All 12 entries tagged Bush

Kucinich presents Bush impeachment articles

David Edwards and Mike Sheehan
Raw Story
Tuesday, June 10, 2008

An Ohio Democratic lawmaker and former presidential candidate has presented articles of impeachment against President George W. Bush to Congress.

Thirty-five articles were presented by Rep. Dennis Kucinich to the House of Representatives late Monday evening, airing live on C-SPAN.

"The House is not in order," said Kucinich to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), upon which Pelosi pounded her gavel.

"Resolved," Kucinich then began, "that President George W. Bush be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, and that the following articles of impeachment be exhibited to the United States Senate. ...

"In his conduct while President of the United States, George W. Bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of president of the United States, and to the best of his ability preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has committed the following abuses of power..."

The first article Kucinich presented, and many that followed, regarded the war in Iraq: "Article 1 - Creating a secret propaganda campaign to manufacture a false case for war against Iraq."

On several occasions, Kucinich referenced RAW STORY and its noted investigative news chief, Larisa Alexandrovna, as source material for the articles. Two of the RAW STORY pieces Kucinich mentioned are viewable here and here.

Kucinich, a 2004 and 2008 Democratic candidate for the White House, abandoned a prior attempt to begin impeachment proceedings against Bush in January of this year.

In April of 2007, Kucinich presented impeachment articles against Vice President Dick Cheney, but the effort went nowhere. Kucinich exclaimed that "impeachment may well be the only remedy which remains to stop a war of aggression against Iran."

Before leaving office in January 2007, then-Democratic Rep. Cynthia McKinney--currently a Green Party presidential candidate--introduced articles of impeachment against President Bush as her last act in Congress, but that effort also was fruitless.

This video is from C-SPAN, broadcast June 9, 2008.

: 10 Jun 2008 13:15 |  Tags: Bush Crimes Dennis Impeachment Iraq Kucinich Misdemeanors News Politics Video |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Charles Manson Prosecutor Says George W. Bush Should be Tried for Mass Murder

Out of 106 felony cases, former LA deputy district attorney Vincent Bugliosi has lost 1. Out of 21 murder cases, he lost 0. Bugliosi is best known for his prosecution of Charles Manson and for his best selling book, Helter Skelter.

In his new book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder, he lays the legal foundation for a prosecutor (either local, state or federal) to indict Bush for the murder of thousands.

: 28 May 2008 17:48 |  Tags: Bugliosi Bush Charles George Manson Murder News Politics Prosecutor Video Vincent |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Bush's Grandfather Helped Plan Fascist Coup in USA

I'm reading Philip Roth's The Plot Against America this week for my "States of Damage" literature module. In it, Roth sets out a vision of America during WW2 in which a Hitler-sympathiser, Charles Lindbergh, is voted into power and accordingly oversees an oppressive, anti-semitic regime.

It struck me that Roth could have created an even more powerful, parallel "what if?" scenario if he had picked up on this story, as revived by BBC Radio 4 last year:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/document/document_20070723.shtml

"Document uncovers details of a planned coup in the USA in 1933 by right-wing American businessmen"

In 1933, Marine Corps Major-General, Smedley Butler was approached by a wealthy and secretive group of industrialists and bankers, including Prescott Bush, the current President's grandfather, who asked him to command a 500,000 strong rogue army of veterans that would help stage a coup to topple then President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

According to the BBC, the plotters intended to impose a fascist takeover and "Adopt the policies of Hitler and Mussolini to beat the great depression."

The conspirators were operating under the umbrella of a front group called the American Liberty League, which included many families that are still household names today, including Heinz, Colgate, Birds Eye and General Motors.

Butler played along with the clique to determine who was involved but later blew the whistle and identified the ringleaders in testimony given to the House Committee on un-American Activities.

However, the Committee refused to even question any of the individuals named by Butler and his testimony was omitted from the record, leading to charges that they were involved in covering the matter up, and the majority of the media blackballed the story.

General Smedley Butler, author of the famous quote "war is a racket", exposed the fascist plotters but was subsequently demonized and shunned by the government and the media.

In 1936, William Dodd, the U.S. Ambassador to Germany, wrote a letter to President Roosevelt in which he stated,

"A clique of U.S. industrialists is hell-bent to bring a fascist state to supplant our democratic government and is working closely with the fascist regime in Germany and Italy. I have had plenty of opportunity in my post in Berlin to witness how close some of our American ruling families are to the Nazi regime.... A prominent executive of one of the largest corporations, told me point blank that he would be ready to take definite action to bring fascism into America if President Roosevelt continued his progressive policies. Certain American industrialists had a great deal to do with bringing fascist regimes into being in both Germany and Italy. They extended aid to help Fascism occupy the seat of power, and they are helping to keep it there. Propagandists for fascist groups try to dismiss the fascist scare. We should be aware of the symptoms. When industrialists ignore laws designed for social and economic progress they will seek recourse to a fascist state when the institutions of our government compel them to comply with the provisions."

