Transcript Reveals Impeachable Offenses by Bush Re: Iraq War
El Pais published a transcript of the conversation between George W. Bush, Jose Maria Aznar of Spain, and Condoleeza Rice held at Crawford before the Iraq War. Bush is typically bullheaded, impatient, conspiratorial, bullying, arrogant, ill-informed and way over-optimistic. The transcript shows the true colors of the man-- a sort of thuggish, ignorant Mafia don-- who destroyed the United States and destroyed Iraq. (The introductory El Pais article is translated here.)
At one point Aznar prophetically says, "The thing that worries me is your optimism."
The transcript, it seems to me, provides a whole rack of smoking guns that could be a basis for impeaching George W. Bush. The transcript shows that Bush consciously intended to go to war without a United Nations Security Council resolution. The United Nations Charter, to which the United States is a treaty signatory (so that it has the force of American law), forbids any nation to launch an aggressive war on another country. The only two legal mechanisms for war are either that it came in response to a direct attack or that the attacker gained a UNSC authorization. The transcript shows Bush actively plotting to sidestep the UNSC if he could not, gangster-like, threaten its members into compliance.
The second grounds for impeachment is that Bush rejected out of hand a deal brokered by the Egyptians whereby Saddam Hussein would leave the country with a billion dollars and some documents about his WMD program. Reuters reports:
'The Egyptians are speaking to Saddam Hussein. It seems he's indicated he would be prepared to go into exile if he's allowed to take $1 billion and all the information he wants about weapons of mass destruction," Bush was quoted as saying at the meeting one month before the U.S.-led invasion.'
The transcript in Spanish then says (my translation):
'Aznar: Is it certain that any possibility exists that Saddam Hussein will go into exile?
Bush: The possibility exists, including that he will be assassinated.
Aznar: Exile with a guarantee?
Bush: No guarantee! He is a thug, a terrorist, a war criminal.
Bush goes on to say, "Saddam won't change and he'll keep on playing games. The time has come to get rid of him. That's the way it is. We'll be in Baghdad by the end of March."
In other words, Bush could have sent Saddam off to exile in Saudi Arabia and avoided the whole war, but refused to do so because of the family vendetta between the Bushes and the Tikritis. Nearly 4,000 US soldiers have died and thousands have been wounded because Bush would not take the deal Saddam offered him. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead, and millions displaced.
Going to war unnecessarily is an impeachable offense.
The whole immense catastrophe could have been avoided.
There is more evidence of thuggery in the transcript:
Excerpts courtesy Harper's:
' Bush to American Allies: support war or starve
[Condoleezza Rice has just described the diplomatic situation to Bush and Aznar, explaining that Iraq is continuing to insist that it has no weapons of mass destruction.]
Bush: This is like Chinese water torture. We have to put an end to it.
Aznar: I agree, but it would be best to have as much support as possible. Have a little patience.
Bush: My patience has ended. I’m not thinking of waiting beyond mid-March.
Aznar: I’m not asking that you have endless patience. Simply that everything is done to [have maximum international support].
Bush: Countries like Mexico, Chile, Angola, and Cameroon should know that what’s at stake is the security of the United States . . . [Chilean President Ricardo] Lagos should know that the Free Trade Accord with Chile is awaiting Senate confirmation and a negative attitude about this could put ratification in danger. Angola is receiving Millennium Account funds [to help alleviate poverty] and that could be jeopardized also if he’s not supportive…
Aznar: Tony [Blair] wants to wait until March 14.
Bush: I prefer the 10th. This is like a good cop, bad cop routine. I don’t care if I’m the bad cop and he’s the good cop.
Bush on Iraq: the future is bright
“We’re developing a very strong package of humanitarian aid. We can win [the war] without much destruction. We’re planning for a post-Saddam Iraq and believe there is a strong base to build a better future. Iraq has a good bureaucracy and relatively strong civil society.”
Bush on French President Chirac: Mister Arab
“Chirac knows perfectly well the reality. His intelligence services have explained. The Arab countries are sending Chirac a clear message: Saddam Hussein must go. The problem is that Chirac thinks he’s Mister Arab and is making life impossible.” '
Reuters has more:
' In case the war endangered energy supplies, "the Saudis would help us and put all the oil necessary into the market," said Bush, who considered Europeans to be complacent about Saddam.
"Maybe it's because he's dark-skinned, far away and Muslim, lots of Europeans think everything's okay with him," he said. . . '
He was accusing the Europeans of racism! He!
Labels: Iraq
posted by Juan Cole @ 9/27/2007 12:30:00 AM
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51 Comments:
Bush shouldn't be impeached, he should be tried under the Nuremberg standards. Isn't that exactly why there were made? To avoid situations like this.
Why there hasn't been a violent overthrow yet, is completely beyond me. Maybe people just don't realize the scope of things.
