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The following is a list of reasons the people vote for the impeachment of President Bush:
1) Seizing power to wage wars of aggression in defiance of the U.S. Constitution…..
2) Lying to the people of the U.S…..
3) Authorizing, ordering and condoning direct attacks on civilians…..
4) Instituting a secret and illegal wiretapping …..
5) Threatening the independence and sovereignty of Iraq …..
6) Authorizing, ordering and condoning assassinations…..
7) Making, ordering and condoning false statements and propaganda …..
8) Violations and subversions of the Charter of the United Nations and international law…..
9) Acting to strip United States citizens of their constitutional and human rights…..
10) Ordering indefinite detention of non-citizens in the United States and elsewhere…..
11) Ordering and authorizing the Attorney General to override judicial orders …..
12) Authorizing secret military tribunals and summary execution …..
13) Refusing to provide public disclosure of the identities and locations of persons who have been arrested…..
14) Use of secret arrests of persons within the United States…..
15) Authorizing the monitoring of confidential attorney-client privileged communications by the government. …..
16) Ordering and authorizing the seizure of assets of persons in the United States…..
17) Engaging in criminal neglect in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina…..
18) Institutionalization of racial and religious profiling and authorization of domestic spying …..
19) Refusal to provide information and records …..
20) Rejecting treaties protective of peace and human rights …..
WASHINGTON -- President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.
Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ''whistle-blower" protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research.
"'I don’t give a goddamn,' Bush retorted. 'I’m the President and the Commander-in-Chief. Do it my way.'
"'Mr. President,' one aide in the meeting said. 'There is a valid case that the provisions in this law undermine the Constitution.'
"'Stop throwing the Constitution in my face,' Bush screamed back. 'It’s just a goddamned piece of paper!'"
• The government could bug, wiretap, or search anyone in America for up to 15 days without going to any court.
• The government could seize personal information about Americans (including credit information, educational transcripts, etc.) in a wide range of circumstances without the approval of any court.
• Individuals and groups which advocate Second Amendment rights could be classified as "foreign powers" and subjected to electronic surveillance for up to one year without the approval of any court.
• DSEA could allow members and supporters of gun rights organizations to be stripped of their citizenship, arrested and held indefinitely without charges, here or abroad, in secret at a secret location without access to an attorney or benefit of constitutional protections.
• Allows the federal government to create and sustain a DNA database of "suspected" terrorists, with the federal government exercising unfettered discretion over who is a "suspected" terrorist. Under this law, a "suspected" terrorist would be any person whom the U.S. Attorney General says is a "suspected" terrorist.
Authorized by an executive order signed by President Bush in 2002, the extralegal spying program enables the NSA to engage in covert domestic surveillance of American citizens and foreign nationals. Revealed to the public last year by the New York Times, the NSA's controversial program has become the subject of contentious debate. After the Senate decided not to pursue an inquiry into the program at the insistence of vice president Cheney, the EFF and several other organizations filed suits against the government and the telecommunications companies that facilitated the program. The federal government tried to crush the litigation by invoking the state secrets privilege. Although the ACLU's case was dismissed, Judge Vaughn Walker rejected the state secrets argument, and decided to permit the EFF to pursue its case against AT&T. The Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation lawsuit against the NSA was also permitted. Characterizing the program as unconstitutional, Judge Anna Diggs Taylor ordered the NSA to halt unwarranted surveillance activity earlier this month.
"This bill is all about authorizing the president to invade the homes, e-mails and telephone conversations of American citizens in ways that are expressly forbidden by law," Sen. Patrick Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who serves as the committee's co-chairman, said in a statement Wednesday.
Critics also argued that the measure erodes Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures by allowing the FISA court to issue blanket approval for an entire surveillance program, rather than for individual, targeted wiretaps.
Congress passed a controversial bill which grants the President the right to commandeer Federal or even state National Guard Troops and use them inside the United States. This bill, entitled the John Warner Defense Appropriation Act for Fiscal Year 2007 (H.R. 5122.ENR), contains a provision, (Section 1076) which allows the President to:
“...employ the armed forces, including the National Guard in Federal service, to...
