ConyersThreatens Bush With Impeachment, Over Iran

May 8, 2008
The Honorable George W. Bush
President of the United States
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Mr. President:

We are writing to register our strong opposition to possible unilateral, preemptive military action against other nations by the Executive Branch without Congressional authorization. As you know, Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution grants Congress the power "to declare war," to lay and collect taxes to "provide for the common defense" and general welfare of the United States, to "raise and support armies," to "provide and maintain a navy," to "make rules for the regulation for the land and naval forces," to "provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions," to "provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia," and to "make all laws necessary and proper for carrying into execution ... all ... powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States." Congress is also given exclusive power over the purse. The Constitution says, "No money shall be drawn from the Treasury but in consequence of appropriations made by law."

By contrast, the sole war powers granted to the Executive Branch through the President can be found in Article II, Section, which states, "The President shall be the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into actual Service of the United States." Nothing in the history of the "Commander-in-Chief" clause suggests that the authors of the provision intended it to grant the Executive Branch the authority to engage U.S. forces in military action whenever and wherever it sees fit without any prior authorization from Congress.

In our view, the founders of our country intended this power to allow the President to repel sudden attacks and immediate threats, not to unilaterally launch, without congressional approval, preemptive military actions against foreign countries. As former Republican Representative Mickey Edwards recently wrote, "[t]he decision to go to war ... is the single most difficult choice any public official can be called upon to make. That is precisely why the nation’s Founders, aware of the deadly wars of Europe, deliberately withheld from the executive branch the power to engage in war unless such action was expressly approved by the people themselves, through their representatives in Congress."

Members of Congress, including the signatories of this letter, have previously expressed concern about this issue. On April 25, 2006, sixty-two Members of Congress joined in a bipartisan letter that called on you to seek congressional approval before making any preemptive military strikes against Iran. Fifty-seven Members of Congress have co-sponsored H. Con. Res. 33, which expresses the sense of Congress that the President should not initiate military action against Iran without first obtaining authorization from Congress.

Our concerns in this area have been heightened by more recent events. The resignation in mid-March of Admiral William J. "Fox" Fallon from the head of U.S. Central Command, which was reportedly linked to a magazine article that portrayed him as the only person who might stop your Administration from waging preemptive war against Iran, has renewed widespread concerns that your Administration is unilaterally planning for military action against that country. This is despite the fact that the December 2007 National Intelligence Estimate concluded that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in the fall of 2003, a stark reversal of previous Administration assessments.

As we and others have continued to review troubling legal memoranda and other materials from your Administration asserting the power of the President to take unilateral action, moreover, our concerns have increased still further. For example, although federal law is clear that proceeding under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) "shall be the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance" can be conducted within the U.S. for foreign intelligence purposes, 18 U.S.C. 2511(2)(f), the Justice Department has asserted that the National Security Agency’s warrantless wiretapping in violation of FISA is "supported by the President’s well-recognized inherent constitutional authority as Commander in Chief and sole organ for the Nation in foreign affairs". As one legal expert has explained, your Administration’s "preventive paradigm" has asserted "unchecked unilateral power" by the Executive Branch and violated "universal prohibitions on torture, disappearance, and the like."

Late last year, Senator Joseph Biden stated unequivocally that "the president has no authority to unilaterally attack Iran, and if he does, as Foreign Relations Committee chairman, I will move to impeach" the president.

We agree with Senator Biden, and it is our view that if you do not obtain the constitutionally required congressional authorization before launching preemptive military strikes against Iran or any other nation, impeachment proceedings should be pursued. Because of these concerns, we request the opportunity to meet with you as soon as possible to discuss these matters. As we have recently marked the fifth year since the invasion of Iraq, and the grim milestone of 4,000 U.S. deaths in Iraq, your Administration should not unilaterally involve this country in yet another military conflict that promises high costs to American blood and treasure.

Sincerely,
The Honorable John Conyers
Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

WTF Is Really Going On With Impechment?

Are the Demos really afraid of BushCo?

Are the Rethugs afraid of BushCo?

Is this country really about to blow the hell apart?

Chances are good that the answers to all three are, YES!

Dave Lindorff:

Office Arrests: The Shame of John Conyers

Submitted by BuzzFlash on Tue, 07/24/2007 - 2:47pm. Dave Lindorff

If Rosa Parks had lived two years longer, what happened today in the halls of Congress might have killed her. It certainly would have broken her heart.

