The Only Certain Guaranteed Way to Stop Bush & Cheney Is to Remove Them from Office, ASAP

Put aside the laundry list of good solid reasons to impeach George Bush, like illegal and unconstitutional warrantless wiretapping, torture, suspension of habeas corpus, and other possible criminal improprieties. Republicans supported that misconduct, and so they wouldn't join Democrats in any impeachment based on charges related to those activities. And therefore it would be a pointless exercise, since there's no way that a 2/3 vote could be secured for conviction. Thus Democrats of pragmatic mind, to date, have considered impeachment to be a problematic distraction from passing doable legislation in the 110th Congress. But that was yesterday. Today, 70% of the public is pointedly opposed to the Bush/Cheney escalation of the war in Iraq, which they have arrogantly undertaken in direct and confrontational contradiction to the public's expressed wishes. They have ignored the results of the election, they have ignored the advice of the Iraq Study Group, they have ignored the expertly informed and experienced judgments of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and many command officers, and they have persisted in the policy of throwing away untold numbers of American lives (and literally billions of dollars) in service solely to their completely deluded fantasy wishful thinking. And now, today, there exist staggering indications that Bush and Cheney have decided that they can unilaterally launch yet another war - this time against Iran and/or Syria - in secret, with complete disregard for the Constitution's very clearly defined Article 1 Section 8 delineation of powers, in the total absence of consultation with or approval from Congress. A number of Republican Senators are already standing forthrightly opposed to Bush's war escalation. The willful and abjectly dictatorial usurpation of warmaking authority - and in the express opposition to the overwhelming majority of American public opinion - is not something the Republicans have already endorsed, and therefore those GOP votes for impeachment - for this one reason only - are potentially up for grabs. Bush and Cheney have now earned the intense antipathy of the public. But if additionally the citizenry has the holy living bejeebers scared out of it by Bush's and Cheney's fanatical pursuit of the Rapture, and people recognize that the only way to stop them from their continued megalomaniacal lunacy is to remove them from office, the pressure on the Republicans to impeach both Bush and Cheney will be difficult to resist. Indeed, they may well not want to resist it. The most difficult obstacle for Republicans, without additional factors being considered, wouldn't be getting rid of Bush and Cheney per se; their biggest hang up would be the elevation of third in line to the presidency, the Speaker of the House, which is now Democrat Nancy Pelosi. But the Democrats can offer a little grease for the wheels. If the public mood becomes as plainly hostile towards Bush as it was towards Nixon - the handwriting on the wall being in gigantic neon letters - Democrats can offer Bush and the GOP a deal. Bush fires Cheney, and replaces him with a Republican already approved for the occasion by the Democrats - perhaps Richard Lugar or John Warner or Chuck Hagel or maybe even Thad Cochran - and then Bush is allowed to resign, and to avoid the ordeal of an impeachment. The new Vice President then assumes the presidency, Republicans get to keep hold of the Executive Branch (and a much much better prospect for 2008 than they currently enjoy). Alternatively, if the boy king persists in refusing to acknowledge reality, impeachment charges may be brought simultaneously against both Bush and Cheney, with Cheney's trial in the Senate coming first. The same replacement deal remains on the table. An impeachment is a political process, not a conventional legal trial. The specific charge(s) fulfilling the "high Crimes and Misdemeanors" requirement could be manifest in a variety of forms, but the bottom line is simply that a proof must be provided that the accused is in violation of the law or the Constitution. The phrasing of the Declaration of Independence works pretty well in the current circumstance: "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security." The call for impeachment must come from the public at large, not narrowly from Democrats. The reason for impeachment must be focused exclusively on the Bush/Cheney usurpation of authority in direct violation of the Constitution, to continue their war. That's the one salient reason the public can support by enormous and compelling majority, sufficient to persuade reelection-conscious Republicans, in order to gain the 2/3 vote needed for conviction. The only way to stop Bush and Cheney from their insane sacrifice of American blood and treasure is to remove them from office, as soon as possible. Impeachment is not fun. The fact that it has become a necessary option to consider is tragic in the extreme. But if they are not removed, they will only make things worse. More Americans will needlessly die, wasted for no good reason whatsoever.