Bush is the twice elected US president. The American nation in its entirety is guilty of war crimes and the destruction of Iraq.
What good is impeachment for the millions of your Iraqi victims. Start thinking compensation, on US levels.
Juan,
¿Cuales son sus raíces latinos?
...Oh, great post, by the way!
This is indeed another smoking gun and proves once more that Bush and Cheney are war criminals. Unfortunately the Democrats in Congress seem to be more concerned about an ad in the NY Times, and too busy authorizing a war on Iran, a retroactive immunity for illegal wiretappers, and putting a known vote-rigging master in charge of the Federal Election Commission.
So the glove does fit after all!
The "$1 billion for exile" package would have been hard to pull off without guarantees. Saddam was perhaps delusional, but not stupid. He would have insisted on money in advance and personal hostages of kin to counterparties to the deal.
Bush's claim that Saddam wanted to ferret out WMD information is obscure. Was this to bribe a potential host? As it turns out, the "information" would have been next to worthless. But the legend would have persisted that Saddam had all kinds of dirty secrets; failure to capture them would have been seen as a failure to comply with the (then) central premise of the confrontation.
Had Saddam left Iraq in the hands of a Sunni custodian, many of the post-Saddam dilemmas would have been exactly the same. The disintegration of the Baath fear-based regime and the subsequent breakdown in law, peace, or sense of loyalty might have been the same or worse. Imagine Shiites chiding under some puppet provisional order. Imagine Bush trying to replace it with an Allawi-Chalabi administration. Likewise, imagine the same question over whether to liquidate the army. There would have been no "shock and awe" bombing, but the carnage from the insurgency might have erupted along a similar trajectory.
To exile an autocrat gives no assurance of a neat outcome. Consider Iran or post-WWI Germany.
Idi Amin went into exile in Saudi Arabia and Uganda's subsequent history, although rough, has been begign compared to Iraq, Yugoslavia, or Somalia. But maybe the post-Tutsi catastrophe Rwanda presents a more pertinent post-Baath example.
Concerning Bush's demeanor, why feign any shock or surprise? CEOs, coaches, clergy, and even university faculty often refer to rivals in a similar way. Viewers of "The Sopranos" obviously enjoyed the vicarious experience of a world of gruff, uncouth, vain, swaggering louts with a readiness for violence.
There is another article of interest, one that can be linqued @
http://tinyurl.com/36nc2j
entitled: Iraq: A Bush Family Jihad?
by Felicity Arbuthnot
We must recall that much of what goes on in the Buscists' minds centres on retribution and revenge. The Buscist-in-Chief told the World that part of what was behind the looming invasion was the attack (or plans thereto) on his family around about April 1993. It was seeming 'okay' to target Saddam Hussein without expecting anyone to want their own redressment by seeking out the initiator of the 1990-91 Iraqi Boondoggli, followed by the crippling sanctions that existed thereafter.
Long ago, there was an image posted of GHW standing on an oil platform off of the coast of Kuwait, bringing to mind that the 'freeing' of that 19th province had more to do with personal and private concerns than with rectifying the problems caused by the Angaloids in the 1920ies and beyond and their - along with the American accomplices - detrimental affecting of Arabian and Persian politics. We remember that the famous Arab chieftain of 'Lawrence of Arabia' went on to be something in Syria before being reassigned to Iraq following French interference.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faisal_I_of_Iraq
We've all seen the images of 'W' holding hands with his Saudi pal as well as the one of Rummy encountering Hussein, again with hands clasped. These were a far cry from the one of Joe Wilson and his press conference appearance with a noose around his neck. "When Hussein sent a note to Wilson (along with other embassy heads in Baghdad) threatening to execute anyone sheltering foreigners in Iraq, Wilson publicly repudiated the dictator by appearing at a press conference wearing a homemade noose around his neck, and declaring, "If the choice is to allow American citizens to be taken hostage or to be executed, I will bring my own fucking rope.""
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_C._Wilson
Despite GHW declaring Wilson a hero, persons with mettle have been vilified for not serving the interests of the Buscists' and their foreign patrons. Of course, the El Pais transcript still needs to be translated and distributed widely for public review. In spite of what appears to be steaming print, we all knew the irrationale for engaging Iraqis in another military encounter. We only need to reflect on the capturing of the Al Rasheed Hotel and the removal of the mosaic image of GHW, replacing it with one of Saddam Hussein. As Rod Stewart once told us, 'Make the best out of the bad just laugh it off
You didn't have to come here anyway
So remember, every picture tells a story don't it'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Every_Picture_Tells_A_Story
http://members.aol.com/hannuschka/lyrics/evryp_ly.htm#BM1
Definitely a good slice of Bush's hidden side
I'd be interested to hear what you think the implications of the Senate classifying the Iranian Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization?
Juan,
You say this: "In other words, Bush could have sent Saddam off to exile in Saudi Arabia and avoided the whole war, but refused to do so because of the family vendetta between the Bushes and the Tikritis."
