[Nicko]

So um, what do you guys make of this?
------------------------

Is lying about the reason for a war an impeachable offense?

By John W. Dean
FindLaw Columnist
Special to CNN.com

(FindLaw) --President George W. Bush has got a very serious problem. Before asking Congress for a joint resolution authorizing the use of U.S. military forces in Iraq, he made a number of unequivocal statements about the reason the United States needed to pursue the most radical actions any nation can undertake -- acts of war against another nation.

Now it is clear that many of his statements appear to be false. In the past, Bush's White House has been very good at sweeping ugly issues like this under the carpet, and out of sight. But it is not clear that they will be able to make the question of what happened to Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) go away -- unless, perhaps, they start another war.

That seems unlikely. Until the questions surrounding the Iraqi war are answered, Congress and the public may strongly resist more of President Bush's warmaking.

Presidential statements, particularly on matters of national security, are held to an expectation of the highest standard of truthfulness. A president cannot stretch, twist or distort facts and get away with it. President Lyndon Johnson's distortions of the truth about Vietnam forced him to stand down from reelection. President Richard Nixon's false statements about Watergate forced his resignation.

Frankly, I hope the WMDs are found, for it will end the matter. Clearly, the story of the missing WMDs is far from over. And it is too early, of course, to draw conclusions. But it is not too early to explore the relevant issues.
President Bush's statements on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction

Readers may not recall exactly what President Bush said about weapons of mass destruction; I certainly didn't. Thus, I have compiled these statements below. In reviewing them, I saw that he had, indeed, been as explicit and declarative as I had recalled.

Bush's statements, in chronological order, were:

"Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for the production of biological weapons."

United Nations address, September 12, 2002

"Iraq has stockpiled biological and chemical weapons, and is rebuilding the facilities used to make more of those weapons."

"We have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons -- the very weapons the dictator tells us he does not have."

Radio address, October 5, 2002

"The Iraqi regime . . . possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons."

"We know that the regime has produced thousands of tons of chemical agents, including mustard gas, sarin nerve gas, VX nerve gas."

"We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVS for missions targeting the United States."

"The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam Hussein has held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, a group he calls his "nuclear mujahideen" -- his nuclear holy warriors. Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of its nuclear program in the past. Iraq has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons."

Cincinnati, Ohio speech, October 7, 2002

"Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent."

State of the Union Address, January 28, 2003

"Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised."

Address to the nation, March 17, 2003
Should the president get the benefit of the doubt?

When these statements were made, Bush's let-me-mince-no-words posture was convincing to many Americans. Yet much of the rest of the world, and many other Americans, doubted them.

As Bush's veracity was being debated at the United Nations, it was also being debated on campuses -- including those where I happened to be lecturing at the time.

On several occasions, students asked me the following question: Should they believe the president of the United States? My answer was that they should give the President the benefit of the doubt, for several reasons deriving from the usual procedures that have operated in every modern White House and that, I assumed, had to be operating in the Bush White House, too.

First, I assured the students that these statements had all been carefully considered and crafted. Presidential statements are the result of a process, not a moment's though. White House speechwriters process raw information, and their statements are passed on to senior aides who have both substantive knowledge and political insights. And this all occurs before the statement ever reaches the President for his own review and possible revision.

Second, I explained that -- at least in every White House and administration with which I was familiar, from Truman to Clinton -- statements with national security implications were the most carefully considered of all. The White House is aware that, in making these statements, the president is speaking not only to the nation, but also to the world.

Third, I pointed out to the students, these statements are typically corrected rapidly if they are later found to be false. And in this case, far from backpedaling from the President's more extreme claims, Bush's press secretary, Ari Fleischer had actually, at times, been even more emphatic than the President had. For example, on January 9, 2003, Fleischer stated, during his press briefing, "We know for a fact that there are weapons there."

In addition, others in the Bush administration were similarly quick to back the President up, in some cases with even more unequivocal statements. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld repeatedly claimed that Saddam had WMDs -- and even went so far as to claim he knew "where they are; they're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad."

Finally, I explained to the students that the political risk was so great that, to me, it was inconceivable that Bush would make these statements if he didn't have damn solid intelligence to back him up. Presidents do not stick their necks out only to have them chopped off by political opponents on an issue as important as this, and if there was any doubt, I suggested, Bush's political advisers would be telling him to hedge. Rather than stating a matter as fact, he would be say: "I have been advised," or "Our intelligence reports strongly suggest," or some such similar hedge. But Bush had not done so.