1. restore public order and enforce the laws of the United States when, as a result of a natural disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency, terrorist attack or incident, or other condition in any State or possession of the United States..., where the President determines that,...domestic violence has occurred to such an extent that the constituted authorities of the State or possession are incapable of maintaining public order;
2. suppress, in a State, any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy...” [3]
Senator Patrick Leahy and others have condemned Section 1076 because it effectively nullifies the Posse Comitatus Act and the Insurrection Act (10 U.S.C. 331-335) and gives the President the legal ability to define under what conditions martial law may be declared. [4]
n a stealth maneuver, President Bush has signed into law a provision which, according to Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), will actually encourage the President to declare federal martial law (1). It does so by revising the Insurrection Act, a set of laws that limits the President's ability to deploy troops within the United States. The Insurrection Act (10 U.S.C.331 -335) has historically, along with the Posse Comitatus Act (18 U.S.C.1385), helped to enforce strict prohibitions on military involvement in domestic law enforcement. With one cloaked swipe of his pen, Bush is seeking to undo those prohibitions.
Public Law 109-364, or the "John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007" (H.R.5122) (2), which was signed by the commander in chief on October 17th, 2006, in a private Oval Office ceremony, allows the President to declare a "public emergency" and station troops anywhere in America and take control of state-based National Guard units without the consent of the governor or local authorities, in order to "suppress public disorder."
An extraordinary Presidential Executive Order, signed into law by President Bush on May 22 but kept out of the pages of the US media, further underscores the real motivations behind the illegal US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Ostensibly drawn up in order to protect Iraq’s oil wealth, Executive Order (EO) 13303, “Protecting the Development Fund for Iraq and Certain Other Property in Which Iraq Has an Interest”, provides unlimited authority for US corporations to loot Iraqi oil and grants them permanent immunity from any legal actions over the consequences.
EO 13303 begins with a declaration that the possibility of future legal claims on Iraq’s oil wealth constitutes “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.” It goes on to state that “any ... judicial process is prohibited, and shall be deemed null and void” with regard to the Development Fund for Iraq, as well as for any commercial operation conducted by US corporations involved in the Iraqi oil industry.
Section 1(b) of the EO eliminates all judicial process for “all Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons.”
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."
"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."
"Our intelligence officials estimate that Saddam Hussein had the materials to produce as much as 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent."
"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."
The study counted 935 false statements in the two-year period. It found that in speeches, briefings, interviews and other venues, Bush and administration officials stated unequivocally on at least 532 occasions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or was trying to produce or obtain them or had links to al-Qaida or both.
"It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida," according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. "In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003."
Bush led with 259 false statements, 231 about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 28 about Iraq's links to al-Qaida, the study found. That was second only to Powell's 244 false statements about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 10 about Iraq and al-Qaida.
America is safer
"The Bush-Cheney team have turned the United States into a family business," says Harvey Wasserman, author of The Last Energy War (Seven Stories Press, 2000). "That's why we haven't seen Cheney - he's cutting deals with his old buddies who gave him a multimillion-dollar golden handshake. Have they no grace, no shame, no common sense? Why don't they just have Enron run America? Or have Zapata Petroleum (George W. Bush's failed oil-exploration venture) build a pipeline across Afghanistan?"
In early 2005 CIA officials told the Washington Post that at least 50 percent of its estimated $40 billion budget for that year would go to private contractors, an astonishing figure that suggests that concerns raised about outsourcing intelligence have barely registered at the policymaking levels.
The General Accounting Office (GAO) estimates 48,000 private security and military contractors (PMCs) are stationed in Iraq. The Pentagon's insistence on keeping a lid on military force requirements (thereby avoiding the need for a draft) is one reason for that astronomical growth, which has boosted the fortunes of the "corporate warriors" so much that observers project the industry will be a $200 billion per year business by 2010.
