Posted by
David Smith on Thursday, November 08, 2007 12:10:48 AM
OK, granted, it's not new now, but I promise that I came up with it originally yesterday during the vote in the House to table Rep. Dennis Kucinich's Resolution to Impeach VP Cheney.
As we all know, Democratic Presidential Candidate Dennis Kucinich entered a Resolution to Impeach the Vice President. Mostly, this is a cheap stunt by a Presidential candidate who is desperate for some press, and he isn't even getting much of that for his stunt! Amazing in itself.
The final vote was 218-194 in favor of tabling the matter. The Republicans apparently began thinking the same thing at the same time I did: This matter should not be tabled, it should be exploited!
Democrats have been talking about, "Bush lied, they died," and related topics incessantly for years now. OK, I'm not going to make the argument that information used to sell the war to Congress was completely accurate, but just imagine how fun it would be to force the Democrats to sell the idea in a full discussion! On the record! When other, more important business is being set aside for the circuss that would be impeachment hearings.
Had the 80-some Republicans who voted to table had voted not to table, the matter would be forced into the discussion/impeachment process. I would love to see Speaker Nancy Pelosi squirm while overseeing those proceedings. Try to explain how that's going to pass. Try to explain how the Senate would ever vote to remove. Try to explain that any number of other matters don't deserve the time this would take up, and that, instead, Impeaching the Vice President warrants the complete, undivided attention of the Democratic Party, Congress, and the media hoopla/circuss that undoubtedly would dominate our lives for the next 3 months when...most Americans really don't give a flip.
And that is the point. Republicans need to take every opportunity to make the Democrats look like the idiots they are behaving like. Americans want any number of other items to be dealt with. Impeachment? Please. This serves one purpose: Payback! Good old-fashioned revenge. Clinton's 1998 repaid with Cheney's 2007.
And Republicans could make the Democrats look like the utter stooges they are, and they passed up the opportunity blind.
You see, this is the kind of thinking that led Ronald Reagan to appoint a bunch of Stanford Law School graduates to the "supreme Court."
This is the kind of strategy that led Republican Presidents to appoint seven of the Justices on the Roe v. Wade "supreme Court," yet experience a 7-2 decision going the other way.
And this is the kind of strategic thinking that led the Republicans in the US House to propose the 1994 Contract with America while conveniently neglecting to get the big brothers in the Senate on board, resulting in only one out of ten items in the "contract" being sent to President Clinton to veto. Really effective strategy.
Republicans are dumbing their way through Congress and they need to wake up. Just because you are in the minority doesn't mean you can't make the Democrats look stupid occassionally. And if Rep. Kucinich is dumb enough to bring Articles of Impeachment against Cheny, then let him!!
Americans don't want impeachment. Americans want results. And Democrats are only looking to make the President look bad. SCHIP. SCHIP2. Overriding the water projects veto. Attempting to override every veto. Blaming the Bush Administration for everything from Katrina (the hurricane itself) to 9/11 (kooks trying to convince us that 9/11 was an 'inside' job).
Democrats are incapable of delivering in the majority, but their handlers in the MoveOn.org world of liberal activists drive them on, their vitriolic hatred of Bush determining their every move.
"You want to impeach Cheney?" Republicans should have said. "OK, let's not table this...let's discuss this completely!" I mean, trot out the Congressional record and point out what was said by individual Democrats in voting to approve the war. "You want to bring up individual items and discuss from testimony, intelligence, etc?" Fine--do it!! Put it squarely in the court of Democrats to prove their points once and for all. Or admit that they truly cannot so we can truly "move on" as a nation.
But this is why Speaker Pelosi was nowhere to be found...I almost cannot blame her for being absent! Why would you want to be in the Speaker's chair when such a matter came up? Neither would I--if I were a Democrat!
Bring this issue to the head of the class--not because I am anti-Cheney, but because Democrats don't have a case at all! Make them look bad, bad, bad!!
All it would have taken would have been 20 additional Republicans in the House and it would have happened. And Republicans should have been on top of this yesterday and ensured that the most politically embarassing option had been implemented. Oops.
Maybe they can call on a vote to "un-table" it???