The proven record of Prescott Bush's involvement in financing the Nazi war machine dovetails with the fact that he was part of a criminal cabal that actively sought to impose a fascist coup in America.

: 06 Feb 2008 20:32 |  Tags: America Bush Coup Fascist Philip Plot Politics Prescott Roth Usa |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Bush push for telco immunity 'textbook example of fascism'

Writing about web page http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Olbermann_rails_against_Bush_fascist_telecom_0201.html

Olbermann: Bush push for telco immunity 'textbook example of fascism'

David Edwards and Nick Juliano
Raw Story
Friday, February 1, 2008

In a blistering condemnation of President Bush's willingness to go to the wall for corporations he relies on to spy on Americans, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann says the president's message in his State of the Union address calling for immunity of telecommunications companies is a "textbook example of fascism."

Bush and Congressional Democrats are in a pitched fight over whether to free telecoms from legal liability as part of an overhaul of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The president says the companies should be rewarded for their cooperation in the war on terror; critics say legal immunity would preclude any oversight of Bush's warrantless wiretapping program that ensnared US citizens.

Olbermann accused Bush's threat to veto any bill without immunity of aiding the terrorists, when coupled with his threat that failing to act on a permanent FISA expansion would weaken US national security.

"You told Congress, if you do not act by Friday, our ability to track terrorist threats would be weakened, and our citizens would be in greater danger," Olbermann said. "Yet you you are willing to weaken that ability. You will subject us, your citizens, to that greater danger. This is simple enough for you to understand. If Congress approves a new FISA act without telecom immunity, and sends it to your desk, and you veto it, you, by your own terms and your own definitions, you will have just sided with the terrorists."

The host further excoriated Bush for refusing to even acknowledge corporate assistance, always couching his calls for immunity by describing companies "believed" or "alleged" to have assisted his still-classified program.

"If you, sir, are asking Congress and us to join you in this shameless, breathless, literal textbook example of fascism, the merged efforts of government and corporations who answer to no government, you still don't have the guts to say the telecom companies did assist you in your efforts?" Olbermann asked. "Will you and the equivocators who surround you like a cocoon never go on the record about anything? Even the stuff you claim to believe in?"

Ironically, Olbermann notes, that Vice President Dick Cheney did go on the record about telecom involvement, when he spoke to conservative talker Rush Limbaugh Wednesday.

"The Vice President probably shouldn�t have phoned in to the Rush Limbaugh Propaganda-Festival yesterday. Sixth sentence out of Mr. Cheney�s mouth: The FISA bill is about, quote, 'retroactive liability protection for the companies that have worked with us and helped us prevent further attacks against the United States,'" Olbermann said. "Oops. Mr. Cheney is something of a loose cannon, of course. But he kind of let the wrong cat out of the bag there."

Some critics dismissed Olbermann as a hyberbolic ranter who relies on over-the-top rhetoric.

"The MSNBC host, who once scolded public figures who use Nazi references, made his own latest invocation of Nazi Germany, as he compared the telecoms to the Krupp family who were convicted of war crimes at Nuremberg," wrote conservative media critic Brad Wilmouth. "Olbermann: 'It begins to look like the bureaucrats of the Third Reich trying to protect the Krupp family industrial giants by literally rewriting the laws of Germany for their benefit. And we know how that turned out. Alfred Krupp and 11 of his directors were convicted of war crimes at Nuremburg.'"

Unable to reach a final agreement on how to update FISA and whether to give immunity to the telecoms, Congress this week passed a 15-day extension to the Protect America Act, a temporary FISA extension forced through Congress just before its August recess.

On Monday, the Senate will resume debate on the FISA expansion, after Republicans backed off their demands that all proposed amendments be subjected to a 60-vote majority, according to Congressional Quarterly. The subscription-only Capitol Hill journal reports:

Three amendments to be voted on next week will address retroactive immunity for companies being sued for allegedly assisting the National Security Agency in its warrantless surveillance program.

One, by Democrats Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, would simply remove the immunity provisions, which are a priority for the Bush administration.

Another, by Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., would substitute the federal government as the defendant in the lawsuits. Both would only need a simple majority for adoption.

A third, by Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., would require the companies to justify their actions before the secret FISA court, which would then decide whether immunity was warranted. It would require 60 votes to be adopted.

Some critics see the move as just another GOP gambit to block immunity from passing.

"It seems rather clear what happened here. There are certain amendments that are not going to get even 50 votes -- including the Dodd/Feingold amendment to strip telecom immunity out of the bill -- and, for that reason, Republicans were more than willing to agree to a 50-vote threshold, since they know those amendments won't pass even in a simple up-or-down vote," writes Glenn Greenwald, a prominent blogger covering the FISA fight.

