The Impossible, Now Possible?

Obama wins Iowa.

A black man becomes president...?

Assuming Der Bush doesn't cancel elections.

Impeachment Guests' Books

...now linked to, on the right side of this page. If you enjoy/are sufficiently disturbed by our Impeachment hearings and want to read more, check out these crucial texts - keystones of the CP library.

Sean Penn Rocks the Mic

For serious. Give this speech, delivered last night at San Francisco State, a read.

Staceyann Chin, Round 2: Open Letter

...to gay men, dykes, transsexuals, blacks, women, et al.

S.C. doesn't immediately give away how her letter to a gay group relates to the impeachment of the president. She takes her time, reading in measured breaths, appalled that gay women have gone from happily out, in the Ellen era, to shunning the word "lesbian" for more neutral, less politically-identifiable terms today, only a decade or so later. S.C. is pissed. Something has changed, and she's not exactly sure why, and I'm not exactly sure what's changed, but I'm fairly sure I agree with S.C.'s views about it.

Here's my best attempt to decode the calmer portions of her letter:

Gay men used to be united in the struggle against AIDS - everywhere. They supported young black women in other countries who are routinely raped our forced into prostitution. Now those same well-to-do gay men don't seem to care as much. AIDS isn't a huge epidemic in America anymore, at least not for white men, so the issue is over and AIDS will not addressed elsewhere.

[Her tone changes; her face bunches up. This is just an example of something. A general apathy. A malaise with the Left, the enervated, vitiated, minority-lip-servicing-but-really-who-cares-because-let's-face-it, we're-doing-fine Left...]

The less calm regions of Chin's thoughts would look like night in Alaska if you painted them. They are black and white, and cold, cold, cold...

Chin, like a young Bell Hooks, excoriates all of us who do not daily involve ourselves in the plights of the poor and abused and mistrusted, here and abroad, gay and straight and black and whatever. Her point is that struggles are interconnected, and deadly apathy eventually circles back home.

I.e., we cannot stand by and say, "this isn't my struggle; I'm a [fill in identity-group]." Bush and Cheney's crimes effect not only all U.S. citizens and noncitizens, but all people of the world. If this time the boy in the small town dies for the cause of his oil, next time it could be you, for some evil cause you never dreamed of.

Chilling stuff - watch her do it - she twists your own brain on itself, making you ask, "What have I done to help anyone? Am I one of the imperialists (I can't be!)?" But if we all band together...? Incantation that stuns, prepares for the revelations ahead (the proceedings of the impeachment - what to do).

Hard to write in the dark; hard to finish this post; I'm not sure how else to talk about Chin's work but in these immediate impressions. Perhaps a later post will clarify where I think her cynicism and boundless energy and moral laser-guidance can/will take us.

Anyway, I won't yak more about it when you can watch her yourself here. (The audio seems to cut out every few seconds - is that just me?)

Lewis Lapham Wrecks Headz

Former Harper's editor Lewis Lapham walks slowly to the stage. The mic droops not quite near his mouth, and his gravelly voice is hushed. Everyone holds their breath and lean forwards. Lapham speaks. He is not going to sing. It's hard to imagine him singing.

Lapham invites us to consider that John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, asked his staff to prepare a document explaining why Bush should be impeached. The 182-page report convinced the doubting Lapham of the need to investigate Bush's crimes via impeachment. In his words, why we would run the risk of not impeaching them?

Bush and crew have conspired to commit fraud (to misuse the money we have invested in the executive on what Lapham calls a "frivolous" war). Double-L:

"We have before us in the White House a thief... A liar, who seeks to instill in the American people a state of fear. A televangelist... A wastrel... In a word, a criminal - known to be armed, shown to be dangerous." He mentions the regime's "pet Bismarcks and bibles in closed rooms."

Lapham's perfect. The fire in his voice is strangled down to embers by his steely, editorial look and snappy rhythm. His face betrays nothing as he excoriates "the fiction of permanent war" in the name of national security. This is the meat of the impeachment cause: Bush has created war and will keep us mired in war indefinitely in order to preserve broad-ranging powers and ensure his own imperial impunity.

We must stop him. Or rather, we must pressure Congress to do so.

The problems with impeachment are, as Lapham states, "romanticism" - the general American notion that our own president would never perpetrate so great a fraud as a straight-up Wag the Dog, Downing Street, needless war - and "apathy," which should be self-explanatory.

Are we "a public unwilling to recognize the President of the United States as a felon," or a public unwilling to persecute felonies?

(Lapham speaks to us as if we are a congressional investigatory committee, which is flattering but slightly confusing. Given that the stage is full of empty chairs, I believe the trope might be that we are listening in on such. It doesn't matter.)

