I don't understand why Nancy Pelosi has taken impeachment off the table. Down With Tyranny draws heavily on an OpEd by George McGovern to bring this question up again.
I have to say that I'm terrifically disappointed in Pelosi as Speaker, almost as much as I am in Harry Reid as Senate Majority Leader. We were hoping for some opposition to the White House in 2006, in case no one noticed. Sadly, it seems the Republicans are still in control of Congress, no matter what the numbers say.
2 comments:
I think Pelosi took impeachment off the table for two reasons. First, she wanted Congress to concentrate on actually enacting some progressive legislation and not get all tied up in the sort of meaningless and costly revenge litigation the Republicans had visited on Bill Clinton. Second, because any impeachment enquiry would necessarily involve both Bush and Cheney, it was necessary for her to duck any accusation that she might have encouraged impeachment so as to ascend to the presidency herself, being next in line after those two. I can sort of understand her reluctance to get involved with impeachment but it doesn't make her avoidance of it or her discouraging others' involvement any more palatable. I think her big mistake, though, was to announce to the admiring multitudes (so to speak) that she was going to rise above it -- which gave the Republicans the open door they wanted to walk through in order to congest the corridors of action on the other side. It would have been better, I believe, had she kept her mouth shut about taking impeachment off the table, and let the angry progressives in Congress go ahead with it -- she might have been able to get at least a minimum of bipartisan action out of the Right that way.
I think you're absolutely right. I honestly don't know if it's incurable naivete (the Republicans will act like reasonable people, even though there's is no evidence to support that idea) or sheer ineptitude.
Post a Comment