In March, Custer Battles became the first Iraq occupation contractor to be found guilty of fraud. A jury ordered the company to pay more than $10 million in damages for 37 counts of fraud, including false billing. In August, however, the judge in the case dismissed most of the charges on a technicality, ruling that since the Coalition Provisional Authority was not strictly part of the U.S. government, there is no basis for the claim under U.S. law. Custer Battles' attorney Robert Rhoad says the company's owners were "ecstatic" about the decision, adding that "there simply was no evidence of fraud or an intent to defraud."
Halliburton is under Justice Department Securities and Exchange Commission investigation over allegations of improper dealings in Iraq, Kuwait and Nigeria," Whitley Strieber wrote March 12, 2007.
A "newly unearthed" March 2003 "Pentagon e-mail says action on a no-bid Halliburton contract to rebuild Iraq's oil industry was 'coordinated' with Cheney's office. Cheney was chief executive officer of the oilfield services giant from 1995 until he joined George W. Bush's presidential ticket in 2000."
"The e-mail, reported by Time magazine [in its June 7, 2004, Issue], provided 'clear evidence' of a relationship between Cheney and multibillion-dollar contracts Halliburton has received for rebuilding Iraq, Sen. Patrick Leahy said," according to Reuters. "'It totally contradicts the vice president's previous assertions of having no contact' with federal officials about Halliburton's Iraq deals, Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, said in a conference call set up by John Kerry's presidential campaign. 'It would be irresponsible not to hold hearings.'"
Nour USA Ltd.Incorporated shortly after the war began, Nour has received $400 million in Iraq contracts, including an $80 million contract to provide oil pipeline security that critics say came through the assistance of Ahmed Chalabi, Iraq's No. 1 opportunist, who was influential in dragging the United States into the current quagmire with misleading assertions about WMDs.
President Bush plans to propose a $2.7 trillion budget tomorrow that would shrink most parts of the government unrelated to the nation's security while slowing spending on Medicare by $36 billion during the next five years, according to White House documents. The spending plan Bush is to recommend to Congress will call for the elimination or reduction of 141 programs -- for a savings of $14.5 billion
Several of CACI's top management are involved with policy and decision making within the current Bush administration, or have significant ties to the current Pentagon.
Herbert W. Anderson (Outside Director) - In 2001 President George W. Bush appointed Mr. Anderson as a principal member of the President’s National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee. He currently serves as a member of the Secretary of the Air Force Advisory Group. Mr. Anderson is a former member of the Defense Science Board, the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association Board, and as a former subcommittee board member of the Aerospace Industries Association.
Barbara A. McNamara (Outside Director) - served as NSA's Special U.S. Liaison Officer in London, England until August 2003. She was responsible for representing NSA in its relationships with United Kingdom authorities including the Government Communications Headquarters, the cryptologic organization of the UK. From 1997 to 2000 Ms. McNamara was Deputy Director of NSA. From 1995 to 1997 she was Deputy Director of Operations for NSA. Prior assignments include Executive Director of NSA/Central Security Services (CSS) and NSA/CSS Representative to the DoD.
Arthur L. Money (Outside Director) - served as Assistant Secretary of Defense (ASD) for Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence from 1999 to 2001. He was DoD Chief Information Officer from 1998 to 2001 and Senior Civilian Official, Office of the ASD, from 1998 to 1999. In the Air Force, Mr. Money served as Assistant Secretary for Research Development and Acquisition, and Chief Information Officer.
Gen. Larry D. Welch, USAF (Ret.) (Outside Director) - currently a Fellow at the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA), a federally chartered research center providing operations, technical, management and information systems analysis for the DoD and other government agencies.
Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force appeared to have some interest in early 2001 in Iraq's oil industry, including which foreign companies were pursuing business there, according to documents released Friday by a private watchdog group.
Judicial Watch, a conservative legal group, obtained a batch of task force-related Commerce Department papers that included a detailed map of Iraq's oil fields, terminals and pipelines as well as a list entitled "Foreign Suitors of Iraqi Oilfield Contracts."
