Impeachment 'Strategery'

   It's almost too painful to contemplate. Democratic leaders in the House have taken impeachment off the table apparently in the belief Republicans are on the ropes and larger majorities in Congress and the White House are theirs for the taking. Pursuing impeachment, they reason, would only raise a stink that might somehow threaten what otherwise looks like a sure bet.

   Speaker Nancy Pelosi further suggests the Democratic agenda of important legislation would be stymied in the turmoil of an impeachment action.

   At the same time, Democrats seem determined to nominate as their presidential candidate in 2008 either the polarizing wife of a polarizing ex-president or an inexperienced black man.

   Meanwhile George Bush continues to live out Dick Cheney's dream of clutching ever more power and further expanding the reach of the American Empire.

   What Democrats in congress apparently fail to grasp is that growing numbers of Americans want the Bush Administration to be held accountable for a lengthy lists of offenses, the worst being the gutting of the Constitution and Bush's fraudulently conceived war of aggression in Iraq. 

   Nothing the Democrats might accomplish legislatively is likely to erase the perception they simply lack the courage to take on the Bush-Rove-Cheney White House. Neither will it quell the outrage building around the notion Bush and his corrupt cronies might be allowed to walk away unpunished for their many crimes against America.

   The ultimate payoff for the Democrats will probably come with the all too predictable outcome of choosing Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama carry the Party's pennant in 2008. They also are likely to learn that cowardice isn't an appealing attribute for a Party asking voters' to put it in power.

The Real Surrender Monkies

Republicans delight in accusing Democrats of cutting and running, hoisting the white flag and other phrases calculated to paint Democrats as the party of surrender.

Yet it was the Republican leadership that succumbed to terrorism and set in motion the actual surrender of America. For it was the Republican leadership that yielded to terrorists' desire to intimidate Americans  and destroy the fabric of their nation. The Republicans accomplished this by capitalizing on our fears to consolidate power and then and dismantling the Bill of Rights one by one.

The resultant Bush empire bears little resemblance to the America he inherited when he was sworn in as president. More and more each day it operates like an empire ruled by an unenlightened emperor.

And we can't blame terrorism for the sea changes that have taken place in America on Bush's watch. Terrorism is an ancient tactic that always has been and always will be available to otherwise powerless groups and nations harboring powerful animosities.

All that changed on 911 was the scope of success of a single attack in a series of attacks attempted over decades by the same folks who've long despised America for its Middle East policies.

So it is Bush and his sleepwalking followers that have surrendered America by handing it over to Big Business power brokers and dismantling the foundational documents that made it what it once was....and sadly is no more.