best way to leave Iraq in a hurry, without having al Qaida shooting at the withdrawing troops, many critics would then cheer the President. But let’s say Bush would announce something much smaller. Such as announce that in realization that some prison sentence are too harsh, and present very ill health, he was pardoning Leonard Peltier. Would some Democrats denounce this as a publicity stunt, pardoning a dying old man who could barely even realize he was no longer in prison? Then, a police chief join the Impeach Bush campaign to the cheers of many antiwar activities? Is there anything, besides appointing someone like Ron Paul or Murtha to be Secretary Defense, that Bush could do without being condemned from every direction?

We are supposed to have a nation of laws not men, Bush isn’t totally aware of this fact, but impeaching him just because we need a scapegoat for everything going wrong, would be another blow to the concept of an orderly system of justice.

Kerry supporters used to use positive thinking on John Kerry that he was really for peace, despite all his hedgey statements. If we use positive thinking on President Bush I believe we will have a better world.

Should Bush Be Impeached? No.
http://www.opednews.com/maxwrite/diarypage.php?did=5108


Will blaming, or to some extent, scapegoating Bush solve our problems?

Let’s all admit it, America isn’t what it should be, but will blaming everything on Bush make it better? We had slick Willie, who gave the poor personal respect, by playing the saxophone and wearing casual clothing. He loved cultural progressive causes like feminism and gay rights, while attacking the unions on bread and butter issues. Earlier the Ronald Reagan revolution managed to get many Catholics and Jews to be less progressive, the way Clinton managed to get Gays and feminists to be less active against poverty.

The President’s father, Bush Sr., had no respect for civil liberties, all the way back to World War II where the war was won by terrorizing Japanese-Americans in order to put fear in the hearts of German and Italian American Nazis that if they misbehaved their children would be rounded up also. Plus, the war was won by breaking the German and Japanese secret code, and keeping it secret from them by such things as allowing Pearl Harbor command not to be alerted that the Japanese Ambassador in Washington DC got a secret message that the Japanese were attacking Pearl Harbor instead of Guam like everyone feared. [Relatedly-in-the-British-archives–now-declassified-Britain-knew-but-didn’t-tell-the-US-about-Pearl-Harbor-to-make-sure-the-US-declared-war-on-Germany-and-not-just-Japan.]

Bush was a rich spoiled brat, who ruined his life with drugs, got helped by a mentoring experience, and along with Jimmy Carter before him, truly hoped, that having become a Christian, would make this a more tolerant and caring world. But back in college he called a professor a Communist for assigning the “Grapes of Wrath” as a reading requirement. So, I see a total inconsistency, which Cheney and Karl Rove, and Tony Snow had been managing to play upon, while others see evil, and keep condemning him which makes him worse.

The worst way out of Iraq is for US troops to be leaving as al Qaida is firing at and suicide bombing US troops as they leave. It would be better to ask Iran to restore order in exchange for agreeing to punish al Qaida to the fullest extent of their laws, even better for Bush to appoint John Murtha, or Ron Paul to be Secretory of Defense to orchestrate a speedy exit strategy, one speedy enough for moderate Shiites to get worried that a terror attack by al Qaida might get in the way of US withdrawal.

When it comes to Bush I am also disgusted that he let bin Laden get away before 9/11 for fear of destabilizing Pakistan. At some point the US may have to invade Pakistan to prevent al Qaida from owning Pakistani nukes. But it seems to me al Qaida is hair triggering an attack on the US to coincide with the US sending troops to Pakistan.

No mater what al Qaida does, most Americans are not going to wear turbans and berkas or consider bin Laden a spiritual leader, and if the dollar collapse like bin Laden is systematically encouraging it will affect the Muslim world far more than al Qaida realizes. The greatest possibility for victory from al Qaida’s point of view would be for the US totally surround itself by a high wall, both physically and where impossible, electronically, and kick both Jews and Muslims out of the country to fight their wars in their part of the world not ours. Let’s follow Cindy Sheehan’s original example and try to speak personally with Bush to change his policies.


MASSIVE CHANGE
Whether Impeachment in the US, or a Brand-New-Government in Cuba may end up Bad News

Bush came into office hot to trot for war or for creating massive changes in Iraq, Cuba, Iran, and North Korea. However, very unhappy changes in Iraq have ended his bellicoseness quite a bit but not many are noticing.

Cuba has also been mellowing; The elder Castro wasn’t the firebrand that executed his enemies early in the revolution, and his brother Raul is now cutting back some of the sharp edges of his brother’s revolution. And Venezuela, has taken over the role of backing progressive change elsewhere in the world.

However, since right-wing Cubans unhappy with Republican anti-immigrant feelings have been part of the 2004 Democratic sweep, and have been a integral part of lobbing against a harsh immigration policy, no one has noticed that Cuba has been slowly but systematically mellowing, nor note how ridiculous it would be to continually play around with encouraging drastic, and what may end up being, very unhappy change in Cuba.

