You took an oath, Mr. Van Hollen
As required by Article VI of the Constitution, Representative Chris Van Hollen swore this oath of office for the 110th Congress:

I, Chris Van Hollen, do solemnly swear ... that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.

Mr. Van Hollen's memory of that oath may need refreshing.

As first reported on Takoma Park Impeach Bush & Cheney on Friday, Representative and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) chairman Van Hollen made some remarks about impeachment during a telephone conference call with DCCC supporters and bloggers:

A caller asked about "Congress’s constitutional responsibility to impeach," adding "How much further abuse will be required for Democratic leadership to take action?"

Representative Van Hollen replied that Democrats have "stepped up from Day 1" and that they’re now in a "big fight" over the process of how U.S. Attorneys are hired and fired, and are now using subpoena power to try to compel testimony about that matter.

However, he did not want to "consume the entire resources and efforts" of Congress on impeachment. He claimed that impeachment would "would indisputably be the whole [focus] of Congress," and that with the amount of time remaining before the next election, that would hinder Democrats’ ability to move forward on other things. He closed by reiterating the talking point that he did not want to "consume the entire resources of Congress on impeachment."

While these are discouraging words to those of us who celebrated the city of Takoma Park's impeachment resolution on Monday, there may be a silver lining -- this argument is so patently absurd that an accomplished, intelligent man like Mr. Van Hollen could surely not bear repeating it for very long. I'll look it up to make absolutely sure, but I don't believe that crops rotted in the fields, millions starved, or that Congress was unable to do other work during the Nixon and Clinton impeachment processes.

Unfortunately, once you allow for hyperbole, Van Hollen's statement is doubly discouraging. For it can surely only mean that supporting and defending the Constitution simply isn't worth it to Rep. Van Hollen, when he thinks of all the other things he wants to accomplish -- it's too costly, too much effort, too many other priorities suffer.

Too bad.

You took an oath, Mr. Van Hollen. That oath wasn't to pass an energy bill, it wasn't to raise the minimum wage, it wasn't to enact the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, it wasn't even to get us out of Iraq.

I'm sorry it's inconvenient; I'm sorry it may mean more work; I'm sorry you may pass one less highway bill. But the oath you took was to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. That is your job.

Do your job.


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CROSSPOSTED to "Daily Kos". I edited the second paragraph to read: Mr. Van Hollen is by no means the only Democratic leader whose memory of that oath seems to need refreshing. But he's my representative -- one I've voted for, one I've worked for, and one whose positions I usually support -- so I'm addressing him. An attached poll asks the question "Should Democratic leadership put impeachment on the table?"; currently 86% of the nearly 60 respondents answer "yes." Go join the fun.
posted by Thomas Nephew at 1:14:00 AM -- |    

 
County Councilmember Valerie Ervin to sponsor impeachment resolution
Via Takoma Park Impeach Bush & Cheney:

At a Wednesday evening Old Takoma Residents Association (OTRA) meeting, Montgomery County Councilmember Valerie Ervin said she would be happy to sponsor an impeachment resolution like the one Takoma Park passed on Monday.

She and her aides will be studying the Takoma Park impeachment resolution (.PDF file), which urges “our elected members of the Montgomery County Council, the Montgomery County Executive, the Maryland legislature and the Governor to consider and adopt similar resolutions.”

OTRA is a neighborhood group focused on local issues like planned development at the Takoma Metro station, the Purple Line, and the looming change in status of Washington Adventist Hospital, to name a few. It was my first meeting, and it was an education. Ms. Ervin sparred with opponents of the ICC, who challenged her (politely) to work to oppose that highway development project. She said she wouldn't do that, that the decisions had already been made; she also seemed to deny the assertion, as I understood it, that ICC funding might dry up Purple Line funding.

Ms. Ervin was happier to talk about the Purple Line -- she said young people like her son, who bikes to work, are concerned about the future of the planet, and that she wanted to try to get people out of their cars wherever possible. She said there's been rapid progress lately; planners have apparently settled on a route that would take the line through a new library to be located in Silver Spring at Bonifant and Fenton, and that will not go through the Sligo Creek Park area. Some of the construction would likely tunnel under the Wayne/Flower intersection, atop a hill too steep for a light rail system to climb. She also said that DC planners and politicians had indicated they'd "take a look at" OTRA neighborhood objections to the current plans for mixed development at the Takoma Metro. Those plans unaccountably call for a large number of 2 car garage households at a mass transit location, possibly because that's what the developer is most familiar with building.