So what are we now to conclude if Bush's statements are found, indeed, to be as grossly inaccurate as they currently appear to have been?

After all, no weapons of mass destruction have been found, and given Bush's statements, they should not have been very hard to find -- for they existed in large quantities, "thousands of tons" of chemical weapons alone. Moreover, according to the statements, telltale facilities, groups of scientists who could testify, and production equipment also existed.

[Nicko]

So where is all that? And how can we reconcile the White House's unequivocal statements with the fact that they may not exist?

There are two main possibilities. One, that something is seriously wrong within the Bush White House's national security operations. That seems difficult to believe. The other is that the president has deliberately misled the nation, and the world.
A desperate search for WMDs has so far yielded little, if any, fruit

Even before formally declaring war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the president had dispatched American military special forces into Iraq to search for weapons of mass destruction, which he knew would provide the primary justification for Operation Freedom. None were found.

Throughout Operation Freedom's penetration of Iraq and drive toward Baghdad, the search for WMDs continued. None were found.

As the coalition forces gained control of Iraqi cities and countryside, special search teams were dispatched to look for WMDs. None were found.

During the past two and a half months, according to reliable news reports, military patrols have visited over 300 suspected WMD sites throughout Iraq. None of the prohibited weapons were found there.
British and American press reaction to the missing WMDs

British Prime Minister Tony Blair is also under serious attack in England, which he dragged into the war unwillingly, based on the missing WMDs. In Britain, the missing WMDs are being treated as scandalous; so far, the reaction in the U.S. has been milder.

New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman, has taken Bush sharply to task, asserting that it is "long past time for this administration to be held accountable." "The public was told that Saddam posed an imminent threat," Krugman argued. "If that claim was fraudulent," he continued, "the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history -- worse than Watergate, worse than Iran-contra." But most media outlets have reserved judgment as the search for WMDs in Iraq continues.

Still, signs do not look good. Last week, the Pentagon announced it was shifting its search from looking for WMD sites, to looking for people who can provide leads as to where the missing WMDs might be.

Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton, while offering no new evidence, assured Congress that WMDs would indeed be found. And he advised that a new unit called the Iraq Survey Group, composed of some 1400 experts and technicians from around the world, is being deployed to assist in the searching.

But, as Time magazine reported, the leads are running out. According to Time, the Marine general in charge explained that "[w]e've been to virtually every ammunition supply point between the Kuwaiti border and Baghdad," and remarked flatly, "They're simply not there."

Perhaps most troubling, the president has failed to provide any explanation of how he could have made his very specific statements, yet now be unable to back them up with supporting evidence. Was there an Iraqi informant thought to be reliable, who turned out not to be? Were satellite photos innocently, if negligently misinterpreted? Or was his evidence not as solid as he led the world to believe?

The absence of any explanation for the gap between the statements and reality only increases the sense that the President's misstatements may actually have been intentional lies.
Investigating The Iraqi War intelligence reports

Even now, while the jury is still out as to whether intentional misconduct occurred, the President has a serious credibility problem. Newsweek magazine posed the key questions: "If America has entered a new age of pre-emption �when it must strike first because it cannot afford to find out later if terrorists possess nuclear or biological weapons�exact intelligence is critical. How will the United States take out a mad despot or a nuclear bomb hidden in a cave if the CIA can't say for sure where they are? And how will Bush be able to maintain support at home and abroad?"

In an apparent attempt to bolster the President's credibility, and his own, Secretary Rumsfeld himself has now called for a Defense Department investigation into what went wrong with the pre-war intelligence. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd finds this effort about on par with O.J.'s looking for his wife's killer. But there may be a difference: Unless the members of Administration can find someone else to blame -- informants, surveillance technology, lower-level personnel, you name it -- they may not escape fault themselves.

Congressional committees are also looking into the pre-war intelligence collection and evaluation. Senator John Warner, R-Virginia, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said his committee and the Senate Intelligence Committee would jointly investigate the situation. And the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence plans an investigation.

These investigations are certainly appropriate, for there is potent evidence of either a colossal intelligence failure or misconduct -- and either would be a serious problem. When the best case scenario seems to be mere incompetence, investigations certainly need to be made.