Rep. John Conyers, venerable member of Congress, finally chair of the House Judiciary Committee, a man who worked with Parks in Alabama and then hired her on his staff after he won election to Congress in Detroit, today had 48 impeachment activists, including Gold Star Families for Peace founder Cindy Sheehan, Iraq Veteran Against the War activist Lennox Yearwood, and Intelligence Veterans for Sanity founder Ray McGovern, arrested for conducting a sit-in in his office in the Rayburn House Office Building.

The three, together with several hundred other impeachment activists who packed the fourth floor hallway outside Rep. Conyers' office, had come to press Conyers to take action on impeachment, and specifically to start action on H.Res. 333, the bill submitted nearly 3 months ago by Rep. Dennis Kucinich calling for the impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney.

After nearly an hour of talking with Conyers, a clearly angry Sheehan emerged together with Yearwood and McGovern, and announced to the waiting throng in the hall that Conyers had told them "impeachment isn't going to happen because we don't have the votes." Sheehan said Conyers had insisted that the best thing was for Democrats to focus on "winning big in 2008."

To a loud and angry chorus of boos and hisses, the three went back inside Conyers' office suite, where they were joined by some 30 other supporters, and all were subsequently arrested, at Conyers' request, by Capitol police, who cuffed them and walked them off for booking. Several of those who sat in refused to walk and were carried or dragged out of the Rayburn Office Building, as the activists in the hall chanted "Shame on Conyers! Shame on Conyers!" and "Arrest Bush, Not the People!"

It was a thoroughly disgraceful scene wholly unworthy of a dean of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Before returning to sit in the Judiciary Chairman's office and await arrest, Sheehan publicly announced her intention to run in 2008 as an independent candidate for Congress against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and she called on Americans everywhere to run not just against Republicans in 2008, but against Democrats too.

Yearwood, an Air Force chaplain, said Conyers had been a mentor to him, but he declared he now felt betrayed and that Americans needed to take back their government. As he was led down the hall to his arraignment, the handcuffed Yearwood pointedly sang "We Shall Overcome!"

This reporter subsequently called Conyers' press office for an explanation of Conyers' true position on impeachment. Only a few days earlier the congressman, visiting a San Diego meeting on health care reform, had told members of Progressive Democrats of America that it was time to "take these two guys (Bush and Cheney) out" and had promised that if just "a few more" members of the House signed on to the Kucinich bill (it already has 14 co-sponsors), he would move it forward for consideration in his Judiciary Committee. Asked how that statement squared with what he had told the group of activists in his office, the spokesman said Conyers "must have been misunderstood" in San Diego. He said in view of Conyers' statement to Sheehan and the others today, the Kucinich bill was "not going to go anywhere."

As impeachment activist David Swanson of AfterDowningStreet.org has said, there "seems to be two John Conyers," one who, in 2005 and early 2006, while Republicans controlled the House, was systematically making the case for impeaching the president and vice president (he had even submitted a bill, with 39 co-sponsors, which called for creation of a select committee to investigate possible impeachable crimes by the Administration), and one who, submitting to the wishes of the new House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was keeping impeachment "off the table."

Occasionally the former Conyers breaks out, saying things such as the president needs to be "taken out" or, as he put it at an anti-war rally last spring, that "we can fire him!" But then the other Conyers comes to the fore, and stands in the way of impeachment action. As Swanson, who was one of those arrested, writes in his report on the event, Conyers, who expressed concern about his "legacy," is about to see it "flushed down the toilet."

This time, however, it was worse than just doing nothing. The arrest of impeachment activists and their forcible eviction from his office was a betrayal of people who were doing the very kind of thing that had allowed Conyers to make his way into Congress in the first place: sitting in to insist on action on their demands for justice. It was, after all, sit-ins that helped lead to the Voting Rights Act that allowed African-American candidates such as Conyers to finally win seats in the U.S. Congress.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the Democratic Party -- Congressional Black Caucus and Progressive Caucus included -- has become nothing but a dried out husk, living on old glories and devoid of any principle other than returning its elected officials to their offices and their perks, year after year. As one angry activist in the hallway remarked, "Where is today's (Rep. Allard) Lowenstein or Father Drinan. There is none!"

It's ironic that Rep. Conyers, speaking in 2005 on "Democracy Now!" following Rosa Parks' death at the age of 92, said her passing "is probably the end of an era." Certainly, with his request to have Capitol Police officers enter his office (the very office where Parks once had worked as a staff member!) to cuff and arrest peaceful protesters who were trying to defend the Constitution, he has made that point far more clearly than he could have expressed it in mere words.