Are you suggesting this is a primary motive for the war. For me at least, the Iraq was intended to be the beachhead for a neo-liberal remaking of the ME. Letting Saddam off the hook would have meant that the grand project would have been thwarted. This is not to mention the fantasies of Iraqi oil as the ultimate geostrategic fulcrum.
Thanks for your work as always. --LJ
The democrats in the US Congress won't lift a finger to impeach. I am almost certain the illegal surveillance the administration has engaged in these last 6 years has been to obtain information with which to blackmail anyone into compliance, particularly congresspeople.
Every war could have been avoided. All wars start with lies, and the ones starting the wars are always liars. So, if people would recognize that, and then strongly oppose such actions and refuse to fight in them, war would be avoided.
In 2003, there were a lot of people on the streets in the USA. But there should have been 100 people for every one standing there.
Instead, we had about 15% of the population opposed to the war, 15% ambivalent, and about 70% in support. And it turns out (in my town) that more people came to the SOS (Support Our Soldiers) rally than the anti-war rally.
Americans who did not actively try to stop this war are not "innocent bystanders" - least of all the lawmakers.
And anyone who fell for the "WMDs" crap should own up to being gullible and stupid.
Now here's the real kicker for those who though that this war was a good idea, or maybe a good idea, for the Iraqi people - with today's wars, we don't know how they will end, since we currently have the ability to wipe ourselves completely off the planet with our nuclear bombs..... and we don't know how this war will end either. There are no guarantees that our grandchildren will see the end of it.
We have a choice today of non-violence or non-existance. No weapons made by humans have failed to be used in the past, and we should not have a huge stockpile of nuclear weapons in the US and around the planet and go around thinking it will all be okay.
Sorry, but none of those are recognized in US law as grounds for impeachment. International law that is not codified in US statute law presents no basis for prosecution or other legal action. And while ratified, no provision of the UN Charter has been made into statute law. Even if it were, the Congressional resolution authorizing force would have met its requirements. Wishful thinking and problematic optimism of your own...
Everyone should immediately write, call, fax, and/or email their U.S. Senators (or, better yet, show up at their offices). We all need to DEMAND that our Senators DO NOT HAVE OUR PERMISSION to continue to fund this b.s. war. Further, we must also DEMAND IMMEDIATE IMPEACHMENT. Don't stop writing, calling, faxing, and/or emailing. Don't leave their offices, either.
While reading your entry on the conversation with Aznar and Rice, I was listening in the background to a rerun of the PBS documentary on Thomas Jefferson.
The juxtaposition is, of course, horrifying, made even more so by the starkness, and, I fear, truth of your blunt assessment: "the man who destroyed this country and who destroyed Iraq."
Oh my. Keep telling the truth. It's the only (faint) hope we have.
You think launching a war that was specifically authorized by Congress is an "impeachable offense?"
Who would try him? The same Senate that voted for the war?
Wow. You're even dumber than I thought you were.
The US does did not need permission from the UNSC to attack Iraq any more than we needed it to attack Serbia over Kosovo.
If it was a problem, maybe Saddam Hussein should have done a better job living up to the terms of the cease fire agreement in 1991.
Juan, you're frankly delusional in this case.
Speaking of falling for the WMD crap, what WMD documents did Saddam want to take with him (or destroy) when heading for exile? Was there really something he wanted to conceal, or was he just concealing the fact that he DIDN'T have any WMDs to speak of?
In any case, it's not much of a conclusion to jump to that Saddam was concealing WMDs if he claimed to have WMD documents that he wanted to take with him to exile. Could this have been part of why the Bush administraion hung the excuse for the war on WMDs?
Professor Cole,
You display the same ignorance of our Constitution as you show towards military matters and geopolitics. The President of the US can seek Congressional approval for use of military force under any circumstances, under US law not abrogated by any treaty with other nations, or the UN.
That said, do you really think letting Saddam flee Iraq with $1 billion and info on WMD would get Iraq off the hook the for 17 UNSC resolutions Iraq was in violation of? From a moral standpoint? If not immoral in your eyes, would you think it wise?
And how is it that the US "is destroyed?" If you mention all the human rights and unconstitutional blah blah blah, really? Are critics like you in jail? Is anyone, other than people who associated with and fund and sponsor known terrorist organizations? Are Democrats and other war opponents precluded from criticising the war and President on a daily (hourly) basis?
I know this is like your schtick and all, but you seem an intelligent man who no doubt could find something more fittign for your intellect than rabid conspiracy and hate mongering.
Oh, and reading an accurate and full translation of these transcripts will actually yield a conclusion just about 180 degrees contrary to your own.
(But I know you'll be too busy to follow up, on to the next Bush outrage.)
