The Bush Watch - Chapter 2

[Miulang]

George Bush and the "3rd Great Awakening"

Granted, the President was speaking to a crowd of conservative journalists and in a closed session, but come on...what ever happened to separation between the Church and the State? Wonder if he realizes that there's been a resurgence of Muslim immigrants into this country since 9/11?

President Bush said yesterday that he senses a "Third Awakening" of religious devotion in the United States that has coincided with the nation's struggle with international terrorists, a war that he depicted as "a confrontation between good and evil."

Bush told a group of conservative journalists that he notices more open expressions of faith among people he meets during his travels, and he suggested that might signal a broader revival similar to other religious movements in history. Bush noted that some of Abraham Lincoln's strongest supporters were religious people "who saw life in terms of good and evil" and who believed that slavery was evil. Many of his own supporters, he said, see the current conflict in similar terms.

Miulang

[Miulang]

Bush's skirting of Geneva Convention smacked down

Looks like the Senate is finally starting to show its cojones. Today, during a session of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which was voting on a Bush proposal to sidestep Article 3 of the Geneva Convention, 4 Republicans sided with their Democratic cohorts to approve the protection of detainee's rights.

President Bush went to Capitol Hill today to rally Republican support for his anti-terrorism policies, but a Senate committee dealt him a serious setback after a former member of his cabinet broke with him on a crucial issue.

Hours after Mr. Bush huddled with House Republicans, he suffered a defeat on the other side of the Capitol, as the Senate Armed Services Committee endorsed legislation that would give suspected terrorists more legal protections than the president desires.

Four of the panel's 13 Republicans joined all 11 Democrats in rejecting Mr. Bush's proposal to keep defendants from seeing classified evidence against them. The vote came a day after the House Armed Services Committee adopted a measure that more closely parallels what the president wants.

Mr. Bush said after conferring with Republican House members that he had "reminded them that the most important job of government is to protect the homeland." As part of his plan, the president wants Congress to enact legislation that would authorize tougher interrogations of suspected terrorists.

And that is what Congress must not do, said Colin L. Powell, the former secretary of state. "The world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism," Mr. Powell said in a letter to Senator John McCain of Arizona, one of the Republicans who differ with Mr. Bush's policies.

What the President and his cohorts don't want the rest of us to know is if we enact what the White House wants, it would prevent us from charging him or anyone in his Administration of war crimes (as well as any troops who participate in massacres or torture of detainees) in the future. It also would make being an American prisoner of war a whole lot dicier...if we allow detainees that we hold to be tortured in order to gain more information, then there will be nothing to prevent our enemies from doing the same to our own troops if they are captured. And after the abuse that we know occurred at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and other places by our troops, and our penchant for using "extraordinary rendition" to spirit people from their countries in the middle of the night to be interrogated "vigorously" by foreign governments, I'm glad the Senate put the kybosh on this Machiavellian plan.

Miulang


P.S. An interesting aside: According to the Huffington Post, one of the "letters of endorsement" that the President presented, which came from a group of military JAGs, was apparently obtained after a 5-hour session with the JAGs, implying that either the JAGs refused to sign the original letter they were being asked to sign, or took that long to hammer out a letter that was sketchy enough so that the JAGs could live with the language.

[Miulang]

Deja vu all over again?

There was a meeting of Constitutional experts in 2003, hosted by John Conyers, which met to discuss articles of impeachment against the Bush Administration to try to prevent us from invading Iraq. Obviously the move didn't go anywhere because the Congress is controlled by the Republicans, but I wonder if what Francis Boyle wrote about that meeting (a Constitutional expert who gave testimony at that meeting), would be worth considering now. Seems that all the facts are even more evident today about the lies that were told to get us into Iraq. And with the prospect of an entanglement with Iran, it's even more urgent that Congress address the subject as soon as the mid term elections are through.

With the composition of the House of Representatives looking like it will shift in favor of a Democratic majority---could 2007 be the year of impeachment for the Bush Administration?

Certainly, if the U.S. House of Representatives can impeach President Clinton for sex and lying about sex, then a fortiori the House can, should, and must impeach President Bush Jr. for war, lying about war, and threatening more wars. We need one Member of Congress with the courage, integrity, and principles of the late and great Congressman Henry B. Gonzalez of Texas. Otherwise, the alternative will be an American Empire abroad, a U.S. Police State at home, and continuing wars of aggression to sustain them--along the lines of George Orwell's classic novel 1984 (1949). Despite all of the serious flaws of the United States government that this author has amply documented elsewhere during the past quarter century as a Professor of Law, the truth of the matter is that America is still the oldest Republic in the world today.[vi] We, the People of the United States, must fight to keep it that way![vii] And for the good of all humanity, we must terminate America's Imperial Presidency and subject it to the Rule of Law.[viii].

Miulang

[Miulang]

Re: The Bush Watch - Chapter 2

I KNEW there was a reason why I liked Joe Scarborough!

This year, maybe Democrats can beat something with nothing. As for Republicans, their only chance of survival is blasting the president for mistakes of the past and attacking the Democrats for their failings of the future.

Of course, you GOP candidates can be sure that such attacks will annoy Bush, even though your survival may be all that stands between him and a crazy Democratic chairman launching impeachment hearings. But if you win this fall only to face his stern rebuke next winter, just tell him it was schadenfreude for all the times the White House treated you badly. With any luck, Bush will think you are talking about that Berlin disco that Moammar Gaddafi bombed back in 1986 and then dismiss you like the worthless billy goat he always suspected you were.

Miulang

[admin]

Re: The Bush Watch - Chapter 2

Miulang, you've posted the last six messages to this thread over several days. Obviously it's time to give it a rest.