But as in the case of Rosa Parks and the Civil Rights movement, arrests and fines will not stop the national grassroots drive to impeach this president and vice president. With polls showing a majority of the country now favors impeachment, and with Conyers, Pelosi, and the Democratic Congress sinking deeper and deeper into disfavor even as the president continues to add to his list of Constitutional crimes, something's gotta give. After all, the Founders, in writing impeachment into the Constitution, did not say the test was whether Congress had the votes to impeach. They wrote that if the president abused his power, or committed other high crimes and misdemeanors, bribery or treason, Congress "shall" impeach.

The American public has made it clear: we want impeachment and we want the troops home.

If Congress doesn't act on these two key issues, they will not get that "big win" Conyers' called for in 2008.

Some members of the Democratic Caucus may not even be back if they keep this up.

DAVE LINDORFF, a Philadelphia-based investigative journalist and columnist, is author, most recently, of "The Case for Impeachment: The Legal Argument for Removing President George W. Bush from Office" (St. Martin's Press, 2006 and now in paperback), co-authored by Barbara Olshansky. A veteran investigative journalist and columnist, his work is also available at thiscantbehappening.net.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Impeachment? Conyers is making growly noises.

We can only hope that he is not just blowing smoke, again.

And we can call his office tomorrow in vast numbers and any other Democrats (three of them) who might decide to sign to be impeachment sponsors.

Conyers: 3 More Congress Members and I'll Impeach

Submitted by davidswanson on Sat, 2007-07-21 22:50. Activism | Congress | Impeachment | Nonviolent Resistance

By David Swanson

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers has said that if three more Congress Members get behind impeachment he will start the impeachment proceedings.

I was a guest today on Bree Walker's radio show. She's the progressive radio host from California who purchased Cindy Sheehan's land from her in Crawford, Texas.

Bree attended an event on Friday in San Diego at which Congressman Conyers spoke about impeachment. Her report was extremely interesting. I had already heard reports that Conyers had said: "What are we waiting for? Let's take these two guys out!" But, of course, what we're waiting for is John Conyers. Is he ready to act? It was hard to tell from that comment. In January, Conyers spoke at a huge rally on the National Mall and declared "We can fire them!" but later explained that what he meant was that we could wait for two years and Bush and Cheney's terms would end. Was this week's remark just more empty rhetoric?

It appears to be more than that. Bree Walker told me, on the air, that Conyers said that all he needs is three more Congress Members backing impeachment, and he'll move on it, even without Pelosi. I asked whether that meant specifically moving from 14 cosponsors of H Res 333 to 17, or adding 3 to the larger number of Congress Members who have spoken favorably of impeachment but not all signed onto bills. Bree said she didn't know and that Conyers had declined to take any questions.

Either way, this target of three more members seems perfectly doable. It's safe to assume, I think, that we're talking about impeaching Cheney first. But, even if Conyers is talking about Bush, the target is perfectly achievable.

First, there are Congress Members like Jesse Jackson Jr. who have spoken out for impeachment but not signed onto H Res 333. They should be urged to act now! Second, there are dozens of members who signed onto H Res 635 a year and a half ago, Conyers' bill for an investigation into grounds for impeachment, who have not signed onto H Res 333 yet. Third, one of the excuses citizens often hear from lots of Congress Members for not signing onto articles of impeachment is that not enough of their colleagues have signed on and therefore "we don't have the votes." Well that just changed. Now three more votes is all that's needed to get this machine rolling. Fourth, many of the 14 Congress Members backing H Res 333 have used similar excuses to justify refraining from lobbying their colleagues to join them. That can now end. Our 14 leaders can do more than just put down their names.

Now, if Conyers begins impeachment proceedings in the House Judiciary Committee, we should all be clear on what that will mean. If it is serious, it will not mean sending any subpoenas or contempt citations to the emperors' court. Bush and Cheney have already repeatedly refused to comply with subpoenas.

President Richard Nixon did the same, of course, and his refusal to comply with subpoenas constituted the offense cited in one of the three Articles of Impeachment approved by the House Judiciary Committee on July 27, 1974 as warranting "impeachment and trial, and removal from office." But Bush and Cheney have gone further, ordering former staffers not to comply with subpoenas, and announcing that the Justice Department will not enforce any contempt of Congress proceedings.

