"It is,
of course, a different legal matter when one places hand on Bible
while taking the oath of office for the presidency...”
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M.A.D.
Politicians
MANEUVERING
AND DECEITFUL
Posted February 19, 2004 thepeoplesvoice.org
By: Ted Lang
Why was former President Bill Clinton
impeached? Can this now be
legally justified? Was it only
the perjury committed while placing hand on Bible and then lying?
Minor lie or not, it brought down the most powerful man on Earth.
But how many died as a result? Was
impeachment merely the orchestrated political harassment of Bill Clinton?
It is, of course, a different legal matter when one places hand on Bible
while taking the oath of office for the presidency, or any significant
federal position, including that of member of Congress.
And that oath requires that the candidate for office swear to
preserve and protect the Constitution of the United States of America.
This is so because we are supposed to be a nation governed by laws,
not by men, not by personalities, and not by political parties redolent of
partisan posturing. To ensure
that political persuasion, popular emotions and sociological trends never
supplant our written guarantee of justice for all, it is imperative that all
in America play by the hallowed principles of our nation’s rule of law.
Whenever individuals, groups, or political parties end-run these rules,
there are bound to be problems. Therefore,
as a minimum, those that have arranged and maneuvered to avoid the rule of
law must be held accountable, no matter their rank or exalted station.
Fail this, our republic and its primary legal objective of
sanctifying and protecting individual freedom via justice for all will
surely fall.
President George W. Bush aggressively persisted in demanding that the
Congress temporarily suspend the rule of law which precludes the president
from declaring war on nations of his own choosing.
It is obvious that it was for this reason that the Founders required
that only Congress, the elected and once state-appointed senatorial
representatives of the people, be allowed to declare war on another
sovereign nation. And this
difficult-to-obtain permission is framed also within the context of the self
defense of our nation’s borders.
But what has President George W. Bush done?
He used falsified information that fooled the American people and its
representatives into a war with a nation that never presented a threat to
our borders, and that was never even close to having such military
capability. It is clear that
the Founders realized the vulnerability of just one man, and it is for the
vital purpose of ensuring that all the people get behind the nation’s
Commander-and-Chief of our assembled and combined armed forces during a
declared war. To give one
individual this much power is to open the door for initiating war solely on
behalf of a rich individual or individuals that can bribe or richly reward
the president for doing so.
The only justification for the people of the United States, through their
Congress, to declare war was during invasions.
Article I of the Constitution, Section 8, paragraph 14, offers one
other possibility for calling forth the militia: to “suppress
insurrections….” Iraq was neither an invasion nor an internal
insurrection.
The “legal precedent” relied upon, is of course, twofold in
constitutional impropriety; first, we should not be governed by precedent
– we should be governed by constitutional law.
Second, precedent can be established both incorrectly and therefore
unjustly. Once again, it relies
totally on legal contest, which in turn relies heavily upon the persuasive
talents of lawyers and politicians. Precedent
is, therefore, largely dependent upon the talents of one individual, or upon
a small group of individuals, as opposed to the reasoning, logic, and
intellectual arguments that created this nation by the people’s Founding
Constitutional Convention.
President George W. Bush maneuvered US into an illegal, unjust war, a war
unconstitutional in terms of both its purpose and initiation.
Arguments maneuvering public focus and media attention away from the
deceitful intent of this unprovoked resultant carnage are non sequitur.
Intelligence failings are not a defense.
Mistake is not a defense. Good
intentions are not an excuse. Citing
Saddam Hussein as a bad and evil person to justify this deadly war is
moronic at best.
Once again, perfectly useless panels, commissions, and investigations will
be launched to fool the public, and the corporate media will cooperate in
shifting public focus away from the real issues.
There is only one inquiry authorized by law that has applicability in
such cases of governmental maneuvering and deceit.
Those interested in the appropriate manner of inquiry, one that
precludes the secrecy of the required proceedings, can be found under
Article II, Section 4 of our Constitution.
Bill Clinton’s been there.
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© Copyright THEODORE E. LANG 2/15/04 All
rights reserved. Ted Lang is a political analyst and a freelance writer.