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insights Archive for: July 2007
Open Letter to Conyers
posted by snarko2 on July 30 2007
David Van Os faxed the following letter to Congressman John Conyers, chair of the House Judiciary Committee. Impeachment proceedings would begin in his committee. The fax number is shown below. DVO asks that you consider writing your own letter and faxing it to Rep. Conyers. We have a Constitution to save.
July 23, 2007
The Honorable John Conyers, Jr., Chair
House Committee on the Judiciary
Fax: 202-225-0072
Dear Chairman Conyers,
Probably more than most, you are obviously aware of the egregious pretensions of George Bush and Dick Cheney to virtually unlimited executive power at the expense of the legislative and judicial branches. Over and over again George Bush, Dick Cheney, and their agents have told the country that the presidency is above the rule of law, indeed that the president is the law unto himself, subject to check by nobody.
I am old enough to have lived through Tricky Dick's assault on the Constitution. I agree with John Dean that the Bushites are much worse.
Normal political jousting between the Congress and the president only plays into their hands, because it encourages their belief that there is nothing they can't get away with.
The Framers of the Constitution put the impeachment clause in our founding covenant because they knew there would be occasions of such arrogant abuse of power that the normal political processes would not be enough. They gave us impeachment to use as our recourse for the egregious types of abuse of power that threaten the integrity of our Constitutional structure.
I believe you are well aware that the nation is facing that level of abuse of power. I do not believe that anything in our past 231 years of national history is equal to the breadth and malevolence of the Bush-Cheney gang's claims of uncheckable executive power.
Mr. Conyers Sir, the House of Representatives is the people's House. The people must rely on the House to defy the Bush-Cheney power grab through impeachment proceedings, the method given to us by the Framers to deal with this very situation. Sir, when you say, "impeachment is off the table," you are saying that part of the Constitution is off the table. You are giving the Bush-Cheney gang of thieves a free pass in advance when you say impeachment is off the table.
Please Sir; please initiate impeachment proceedings in the Judiciary Committee.
Sincerely,
David Van Os
San Antonio, Texas
Active Civil Rights, Labor, and Constitutional lawyer
Texas Democratic Nominee for Texas Attorney General in 2006
Tel. 210-821-1700
A Constitution to Save
posted by snarko2 on July 3 2007
Two hundred twenty-one (221) years ago our nation's Founders issued the momentous Declaration of Independence from Great Britain and its tyrannical king. Never before in the history of the human race had a new nation been founded for the purpose of protecting the unalienable rights of the individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; never before on this globe had a nation's very birth been based on the principle that government derives its powers only from the consent of the governed.
This world-shaking declaration announced more than a new country. It was not only a revolution against one particular tyrannical king; it was a revolution against all the old ways and in favor of unprecedented new ways. It set forth the vision of a new society. It was to be a society without monarchs, royalty, titles of nobility, lords or castes. It was to be a nation of self-government, wherein every citizen was a 100% equal part owner of the government, and wherein the rule of law was to be the only king.
When the Founders wrote the new nation's Constitution eleven years after the great Declaration, they began the instrument with the three powerful words that solemnly recognized a democracy's only legitimate source of authority: that "We the People of the United States…. do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America" In Article I, Section 9 they concisely restated the core of egalitarian democracy: "No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States" The entire Constitution created a marvelous interlocking relationship of checks and balances to ensure to themselves and future generations the preservation and blossoming of liberty and democracy under the rule of law.
Dear friends and fellows, at this 221st anniversary of our Founders' Declaration of Revolution, we who are their successors find ourselves in a time in which their Vision is in mortal danger. The highest officers of our national government have so consistently, continuously, and repeatedly demonstrated their contempt and defiance of the rule of law that we must admit to ourselves and to our posterity the monstrous fact that We the People have permitted a criminal gang to occupy the executive branch of our government, from where they have sought to abolish the checks and balances, discard the Bill of Rights, and transform the chief executive of our self-government into a new form of monarch with the divine right of command.
To quote one of the great pamphleteers (of whom today's bloggers are the successors) of the Revolution, Thomas Paine,
"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph" COMMON SENSE, December 23, 1776.
Who are today's summer soldiers and sunshine patriots? They are the representatives of tyranny who claim the power of the Constitution and the protection of the law while trampling on the very Constitution and rule of law which give them the power and protection they claim; they are the acolytes who proclaim a love of freedom while suppressing dissent; they are the royalists who mouth support for democracy while establishing aristocracy in their own country; and they are the sycophants who deliberately blind themselves to truth and who in their self-hatred attempt to shut down the light of truth for all of us.
Who are the patriots who serve their country and deserve the love and thanks of man and woman? They are the citizens who stand firm NOW and whose voices rise high NOW in opposition to the anti-Constitutional tyranny of the criminal gang that is seeking to destroy the rule of law and the checks and balances that are our nation's lifeblood.
In the latest demonstration of contempt for the rule of law, the would-be monarch who is masquerading as president of our nation unilaterally relieved from serving a lawful and proper prison sentence a former government official who was found guilty by a jury of his peers of committing perjury in the obstruction of a law enforcement investigation by his own government, and sentenced by a respected and conscientious judge, with such sentence upheld by a respected panel of a respected court of appeals.
The former government official's qualification for the commutation of his sentence? He was a friend of the president and vice president. He was a part of the continuing criminal conspiracy that has been deliberately attempting to ruin every fundamental value of our nation for the past six and one-half years, taking and destroying thousands of lives in the process. It was imperative for the head gangster to send a signal to the rest of the gang that nothing has changed; otherwise some member of the gang might repent and tell all.
In order to save our Constitution and protect the American people from further executive crimes, the House should impeach and the Senate convict both this president and vice president for their long records of contempt for the Constitution and the rule of law, for their high crimes against the fabric of our Constitutional democracy. The people should flood their elected Congressional representatives of both parties with demands for impeachment. No amount of political calculus should be allowed to get in the way. No political gamesmanship should be tolerated. The Beltway consultantocracy should be told to shut up. Let the people's voices be heard.
These are indeed soul-trying times. The incredible Vision of 7-4-1776 is indeed in mortal danger. The sacrifices of innumerable brave patriots whose blood spilled to preserve that Vision are at risk of being dishonored. But indeed, the harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph. Keep fighting. We only have a Constitution and a world to save.
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