Impeach, or the terrorists win

Written in response to South Florida Sun-Sentinel's editorial on June 12th: Impeachment not worth another minute of anybody's time

Is there anything more important than holding our leaders accountable for their actions?

The South Florida Sun-Sentinel argues in its June 12 editorial that the fruitless wars this President lied us into, the failing economy that this President has spent us into, that gas prices – a by-product of the disastrous war, falling dollar, and lack of a real energy policy – are more important than impeachment.

By this logic, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel argues that attacking Iraq was not necessary. Saddam was in his 70s and wouldn’t have been in power much longer. Holding war crime trials in Nuremburg was pointless – the war was over. The embargo on Castro’s regime in Cuba should be tossed aside as well and we shouldn’t bother to try him for his crimes should we have the opportunity as he is now out of office.

And the South Florida Sun-Sentinel might have been right if this was simply incompetence – his and ours – for we the people elected him, at least the second time. And in a democracy, we would be responsible. But this has been anything but a democracy and he has been anything but a President. For Bush and his administration has lied to the American public, ignored the rule of law, and subverted and perhaps perverted the justice system in its ideological quest for power. He has championed torture, spied on Americans, and lied to lead us into war, and that is only 3 of the impeachable offenses that he should be held accountable for.

And thus the South Florida Sun-Sentinel is wrong. In its short-sighted view, it ignores what is obvious to most citizens of this republic, that if we do not hold these men accountable for their actions against us and their oaths of office, we cheapen the US Constitution and that which makes this nation great. By not acting and recognizing the failures and holding those accountable for them, we weaken the republic. By not impeaching this President and his administration, and thus holding them accountable on the record, we hand the terrorists a victory beyond their dreams – the very real damage to our nation that will last far longer than the smoke from 9/11, the ill-deserved freedom of Bin Laden, and the spectre of violence in Iraq. We lose the rule of law that our founding fathers clearly held so dear. We lose our reputation, our dignity, our moral authority. We lose the core of our uniquely American values – now and for generations to come.

By not impeaching this President, the terrorists win.