House Judiciary Hearing: Determination of Strength of Evidence for Impeachment of President George Bush

House Judiciary Hearing: Determination of

Strength of Evidence for Impeachment of

President George Bush

On Friday, of last week, the House Judiciary Committee, under the Chairmanship, of Representative John Conyers met for five hours, at the capitol. The committee interviewed and heard testimony from a number of law professors, attorney generals, one former member of congress, who had been a member, of the House Committee, which was charged with the impeachment proceedings, of former President Bill Clinton, along with the Congressional Representative, Dennis Kucinich, who is the author of the Resolution to begin impeachment proceedings, read the formal Resolution on the floor of the House. Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, made the decision, to allow the House Judiciary Committee to hold a hearing of determination to see if there was sufficient evidence to forward a resolution to the full House of Representatives, to begin impeachment proceedings against the President of the United States.

Representative Kucinich, stated that Senate Joint Resolutions 45 and 114 outlining the reasons for going to war against Iraq, were in effect, not an honest presentation of the facts, as outlined in the initial reports prepared by the CIA, and other reporting authories. This fact was known by the Administration, according to Mr. Kucinich, because the Administration had taken out any caveats, in the original reports, which stated that there was a possibility of a certain thing and not that it was a fact. Or that this may be the case and instead made it definitive, In other words the reports given to Congress were stated as fact and not possibilities. The original reports also included, according to testimony, that Iraq and Saddam Hussein presented no imminent threat to the United States, was not found in the report given to Congress. Then there was former head of the CIA, George Tenet who is said to have stated, that the report was a “slam dunk”.

Various members of the House spoke, and most were true to their party line, Republicans having no interest in proceeding with any impeachment hearing or having the full house, consider a resolution to begin such a hearing. The Democrats were mostly on the other side, thinking that there was sufficient evidence to go forward, to have a hearing to decide, if an impeachment of the President was warranted. One Democrat said that he was not interested in leading a charge, to impeach the President. The points raised in the hearing were, the signing statements that, in effect muted the bills that the President signed into law, of which there are reportedly 1,100, at this point in time, the firing of nine U. S. Attorney Generals, who would not tow the line for Republicans who wanted Democrats investigated and cited for crimes, before the 2006 election, the warrant less wiretapping of citizens of the United States, by tele- communications companies, at the behest of the Federal Government, ( which by the way, Congress, passed a law protecting those companies recently), and possible other abuses of executive privilege, on the part of the current administration.

The Republicans and some members on the panel testifying, argued that it would have to be proven that the President and the Administration, knew that the report, as presented to Congress was inaccurate and was presented that way, in order to mislead Congress and to perpetrate a an invasion and war with Iraq, based on falsified and selected information, and to convince Congress that there was an imminent threat, posed by Iraq. Also, that it was intentional, on the part of the Administration to formulate an invalid reason to start an unnecessary war.

The Democrats argued that there were enough facts, just based on the original reports and the sanitized versions of the reports presented to Congress, to move forward, to the full House. Judiciary House Committee Chairman, John Conyers, stated as the hearing came to an end, after five hours, that this was the most important hearing held, during the 110th Congress. The transcript of the hearing, Mr. Conyers stated, in essence, would be held open for a period of time, for any other necessary additions to the transcript.

The transcript will be reviewed by House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, who has stated previously, that any impeachment of the President, would be off the table, there has been no indication that she has changed her mind, but she, by allowing this hearing to take place, evidently wanted the Judiciary Committee information to be made a matter of Congressional Record.