Scott Horton, of Harpers posted this quote today:
“We are mad, not only individually, but nationally. We check manslaughter and isolated murders; but what of war and the much-vaunted crime of genocide?
There are no limits to our greed, and neither to our cruelty. And as long as such crimes are committed by stealth and by individuals, they are less harmful and less portentous; but cruelties are practiced in accordance with acts of the senate or of a popular assembly, and the public is invited to do that which formerly was forbidden to the individual.
So we come to this clearest manifestation of insanity: that deeds which rightfully would be punished with a sentence of death when committed by an ordinary man, are suddenly praised and celebrated when committed by a general wearing a uniform.” –Seneca
I would like to add a native speech delivered to a tribal council with U.S. teaty agents in Illinois discussing the sale of the environs that now constitutes Chicago:
"Some of our chiefs will tell you that we own this land... That's NOT what the great spirit told ME! He said NO MAN owns it, HE owns it! ...And I was informed to tell the white people when I met them in council --Kannekuk, Kankakee medicine man
Although Bush must remain primarily responsible for invading Iraq, there were plenty of prominent "co-conspirators" in Congress - including Democrats. If US military commanders felt there was not plenty of support for Bush's invasion among members of Congress in both parties, they could have had the invasion postponed through legislation.
Political ties are very close between military commanders and powerful members of Congress of both parties. However Democratic propaganda always goes to great lengths to blame Bush alone for the invasion of Iraq while totally ignoring the powerful Democrats in Congress who supported the invasion.
Also yesterday the Senate passed a "sense of the Senate" amendment which could greatly complicate the US military, diplomatic and economic mission in Iraq. General Petraeus said clearly in his testimony before Congress that Iran's interference in Iraq could be handled WITHIN Iraq. However the Senate has chosen to reject his testimony by a vote of 76-22 (link below) and decided to support external interference against Iran for their behavior inside Iraq.
Supporting this were 20 Democrats by my count, plus AIPAC's man on the hill - Senator Lieberman (I-CT). The "sense of the Senate" amendment states: "The United States should designate Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps as a foreign terrorist organization under section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act and place the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps on the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists."
Many Senators wanted even tougher language in the bill, but the Senate Majority Leader wouldn't allow it. Therefore would someone PLEASE stop these Senate Democrats so desperate to oppose Iran that they will even over-ride the recommendation of General Petraeus! Fortunately 2 prominent Senate Republicans, Lugar and Hagel, voted against the amendment.
The vote is here:
http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=110&session=1&vote=00349
12:00 PM, Gorm Casper said... "Why there hasn't been a violent overthrow yet, is completely beyond me. Maybe people just don't realize the scope of things."
No violent overthrow by the people... yet... but Daniel Ellsberg (of Pentagon Papers fame) says there has been a coup, and the endgame depends on a war with Iran, which BTW, is getting closer because our federal civic leaders just passed a bipartisan resolution declaring the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (common terminology), an internationally legitimate wing of the Iranian military, as a terrorist organization.
In the Democratic presidential debate last night, Mike Gravel chewed on Hillary Clinton for that, and the news commentator I post for did his commentary on it this morning:
[September 27 2007] Travus T. Hipp Morning News & Commentary:
Hypocrisy & Surrealism On The Campaign Trail… Those Are The Words That Comes To Mind When I Watch The Democratic Presidential Debates
Daniel Ellsberg: 'A Coup Has Occurred'
In a remarkable speech, Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg warns that the United States will complete its slide into a "police state" if President Bush goes ahead with a war on Iran. Referring to Bush's steady accumulation of power over the past six years, Ellsberg said, "a coup has occurred" and would be solidified by the crisis of an expanded war in the Middle East. To stop this, he urges government officials to live up to their oath of office and defend the Constitution.
The Daniel Ellsberg speech, via consortiumnews [Here}
It is worth remembering three basic points. 1. The House of Representatives impeaches. 2. The Senate tries. 3. The grounds for impeachment and conviction can be anything the Representatives and the Senators accept (mainly anything the public will accept).
The fact that one man can wreak so much havoc upon the nation and the world reveals an enormous flaw in our separation of powers. Congress voted for the war, but was that because of intelligence filtered or influenced by that one man and his cronies? If the behavior described here is not now legal cause for impeachment, then the system should be very busy right now writing the laws that will make it so. Are we going to learn from this and act accordingly, or are there simply too many contenders in the field holding the pens who are also lusting for that same amount of power?
300 million Americans has no power to do that, not even a billion of these sheep’s. If they thought for one second that this is a possibility, they would have not done all they done from 9-11 to Guattanamo to Iraq and all in between. When you are going to face the facts.
Americans reminds me with similar people living in similar conditions, one that the people told they have the power but in fact they have none and the State controlled Media and Secret Service insure the order prescribed, Syria!! in fact Syrians may have it even better, they don't have AIPAC , Zionists and JDL chapters suffocating free speech and human dignity.