"But then, there are other amendments which might be able to get 50 votes, but cannot get 60 votes -- such as Feinstein's amendment to transfer the telecom cases to the FISA court and her other amendment providing that FISA is the "exclusive means" for eavesdropping -- and, thus, those are the amendments for which the GOP insisted upon a 60-vote requirement."

During his comment, Olbermann reiterated the revelation from former AT&T technician Mark Klein, who blew the whistle on his former company's collusion with the National Security Agency, that he connected a "Big Brother machine" to funnel every piece of communication crossing AT&T's wires into an NSA database.

"This isn't about finding that kind of needle in a haystack, this isn't even about finding that haystack" Olbermann said. "This is about scooping up every piece of hay there ever was."

This video is from MSNBC's Countdown, broadcast January 31, 2008.

: 02 Feb 2008 14:12 |  Tags: Bush Fascism Olbermann Politics Telecommunications Video |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Keith Olbermann's special comment on Bush's lies over Iran

Writing about web page http://youtube.com/watch?v=63py2c0DCAg

: 08 Dec 2007 03:10 |  Tags: Bush Iran Keith Olbermann Video |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

New report says Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003

Writing about web page http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSWBT00801220071203

A new U.S. intelligence report says that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that it remains on hold.

: 04 Dec 2007 00:54 |  Tags: Bush Iran Nie Report War |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

“Thousands” Illegally Rendered By Bush Administration for Interrogation and Torture

: 30 Nov 2007 16:54 |  Tags: Bush Illegal Rendition Torture |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Why things will get worse in the US under Hillary

This is the extended edit of an article I wrote for today’s Warwick Boar (unfortunately they didn’t seem to receive my emails with the new version!):

Why things will get worse in the US under Hillary

Bush – Clinton – Bush…..Clinton? If Hillary Clinton wins the presidency of the USA in 2008, the country will have watched the same tag-team tournament for 19 years. It feels like one of those maddening instances of sports coverage where for some reason the game refuses to end, gliding past the surrendering boundaries of the TV schedule, and while you bemoan the futility of it all the commentators get more and more worked up about how immensely exciting it is. I wish the crowd would just stand up and do that chant, “Blow the f-ing whistle, blow the f-ing whistle…”

By the most recent estimates Hillary Clinton holds a massive 33 point lead on her closest Democratic competitor, Barack Obama, and she has raised more money for her campaign (over $90 million) than all the Democratic and Republican candidates combined. Given that the Republican candidates are, with the exception of grassroots contender Ron Paul, such unapologetic, unrelenting warmongers at a time when a majority of the public is solidly against the Iraq war and the Republican administration, the surely nominated Hillary will go up against an unelectable Republican ticket.

Hillary’s recent rhetoric over the Iraq war (a “grotesque mistake” and a case of “mismanagement”) is, sadly, convincing enough for a large constituent of faithful Democrats, despite the fact that she voted for the war and backed it for 3 years. They don’t recognize the couched complicity of her position that US forces must persist in Iraq until there is a “unified government”. As one Newsday columnist Jimmy Breslin described it, “she sneaks and slithers past you with her opinion on a war that kills every day.” Hillary has said that she if she wins the presidency she won’t take US troops out of Iraq even by 2013. Journalist Ted Kopel recently told NPR that she has also admitted that troops would be in Iraq at the end of her second term – that’s 2018.

Mrs. Clinton is also encouraging a more hostile policy towards Iran, suggesting military force and criticizing Bush for not being aggressive or hasty enough in branding the Iranian Revolutionary Guard an “international terrorist organization”. She really is stretching her hand up highest in a class full of war hawks. Accordingly, the “defence” industry has now publicly abandoned its allies in the Republican Party and is backing Hillary.

Of course, it is not so much Hillary’s policies that ensure the success of her campaign as her celebrity status. The lasting sympathetic picture of a wronged yet strong wife, the exciting prospect of a female president, the accolade of “experience”, all of this has distracted the public from the question of whether Hillary would actually offer the country a departure from the Bush/Cheney administration’s imperialism, domestic authoritarianism and unaccountability. I dread Hillary’s success in 2008 because she will, on the contrary, “stay the course”, with the added problem that Democrats who would usually stand up to the moronic menace of Bush will feel less inclined to stand up to the “liberal” autocracy of Clinton.

Still, some liberals know to jump off the bandwagon when Rupert Murdoch jumps on. Murdoch, the chairman and CEO of News Corp and an open cheerleader of the Bush administration, hosted a fundraiser dinner for Mrs. Clinton last year.