At the end of the meeting, I finally had a chance to say why I'd come: to see if Ms. Ervin would sponsor an impeachment resolution like the one passed by Takoma Park. Suggesting that the vote on Monday showed a lot of her constituents were not only concerned about the future of the planet, but also about the future of our country's political system, I asked if she'd consider sponsoring an impeachment bill like Takoma Park's.

And she said she'd be happy to.

On general principles, I'd braced for some kind of disappointment, even though she'd taken one of our impeachment signs during the July 4th parade. After the meeting, her aide came over to ask me to send him a copy of the resolution; I offered her another lawn sign I'd brought along, and she agreed to Seth Grimes taking a picture of us with her holding it, commenting "I imagine this will be on YouTube."

The lesson, I guess, is that sometimes you just need to show up. posted by Thomas Nephew at 1:10:00 AM -- |    

 
Welcome Crooks and Liars readers
The "N" in the Crooks and Liars post refers to Monday's post, currently still on this page-- Takoma Park City Council to vote on impeachment resolution today. In it, I mention a dispute I had with Jim Henley about the value of my home town, Takoma Park, MD, passing a resolution recommending the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. To complete the explanation, Avedon Carol later called Henley's remarks "snarky." That they were, but perhaps they were simply an outburst by someone who lives nearby and is understandably jealous of those who live in our fair city.

For folks not coming here via Nicole Belle's "Crooks and Liars" post, here's the very nice impeachment roundup I'm talking about:

I is for Iraq, the dead and dying
M is for the “ Mass” in “WMD”
P is for the Presidential lying
E… Ex-ec-u-tive, u-ni-ta-ry–

A is for Attorneys who were let go
C is for the Constitution — maimed
H is for Hell we’ve made at Gitmo
M is for the Mandate that Bush claimed–

E is for the Eight-inch, cut “reporter”
N is for uNserious blogs’ snark
T is for those winger Troll supporters
… And now, the final exclamation mark!

Put them all together, they spell I-M-P-E-A-C-H-M-E-N-T-!

A word that means the world to me…

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EDIT, 7/25: Sentences with Avedon Carol and Henley links added. Hi Jim!
posted by Thomas Nephew at 12:40:00 PM -- |    

 
Mayor Kathy Porter on MSNBC after impeachment vote
Takoma Park Mayor Porter appeared on MSNBC with Tucker Carlson yesterday evening. It came as no surprise that Carlson decided to use the occasion to belittle the impeachment vote, essentially echoing Jim Henley's "silly" remark last weekend.

But Mayor Porter completely turned the tables on Carlson, responding to his foolery with calm, measured, sensible answers.

Impeachment advocates take note: having people like Mayor Porter speak on your behalf is one of the great, great benefits of passing impeachment resolutions like Takoma Park's.*

Time wouldn’t have permitted every one of Carlson’s mistakes to be rebutted — particularly when he simply repeats them and says he’s right. I’m referring to Carlson's charge that supporting impeachment is "partisan," which Mayor Porter rightly denied without elaboration -- only for Carlson to repeat, "it’s partisan because... it is partisan, obviously..."

No, it’s not. Any voting on this may well turn out to follow partisan lines, but impeachment itself isn't partisan, it’s constitutional — it’s a mechanism mentioned over and over again in our Constitution. The word is there for a reason, and that reason isn’t to benefit Democrats, Republicans, Greens, or Libertarians — it’s to benefit the country.

