Is impeachment a good idea? They impeached Bill Clinton and he has an approval rating

of about 80 percent now. Of course I know the Senate acquitted him and it obviously would acquit Dumbya.

Just a thought...

Plus, Clinton is charismatic and smart. Bush is a dumb fuck and a snide bully. Clinton knows how to win people. Bush does not. People never liked Bush for himself. They may have thought they did but Bush's personality was never an issue. Clinton IS a Personality.

Mostly though, we cannot fail to do what is called for ethically because of how it might influence his approval or lack of, ratings.
Lee

We can haggle about the reasons all day but bottom line is it ain't gonna happen. Unfortunately.

A lie about a bj that wasn't fatal to anyone or a lie that led us into a bogus war that has killed hundreds if thousands....Impeachment seems fairly simple and logical to me.

Some might call it splitting hairs, that's expected, but Clinton didn't, in fact, lie.
Unless I have researched totally bogus information, the official definition of "sexual relations" (paraphrasing here) in the government did not include oral sex.

It's been a while and I may have missed something, but the Clenis may well have been very well aware that the official view was that sex had nothing to do with mouths or cigars and planned his excursions to delicately remain legal.

There's gotta be a joke in here, somewhere...

something different to me than a bj does. Whether he lied or not is a matter of semantics and perception. We know his antics and his 'lie' only hurt his family. It surely was not an impeachable offense.

LOL, yes there is a joke in there somewhere....But, be such a 'lady' (ahem), I'll leave it to you, k?

**The real truth is, it's too early here for me to be extra clever!

Bill Clinton is popular, because he's smart and compassionate. W won't approach Bill Clinton's level, because he just does not have the capacity.

That's what Congress would accomplish by impeaching Bush (House impeaches, Senate convicts). Even if the Senate did not convict, it would be accountability... finally... for Dubya. I think it's the ONLY way there will ever be accountability. And impeachment would be on his record. I believe if the Dems do not hold Bush accountable, future presidents will use Bush as precedent. Lying and stonewalling Congress will be normal, ignoring subpeonas will be normal, spying on Americans will be normal, and so on. A president just needs to get an Attorney General who is loyal, and a president can do anything, that will be the new normal. Congress' oversight role will be a thing of the past.

It's also important IMO that Congressional Dems are on the historical record, that they TRIED to stop Bush when they had the chance. If the Dems do nothing, history will record Bush as a "controversial" president... not a president who broke the law (and got away with it, because of partisan Republicans in the Senate). I believe not impeaching will harm the Democrats, long term. They will go down in history as pathetically weak.

If the impeachment hearings are truly successful (and I think they will be) I believe it could be hard for some Senate Republicans to vote against conviction. The GOP could pay a political price at the polls, for condoning Bush's illegal activity, not unlike how some Republicans are going to pay a price at the polls for supporting Bush on the war.

I don't see any downside to impeachment hearings. Not anything tangible. "They'll say mean things about us" and "It might look bad". Pretty wimpy rationale, when you realize that not impeaching means Dems allow Bush to permanently change the government's balance of powers, and erode the Constitution.

All Bill did was accept a b.j. -- something a lot of us don't think is all that bad or anybody else's bidness.

By contrast, W & Cheney LIED us into a war in which hundreds of thousands of died to no good end, among many other high crimes, about which we will doubtless learn a great deal more if we can just HAVE hearings.

I'm not worried about backlash.

A coordinate all fronts campaign to get the American people to stand up and scream "RESIGN". That's what we need. First stop, sit-ins at every news office until they start reporting real facts and real news.

they might just keep coming back and THEN we'd be really screwed.

(oops.)

and it is one that most of the anti impeachment crowd don't get

The Dems did not go forth in 1988 becasue the WH was sown in

You do remember the Dukakis Presidency, don't you :sarcasm:

Once they realize that, they may realize why they are on the wrong side of history

:sarcasm:

that ignoring these crimes will set dangerous precedents for future administrations to follow?

The stage is being set for some seriously fucked up shit. I'd hate for your grandkids (I won't have any) to live through it.

You have to remember impeachment was a huge noose over Gore's head when he ran for President, if Clinton would have never been impeached we may have never had bush as our President.

The law is not a popularity contest.

Well, it actually is, and that's why this depresses me.

The backlash would be tremendous. Had there not been a Clinton impeachment, George Bush would have lost by alot less than 50,000 votes in 2000.

With slightly higher "disapprove as a person" ratings in swing and southern states. One of the main themes of the Bush 2000 campaign was that he was going to "restore honor and dignity to the White House". Rove's publicly stated strategy was "to have people see (Bill) Clinton when they hear Gore". So in the short run, the impeachment of Bill Clinton did help the GOP candidate in the next Presidential cycle. Something else to keep in mind about the 2000 campaign is that Bush Sr. was polling very high then, winning hypothetical rematches against Bill Clinton by a landslide.

I think trying to decide whether to impeach Bush or Cheney based on how it will affect their poll numbers is a bad idea. There will come a time when their poll numbers rise - - the next President will do something extremely unpopular or conditions in the U.S. will get so bad that folks will think, "At least under Bush inflation wasn't 400%" (or whatever). It will happen at some point in the future. Look at how many folks have looked at Bush and said "I never thought I'd miss Nixon, but at least he created the EPA" or something similar.

I think the decision about whether to impeach Bush and Cheney should be based on whether they committed one or more impeachable offenses.

Do you think that's going to apply to Bush?