This Can't Be Happening!

Say what you will about the looming catastrophe facing the world as the pace of global heating and polar melting accelerates. There is a silver lining.

Look at a map of the US.

A massive outpouring of angry mail and phone calls to the nation's leading newspapers led to editors calling Congress members Robert Wexler (D-FL), Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), after having turned down an op-ed by the three calling for immediate hearings on the impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney.

At least one of those papers, the Miami Herald, which is in Rep. Wexler's congressional district, reversed itself and decided to run an edited version of the editorial it had rejected only days earlier.

NEWS FLASH! Rep. Wexler's petition calling for immediate impeachment hearings on Dick Cheney has passed the 100,000 signature mark! (He'll be talking about it, and I'll be interviewing him on Florida Progressive Radio Thursday, Dec. 21 at 9 pm. Listen in live on line at Florida Progressive Radio)
______________

The push for hearings on Dennis Kucinich's Cheney impeachment bill (H Res. 799) continues, with the number of signers of Wexler's petition now topping 90,000.

Over this weekend and by noon today, 82,000 Americans signed a petition sponsored by Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL) and two other members of the House Judiciary Committee, Reps. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), calling on that committee and its chairman, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) to begin immediate hearings on Rep. Dennis Kucinich's bill to impeach Vice President Dick Cheney.

There was no report in the nation's corporate media on the three Judiciary Committee members' call (they are three senior members of the House Democratic Party), and no report on the remarkable public response to their petition.

It's not being reported in the corporate media, which also refused to publish an opinion piece penned by six-term Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL), Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), and Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI). But a whopping 50,000 people responded in just one day to Rep. Wexler's call for people to sign his on-line petition supporting an immediate start to hearings on Rep. Dennis Kucinich's Cheney Impeachment bill (H Res 799)

Faced with an obstructionist leadership in the House, and a mainstream media that have forsaken their role as a Fourth Estate monitor of government abuse, three Democratic members of the House Judiciary Committee are calling on the public to demand that the Congress initiate impeachment hearings immediately against Vice President Dick Cheney.

While the Democratic and Republican candidates for president blather on about non-issues like who will be meaner to immigrants, who will use the most water on torture victims, who wanted to be president at the youngest age, who’s the best Christian and other such nonsense, and while Congress and the president dance their meaningless dance of pretend conflict, let’s for a moment ponder something more momentous.

What if the US just packed up and left Iraq and Afghanistan, and brought the troops all home, shut down the 750-odd overseas bases we operate around the globe, and slashed our military budget by 75 percent?

Hear the Nov. 12 debate on WHYY's "Radio Times" program, hosted by Marti Moss-Coane, over the question: Did Mumia Abu-Jamal Get a Fair Trial?

Dave Lindorff is the author of the book Killing Time: An Investigation into the Death Penalty Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal (Common Courage Press, 2003).

John Hayden, a private attorney and former county prosecutor from New York, is the author of a self-published book, Mumia Abu-Jamal: Patron Saint of American Cop Killers.

Hear Dave Lindorff make the case for impeaching President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, and talks about the steps that are being taken to lay the groundwork for the imposition of martial law, in a talk given Oct. 21 in West Hartford, CT.

This program was organized by Connecticut activists Marge and David Schneider. The recording was produced by Dori Smith of WHUS Radio in Mansfield, CT.