Sen. Bob Graham -- a former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee -- told CNN's Aaron Brown, that while he still hopes they finds WMDs or at least evidence thereof, he has also contemplated three other possible alternative scenarios:

One is that [the WMDs] were spirited out of Iraq, which maybe is the worst of all possibilities, because now the very thing that we were trying to avoid, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, could be in the hands of dozens of groups. Second, that we had bad intelligence. Or third, that the intelligence was satisfactory but that it was manipulated, so as just to present to the American people and to the world those things that made the case for the necessity of war against Iraq.

Sen. Graham seems to believe there is a serious chance that it is the final scenario that reflects reality. Indeed, Graham told CNN "there's been a pattern of manipulation by this administration."

Graham has good reason to complain. According to the New York Times, he was one of the few members of the Senate who saw the national intelligence estimate that was the basis for Bush's decisions. After reviewing it, Graham requested that the Bush administration declassify the information before the Senate voted on the administration's resolution requesting use of the military in Iraq.

But rather than do so, CIA Director Tenet merely sent Graham a letter discussing the findings. Graham then complained that Tenet's letter only addressed "findings that supported the administration's position on Iraq," and ignored information that raised questions about intelligence. In short, Graham suggested that the Administration, by cherrypicking only evidence to its own liking, had manipulated the information to support its conclusion.

Recent statements by one of the high-level officials privy to the decision making process that lead to the Iraqi war also strongly suggest manipulation, if not misuse of the intelligence agencies. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, during an interview with Sam Tannenhaus of Vanity Fair magazine, said: "The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason." More recently, Wolfowitz added what most have believed all along, that the reason we went after Iraq is that "[t]he country swims on a sea of oil."
Worse than Watergate? A potential huge scandal if WMDs are still missing

Krugman is right to suggest a possible comparison to Watergate. In the three decades since Watergate, this is the first potential scandal I have seen that could make Watergate pale by comparison. If the Bush Administration intentionally manipulated or misrepresented intelligence to get Congress to authorize, and the public to support, military action to take control of Iraq, then that would be a monstrous misdeed.

This administration may be due for a scandal. While Bush narrowly escaped being dragged into Enron, which was not, in any event, his doing. But the war in Iraq is all Bush's doing, and it is appropriate that he be held accountable.

To put it bluntly, if Bush has taken Congress and the nation into war based on bogus information, he is cooked. Manipulation or deliberate misuse of national security intelligence data, if proven, could be "a high crime" under the Constitution's impeachment clause. It would also be a violation of federal criminal law, including the broad federal anti-conspiracy statute, which renders it a felony "to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose."

It's important to recall that when Richard Nixon resigned, he was about to be impeached by the House of Representatives for misusing the CIA and FBI. After Watergate, all presidents are on notice that manipulating or misusing any agency of the executive branch improperly is a serious abuse of presidential power.

Nixon claimed that his misuses of the federal agencies for his political purposes were in the interest of national security. The same kind of thinking might lead a President to manipulate and misuse national security agencies or their intelligence to create a phony reason to lead the nation into a politically desirable war. Let us hope that is not the case.

John Dean, a FindLaw columnist, is a former counsel to the president of the United States.

[zigzag]

Interesting. Dean has mistakenly taken at least some of the reports at face value (e.g. Wolfowitz' quote about oil). On the other hand, the Bush quotes are on the record. And Dean knows this territory well - he was chief counsel for Nixon and his testimony about what Nixon knew was probably the most sensational of the Watergate hearings. Still, it's premature, and he seems overly eager.

I expect that unless an extremely hot smoking gun is found in the administration, the opposition (and I include McCain in that group) will make hay of this but won't seek impeachment. As we know from the Clinton episode, it's too risky, the public doesn't have a taste for it. Even if a smoking gun were found, I'd rather not see it develop into an impeachment-level proceeding. But if serious weapons aren't found, it could have a real impact on the election, especially if the economy remains sluggish.

Ironic how people are saying "Jeez, I sure hope we find WMD!"

I believe the administration massaged the evidence (most administrations do), but it's too early to say whether it's as serious as Dean suggests.

[SimeyTheLimey]

We have elections in this country. If you think that a politican lied, or just made a bad judgement call, you vote for the other candidate in the next election. That's how it works. You don't go crying to mommy and calling the impeachment cops. Two presidents have been impeached (Johnson and Clinton). Both times the impeachments were politically-motivated vendettas by opponants who knew hey didn't have enough support to win fairly. If Democrats turn to impeachment, it will be an admission that they know they will lose in 2004 (as it was, in my opinion, when the Republicans impeached Clinton).