The papers also included a detailed map of oil fields and pipelines in Saudi Arabia and in the United Arab Emirates and a list of oil and gas development projects in those two countries.
The papers were dated early March 2001, about two months before the Cheney energy task force completed and announced its report on the administration's energy needs and future energy agenda.
WASHINGTON — National Guardsmen and reservists who are injured on active duty face daunting and sometimes insurmountable hurdles to get medical care, soldiers and military officials told a congressional panel Thursday.
• The GAO said that soldiers, including many with severe injuries, are given little help navigating a thicket of regulations and procedures necessary to gain access to military doctors.
• Injured soldiers sometimes have to pay their own medical bills or go into debt because their active-duty tours end and they are physically unable to go back to their civilian jobs.
• As recently as April, more than one-third of injured soldiers who applied to have their benefits extended were denied.
The U.S. House of Representatives approved billions of dollars in cuts to veterans' programs over the next 10 years—on the same day it unanimously passed a resolution of “unequivocal support” for the nation's troops overseas. Proposed by President Bush as part of his 2004 budget plan, the reductions—estimated at $28 billion—would erode health-care benefits already stretched by other budget shortfalls, raise costs, and decrease veterans' access to medical care.
Bush to Cut Veterans' Benefits
Bush plans to cut funding for veterans’ health care over the next few years, yes this is while an increasing number of troops are returning home wounded from battle in Iraq and Afghanistan. The President is pushing these cuts to fulfill his pledge to “balance the budget by 2012,” which is a shell game in itself.
“Even though the cost of providing medical care to veterans has been growing rapidly — by more than 10 percent in many years — White House budget documents assume consecutive cutbacks in 2009 and 2010 and a freeze thereafter,” according to a report by the AP.
George Bush is blocking a full public inquiry into 9-11. Richard Cheney threatens Democrats to keep quiet. "Press the issue, Cheney implied, and you risk being accused of interfering with the [war on terrorism]."
Cheney admitted "he would advise President Bush not to turn over to Congress the August intelligence briefing that warned that terrorists were interested in hijacking airplanes, and he insisted that the investigation into Sept. 11 should be handled by the Congressional intelligence committees, not an independent commission
WASHINGTON - President Bush invoked executive privilege Monday to deny requests by Congress for testimony from two former aides about the firings of federal prosecutors.
President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have placed strict limits on the private interviews they will grant to the federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks, saying that they will meet only with the panel's top two officials and that Mr. Bush will submit to only a single hour of questioning, commission members said Wednesday.
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is urging a former White House political director to ignore a subpoena and not testify before Congress about the firings of federal prosecutors, her lawyer says.
The Senate Judiciary Committee wants to hear from Sara Taylor at its hearing Wednesday and she is willing to talk. Testifying, however, would defy the wishes of the president, “a person whom she admires and for whom she has worked tirelessly for years,” lawyer W. Neil Eggleston said.
THE Iraq war has cost the US 50-60 times more than the Bush administration predicted and was a central cause of the sub-prime banking crisis threatening the world economy, according to Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz.
The former World Bank vice-president yesterday said the war had, so far, cost the US something like $US3trillion ($3.3 trillion) compared with the $US50-$US60-billion predicted in 2003.
The spending on Iraq was a hidden cause of the current credit crunch because the US central bank responded to the massive financial drain of the war by flooding the American economy with cheap credit.
"The regulators were looking the other way and money was being lent to anybody this side of a life-support system," he said.
That led to a housing bubble and a consumption boom, and the fallout was plunging the US economy into recession and saddling the next US president with the biggest budget deficit in history, he said.
ONE OF BRITAIN'S largest unions condemned as "obscene" yesterday a report by business leaders which claimed the economy would benefit from a short war with Iraq.
John Edmonds, general secretary of the giant GMB union, attacked the study by the Institute of Directors (IoD), which said a short war would end damaging uncertainty in the stock markets.
But the report warned that a prolonged conflict, cuts in oil production and diplomatic crises for the West would have severe economic consequences.