Monday, June 30, 2008

Can we afford even one more day?

Our Republic, as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, was intended to prevent us from being in the situation we find ourselves in. If everything worked as intended, Bush would never have been selected in 2000, re-elected in 2004, or would have been impeached by the end of 2007.

But everything has failed us. Our economy is declining. We're deep in debt. Our troops are bogged down in the Middle East. Our dependence on oil and fossil fuels threatens to cripple us further. (Ironic how the price of oil is hurting our economy so much, when steps to move away from it are often cast aside as likely to 'hurt our economy.')

And now, the venerable Seymour Hersh, who has been right about so many things these past eight years, brings us this: Preparing the Battlefield, a report on how the Bush Administration, with the consent of the so-called "Gang of Eight" have been stepping up covert activities inside Iran.

Who are these congressmen (and woman?) to think that they have any place in colluding with an Executive to draw us closer to a war that they seem to think is a foregone conclusion? How are these actions any different than an overt declaration of war? Of course, if we found out that Iran was leading covert operations in the U.S. to undermine our government, would we not consider that an act of war? I think we would.

The article, and other commentators elsewhere, have suggested that the Bush administration wants to do something about Iran before Bush leaves office, or that Israel might want to strike while it still has a hawkish supporter in office.

Thankfully, Bush doesn't have much time left. But every day this President is still in office, we are in danger. Can we afford even one more day, let alone seven months?

I don't think we can take that chance.

If our Republic was operating as the Founders intended, we would be well into the impeachment process by now. Little did they expect that the sacred Impeachment would become a political tool by the Republican party, and that the opposition party would be adverse to using it because there are 'better' things they could be doing--ignoring the fact that the Republicans have been obstructing everything they have tried to do, making that excuse worse than irrelevant.

Without impeachment, re-election, or any other possible consequences to his actions, this administration has no incentive to restrain itself.

When the Executive ignores the popular will, and Congress refuses to take action, what recourse is left to the ignored public?

Unfortunately, short of armed revolution, I don't see any. I don't believe, this day in age, that anything like revolution would be successful anyway--we've become too urbanized, too pampered and lazy to even consider it.

Some would say that as long as our elections are in tact and the Democrats are able to take power again, everything is A-Okay. That will be true, when it happens. But for the next seven months, we are closer to a dictatorship than we've ever been. Hopefully it will be temporary, and there is no reason to think anything will happen to prevent that, fortunately.

But my question to you is, what can we do in the meantime? Can a war with Iran be prevented? And if our worst fears are realized, and one does start... what should be done then?

(Cross-posted at DailyKos and on Facebook.)