But in fact, there will be no impeachment because there are a number of practical hurdles:

1. Congress saw most of the same intelligence that the president did. It was their call whether or not to authorize the war. They voted to authorize. If they try to impeach for this decision, they will end up impeaching themselves -- maybe not literally, but figeratively. If there is a scandal, they are not going to want to remind everyone that they willingly took part.

2. Impeachment is inevitably political. Both houses of Congress are Republican. It is possible for a party to turn on its leader (the GOP turned on Nixon), but there has to be real misfeasance for that to happen. So far, this "scandal" is only of interest to the extreme left, and Buchaninite right -- the same people who opposed the war all along. Until the rest of us see a problem, there will be no impeachment.

3. Impeachment isn't like a vote of confidence in a parliamentary democacy. It doesn't cause an entire government to fall. Impeachment only removes the individual officeholder who is impeached. Do you really want Cheney to be president?

[moki]

Originally posted by Nicko:
So um, what do you guys make of this?

I actually found it to be an interesting reasonably written column. However, if we're going to impeach Mr. Bush, we should retroactively impeach Mr. Clinton, too. (check out his statements vis-a-vis Iraq and WMD in 1998 just before he bombed Iraq)

*If* Mr. Bush actually lied about WMD, then I would indeed heartily support impeaching him. However, I find it extremely unlikely that this occurred. My opinion is summed up here:

http://www.ambrosiasw.com/webboard/F...ML/006495.html

[zigzag]

Originally posted by moki:
I actually found it to be an interesting reasonably written column. However, if we're going to impeach Mr. Bush, we should retroactively impeach Mr. Clinton, too.

Which is why I'd rather not see it head that way, even if somebody proves that Bush lied. If mere lying becomes the standard, we'll never move forward.

I take it for granted that politicians lie, and that Bush lied (or, if people want to be euphemistic about it, "exaggerated", "spun", "misrepresented", etc.). I don't even understand why people waste breath debating the question. I think what matters to most of the electorate is results, and I suspect that the Democrats (and McCain) understand this well enough to make hay out of the controversy (or scandal, as the case may be) but not seek impeachment. I agree with Simey that unless something totally unexpected pops up, we should deal with it through the ballot box.

[bracken]

It depends what your definition of sex, I mean, lying is.

[Lerkfish]

-

[Zimphire]

I guess we will see in 2004.

[BRussell]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
We have elections in this country. If you think that a politican lied, or just made a bad judgement call, you vote for the other candidate in the next election. That's how it works. You don't go crying to mommy and calling the impeachment cops. Two presidents have been impeached (Johnson and Clinton). Both times the impeachments were politically-motivated vendettas by opponants who knew hey didn't have enough support to win fairly. If Democrats turn to impeachment, it will be an admission that they know they will lose in 2004 (as it was, in my opinion, when the Republicans impeached Clinton).

You seem here to be going beyond this case with Bush and saying that impeachment is never valid, and presidents should only be accountable to the ballot box. I disagree with ya there, and I wonder if you really mean to suggest that. Nixon, for example, proves that impeachment works.

I also disagree that only extremists care about this. Wouldn't you care if, for example, the politicals put pressure on the intelligence people to faslify information in order to justify this war? Whether or not that's impeachable, I think it's "care"-able.

The arguments I hear are 1. WMDs will be found, or 2. they were destroyed immediately before the war. You don't hear too many people saying "I don't care if there were never any WMDs and the Bush admin knew it all along."

[Spliffdaddy]

I don't care if there were never any WMDs and the Bush admin knew it all along.


Freeing the Iraqi citizens is a good reason on its own.

[BRussell]

Originally posted by Spliffdaddy:
I don't care if there were never any WMDs and the Bush admin knew it all along.

[macvillage.net]

It's not an impeachable offense when most of the government is the same party.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by BRussell:
You seem here to be going beyond this case with Bush and saying that impeachment is never valid, and presidents should only be accountable to the ballot box.

I think that impeachment is very rarely valid. In the cases of Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton it was invalid. In the case of Nixon it probably was valid. What Nixon did subverted the political system and abused power. That wasn't the case with either Johnson or Clinton and it isn't the case here (assuming, for the sake of argument that there is any truth to the allegations). What Bush is accused of is making a policy call that many disagree with. That is politics, not "high crimes and misdemeanors."

