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| Henry Hyde Leads the Charge |
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| And Richard Simmons IS James Bond……. |
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This is Dark Cloud on Wednesday, January 27, 1999. I’m sorry, but I cannot help it. I have watched the Impeachment process and I enjoy it. It is so wonderful to see the vilest of the House Republicans self-destruct in front of the Senate, their peers, the world. It was also wonderful to see that there remain some terrific public speakers, and that they seem to be on the side of logic and good. Dale Bumpers shone like Demosthenes after one blubbering nitwit after another got up, produced the right wing rant, and then was slowly and meticulously blown out of the water by either a despised attorney or straight talking. Henry Hyde made a fool out of himself by implying that World War Two and Vietnam vets would be betrayed if The House Managers did not get their way. Another amiable doofus suggested that Paula Jones was the new Rosa Parks, thus revealing a barely hidden disrespect for the Civil Rights Movement and grotesque valuation powers. One other fat, white, and male creature delivered a speech so full of errors and so boringly that it was a toss up as to which aspect was more self-defeating. Asa Hutchinson produced a conspiracy theory so bizarre that he may have gotten a call from programming at Fox Television after he sat down. It was not even necessary for David Kendall to blow it apart. The only thing I can recall more ridiculous than what we have been watching took place in Spain after the semi-fascist dictator Francisco Franco died in 1976. It was an attempted coup attempt by some true believers of the Generalissimo which included some ancient soldier - in that ridiculous hat and uniform of the Guardia Civil - bellowing into the Spanish legislature until security guards escorted him away as if he were a raving idiot. But he was a raving idiot, as the installed television clearly revealed even to people who did not speak Spanish, and what could have been a bloody episode sputtered out immediately. Every time I see a Republican House Manager take the floor I think of that Spanish comic opera. So different and yet… And yet. It has been reported that most of the House Managers and, indeed, most of Clinton’s more rabid foes are Southern, white, male, and anti the New South. They profess Christian values yet deal with the Big Lie and the smaller variety. They are social dinosaurs. They seem to feel that if they can reveal sexual detail, no matter how mundane, that the country will eventually be shocked and condemn the accused. They talk about the children – always a sign of the true thug – but cannot produce anyone to confront the President who has led a more exemplary life than he has, or dares pretend so. Thank you Larry Flynt. What seems to be happening is that the Republican Senate has allowed a certain amount of time to the Republican House Managers to indicate a respect that clearly is not there and clearly is not deserved. Several of the Managers have mentioned that they are former prosecutors and try to impress the Senate with their meager experience, a propos of nothing. They sound like blustery non-entities, big fish from very small and apparently quasi-legal ponds. In the movie, they would be played by Chill Wills. The sad truth is that the White House would love this to go on forever, although they profess the opposite. The longer the right-wing republicans are in the spotlight, their popularity continues to sink. It is one long campaign commercial for the Democrats. Nothing James Carville can concoct would be better for his party in the next election. Today, the Senate has had a chance to vote upon a motion to drop the case and get back to work. If defeated, the Senate can vote on whether or not to have witnesses. Here is the correct vote. As much as I detest the whole impeachment thing over adolescent sex in the Oval Office and its cover-up, the immense waste of money to give the Himmler-like Kenneth Starr a free hand as Special prosecutor, the hypocritical and power-hungry Republican right wing, I agree that at this stage there had damned well better be an actual trial, with witnesses and the rights given the defendant, William Jefferson Clinton, that any defendant receives in the United States. He should request that the jury be sequestered – lock up the Senate – and that if refused start long, laborious court fights over each issue, and drag it out like all cases are. Well, actually he should just imply that is what he might do, and let the Senate stop the trial dead and humiliate the House, which is deserved. At the end, we may get reform about Presidential impeachment procedure, the attendant Senate trial, the independent prosecutor law, and standard cases in District Courts. We may also get some long overdue social reality injected into our court system that would, among other things, make it more difficult for someone to attempt to overturn a national election by such sordid, hypocritical, and dangerous means. |
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