What the impeachment of Cheney or Bush will be is very, very fast. It will not disrupt or distract from the important business of passing nonbinding resolutions and holding all-night gripe sessions over bills destined to be vetoed. Impeachment in the case of Dick Cheney need not take the three months it did for Nixon or the two months it did for President Bill Clinton. In fact, it could take a day. Here's why:

Bush and Cheney's lies about Iraqi ties to al Qaeda are on videotape and in writing, and Bush and Cheney continue to make them to this day. There was no al Qaeda in Iraq until the invasion.

Their claims about Iraqi weapons have been shown in every detail to have been, not mistakes, but lies.

Their threats to Iran are on videotape.

Bush being warned about Katrina and claiming he was not are on videotape.

Bush lying about illegal spying and later confessing to it are on videotape. A federal court has ruled that spying to be a felony.

The Supreme Court has ruled Bush and Cheney's system of detentions unconstitutional.

Torture, openly advocated for by Bush and Cheney and their staffs, is documented by victims, witnesses, and public photographs. Torture was always illegal and has been repeatedly recriminalized under Bush and Cheney. Bush has reversed laws with signing statements.

Those statements are posted on the White House website, and a GAO report found that with 30 percent of Bush's signing statements in which he announces his right to break laws, he has in fact proceeded to break those laws.

For these and many other offenses, no investigation is needed because no better evidence is even conceivable. This impeachment will be swift. And it will require only a simple majority. We already know that the Democrats can vote as a block if they want to, and that a few brave Republicans might join them.

Whether the Senate will then convict Cheney will depend on how much pressure citizens apply and how much information the House manages to force onto television sets. The latter could be surprisingly large and substantive, since the conflict of an impeachment is certain to generate incredible ratings.

But even an acquittal would identify the Senators to be removed from office by voters in 2008. And Cheney (or Bush) would still have been 100% impeached. Al Gore didn't run for president pretending he'd never met Bill Clinton and pick Senator Joe Lieberman as a running mate because the Senate convicted Clinton (it acquitted).

The timing of Conyers' remark may be related to the steps the White House has recently taken to assert "unitary executive" dictatorial power. Bush has commuted the sentence of a subordinate who obstructed an investigation into matters involving Bush and Cheney. And, as mentioned above, neither subpoenas nor contempt citations will go anywhere. Impeachment is no longer merely the appropriate step that it has been for the past six years. It is now the only tool left to the Congress for use in asserting its very existence as a functioning body of government.

But the timing is also quite helpful to the grassroots movement for impeachment, and rather symbolic. Five years ago this Monday, the meeting was held at #10 Downing Street that produced the Downing Street Minutes. Over two years ago, then Ranking Member Conyers held a hearing in the basement of the Capitol, the only space the Republican leadership would allow him. At that hearing, several Democratic Congress Members for the first time began talking about impeachment. The witnesses at the hearing were Ambassador Joseph Wilson, attorney John Bonifaz, former CIA analyst Ray McGovern, and a then unknown gold star mother named Cindy Sheehan. They discussed the evidence of the Downing Street documents, which added significantly to the growing body of evidence that Bush and Cheney misled the Congress about the case for war.

This Monday, Sheehan and McGovern and a great many leaders of the movements for peace and impeachment will lead a march at 10 a.m. at Arlington National Cemetery. We will march to Congressman Conyers office and ask to talk with him about impeachment. We will refuse to leave without either a commitment to begin at once the impeachment of Cheney or Bush or both, or our arms in handcuffs. The same day, groups in several states around the country will be sitting in and risking arrest for impeachment in the district offices of their congress members.

Not everyone will be able to take part. But everyone can take two minutes on Monday and do two things: phone Chairman Conyers at 202-225-5126 and ask him to start the impeachment of dick Cheney; and phone your own Congress Member at 202-224-3121 and ask them to immediately call Conyers' office to express their support for impeachment. Your Congress Member might just be one of the three needed, not just to keep us out of jail but to keep this nation from devolving into dictatorship.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Conyers" Bush Cooperation will grow as does impeachment movement

I wouldn't count on that, John!

In all your long political career, you have never seen anything like the Bushites. Neither have I.

Pray we never see anything like them again, providing we can ever get rid of them all.

Rep. John Conyers, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, appeared Sunday on This Week with George Stephanopoulos to discuss his promise to hold hearings next week on President Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's jail sentence. He also responded to questions on his committee's outstanding subpoenas in the matter of the US Attorney firings, offering the striking suggestion that growing public support for impeachment of the president might make the White House more inclined to cooperate.