Circumstance, and refusing to believe the President, have gotten in the way of Bush changing his ways. In October 2004, in Fuluja, an Iraqi go-between arranged with commandeers in the field for insurgents to accept nominal Baghdad authority and the US troops pulled back, while the locals cheered what they thought was the end of the war. The US peace movement instead of joining them was hoping to cheer Bush being kicked out of office. A Kerry ad, complained of terrorists hiding in Fuluja. President Bush then demanded that Al Sadr be turned over for trial. Imagine today Shiite rebels refusing to turn in an Sunni insurgent in return for peace Fulujans then suffered far worse then if they had never agreed to a cease-fire. Later, the Shiites got sick and tired of, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the extremely harsh al Qaeda leader, turning his whereabouts over to the CIA. Bush responded with a peace proposal, but didn’t think to apologize for (or even note) Fuluja so the insurgents didn’t believe him.

Bush humbly apologized for Abu Ghraib Prison abuse in front of the King of Jordan, giving a harried moderate, temporarily much needed status in the Muslim world. Then one general announced “How small Bush looked” and joined the Kerry campaign to the cheers of the antiwar movement. Also Republican Leader Bill Frist was going to call for bipartisan prison detention reform while he was making a grim Congressional report on the additional Abu Ghraib photos Congress privately viewed. But he was cut off the air by a news bulletin of Nick Berg being beheaded. I think if it wasn’t for the two above incidents, the war might be over and Bush’s policy toward detention may have changed as much as his policy toward North Korea has.

Internal image is important, when nuclear armed India and Pakistan were sliding toward war following a bin Laden inspired attack on the India Parliament both the President, and then
Secretary of State Collin Powell, were helpful as a go-between. But even Powell didn’t brag about his role.

So today everyone is focused on the possibility of Impeachment or short of that many are fixated at making Bush as powerless as possible.

In the early 40's Harry Truman, who later became President, suggested if it looks like “Hitler is winning we should support Stalin, and if Stalin is winning we should back Hitler.” I think al Qaeda might have a similar attitude toward both sides in the short period when the US might have no government. Some of the 9/11 plane hijackers had previously studied engineering with the idea that if Islam could return to its llth century ways, it could defeat the West in a few generations, and reverse the present day power roles between Islam and the West. Meanwhile both Bush and the Doves are trying to plan for the next three years, not the next three decades. Massive change in either Cuba or the US could end up being sad news for both countries. When Bush is gone, if we are still fighting Muslims, people will be looking around trying to find someone to blame. Zacarias Moussaoui during his 9/ll trial condemned his Jewish lawyer and urged America to join him in blaming the Jews. Daniel Pearl, a Wall Street Journal correspondent, was lured to Pakistan, than forced to confess to Jews being evil conspirators while being videotaped for the Internet, then beheaded. Perhaps al Qaeda is the only group that really knows what going on. I say “no” to massive change in either Cuba or the US. Let’s lobby Bush to change his ways like Cindy Sheehan did in the first weeks or month of her protest when she was really trying to change Bush’s mind.

I live in Philadelphia where there is minority representation on City Council, I don’t believe the hype about Castro being particularly cruel and oppressive, but no opposition in the Cuban Congress has to mean that those unhappy with the way things are in Cuba don’t express it politically. I wonder if the Cuban Constitution could be amended to include minority representation whether it will satisfy the Miami Cubans who could go home in style without tearing up the place and making young Cubans think they are foreign invaders. (Also, in the US big states like NY could similarly change their state Constitution to elect five of their House of Representative seats at large, with two seats reserved for a minority party.) Maybe also the US could agree to abolish Capital Punishment in exchange for Cuba doing likewise. The inspiration of Communism at least to a certain extent detracts from bin Laden’s appeal. Innus depicting Attorney General Gonzales with a broken Cuban accent, made it easier for him to get in trouble for insulting high school basketball stars. Ending tension between the US and Cuba will strengthen us against terror and make the world more secure.

If Al Qaeda chooses an impeachment crisis in the US to throw its wait around, bin Laden’s dream of removing unrestricted sex, drugs, booze, and democracy from the face of the earth may succeed. Though Al Qaida may not succeed that much in totally outlawing booze.

I urge “VOTE NO” on impeachment, and hope future discussions include both sides of the issue. I agree with those who support Impeachment on one point. Those who claim it is treasonous to discuss the issue don’t understand what our precious freedoms are all about.


Most of the time Impeach Bush presentation have been presented without rebuttal, the following three links are exceptions:

Virginia Town Hall Forum
http://www.peaceandaccountability.com/panel6_23_07.htm

The Nation Magazine Debate
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070212/holtzman
http://www.thenation.com/doc/ 20070212/levinson