If that is a real issue, then it should be dealt with openly in an election. It should not be the subject of a criminal indictment - which is what impeachment more-or-less is. Such an issue should be decided by the people, not by members of congress acting as a court. Using impeachment to decide policy disagreements is misusing the impeachment process for political ends. If your concern is the abuse of power, then that ought to worry you.

[BRussell]

Originally posted by Spliffdaddy:
Freeing the Iraqi citizens is a good reason on its own.

Oh I didn't see this last time.

Good for you Spliffdaddy. I think it's great that so many hardliners became wonderful humanitarians when they didn't find WMDs.

[Lerkfish]

-

[Zimphire]

Originally posted by Spliffdaddy:
Freeing the Iraqi citizens is a good reason on its own.

SHHHHH your ruining their rant.

[Zimphire]

Originally posted by BRussell:
Oh I didn't see this last time.

Good for you Spliffdaddy. I think it's great that so many hardliners became wonderful humanitarians when they didn't find WMDs.

Ah, the old "Conservatives are evil mean people that aren't compassionate" Silliness.

[Millennium]

A sitting President can be impeached for "high crimes and misdemeanors". The question, therefore, can be restated, "would lying about the reason for a war be qualify as a 'high crime or misdemeanor'?" My following statements all assume for the sake of argument that Bush did in fact lie; I'm not convinced of that yet myself.

The answer: I don't know. It's not perjury, because he wasn't under oath (unlike his predecessor), but it could be considered a kind of fraud. Theoretically you might even be able to call it slander, though that's a bit of a stretch. Regardless, though, you'd first have to prove that Bush knowingly lied about the weapons of mass destruction (he is afforded the same "innocent until proven guilty" protection as any other US citizen).

That's not going to be easy. The laws concerning this sort of thing are different in the US than in some other nations. It's not enough for the statements to be untrue; the accused has to have known those statements to be untrue at the time they were made. As it is, that's probably impossible to prove in this case, since the inspections were designed in such a way that they could never have proven that there were no weapons. And unfortunately for the conspiracy theorists, the US couldn't have engineered that, as they had practically no say in the design of the inspections process (this being, interestingly enough, at the insistence of Iraq). So even if Bush and company lied, there may be no case to present.

To be perfectly frank, I wouldn't be surprised if Bush had been duped. I've long thought that he's little more than a fall guy for the truly dangerous folks in the administration, like Ashcroft. They can deflect the blame for their own traitorous deeds onto him, and thus get off more or less scot-free.

[Lerkfish]

-

[boots]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
I agree, I think it's more than plausible that Bush was duped. consider Rumsfeld's creation of a separate CIA. After all, Bush was not part of the original neocon group (rumsfeld, wolfowitz, perle, cheney). Securing Iraq as part of a larger reshaping of the middle east agenda was part of their plan they kept trying to push through long before Bush was prez.

Yep. It fits his MO too. When he puts together a team to study a problem, he has a proven track record of supporting their recommendations. 9/11 made him listen the the hawks.

I don't necessarily agree that he didn't understand what and why...just that he would follow their lead.

[BRussell]

Originally posted by Millennium:
The answer: I don't know. It's not perjury, because he wasn't under oath (unlike his predecessor), but it could be considered a kind of fraud. Theoretically you might even be able to call it slander, though that's a bit of a stretch.

So are you saying that the president must be guilty of a specific US law in order to be guilty of a high crime and misdemeanor? I don't know. I doubt it. (Just speaking in general terms, not about the Bush case.)

Who, other than Congress, determines whether a specific law has been broken? Who ensures that the president has been treated fairly (e.g., burden of proof like you mentioned)? No one. As Simey says, it's basically a political process rather than a legal one, so I'm not sure that your legal analysis really applies. Maybe it should apply, but I'm not even sure about that. Isn't it possible for a president to do something perfectly legal and yet still be deserving of impeachment. What if a president launches nuclear weapons at Canada? OK, that might not be such a bad idea, but you get the idea.

[bewebste]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
I think that impeachment is very rarely valid. In the cases of Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton it was invalid. In the case of Nixon it probably was valid.