Impeachment...LOL your too old Mr. Cole. When did you last got down to night club, a street fair, a ball game and talked to the illiterate and uninformed idiots that make up 99.8 % of America? You will be surprised if they read your blog, they may demand your impeachment ???.LOL...LOl...LOL. The Jews and Israeli figured this out decades ago, that is why they rule America, own it and own you.
Juan- I don't understand the excitement about this revelation. It has long been understood by most people, in one way or another, that the war is about oil and political power.
In terms of public opinion, the political sentiment exists for impeachment. If it were stoked, it would grow larger.
The Democrats are not idiots. They know this. So why didn't they move to impeach long ago?
Because they are not a real opposition party. They do not want to upset the apple cart that much. They also share the same long-term goal as Bush: U.S. domination of the Middle East.
If they impeached Bush, they would start setting people's expectations of them too high. People would start thinking: great, we got rid of that asshole, now what can we do next? But the Democrats don't want to follow through on that next thing. They don't want to really end the war.
The sooner we stop looking for the Democrats to miraculously grow a spine and start fighting, the sooner we'll realize that we already have a weapon to wield -- grassroots protest and organization.
At 5:13 PM, TMD said...
"Sorry, but none of those are recognized in US law as grounds for impeachment."
The number of times that the following has to be pointed out amazes me:
Article II. Section 4. The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.
Any form of definition of the phrase 'high crimes' is missing from the Constitution. The fact that the framers of our Constitution decided to include misdemeanors as a reason for impeachment sets the tolerance threshold pretty low.
First of all, the president can be impeached for any 'high crimes and misdemeanors' any way Congress wants to define them. There is no such thing as a "statutory" "high crime." Conspiring to, and then deliberately violating a US treaty (the UN charter) would do just fine. We could even turn him over to the Hague.
As for the congressional authorization for him to fight a 'war on terror,' that is irrelevant to the point I am making. I am saying that the transcript reveals that he could have achieved the *aim* of regime change in Iraq without a war. Insisting on a war that did not have to be fought (because he petulantly refused to give Saddam a guarantee of safe conduct) is certainly a high crime. I think it could be argued that he should be charged with one million murders. Is that a misdemeanor?
Juan
So Saddam was going to take "WMD" information with him if he went into exile? But I thought Iraq didn't have any wmds and Bush knew this and Bush lied?
btw a well sourced story about the Egyptians/Libyans negotiating for Saddam going into exile appeared shortly before the war. Negotiations came to nought.
But what if they hadn't, Dr Cole? The Baath regime would still be in place today along with the Baath run Iraqi Army and the shiites would be in their customary positon of servitude to the 20% Sunni population.
What would you have been saying in those circumstances, I wonder? Much about the second great Bush betrayal of the Shiites and Kurds?
Well Clinton actively side-stepped the UN to go to war. Rack him up.
Bush gave Saddam and sons 48 hrs to leave Iraq. Saddam did not.
And on your point 3, go back just a little further into history, to Gulf War 1, where the US bribed other countries to partake in the "collation"
Do try harder.
The United States is currently being ruled by madmen and their boot lickers. They will never relinquish power peacefully.
In the likely event that the conversation reported didn't take place in Spanish, we need to see the original English-language transcript before drawing any inferences. To speculate based on an English translation of a Spanish translation of the original is to engage in a game of chinese whispers, not serious analysis.
10:56 PM, Juan Cole said...
As for the congressional authorization for him to fight a 'war on terror,' that is irrelevant to the point I am making. I am saying that the transcript reveals that he could have achieved the *aim* of regime change in Iraq without a war. Insisting on a war that did not have to be fought (because he petulantly refused to give Saddam a guarantee of safe conduct) is certainly a high crime.
By that standard, waging any war - including a defensive war, since one always has the option to surrender to the invader instead of fighting - is necessarily a high crime. I don't buy it. Still, as Jeff mentioned above, the definition of an impeachable offense is a political question, so the valence of "transcript reveals impeachable offenses" is fairly minimal, given that an impeachable offense is anything that the general public will swallow Congress impecahing a President for. I would have thought that perjury would be an impeachable offense, but as we learned in the Clinton impeachment, the public spit the bit, ergo, perjury wasn't an impeachable offense, for that President, at that time. You evidently think that prosecuting a war is an impeachable offense, but I suspect the public would spit that bit, too.
Very recently, I read, or heard--I don't remember which--that the word "misdemeanor" had a very different meaning in the 18th Century than it does today, with much more severe connotations. Maybe someone here can elucidate.
George W. Bush is quoted as saying: "The Constitution? “It’s just a goddamned piece of paper!”
He swore an oath on that constitution, and that statement basically says that he didn't swear an oath to the words on the 'paper'.
He lied... Perjured his sworn oath.
That's impeachable..
...and then we'll have BIG Dick Cheney.
Blah!