Conyers began by explaining why hearings into the Scooter Libby commutation are appropriate, even though the president's pardon power is absolute. "What separates this from President Clinton's pardons, and anybody else's," said Conyers, "is that ... the president is not supposed to intervene until there has been an exhaustion of the appeal process. And here the president didn't wait. ... The suspicion was that if Mr. Libby went to prison, he might further implicate other people in the White House, and that there was some kind of relationship here that does not exist in any of President Clinton's pardons."

"You seem to be suggesting that President Bush commuted Mr. Libby's sentence in order to keep him quiet," said a surprised-sounding Stephanopoulos.

"That's what the general impression is," responded Conyers. However, he insisted that his committee was simply asking Bush to do what Clinton had done and release his lawyers from executive privilege so they could explain the commutation and and "put this kind of feeling, that is fairly general, to rest."

Stephanopoulos next asked Conyers what he intended to do in light of a Washington Post report that the White House plans to deny his request for documents on the US Attorney firings. Conyers refused to be drawn into speculation, replying that "we don't have any other choice" but to press ahead with the subpoenas.

Conyers emphasized that his committee is continuing to negotiate with the White House, and told Stephanopoulos, "We're hoping that as the cries for Cheney and Bush now reach 46% and 58%, respectively, for impeachment, that we could begin to become a little bit more cooperative, if not even amicable in trying to get to the truth of these matters."

"We're seeking cooperation," insisted Convers. This is not partisan in any way." He also told Stephanopoulos, "I didn't put impeachment on the table. I was just telling you that 46% of the American people polled want Bush impeached."

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Conyers Responds to Continuing W.H. Obstruction if Justice

John, you are going to have to call Bush a criminal before anything good is gonna happen.

I know how hard that is and how every Congress is loathe to do such a thing, but it must be done.

Chairman Conyers Responds to White House Refusal to Justify Blanket Privilege Claims

July 9th, 2007 by Jesse Lee

Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers released the following statement in response to a letter from the White House in which the White House reiterates its intentions to assert executive privilege, without providing justification for the privilege claim as requested by the Committee:

“We are extremely disappointed with the White House letter. While we remain willing to negotiate with the White House, they adhere to their unacceptable all-or-nothing position, and now will not even seek to properly justify their privilege claims. Contrary to what the White House may believe, it is the Congress and the Courts that will decide whether an invocation of Executive Privilege is valid, not the White House unilaterally.”

Read the letter from the White House (pdf) >>

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Healthcare may be what destroys Hillary

It's conventional wisdom that if Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign falters with Democratic activists in places like Iowa and New Hampshire, it will be over the issue of the Iraq war. And her vacillations on the war.

Yet the dividing-line issue in the upcoming primaries may turn out to be not Iraq, but health care. And just like on Iraq, the Democratic base is in no mood for timidity and half-way measures and vague rhetoric. Most rank-and-file Democrats support government-provided national health insurance: enhanced Medicare for All.

And that's no secret to the candidates. This is how the Washington Post described Hillary Clinton's recent, maiden voyage into Iowa as a candidate:

In keeping with her expressed desire to hold a "conversation with Iowans," Clinton asked at one point for a show of hands from the audience, asking them to declare whether they preferred an employer-based system of insurance, a system that mandates all individuals to purchase insurance, with help from the government if necessary, or one modeled on the Medicare system.

Overwhelmingly the audience favored moving toward a Medicare-like system for all Americans.

A show of hands in almost any roomful of Democratic activists will produce the same result: they want a single-payer "Medicare-like system for all Americans." According to the Post, Clinton told the Iowa group: "I'm not ready to be specific until I hear from people."

Pressure from the base on Clinton and other Democratic contenders to get specific will intensify in the early states -- mobilized by groups such as Progressive Democrats of America, Healthcare Now, National Nurses Organizing Committee and Physicians for a National Healthcare Program. So far, none of the sitting senators seeking the nomination are supporting Medicare for All, though former Sen. John Edwards may be coming close. Rep. Dennis Kucinich for years has been a leading supporter in the House.

That single-payer is the rational, cost-effective way to reform healthcare is an easy case to make -- and was eloquently argued last month by respected Democratic party activist and lawyer Guy T. Saperstein. Despite spending twice as much money on healthcare as other industrialized nations, our system fails to cover 47 million people and generally performs poorly. Experts point to the main cause of the failure -- a private insurance bureaucracy that soaks up nearly one-third of all healthcare dollars in waste, profits, paperwork, commissions and advertising.