Lapham winds down. To paraphrase his final point: It isn't the business of Congress to punish the President, but to correct his mistakes and remove him from power. "To cauterize the wound," as it were.

Sounds good to me.

***

P.S. - Here are more impeachment links. A wealth of places to get involved, if you dig through the links to congressional sites and related movements.

My New Favorite Song

Denver, 2008

Washington Monthly asked Theodore C. Sorensen, President Kennedy's speechwriter, to pen his 'speech of his dreams' for the Democratic nominee to deliver at the Democratic Convention in Denver next year. They asked him not to think about any one candidate, but to simply write the speech he would like to hear the nominee give. I suggest you read it outloud to fully appreciate the rhythm and cadence, but it's quite inspiring no matter what. Enjoy!

My fellow Democrats: With high resolve and deep gratitude, I accept your nomination.

It has been a long campaign—too long, too expensive, with too much media attention on matters irrelevant to our nation’s future. I salute each of my worthy opponents for conducting a clean fifty-state campaign focusing on the real issues facing our nation, including health care, the public debt burden, energy independence, and national security, a campaign testing not merely which of us could raise and spend the most money but who among us could best lead our country; a campaign not ignoring controversial issues like taxation, immigration, fuel conservation, and the Middle East, but conducting, in essence, a great debate—because our party, unlike our opposition, believes that a free country is strengthened by debate.

There will be more debates this fall. I hereby notify my Republican opponent that I have purchased ninety minutes of national network television time for each of the six Sunday evenings preceding the presidential election, and here and now invite and challenge him to share that time with me to debate the most serious issues facing the country, under rules to be agreed upon by our respective designees meeting this week with a neutral jointly selected statesman.

Let me assure all those who may disagree with my positions that I shall hear and respect their views, not denounce them as unpatriotic as has so often happened in recent years. I will wage a campaign that relies not on the usual fear, smear, and greed but on the hopes and pride of all our citizens in a nationwide effort to restore comity, common sense, and competence to the White House.

In this campaign, I will make no promises I cannot fulfill, pledge no spending we cannot afford, offer no posts to cronies you cannot trust, and propose no foreign commitment we should not keep. I will not shrink from opposing any party faction, any special interest group, or any major donor whose demands are contrary to the national interest. Nor will I shrink from calling myself a liberal, in the same sense that Franklin and Theodore Roosevelt, John and Robert Kennedy, and Harry Truman were liberals—liberals who proved that government is not a necessary evil, but rather the best means of creating a healthier, more educated, and more prosperous America.

They are the giants on whose shoulders I now stand, giants who made this a better, fairer, safer, stronger, more united America.

By making me your nominee, you have placed your trust in the American people to put aside irrelevant considerations and judge me solely on my qualifications to lead the nation. You have opened the stairway to what Teddy Roosevelt called the “bully pulpit.” With the help of dedicated Americans from our party, every party, and no party at all, I intend to mount that stairway to preach peace for our nation and world.

My campaign will be based on my search for the perfect political consensus, not the perfect political consultant. My chief political consultant will be my conscience.

Thank you for your applause, but I need more than your applause and approval. I need your prayers, your votes, your help, your heart, and your hand. The challenge is enormous, the obstacles are many. Our nation is emerging from eight years of misrule, a dark and difficult period in which our national honor and pride have been bruised and battered. But we are neither beaten nor broken. We are not helpless or afraid; because in this country the people rule, and the people want change.

True, some of us have been sleeping for these eight long years, while our nation’s values have been traduced, our liberties reduced, and our moral authority around the world trampled and shattered by a nightmare of ideological incompetence. But now we are awakening and taking our country back. Now people all across America are starting to believe in America again. We are coming back, back to the heights of greatness, back to America’s proud role as a temple of justice and a champion of peace.

The American people are tired of politics as usual, and I intend to offer them, in this campaign, something unusual in recent American politics: the truth. Neither bureaucracies nor nations function well when their actions are hidden from public view and accountability. From now on, whatever mistakes I make, whatever dangers we face, the people shall know the truth—and the truth shall make them free. After eight years of secrecy and mendacity, here are some truths the people deserve to hear:

We remain essentially a nation under siege. The threat of another terrorist attack upon our homeland has not been reduced by all the new layers of porous bureaucracy that proved their ineptitude in New Orleans; nor by all the needless, mindless curbs on our personal liberties and privacy; nor by expensive new weaponry that is utterly useless in stopping a fanatic willing to blow himself up for his cause. Indeed, our vulnerability to another attack has only been worsened in the years since the attacks of September 11th—worsened by our government convincing more than 1 billion Muslims that we are prejudiced against their faith, dismissive of international law, and indifferent to the deaths of their innocent children; worsened by our failure to understand their culture or to provide a safe haven for the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees displaced by a war we started; worsened by our failure to continue our indispensable role in the Middle East peace process.