FindArticles: "The list goes on. Notably, none of these are crimes -- or even misdemeanors -- under the criminal law. As Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story wrote in his great Commentaries on the Constitution, it is not only "crimes of a strictly legal character" that are impeachable offenses, but also political offenses, growing out of "personal misconduct . . . so various" that they "must be examined upon very broad and comprehensive principles of public policy and duty."
I think its time to starve the Democrats into action. Cur off campaign contributions until they show enough spine shut down the Iraq operation and forbid a war aginst Iran. Or at least die trying.
The Republicans are just a part of CHENEY/bush's entourage. Nothing can be expected of them. The Democrats are our only hope, but not if they're comotose, or worse yet trying to out swagger Republicans.
Congress does not need campaign contributions to legislate. Everything it needs to do that is already paid for. And why support re-election for a bunch of deadbeats.
If the Democrats did what the voting public wanted, they would be re-elected even if they had to use a skate board to get from town to town.
Let's start saying NO to the outstretched hands until the Godzilla we want comes out of the cocoon.
please post complete spanish text so I may translate for myself.
It is my understanding that the "WMD information" that Saddam wanted to take with him when he went into exile was not technical info on how to build weapons or how to reconstitute programs.
It is my understanding that he wanted to take with him documentary evidence of the roles played by the first President Bush and Don Rumsfeld, showing that they had given him the technology and components to build his WMD programs in the first place.
That was going to be how he blackmailed the current President Bush into leaving him alone.
That was going to be his insurance.
That WMD info is what Saddam tried to get out during his trial, but was not permitted to present.
Barbara
posted above that
"a well sourced story about the Egyptians/Libyans negotiating for Saddam going into exile appeared shortly before the war. Negotiations came to naught."
I think that might be the very same negotiation attempt that Bush refers to in the transcripts.
And Bush is telling Aznar that he repudiated the overtures because he was determined to have his splendid little war, whether it could be justified or not.
your avid student
/
Is everybody here insane? Saddam wanted to take all of the information he wants about weapons of mass destruction? People here say that is okay? To avoid war, you would give the person violating 14 UN resolutions the power to kill billions of people? The person that tested those weapons on his own people. I truly worry about you people. It reminds me of Rosie being invited to a mideast country where homosexuality is punishable by death. With that case, there is not concept of reason. Just impassioned with the brainwashed left and lack of logic and reason. Since the blog author has to approve this comment means that he is a dictator of what he wants to brainwash people with. That reminds me of Hamas leaders that send children on suicide missions, but will never go on one themselves. They have too good a life preaching their hate...
A lot of comments here are misconstruing the question presented, even to the level of the absurd. The question is not whether option A or B would solve the Iraq problem, but whether option A or B would avoid the extreme cataclysm of a war. Giving Saddam the billion dollar escape plan need not fix the Iraq problem, but it would certainly change the character of the Iraq problem, and thus, offer the possibility of new strategies and new options. Hey, maybe we'd have to go through a whole line of billion dollar escape plans, but with the bill standing now at around half a trillion dollars, with hundreds of thousands dead, millions more wounded, traumatized, conspiring against us, and or displaced, with the infrastructure of a whole nation destroyed for which we will have to pay for rebuilding far far into the future perhaps again and again and again along with restitution and decades of humanitarian aid, with the horrendous damage to the reputation of the U.S. in the eyes of much of the world--add it all up, and with even a hundred or two hundred one billion dollar escape plans dished out, we'd come out ahead, I think--but let me get out my slide rule to make sure. Oops, I can't find it. I'll have to borrow my cousin's. Oh yeah, he'd died in Iraq because of that IED, so that's no good. Sorry, you'll have to do the math yourself.
For me, a more serious impeachable offense is laid out in this article:
Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction
Basically, we went to war based on the questionable testimony of a drunken Iraqi taxi driver despite credible evidence to the contrary.
In both that article and the Spanish document, the president is presented as someone with a closed mind going gangbusters into Iraq, hell or high water. I'm not sure, but I think the American people have someone else in mind when they vote to seat the supposedly most powerful person in the world. Bush is presented in the article as someone who dismisses credible evidence presented by the intelligence community because, obviously, he already has his own agenda. He's going to do what he wants no matter what anyone says. I believe that's called being a dictator. You'd have to go into the law books, I suppose, but I'd hazard the guess that being a dictator would qualify, at least, as a misdemeanor.
The question here, really, is, what are the resources available to the president in the present age for becoming a dictator? Congress approved the war, but upon what basis did they approve the war, upon what evidence presented, upon how much of the available intelligence, and upon whether or not that intelligence has been manipulated or influenced by the presidency or other political bodies. Another question is, after having the authorization for war, is the president required to present to all of Congress any new evidence before actually committing the nation, and will Congress have the power to revoke its authorization? Other questions to be considered in regard to a modern dictatorship is the relationship and access to the media, the nature of the media, and the transfer of intelligence to the media. Sounds to me like a newly conceived list of prerequisites for going to war needs to be written into law with the infraction of any being an impeachable offense. Of course, it would include provisions for a rapid response to an immediate threat to the U.S. or its well-defined assets.