Insurance companies don't treat or heal patients; they just suck the healthcare system dry of hundreds of billions of dollars.

Adding pressure on Democratic presidential candidates was last month's reintroduction of "The U.S. National Health Insurance Act," HR 676, authored by Rep. John Conyers and soon expected to have 80 congressional cosponsors. This Expanded & Improved Medicare for All Bill would fully cover every American, thanks to cost-savings. In its first year, single-payer would save over $150 billion on paperwork alone, and $50 billion though rational bulk order purchasing of medications. Care will be privately delivered by healers and hospitals, but publicly financed -- with no bills, co-pays, deductibles, denials or medically induced bankruptcies.
Every Democratic aspirant will be asked where they stand on HR 676, which is endorsed by 225 labor organizations. Over the years, a common-sense single-payer approach has been endorsed by Consumers Union, some corporate CEOs and 20,000 physicians. Only one force in society stands in the way: the insurance industry. And that sector donates heavily to many "top tier" Democrats.

As healthcare emerges as a dividing-line issue among Democratic candidates, expect mainstream media to tell us the story of Hillary Clinton's healthcare initiative as "First Lady" in 1993. And expect every fact in the retelling to be wrong. Why? Because they got almost every fact wrong at the time. Clinton did not support single-payer; she resolutely stood against popular legislation led by Sen. Paul Wellstone, Conyers and Rep. Jim McDermott, then one of two "doctors in the House."

Indeed, Clinton's proposal was aimed at "reforming" healthcare while keeping a handful of huge insurance companies in the center of the system. No surprise since those firms helped draw up her complicated and bureaucratic "managed competition" scheme, through the industry-dominated Jackson Hole Study Group. A Mother Jones writer in 1993 described the assignment given Hillary by the White House: Build us a better, leaner, cheaper mousetrap (healthcare system) -- but make sure you include a player piano (private insurance giants) in the middle of your contraption.

In late 1993, Hillary's plan came under attack by devious TV ads sponsored by an outfit called the Health Insurance Association of America, acting on behalf of smaller and medium-sized insurance companies. These smaller firms were furious that the Clinton plan would wipe them out and concentrate the industry in a handful of insurers like Aetna and Cigna. (Not unlike what happened to broadcasting under Clintonite media "reform.")

The November election has already changed the terms of the national debate on Iraq. If progressives mobilize, we can also use this moment (and the upcoming presidential primaries) to transform the healthcare debate.

And one day soon we may get what other advanced countries already have: a healthcare system that works, with nonprofit insurance for all.

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Jon Conyers Reports on the Saturday Protests

I appeared today at the peace rally in Washington and want to report to you that there is tremendous energy out there. Celebrities joined many activists and Members of Congress to call for an end to the fighting now. There was a very big crowd on the mall and most media coverage has been pretty positive.

Jane Fonda returned to the peace movement, calling upon Americans not to forget the lessons of Vietnam. I had a chance to speak to Sean Penn and Tim Robbins, who have also used their celebrity as movie stars to bring the media focus to the growing anti-war movement.
PDA, Code Pink and the Institute of Policy Studies all made significant contributions to the events today.

But perhaps the most powerful voices heard today were those from military families, grieving for lost loved ones. Their personal stories cut at your heart like nothing else.

I spoke with some filmmakers doing a piece for the Huffington Post today so I am hoping that you may get to hear directly from some of these military families on those pages later.

So, as we take stock of our efforts today, I wanted to sum up the myriad of challenges that lay before us and the opportunities we have to make things right again in this country.

The Bush Administration has given us:

* Voter Intimidation and suppression and worse costing us two presidential elections.

* The Downing Street Minutes, manipulation of intelligence, and going to war under false pretenses.

* Outing a CIA agent as an act of political revenge.

* Warrantless wiretapping, outside of the law and the Constitution, and creating an unauthorized data base of millions of innocent Americans.

* Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, waterboarding, and other forms of illegal torture.

* Racial Profiling, Rendition, and Secret Prisons.

* An imperial president who takes it upon himself to issue signing statements which change the law to take away our rights.

* Intimidating the press, and firing government whistleblowers.

* Operating a government in secret, above the law and outside of court or congressional scrutiny.

* More than 3,000 Americans dead, scores of thousands of Iraqi's dead, hundreds of thousands wounded, and a cost of more than one trillion dollars.

* And now a massive escalation, disguised as a "surge," with no end in sight.

Today, and every day, we need to let this President know and let the Congress know that we have had enough.

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.