(Via Takoma Park Impeach Bush & Cheney)


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* In this regard, I question the value of returning to Kensington this weekend if it's mainly to confront that city's decision -- one I think is wrong -- to prevent one activist's sale of "impeach them" buttons at a local farmer's market. Rather than continuing to make the issue about button sales, I think it would be far better to go there and simply petition and distribute literature about impeachment -- and it would be better yet if the city's leadership could be persuaded to consider and adopt a pro-impeachment resolution like Takoma Park's. I don't know how likely the latter is, but I suspect it will be less likely if impeachment advocates needlessly confront Kensington about a separate issue. Protesting the abuse of zoning ordinances to limit free speech is very important -- but that has now been done. If the priority is advocating impeachment in Kensington, it seems impolitic and unwise to do so in a way sure to arouse opposition, including that of the mayor, when alternatives are available. posted by Thomas Nephew at 12:30:00 PM -- |    

 
So long, Russ

Dear Senator Feingold,

I've been impressed with you in the past, and supported your earlier censure effort. But if there ever was a time to merely censure Bush and Cheney, it is long past now that your party and (for now) mine hold majorities in both the House and Senate.

You've said yourself you believe the President has committed impeachable acts -- yet that you don't support impeachment because it is a waste of time. I submit that it's censure -- a nonbinding, empty gesture -- that's the real waste of time; impeachment, by contrast, is a Constitutional tool that needs dusting off and sharpening.

To my great surprise and disappointment, you've tried to interrupt and short-circuit progress towards a real Constitutional remedy to a real Constitutional crisis, offering instead the distraction of a toothless, worthless censure vote.

Accordingly, I request that you remove me from your e-mail list.

With regrets,

Thomas Nephew

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NOTE: "You've said yourself" -- DailyKos post, via NTodd ("Dohiyi Mir").
UPDATE, 7/24: Hmm. Maybe I'm wrong. John Nichols -- the author of "The Genius of Impeachment" who was featured on a recent Moyers program I wrote about -- thinks Feingold's censure idea is a good one:

Censure is not the cure. Impeachment is. But censuring Bush and Cheney ought not be seen as a compromise, or an insufficient response to the crisis. It is a senatorial compliment to the burgeoning movement for impeachment -- a movement that today delivered petitions with more than 1,000,000 signatures to Congressman John Conyers appealing to him to begin impeachment proceedings. Conyers, it should be noted, indicated at a recent meeting in California with members of Progressive Democrats of America that he would be receptive to appeals from other members of the House to develop a game-plan for considering serious impeachment proposals.

Supporting Feingold's censure resolutions should not distract from nor negate the push for impeachment. Rather, moves to get the Senate to censure Bush and Cheney ought to be seen as vital pieces of the broader struggle to hold this administration to account.

Via Avedon Carol ("The Sideshow"). To me, this is a pretty backhanded "senatorial compliment to the burgeoning movement for impeachment": "I am concerned about the great deal of time multiple impeachment trials would take away from the Congress working on the problems of the country." (Emphasis added.) But Feingold and Nichols have a point, of course, that impeachment per se is a House matter anyway. (So why'd Feingold bring it up?). UPDATE, EDIT, 7/25: "trials" emphasized; thus, Feingold's statement refers to the trial, which would be in the Senate. posted by Thomas Nephew at 12:30:00 PM -- |    

 
Impeachment resolution passes unanimously
On Monday evening the Takoma Park City Council unanimously approved -- and improved -- a resolution calling for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney. Sponsoring councilmember Reuben Snipper was joined by councilmembers Seamens, Barry, Williams, and Mayor Kathy Porter in the 5-0 vote. Councilmembers Austin-Lane and Clay were out of town.*

The original resolution was amended by Councilmember Seamens to also recommend that the county council and state legislature pass impeachment resolutions, and to urge Takoma Park residents to write Rep. Chris Van Hollen, Senator Ben Cardin, and Senator Barbara Mikulski asking them to support impeachment.

All of us working on this were deeply gratified (and relieved) to see very good turnout for the meeting by local impeachment supporters -- including a number of dear neighbors of mine. We had learned there would actually be local TV camera crews on hand, and hastened to try to add a little more "visuals" to the scene; an alert and quick canvass of our neighborhood produced enough American flags to add some red, white, and blue to our ubiquitous green lawn signs. A mother/daughter team also brought a banner with a striking double portrait of Bush and Cheney and the words "Partners in Crime."

I had actually happened to meet one of the news teams, from Fox 5, on Cedar Avenue on my way to the meeting. I had struck up a conversation with a neighbor about why and where I was carrying eight or nine lawn signs -- and that got filmed. A minute later, in the community center parking lot, I was interviewed -- and a couple passing by asked for another lawn sign; that got filmed too. Sometimes you just need to get lucky -- ten minutes had turned into a pretty good bit of footage, and it all got used in the news report at 10 o'clock. But of course, it wasn't just luck -- Lisa Moscatiello has done a lot of media outreach in the last week, and she's why that news team was there in the first place.