We have adopted some of the most indefensible tactics of our enemies, including torture and indefinite detention.

We have degraded our military.

We have treated our most serious adversaries, such as Iran and North Korea, in the most juvenile manner—by giving them the silent treatment. In so doing, we have weakened, not strengthened, our bargaining position and our leadership.

At home, as health care costs have grown and coverage disappeared, we have done nothing but coddle the insurance, pharmaceutical, and health care industries that feed the problem.

As global warming worsens, we have done nothing but deny the obvious and give regulatory favors to polluters.

As growing economic inequality tarnishes our democracy, we have done nothing but carve out more tax breaks for the rich.

During these last several years, our nation has been bitterly divided and deceived by illicit actions in high places, by violations of federal, constitutional, and international law. I do not favor further widening the nation’s wounds, now or next year, through continuous investigations, indictments, and impeachments. I am confident that history will hold these malefactors accountable for their deeds, and the country will move on.

Instead, I shall seek a renewal of unity among all Americans, an unprecedented unity we will need for years to come in order to face unprecedented danger.

We will be safer from terrorist attack only when we have earned the respect of all other nations instead of their fear, respect for our values and not merely our weapons.

If I am elected president, my vow for this country can be summarized in one short, simple word: change. This November 2008 election—the first since 1952 in which neither the incumbent president’s nor the incumbent vice president’s name will appear on the national ballot, indeed the first since 1976 in which the name of neither Bill Clinton nor George Bush will appear on the national ballot—is destined to bring about the most profound change in the direction of this country since the election of 1932.

To meet the threats we face and restore our place of leadership in the free world, I pledge to do the following:

First, working with a representative Iraqi parliament, I shall set a timetable for an orderly, systematic redeployment and withdrawal of all our troops in Iraq, including the recall of all members of the National Guard to their primary responsibility of guarding our nation and its individual states.

Second, this redeployment shall be only the first step in a comprehensive regional economic and diplomatic stabilization plan for the entire Middle East, building a just and enduring peace between Israel and Palestine, halting the killing and maiming of innocent civilians on both sides, and establishing two independent sovereign states, each behind peacefully negotiated and mutually recognized borders.

Third, I shall as soon as possible transfer all inmates out of the Guantanamo Bay prison and close down that hideous symbol of injustice.

Fourth, I shall fly to New York City to pledge in person to the United Nations, in the September 2009 General Assembly, that the United States is returning to its role as a leader in international law, as a supporter of international tribunals, and as a full-fledged member of the United Nations which will pay its dues in full, on time, and without conditions, renouncing any American empire; that we shall work more intensively with other countries to eliminate global scourges, including AIDS, malaria, and other contagious diseases, massive refugee flows, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction; and that we will support the early dispatch of United Nations peacekeepers to halt the atrocities in Darfur. I shall make it clear that we do not covet the land of other countries for our military bases or the control of their natural resources for our factories. I shall make it clear that our country is not bound by any policies or pronouncements of my predecessor that violate international law or threaten international peace.

Fifth, I shall personally sign the Kyoto Protocol, and seek its ratification by the United States Senate, in order to stop global warming before it endangers all species on earth, including our own; and I shall call upon the Congress to take action dramatically reducing our nation’s reliance on the carbon fuels that are steadily contributing to the degradation of our environment.

Sixth, I shall demonstrate sufficient confidence in the strength of our values and the wisdom and skill of our diplomats to favor communications, negotiations, and full relations with every country on earth, including Cuba, North Korea, Palestine, and Iran.

Finally, I shall restore the constitutional right of habeas corpus, abolish the unconstitutional tapping of private phones, and once again show the world the traditional American values that distinguish us from those who attacked us on 9/11.

We need not renounce the use of conventional force. We will be ready to repel any clear and present danger that poses a genuine threat to our national security and survival. But it will be as a last resort, never a first; in cooperation with our allies, never alone; out of necessity, never by choice; proportionate, never heedless of civilian lives or international law; as the best alternative considered, never the only. We will always apply the same principles of collective security, prudent caution, and superior weaponry that enabled us to peacefully prevail in the long cold war against the Soviet Union. Above all, we shall wage no more unilateral, ill-planned, ill-considered, and ill-prepared invasions of foreign countries that pose no actual threat to our security. No more wars in which the American Congress is not told in advance and throughout their duration the true cost, consequences, and terms of commitment. No more wars waged by leaders blinded by ideology who have no legal basis to start them and no plan to end them. We shall oppose no peaceful religion or culture, insult or demonize no peace-minded foreign leader, and spare no effort in meeting those obligations of leadership and assistance that our comparative economic strength has thrust upon us. We shall listen, not lecture; learn, not threaten. We will enhance our safety by earning the respect of others and showing respect for them. In short, our foreign policy will rest on the traditional American values of restraint and empathy, not on military might.