Remember, impeachment is the trial, not the verdict. I would like to hear Bush's testimony on why he pushed the nation into war disregarding other evidence presented to him by the intelligence agencies, and also, why war despite the possibility of other credible options. I'd like for him to present his case before a 300 million+ jury of his peers. Maybe we'd also get to the actual truth of why we went to war. Perhaps, Colin Powell should be given special permission to preside over the trial. I'd think he would have some interest in the truth about available evidence at the time. He might be able to give the phrase, "you lied to me!" a certain special ring to it.
The details of the separation of powers obviously need to be reworked for the modern age. There has to be some control over this type of behavior. I think there's a few thousands in the ground, and a few thousands more grieving, who might agree with me.
The key word in the Impeachment clause is "SHALL" as in "are to be" or "will" which mean action MUST be taken by the Legislative branch to discipline the officer(s) committing the offense. There is no "taking impeachment off the table." To do so is to violate the constitution and one's oath of office.
This is of course just what's happened: The Executive is already illegitimate in every sense because of the gross crimes its committed, and the Legislative is now clearly illigitimate for failing to do its duty to remove the criminals from the Executive. That is our Constitutional Crisis in the middle of a war that both illigitimate branches of government seem to want to escalate as provided in recent votes and propaganda regarding Iran.
I think the stand is pretty cut-and-dried: Either you stand and defend the constitution or you stand with the war criminals and their enablers.
I did NOT vote for George W. Bush in 2000 nor in 2004. I refuse to be lumped in with the masses of fools, party hacks, wannabees, crackpots and sheeple that did. The election of 2000 was blatantly and obviously stolen by the vilest chicanery in Florida and a Rehnquist Supremely Partisan Court.I have signed petitions, answered hundreds of Action Alerts, written Letters to the Editor, marched, cane in hand, to protest, donated money, put signs in my window, continuously badgered Richard Lugar and Evan Bayh to the point where I am probably on some list, thanked Julia Carson a hundred times for her support, put my thoughts, many times, on this blog and several others, and wished I could do more.
I quite frankly detest all that George W. Bush has done to the people of Iraq. The man is an insult to humanity, a scourge upon this planet, and personifies the concept of evil. Place Richard Cheney in with him. Bush and Cheney have raped this country, deceived its citizens, and rained death and destruction on millions. They have strengthened the curse of terrorism. They and their Noxious Neo-Conservative Thugs have damaged the international image of the United States to an extent never before seen in our history. They are in the process of destroying our economic base and leaving us debt-ridden for generations. If they are equated with the Mafia or the Nazis, that IS appropriate. So, this is one Senior Citizen who is most certainly NOT responsible for the quagmire in which this country now wallows. I would fervently hope that Bush and Cheney be tried, even if in absentia, at the Hague for Crimes Against Humanity, found guilty on all counts, placed on Interpol's MOST WANTED list, and forced to remain as the guests of some despot far from our shores. Our Congress has neither the spine nor the integrity to take action against these criminals. If they will not, then the international community should do so. Bush and Cheney have acted like petty dictators. Congress has enabled them to continue to warmonger and plunder.If you think I am angry now, wait until the simpletons in Congress allow Bush to spend $190 Billion on his debacle, then veto SCHIP. "Compassionate Conservatism?" Never has such a blatant oxymoron been foisted upon so many gullible, naive,and just plain stupid voters. It causes severe nausea to consider it. This blog tells the truth. If you want spin, roll yourself over to Fox.
Bush should get a 3rd term and the left should get a visa......
Cole, wrong....again...lol
I agree that Americans are guilty - those Americans who are stupid are. Not all Americans are idiots. All Conservative Republicans are guilty, they all harbor genocidal racist tendencies and cant seem to search their soul to even realize it. Tough on Iraqis, tough on Iranians, tough on fill in the blank. Dont expect good Americans to change the souls of the bad Americans. We are in serious, serious, trouble. The Iran ammendment the other day WAS terrible, those voting for it are making excuses, but it signs the Senates name to George Bushs lies. People didnt believe Bush, Petraeus, or Crocker, so 3-4ths the Senators stepped up and signed their names, their credibility to Bushs lies.
Impeach the President? Just how laughable an idea is this?
President Bush has about sixteen months left in his term, that's it. To impeach him, you'd have to get a majority of the House to pass Articles of Impeachment (and the Democrats could do that by themselves), a process which would take several months. Then the Senate would have to remove him from office, an act which would require the votes of at least sixteen Republican senators. Thing is, the majority of the people whose votes you would need voted to authorize the war in the first place, and continue to vote for funding for it.