“But isn’t Murdoch a conservative and Clinton a liberal?!” we instinctively cry. No. In fact these labels have been spun past the orbit of recognition. Both Murdoch and Clinton favour big government and imperial war, same as the Bush administration. Bush the “conservative” borrowed over £1.05 trillion from foreign governments and financial institutions from 2001-2005. That’s more than the accumulated borrowings of all previous Presidents.

Hillary will now inherit much newfangled machinery of state corporatism from the Bush years, for example the sprawling Department of Homeland Security, whose internal records show that 0.0015% of cases they deal with are actually terrorism related, and the “New Freedom Initiative”, a Big Pharma program of compulsory mental health tests for all children and eventually all adults. Similar developments will no doubt accelerate with Hillary in the White House because she has even fewer inhibitions about promoting Statism.

Corruption of power and the power of corruption will always saturate the political process but they are made less of a threat by a) tying the hands of the government’s executive branch and b) anticipating the accession of politicians with compromised or dubious track records. Here’s the current situation:

a) The current members of the executive have casually declared themselves unaccountable to Congress; Cheney even announced that his office is independent of the executive. This is additional to the dictatorial powers provided by congressionally approved legislation, for example the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which completely erases “habeas corpus” (the most important constitutional safeguard of personal liberty), and the Defense Authorization Act of 2007, which allows the President to declare martial law autonomously.

b) The Bushes and Clintons are utterly compromised politicians and businesspeople (extending beyond booze and blowjobs). They’re even personally affiliated. George Bush Snr and Bill Clinton are good friends and Barbara Bush calls Clinton a “surrogate son”. Perhaps the drug smuggling operations through Mena in the ‘80s provided some common ground. Or maybe Bush, as a former CIA director, was especially forthcoming to Clinton on account of his work for the CIA while at Oxford University (and conceivably beyond).

Within the inscrutable world of such connections, the most intriguing insight into the current political game in America is provided by Carroll Quigley, Bill Clinton’s Georgetown mentor who helped get him the Rhodes scholarship to Oxford. Quigley wrote candidly in his encyclopedic “Tragedy and Hope: a History of the World in Our Time” that he was permitted in the early 1960s to examine the records of “an international Anglophile network” working through round table groups and cagey front organisations like the Council on Foreign Relations (whose select membership includes Fortune 100 CEOs like Rupert Murdoch, bankers, and politicos like Henry Kissinger, Irving Kristol, Dick Cheney and the Clintons) to “create a world system of financial control in private hands, able to dominate the political system of each country” in a “feudalist fashion”.

Quigley wrote that in US politics “the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can “throw the rascals out” at any election, without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy”. This is exactly what we are seeing.

Enough with the phony pro-wrestling, the American public need to get in the ring and blow the whistle themselves.

: 28 Nov 2007 18:05 |  Tags: 2008 Article Boar Bush Clinton Election Hillary Iran Iraq Presidential War Warwick |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Saddam Offered Exile, But Neo–Cons Unleashed Carnage Anyway

Writing about web page http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/september2007/270907_offered_exile.htm

Saddam Offered Exile, But Neo-Cons Unleashed Carnage Anyway
What could have been saved? A trillion dollars, a million lives, the global reputation of the U.S. - but that wasn't the plan

: 27 Sep 2007 20:37 |  Tags: Aznar Bush Hussein Iraq Lies Neo-Cons Saddam War |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

New Bush Executive Order Intimidates Dissenters

Writing about web page http://infowars.net/articles/july2007/230707ExecOrder.htm

President Bush's newest executive order states that any American citizen who threatens the peace and stability of Iraq and undermines efforts to promote reconstruction and reform there may have all their property and interests seized by the Treasury department without warning. The hypocrisy on display here is astounding given that the only persons in America who are doing these things are the ones who invaded Iraq in the first place and continue to sow chaos and destruction in the face of all time high public opposition.

The Executive Order titled 'Blocking Property of Certain Persons Who Threaten Stabilization Efforts in Iraq' was signed last week on the 17th of July and acts as an amendment to the National Emergencies Act.

While many have decried it as the latest in a string of legislation that constitutes a crack down on protest and free speech, few have pointed out the ultimate irony that under this order high ranking members of the Bush administration are the only ones that should be punishable.

The order focuses on

...acts of violence threatening the peace and stability of Iraq and undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq

...any person determined by the Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense,

(i) to have committed, or to pose a significant risk of committing, an act or acts of violence that have the purpose or effect of:

(A) threatening the peace or stability of Iraq or the Government of Iraq; or

(B) undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq or to provide humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people;

(ii) to have materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, logistical, or technical support for, or goods or services in support of, such an act or acts of violence or any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order; or

(iii) to be owned or controlled by, or to have acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to this order.

: 25 Jul 2007 17:33 |  Tags: Authoritarianism Bush Executive Hypocrisy Iraq Order Police-State Property-Rights Protest Totalitarianism Tyranny War |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem