Amazing what you find if you read the rules. This hasn’t gotten a lot of play in the media yet, but I suspect it will.
It turns out there are various methods of setting a federal impeachment in motion: 1) By charges made on the floor by a member of the House; 2) By charges preferred by a memorial filed by a House member; 3) By charges contained in a Resolution introduced by a House member; 4) By a message from the President; 5) By charges transmitted by a State legislature, or a grand jury; 6) By facts developed and reported by an investigating committee of the House. (You can find the rules in question, here, it’s on page three of the PDF.)
In other words, it’s not just members of the house than can introduce motions of impeachment. So various state legislators have introduced impeachment proceedings against Bush in their own state legislatures. Illinois has, California has, Vermont’s going to, and I have a sneaking suspicion that Louisiana just might want to. Call it a hunch.
Now, here’s the part that’s interesting, and that I haven’t seen mentioned anywhere else: There is one other landmine that Bush has no control over, one other avenue to impeachment– Patrick Fitzgerald and his federal grand jury, currently investigating the Plame/CIA leak case.
Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, that either Cheney or Bush lied under oath, or worked to conceal or hide facts of the case. That’s perjury and/or obstruction of justice. If Fitzgerald can make the case, he can not only indict them for perjury, he can start impeachment proceedings against them immediately. He even has precedent to point to with the Clinton impeachment, which was brought for perjury and obstruction of justice in a civil suit. Perjury in a criminal case could be much worse.
As always, I’m not a lawyer– but this seems pretty solid to me. I defer to Christy Hardin Smith to tell me if I’m wrong. But I think Fitz could get Bush and Cheney impeached, if the facts lean that way. And if that’s true, the Administration could be in for a world of hurt.
Oh, and while we’re at it, you don’t automatically get $500 if you land on Free Parking, either.
Interesting… Worth keeping an eye on these various fronts.
And it looks like they play Monopoly in *your* house different than they play it in *my* house, buddy.
You’re one of those people who not only gets $500, you also get all the money from Luxury Tax and Jail fees, aren’t you?
Man, you probably play with unlimited houses and hotels, too, with uneven building codes. You might even be one of those weirdos who gets an extra $200 if you actually land on GO…