Wanted: a Constitutional Democrat

From HuffPo David Bromwich writes, in the context of the recent gift of wiretapping to Bush, on the real cost to us all:

Wanted: a Constitutional Democrat:

By what force was the Democratic majority effectively split? The answer lies in part in the nature of President Bush's appeal to fear. He has frightened many people into believing that if America is ever hit by another attack, the blame should fall on every lawmaker who ever opposed his will on national security. The Cheney-Bush campaign of fear is relentless, but not entirely disingenuous. President Bush is frightened, and the public has seen it; Vice President Cheney is frightened, and his bunker shows it.

Intimidation apart, a cynical prudence clearly drove some of the crossover votes. Many Democrats believe the party's best strategy is to run out the clock. Let the president have everything he wants between now and November 2008; watch politely, and show a seemly disappointment; and count the profits at election time. The same goes for the president's men, from Petraeus down to Gonzales: give them all they want for the next fifteen months and see where it lands us. That is one reason why impeachment has been taken "off the table."

Of course, impeachment was put into the Constitution partly as a remedy against the rashness and ambition of just such an administration as this; the shadow of impeachment, it was supposed, might curb the desperate attempts of bad men to shore up their power by fresh adventures. But here once more the Democratic calculation appears to be: the worse it gets, the better for us in the end.

In a recent talk with liberal journalists, Nancy Pelosi offered a second kind of prudential reservation: impeachment or censure, of either Cheney or Bush, would "divide the country." That is the same species of wisdom that prevailed with Al Gore when he withheld his support from the late petitions charging voter fraud in Florida in the election of 2000. He was choosing not to divide the country.

Yesterday I invested two of Action Point's valuable hours discussing the importance and necessity of impeachment with John Nichols (The Genius of Impeachment). When I apologized for coming so late to the "party" John was quick to forgive me pointing out that only on July 13, when Bill Moyer's Journal presented the nation's first in-depth broadcast on the topic, had most of America had an opportunity to similarly understand impeachment's value in these times. Now, having decided that for me beginning impeachment proceedings is as necessary as election integrity (i.e. exercising Americans' civic power) to derail Imperialist tendencies in the current administration and it's crop of "minions", I can barely think of anything else.

What is there for you and I to do but make it our job to educate the politicians whose main job appears to be keeping their careers, or expanding them, at our expense.

Decide for yourself if you are on board with impeachment, and then if so, let me know what you are willing to do to make it happen.