In the final analysis, our nation cannot be secure around the world unless our citizens are secure at home—secure not only from external attack, but secure as well from the rising tide of national debt, secure from the financial and physical ravages of uninsured disease, secure from discrimination in our schools and neighborhoods, secure from the bitter unrest generated by a widening gap between our richest and poorest citizens. They are not secure in a country lacking reasonable limitations on the sale of handguns to criminals, the mentally disturbed, and prospective terrorists. And our citizens are not secure when some of their fellow citizens, loyal Islamic Americans, are made to feel they are the targets of hysteria or bigotry.

I believe in an America in which the fruits of productivity and prosperity are shared by all, by workers as well as owners, by those at the bottom as well as those at the top; an America in which the sacrifices required by national security are shared by all, by profiteers in the back offices as well as volunteers on the front lines.

In my administration, I shall restore balance and fairness to the national tax system. I shall level the playing field for organized labor. I shall end the unseemly favors to corporations that allow them to profit without competing, for it is through competition that we innovate, and it is through innovation that we raise the wages of our workers. It shames our nation that profits for corporations have soared even as wages for average Americans have fallen. It shames us still more that so many African American men must struggle to find jobs.

We will make sure that no American citizen, from the youngest child to the oldest retiree, and especially no returning serviceman or military veteran, will be denied fully funded medical care of the highest quality.

To pay for these domestic programs, my administration will make sure that subsidies and tax breaks go only to those who need them most, not those who need them least, and that we fund only those weapons systems we need to meet the threats of today and tomorrow, not those of yesterday.

The purpose of public office is to do good, not harm; to change lives, help lives, and save lives, not destroy them. I look upon the presidency not as an opportunity to rule, but as an opportunity to serve. I intend to serve all the people, regardless of party, race, region, or religion.

Let us all, here assembled in this hall, or watching at home, constitute ourselves, rededicate ourselves, as soldiers in a new army. Not an army of death and destruction, but a new army of voters and volunteers, in a new wave of workers for peace and justice at home and abroad, new missionaries for the moral rebirth of our country. I ask for every citizen’s help, not merely those who live in the red states or those who live in the blue states, but every citizen in every state. Although we may be called fools and dreamers, although we will find the going uphill, in the words of the poet: “Say not the struggle naught availeth.” We will change our country’s direction, and hand to the generation that follows a nation that is safer, cleaner, less divided, and less fearful than the nation we will inherit next January.

I’m told that John F. Kennedy was fond of quoting Archimedes, who explained the principle of the lever by declaring: “Give me a place to stand, and I can move the world.” My fellow Americans—here I stand. Come join me, and together we will move the world to a new era of a just and lasting peace.

Best headline of the week

Firefighters inhaled as ton of pot burned, chief says

Favorite headline of the week

Firefighters inhaled as ton of pot burned, chief says.

And I thought MERCURY was a problem...

Seems the army has been dumping major amounts (only about 64 million pounds) of weapons of mass destruction into the Atlantic Ocean! How awesome is that?! You can read all about it here. But suffice it to say, somebody's got some 'splainin' to do!

old Gladwell on Hate Speech

and if you are still thinking about imus/racism/hate speech/etc...i found this old blog by his gladwellness...i just think its worth looking a little deeper into the issue of hate speech or racism and his point about how all hate speech is not created equal is important...after all, quick, unconsidered judgment is what racism is all about...

by the way, anyone who likes to read gladwell in the new yorker or in book form should go to his site and check out his blog, you can subscribe to it on google reader to get RSS feed...but mr gladwell's unedited musings and wandering curiosities are quite interesting...

now, back to the bees...

Journalism

Bill Moyers has a new series called "Bill Moyers Journal". This week featured an interview with Jon Stewart and my favorite blogger, Joshua Micah Marshall, who broke the US Attorney story wide open. You can watch these segments online now here.

We should just draft him.

Everyone wants Gore. Chris Rock endorsed him on "Saturday Night Live" a couple of weeks ago. I endorse him every chance I get. Now the Republican Mayor of New York City has seen the light:

“I hope Al Gore enters the race; I think it would be good for the country,” the mayor said.

LAWRENCE WRIGHT WINS PULITZER

Our primary homeslice Lawrence Wright's The Looming Tower just won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.

We congratulate him with all our hearts.

The man is a double paragon of journalistic thoroughness and good prose style. He is also one of the easiest-to-work-with people you could ever meet. And a snappy dresser.

(For those of you who missed Wright's My Trip To Al-Qaeda, stay tuned for a very short remounting of the show some time in June.)

Awesome!

Michael Jackson has a brilliant idea.