Ding, Damn, the Witch Ain't Dead


So we’re calling ‘em pretty good here at Rosebud; in July we called for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld; the day before the election we predicted the end of the Rove-ian era. The American people have spoken, as they say, and the effect is exhilaration. Let freedom ring! If we have anything to thank George Bush and Co. for, it's waking the great democratic beast from its Cheetohs-and-American-Idol-induced slumber and reminding it that it has a Constitution to defend. Rooooooooaaar! But Tuesday was only the beginning.

Notice who has been curiously absent during this better-than-hoped-for upheaval: the “real” president, V.P. Dick Cheney. It’s another symptom of the Vice President’s seemingly colossal arrogance that he can’t come out and graciously give the Democrats—and the American people—their due. Wake up, for God’s sake, Mr. Cheney. Your administration came to power first by one dangling Supreme Court vote, and then by an extremely slim margin (if you can even believe the results of the iffy 2004 election), and yet you have ruled over us like a sly-faced martinet, as if we had given you an absolute mandate. Not so. Read the paper. Turn your television on. Emerge from your dark castle.

Americans by and large are not your kind, you and your Machiavellian crew. They, we, are marked by a good common sense which tells us that usually it’s better to just live and let live; that if gay people want to get married, oh, what the hell; that what we need is a living wage and affordable health care and housing and protection for the environment and education for our children; the things that make life good; not Democrat or Republican things, but what’s fair and right; and if the Democrats are taking up these causes, then that’s who we’ll vote in.

The best thing that happened on Tuesday, besides the time’s-up bell for Rumsfeld, was the ascension of Nancy Pelosi to Speaker of the House: an elegant, classy lady who knows how to call a spade a spade (she has called the president an incompetent liar—learn, Democrats!) and most importantly, sees the debacle in Iraq as a real threat to the future of this country, her five children and six grandchildren. I just hope politics on the big stage won’t water her down too much. She’s already talking massive conciliation. Let’s just hope it’s just her public face and she’ll continue to work behind the scenes for what she really believes in—as she did in convincing Senator John Murtha to be outspoken on his opposition to the war.

There are several pitfalls in being too conciliatory, at this juncture. The Democrats could greatly underestimate the people’s will to see the crimes of the Bush administration prosecuted. In assuming, as Pelosi seems to, at least publicly, that we just want to “get on with it” and let Bush bygones by bygones, the Democrats could squander an enormous amount of political capital, and also fail to do what’s right. The Republicans wasted a whole lot of our time and $100 million of our taxpayers’ dollars impeaching Bill Clinton for an ill-advised, and yet consensual, sexual indiscretion. The country thought it was crazy, and yet that doesn’t mean that we should ignore what is not crazy; what is, in fact, our moral imperative:

Bringing Bush administration officials to justice for knowingly lying about the reasons for sending American men and women to war; for enabling their cronies to illegally profit from this war with no-bid contracts and sweetheart deals (and the electricity in Baghdad still isn’t on!).

Bringing justice to bear on those who allowed men, women and children to die needlessly in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Between the war and Katrina, literally thousands of Americans have died as a direct result of the Bush administration’s actions, or inaction. These are crimes of Biblical proportions which one happy election doesn’t wash away. We need justice; but first, we need real investigations.

Another fortuitous result of Tuesday’s election was the probable appointment of John Conyers (D.-Michigan) to the House Judiciary Committee. Conyers has suggested that he believes the president has “engaged in impeachable offenses.” If so, are we just going turn away our eyes now that the Democrats have gained some power, Madame Speaker-To-Be? Isn’t there a Constitutional responsibility in this somewhere? The Democrats can never go wrong if they continue to insist on what is right; the American people will never leave them.

And speaking of what is politically inconvenient, for some, there is the question of 9/11. Nearly 50% of the American people believe there needs to be a new investigation, beyond the one handily managed by former Republican Governor and oil man Tom Kean and Bush insider and co-author of the war on terror Philip Zelikow. Most Americans are still unaware that the Bush administration refused to release documents, evidence, pertaining to 9/11 to the Kean Commission, but you Democrats in the House and Senate are well aware of this, all of you. So what are you going to do about it now?

The Bush administration has well over a year to continue governing in their reckless manner. They have over a year to continue waging their beloved war. They have over a year to try and come up with justifications for it, to bring the American people back to a place of fear and terror, instead of the beautiful place of freedom and power where we are now.

How do we keep them from doing this?

Re-opening the 9/11 investigation would be a very good start.