<nitpick>
Nixon was never actually impeached, since he resigned before they could impeach him. They certainly were going to though, and yes, it probably would have been valid.
</nitpick>

[Millennium]

Originally posted by BRussell:
So are you saying that the president must be guilty of a specific US law in order to be guilty of a high crime and misdemeanor? I don't know. I doubt it. (Just speaking in general terms, not about the Bush case.)

"Crime" and "misdemeanor" imply that a specific law has been broken, at least under the US legal system; this falls under the right to know what one is being accused of. As a US citizen, Bush is not subject to the laws of any other nation, and international law has its own method of dealing with things like this.

Therefore, yes, the President does in fact have to be guilty of a specific US law in order to be impeached.

Who, other than Congress, determines whether a specific law has been broken?

Ordinarily, the courts determine whether a specific law has been broken. The President, members of Congress (including Senators), and Supreme Court justices run under a different system, however (they don't go through the "normal" legal system, as a safeguard against a branch going corrupt and having members of the other branches arrested).

This system works as follows. First, Congress must decide whether or not to initiate hearings (that is, whether a crime may have been committed); this is what is known as "impeachment" and is analogous to being arraigned in the normal legal system. Only three presidents have ever been impeached: Johnson, Nixon, and Clinton.

If the President is impeached then another set of hearings, analogous to a trial, are performed. This is overseen by the Supreme Court, with Congress acting as jury. This is where it is decided whether or not the accused is guilty of the crime.

Finally comes sentencing. No President has ever gotten this far. The most severe punishment which can be dealt is removal from office. However, the other reason to not go through the normal legal system is that this also gets around the double-jeopardy rule; once out of the high levels of government, the convicted can be tried again, through the normal legal system, and sentenced there.

Who ensures that the president has been treated fairly (e.g., burden of proof like you mentioned)? No one.

That is dealt with chiefly through the electoral process, unfortunately. The three impeachments in US history have all been massive media events, so it is difficult for the public to not be aware of what is going on. Getting involved in an impeachment is risky business for a politician's career, and this is intended to keep them on the up and up.

Isn't it possible for a president to do something perfectly legal and yet still be deserving of impeachment.

From a moral standpoint, perhaps, but not from a legal one. This was an argument used by many Democrats during the Clinton scandals, actually. The line of reasoning went that sure, he was scum, but adultery isn't a crime under federal law, and even in those states with laws against adultery it's not considered serious enough to be an impeachable offense. This line of reasoning ignored the perjury aspect of the impeachment, but modulo that, the logic was sound.

What if a president launches nuclear weapons at Canada? OK, that might not be such a bad idea, but you get the idea.

Unless the President overstepped their authority in doing so (i.e. by not getting approval from Congress and having not been attacked first), then no, that would not merit impeachment, at least from a legal standpoint. However, that President had damn well better have a good reason for launching nuclear weapons at Canada, or there will be hell to pay come election day (and probably even sooner than that).

[Lerkfish]

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[zigzag]

Originally posted by Millennium:
However, that President had damn well better have a good reason for launching nuclear weapons at Canada . . .

Rita McNeil. Enough said.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
We have elections in this country. If you think that a politican lied, or just made a bad judgement call, you vote for the other candidate in the next election. That's how it works. You don't go crying to mommy and calling the impeachment cops. Two presidents have been impeached (Johnson and Clinton). Both times the impeachments were politically-motivated vendettas by opponants who knew hey didn't have enough support to win fairly. If Democrats turn to impeachment, it will be an admission that they know they will lose in 2004 (as it was, in my opinion, when the Republicans impeached Clinton).

[chris v]

Originally posted by zigzag:
Rita McNeil. Enough said.

The UN might even back you up if you can get her and Celine Dion in the same strike. Talk about your crimes against humanity...

CV

[BRussell]

Originally posted by Millennium:
"Crime" and "misdemeanor" imply that a specific law has been broken, at least under the US legal system; this falls under the right to know what one is being accused of. As a US citizen, Bush is not subject to the laws of any other nation, and international law has its own method of dealing with things like this.

Therefore, yes, the President does in fact have to be guilty of a specific US law in order to be impeached.

Nah, there's been debate on that question during impeachment hearings, and it's really an open question. And in the end it's up to the Congress and there probably is no judicial review, so there really are no rules about what is an impeachable offense. Again, who ensures that the president broke a law?

Ordinarily, the courts determine whether a specific law has been broken. The President, members of Congress (including Senators), and Supreme Court justices run under a different system, however (they don't go through the "normal" legal system, as a safeguard against a branch going corrupt and having members of the other branches arrested).