The best was yet to come. Once we were all settled in the council meeting room and other business was taken care of, the meeting was opened up to speakers -- just as my family and Maddie's pal B. arrived. So I got to say my piece with Maddie watching, which meant a lot to me. I withdrew to the side of the room after that, holding our family's U.S. flag up for the cameras -- and was really moved as one speaker after another gave proof through the evening that our country is still there. I couldn't help but think of that Norman Rockwell painting, "Freedom of Speech"; you can watch the city's own video of the meeting and see what I mean.

But since this is my blog, and I don't have the energy to transcribe everyone else's remarks, I'll weary you with my own, which were a rewrite of those I made five weeks ago.

I’m here to support the impeachment resolution sponsored by Councilman Reuben Snipper.

Tonight it seems like momentum is building for impeachment. We’ve heard that Judiciary Committee chair John Conyers is looking for just a few more representatives to endorse an impeachment resolution put forward by Kucinich, and he’ll begin impeachment hearings.

Locally, too, the response to this idea is overwhelmingly positive when we petition or go door to door. On July 4, we got a lot of support – including from Rep. Chris Van Hollen, 202-225-5341, who told parade watchers the Libby commutation was making him consider impeachment, too.

But there have also been questions that deserve answers, including, fundamentally, why bother with this? What good will a city council resolution do?

I think the short answer to "why bother?" is summed up by the question: "what if we don't even bother?" Among the terrible precedents this administration has set are: the utter sin and crime of torture. A fraudulent case for war. Abrogation of habeas corpus. Warrantless surveillance in direct defiance of specific law. A king-like disregard and contempt for other laws properly passed and signed, and a refusal to enforce them. Each of these are grounds enough for impeachment, and new ones taunt us each day – Libby’s commutation – the US Attorneys scandal (both considered impeachable by James Madison) – executive orders threatening to dispossess Iraq war opponents – refusal to honor congressional subpoenas or enforce contempt citations. Together, they add up to a administration that must be opposed, whose very policy is to flout the Constitution, to make it a dead letter instead of a living guardian of our liberties and the rule of law.

But also, unless we act now, the next administration like this one can take its lawless, amoral, unconstitutional approach as a consensus starting point, instead of a shame on this country and a reproach to its institutions.

That’s where we come in. The first three words of the Constitution are “We, the people.” We “ordain and establish” the Constitution, we are responsible for it. We, here in this room, too. You, our elected leaders, too. While Congress has hesitated discussing this, you have not, and you have my deep gratitude for that.

Tonight we’re proving that ordinary citizens and local elected leaders care deeply about their country, the Constitution, and the rule of law. I hope we’ll do more, and send a clear message to Congress – and to our own great representative, Chris Van Hollen -- that they must take up the impeachment of a president and vice president who deserve it more than anyone else in the history of this country.

So thank you all for considering this resolution, and for the opportunity to speak for it. And to all of you who vote for it: I’m sure you’ll have many other important achievements -- but I think this may be the finest thing you ever do in public office.

Thank you.

It's nice to get outside and win one every so often.



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* Ms. Austin-Lane emphasized at prior council meetings that she supported the bill. Ms. Clay did as well, judging by her "thumbs up" response to "IMPEACH THEM" lawn signs along the July 4th parade route a few weeks ago.
MORE HERE (Takoma Park Impeach Bush & Cheney): Impeachment resolution passes unanimously!!!, Impeachment resolution approved, improved posted by Thomas Nephew at 2:18:00 AM -- |    

 
Takoma Park City Council to vote on impeachment resolution today
From the "Takoma Park, MD Impeach Bush & Cheney" press release :

On Monday, July 23rd at 7:30 P.M. the Takoma Park, MD City Council will vote on a resolution that calls for Congress to begin impeachment proceedings against Vice President Cheney and President Bush. If the measure passes, Takoma Park will become the first municipality in the Washington, DC area to pass an impeachment resolution. Currently eighty towns and cities across the country have passed impeachment resolutions, including Detroit, MI, San Francisco, CA, Chapel Hill, NC, several towns in Vermont and, most recently, West Hollywood, CA. The Rules of the House of Representatives allow Congress to accept petitions from state and local governments, which are then recorded by the Clerk of the House in the Congressional Journal.