The Democrats had a "debate" two nights ago, and none of the three leading contenders, not Hillary Clinton, not Barack Obama, and not John Edwards, would commit to having the troops out of Iraq by January 20, 2013.
Now, can you tell me where you'd find the votes to impeach and remove the President?
And if, by some miracle, you did impeach and remove George Bush from office, are you aware who would then become president? :)
So many good Americans coming out of the woodwork here. Too bad education about the American Revolution for the masses typically ends some time during elementary school when they're just a bunch of funny guys with funny hats and wigs and wooden teeth putting lanterns in steeples and chasing headless horsemen. I doubt a nine year old gets the specifics straight about the definition of a tyrant and a dictator. I suspect most American adults, when questioned, couldn't even tell you who the king was who the revolution was against, and many wouldn't even know there was a king in the stew at all.
Yes, if there's three days left in his term, you impeach him. Would you let a murderer onto his plane because he's got only a few minutes left in the country?
What was Saddam going to do with his WMD documents? Build a centrifuge in the bathroom of his Egyptian estate? Anyway, you want all the WMD info you need? Go on the internet. He'd probably have become one of the most watched men on the planet. Not THE most watched, but perhaps on the top ten list, and his movements would be very limited, which he wouldn't want to do anyway for fear of having his throat slit the moment he stepped off his "welcome" mat.
Just imagine if we hadn't done Iraq. Where would our resources have gone? We invaded Afghanistan because they harbored al Qaeda and everybody gave us the nod. Would the world have thought much less of us if we had somehow gone on to invade the northern lawless territories of Pakistan? There's a lot of foreign states that would probably have secretly, or not so secretly, cheered us on, and I'd suspect a lot of tribal leaders probably secretly wouldn't mind us getting rid of their strange bedfellows--but don't quote me on that. And our soldiers, how would they have thought about doing that engagement as opposed to Iraq? A little more enthusiasm, perhaps, as well as from the American people? Just a scenario--not saying I'm endorsing it, but compare it to what we've got now. What would have made more sense now, in hindsight? We didn't need to go into Iraq, but a few cowboys at the top made it so--Jesse James and his gang.
Whatever...
The only reason necessary for impeachment is the high crime of failure to execute the duties of the office. Ignoing intel pre-9/11, failure to provide adequate troop force and equipment in Iraq, failure to provide a balanced budget by running Iraq off-budget, Katrina, etc. Don't even need to go into the other crimes.
Dr. Cole,
thanks for revisiting this. Your treatment yesterday was a good start,
but this is much better.
This shows clearly what values are at President Bush's core.
He is evil.
He thinks of American soldiers as expendable pawns.
He was determined to have his war regardless of whether it could be justified.
.
America's moral leaders will latch onto this story and never let go until he is out of office.
If someone you think is a moral leader fails to follow through,
then you were wrong about them.
avid student
/
"Bush is the twice elected US president. The American nation in its entirety is guilty of war crimes and the destruction of Iraq."
Actually both of those elections were stolen. You should read Steve Freeman's book. And the notion of collective guilt is wrong for many reasons as pointed out by Victor Frankl and many other Holocaust survivors.
I wish Bush and Cheney would have a press conference announcing their resignations, so that Pelosi & Co. would get to run the country.
karlof1 said...
"The key word in the Impeachment clause is 'SHALL' as in 'are to be' or 'will' which mean action MUST be taken by the Legislative branch to discipline the officer(s) committing the offense. There is no 'taking impeachment off the table.' To do so is to violate the constitution and one's oath of office."
I think you misunderstand the clause. The impeachment clause provides that "[t]he President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors." While you're correct that the clause ontains the "shall" imperative, that imperative is only that a civil officer of the United States will be removed from office if they are impeached by the Houe and subsequently convicted by the Senate. If I understand your comment correctly, you seem to be suggesting that the clause requires impeachment in the event of treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors - if that's not what you mean, I don't understand how it follows that it violates anyone's oath of office not to initiate impeachment procedings.
UNBELIEVABLE...
The extent of the tough-talking bravado, combined with -- after getting EVERYTHING he wanted from a compliant Republican-Congress -- Bush/Cheney's PATHETICALLY incompetent execution: Zero-planning, horribly poor-judgment, and LIES and SECRETS... all along the way.
It's almost unfathomable, I might not believe any of it, if I didn't see/read/hear it all. Like the rest of the world... which has likely watched in amazement as ONE LITTLE FOOL (President Bush) made America irrelevant in world affairs -- in about FIVE YEARS...
UNBELIEVABLE!
"...who destroyed the United States and destroyed Iraq."
Yes, I read the whole article - but you pretty much lost me here. Last I checked, the U.S. was not anywhere near destroyed. This is such a ridiculous exaggeration that, honestly, I found the rest of the article rather hard to take seriously.
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