But of course that's exactly what impeachment is - one branch going after another.

This system works as follows. First, Congress must decide whether or not to initiate hearings (that is, whether a crime may have been committed); this is what is known as "impeachment" and is analogous to being arraigned in the normal legal system. Only three presidents have ever been impeached: Johnson, Nixon, and Clinton.

Impeachment is the result of the House's hearings, not the decision whether to have the hearing. Nixon wasn't impeached.

I shouldn't care about these points, but you have an odd pedagogical posting style that makes we want to correct you.

Unless the President overstepped their authority in doing so (i.e. by not getting approval from Congress and having not been attacked first), then no, that would not merit impeachment, at least from a legal standpoint. However, that President had damn well better have a good reason for launching nuclear weapons at Canada, or there will be hell to pay come election day (and probably even sooner than that).

Again, I'm not sure I agree. Should there really be no way to remove a president from office who is damaging the country, even if it's not illegal?

You raised an interesting point that I had forgotten about - that impeachment "sentencing" may not necessarily involve removal from office. I think Clinton was treated horribly by the "investigation politics" that was going on during his presidency, but even so, I think he probably should have been punished for what he did - lying and obstructing justice in the Paula Jones case. He probably should have been convicted by the Senate and censured or something.

[Millennium]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
hmmmm...now why does that scenario(minus nukes) sound so familiar?

That depends on your point of view. Congress basically gave him the authority to attack Iraq with their "fire-at-will bill". Now, the question is, was that legal?

Perhaps, perhaps not. There is some precedent to support the claim that it was; Congress often delegates regulatory power to various government agencies (the FCC comes to mind). These regulations are given the force of law, though Congress can kill those regulations at any time, similar to executive orders. At the same time, this sort of regulatory power is itself somewhat shaky, and it could be argued that Congress shouldn't be able to do that either.

Also, it brings up the question: let's say that the fire-at-will bill was unconstitutional. The President then acted in accordance with a law that was unconstitutional, but hadn't been found to be so at the time. What the heck do you do in a situation like that? Does the prohibition on ex post facto laws apply, such that the President couldn't be condiered guilty because at the time the acts were committed the law allowed them, or does the fact that the law was unconstitutional nullify that?

[boots]

Originally posted by Millennium:
That depends on your point of view. Congress basically gave him the authority to attack Iraq with their "fire-at-will bill". Now, the question is, was that legal?

What if he provided false information on which congress based the bill? Isn't that some kind of attempt to defraud the government?

[Lerkfish]

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[Lerkfish]

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[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by bewebste:
<nitpick>
Nixon was never actually impeached, since he resigned before they could impeach him. They certainly were going to though, and yes, it probably would have been valid.
</nitpick>

True. The articles of impeachment were prepared, but Nixon preempted them by resigning. I should have said "would have been valid" (but note: I did say only two presidents have been impeached). Anyway, fair nitpick.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by BRussell:
So are you saying that the president must be guilty of a specific US law in order to be guilty of a high crime and misdemeanor? I don't know. I doubt it. (Just speaking in general terms, not about the Bush case.)

Who, other than Congress, determines whether a specific law has been broken? Who ensures that the president has been treated fairly (e.g., burden of proof like you mentioned)? No one. As Simey says, it's basically a political process rather than a legal one, so I'm not sure that your legal analysis really applies. Maybe it should apply, but I'm not even sure about that. Isn't it possible for a president to do something perfectly legal and yet still be deserving of impeachment. What if a president launches nuclear weapons at Canada? OK, that might not be such a bad idea, but you get the idea.

No, it doesn't take a specific law. As in most things, the Constitution isn't terribly helpful on the specifics. But the standard clearly ought to be something more than a political disagreement if only for political stability reasons. If you want to turn this country into a banana republic, I can think of few things better than substituting political scandals and politically motivated indictments for regularly-held elections. Go down that road and I guarantee that impeachment will go from a twice in every two hundred years exceptional event to once per presidential term. You will set up a tit-for-tat between the parties that you will not be able to stop.

That's Newt Gingrich's road, I'd prefer to avoid that. My basic opinion is that you should trust the people to evaluate their leaders, not the lawyers. If there is a scandal, then bring it up at the next election and let the people decide. That is how democracies govern themselves.