The resolution, now posted at the city's web site, was sponsored by Councilman Reuben Snipper. It lists the fraudulent case for the Iraq war, torture, warrantless electronic surveillance, indefinite detentions of American citizens, and Presidential signing statements as grounds for impeachment. A copy of the resolution, annotated with links to supporting news items and analyses, is available at the TPIB&C web site.

In the absence of action in Congress, gathering and proving local support for impeachment seems to me a good and logical place for impeachment advocates to begin. Yet resolutions like this one can sometimes unaccountably elicit eye-rolling responses -- even from some impeachment advocates. I had a friendly exchange with Jim Henley (proprietor of the deservedly popular "Unqualified Offerings" blog) about this over the weekend, after running into him and his family during Pottermania at a local Border's Books and mentioning the resolution. Henley (who has opined that just about every president since Kennedy has merited impeachment) termed the pending resolution part "silly," part "embarrassingly earnest." I responded:

I don’t think we deserve that. If Congress were showing signs of doing anything about impeachment, I might agree. But they aren’t. This is a legitimate “sense of the people” idea; assuming it passes — knock on wood — it would also tell our Congressman (and DCCC chair) Chris Van Hollen that many of his voters, many of the people he collects money from, and even many of the people he shares microphones with feel strongly about the Constitution, human rights, and the separation of powers. The resolution itself is pretty good, I think, mentioning the fraudulent case for the war, torture, indefinite detention, warrantless electronic surveillance, and signing statements as grounds for impeaching both Bush and Cheney.

There’s nothing wrong and a lot right about city councils making these kinds of things topics of respectable discussion — especially when politicians who *ought* to be doing so won’t. It gives those of us who support the idea a first rung up the ladder to work towards, and gives our reps higher up the political food chain a sense it’s not “just” DFHs who support the idea. Community petitions like this one are often a part of getting “oh it’s hopeless” ideas rolling — abolition, nuclear weapons freeze, to name a couple. Of course they don’t guarantee success. They’re just one way to start trying.

posted by Thomas Nephew at 12:30:00 PM -- |    

 
Bob Dylan - Man Of Constant Sorrow

One of my favorite tracks on one of my favorite albums -- the 2005 compilation "No Direction Home," accompanying the excellent Scorsese documentary of the same name.

I'm no long-time folkie, nor even a Dylan afficionado from way back. For some reason I was kind of standoffish about all of that back when I was a kid and later in college -- all the civil rights stuff, "how many years," Baez, Pete Seeger, and whatnot was kind of sanctified history and I quite unfairly filed it all under "boring." So it was really this documentary and this album that made me a fan. It's a fascinating and exhilarating story: a young Dylan starts with next to nothing but this drive to perform, ignites folk music into transcendence -- and then ignores the catcalls of many of those fans as he forges forward into new electric territory.

As I recall it, this recording was made in the period immediately after Dylan had been to New York City's folk scene of the early 60s, where he obviously became an accomplished performer. Someone* who'd known him from his Minneapolis days was astonished how much Dylan had grown musically in a relatively short time:

He was playing at some party or something and it was like a whole different guy. You hear those stories about the blues men who go out to the crossroads and sell their soul to the devil and come back all of a sudden able to do stuff ...Robert Johnson, Tommy Johnson, that whole mythology... it was one of those kinds of deals almost.

When he left Minneapolis he was just average -- there were five, six other guys doing the same thing. When he came back he was doing Woody and he was doing Van Ronk, he was fingerpicking, he was playing crossharp -- and this is a matter of a couple of months. I mean, this is not like he was gone a year or anything.

I'm not a musician myself, just a listener. But I love this song, and this performance -- you listen to it by itself, without the cheesy TV show staging, and suddenly it's not Dylan, it's the Colorado guy himself, an utterly believable voice from the past. Get the album, rent the DVD -- they're both superb.


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* The fellow wasn't identified during the course of this quote; I'll add it when I learn who he is. posted by Thomas Nephew at 12:07:00 AM -- |