Pelosi slammed in L.A. on failure to impeach Bush*

She was in Los Angeles to discuss her recently published book "Know Your Power: A Message to America's Daughters." Instead, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi got slammed by protesters screaming that she has been derelict in her duties for not authorizing impeachment hearings against George W. Bush.

The venue: more than 300 people paid $30 each Monday night at the American Jewish University (formerly known as the University of Judaism). The format: a 75-minute interview by the Rabbi Robert Wexler (not to be confused with the Palm Beach, Fla., congressman of the same name). The questions: tough but respectful. Wexler asked Pelosi about a recent Rasmussen Poll that showed a 9% approval rating for Congress.

But then, according to blogger Alan Breslauer, things turned ugly. A protester shouted that Pelosi, in not impeaching Bush for launching a war on false pretenses, had failed to live up to her constitutional duties. She shot back:

I take the oath of office to uphold the constitution of the United States and don't tell me that I don't do that. Why don't you go picket the Republicans in Congress that will not allow us to have a vote on the war? This is not very effective. Not very effective.

In the video, it's clear that most of the audience rallied to Pelosi's side, applauding her rebuttal. According to Breslauer, protesters were escorted out by the Secret Service. *(More likely they were local police or perhaps the sergeant at arms, as Igor, one of our readers, pointed out.) But it's also clear that the San Francisco Democrat, with a lifetime of public service, was upset.

As speaker of the House, the third-highest office -- first is the president, then vice president and then speaker -- I take my responsibilities deadly seriously. I try to promote bipartisanship but that's not what the other side wants.

With war protester Cindy Sheehan now on the ballot challenging Pelosi, these challenges are likely to continue. All of which prompts C2C to wonder where the line is between free speech and good manners.

-- Johanna Neuman

Comments

[Allen, Asheville NC, US]

Cong. Pelosi is prepared to hew the line the Constitution & all that, disrergarding that's not how the game is being played anymore. someone should remind her, the constitution is in tatters & she needs to wake up. bi-partainship my eye.

[anonymous]

This has nothing to do with manners. And Pelosi's response did not address impeachment. If Pelosi believes she she has met her constitutional duties, that is her opinion and she is entitled to it. Just because she says it, doesn't make it true, nor does it mean American citizens agree with it.

How fitting the secret service escorted the protesters out. American citizens have no voice any more. Let the citizens vote on impeachment and I bet you'd get one heck of a response in favor of it.

[Cal]

Not ONE member of the Bush administration has been held accountable. NONE. NUNCA. NADA. NERTZ. Add in the flip-flop on FISA and it is almost like the Congressional Dems are helping Bush coverup.

How can anyone possibly say Pelosi has done her job of maintaining checks and balances?

[Lee Larson]

SO, PELOSI IS NOW PROMOTING WHAT SHE CALLS 'BIPARTISANSHIP'? THIS IS THE SAME NANCY PELOSI WHO STATED, EVEN BEFORE TAKING OFFICE, THAT SHE WOULD NOT COOPERATE IN ANY WAY WITH THE REPUBLICANS. AND PEOPLE WONDER WHY THE NATION IS FRAGMENTED??

[Steve Lazzerini]

Trying to impeach the President would be fool hardy. The liberals are still angry over the impeachment of Bill Clinton for perjury....for which he was later disbarred and had his law license revoked. But I love to see the in-fighting.

Americans had a chance to impeach Bush with the 2004 election, it was obvious that he had failed and lied by then, and what did we do. We thank you sir may I have another...

This president should be impeached. And Pelosi is at the front of the line to receive blame for failing to do so.

[Igor]

"...protesters were escorted out by the Secret Service"? Are you sure?

Why would Pelosi have Secret Service protection? Perhaps House of Reps Seargent at Arms plain clothes officers? Then again, maybe the law has changed. Just a thought.

[Bob Johnson]

Anonymous: The citizens voted in two presidential elections and President Bush won in 2000 and 2004 according to the Constitution.

The Constitution does not have citizens voting on impeachment, but leaves that responsibility up to the Congress. Only two presidents have ever been impeached: Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton. Both were acquitted at trial.

Fat chance on getting George W Bush impeached.

You left wing nuts keep fighting amoung yourselves and pretend that either of you make any sense. You certainly can't oppose Slick Willy's impeachment. So you move on to someone else.

It's to bad the left can't use logic in their thinking. Emotions are a poor means to deciding important issues.

[Carl Turner]

"I try to promote bipartisanship but that's not what the other side wants."

Well, then it's time to change tactics, isn't it? No matter how deferential Pelosi and Reid are, and how often they turn a blind eye to Bush and Co. misbehavior, they still get beaten up by the conservative wing nuts. The doormat act is really getting old. Maybe it's time to grow a pair. The voters in this country gave the Democrats a majority in both houses in 2006 with a mandate to end Geo. Bush's reign of terror and all we get out of the Democratic leadership is posturing and whining about bipartisanship. Maybe Pelosi thinks no one in the US has noticed that they haven't done a d@mned thing in 2 years, but the fact is that plenty of people have noticed.

[edward]

The first Amendment's right to free speech has to do with the national government property, (ie roads and parks) not private property. Therefor, as despicable as Pelosi is, her interruptor was rightfully ejected, and not for reasons of rudeness.

Consider if I came to your house. Do I have a right to free speech to call your wife or your mother names? Do you have a right to throw me out? Obviously. In a private venue such as a theater, you do not have the right to interrupt, unless specifically guaranteed in the contract between you, the ticker purchaser, and the ticket seller. This is also why you cannot yell fire in a crowded theater, despite the attempts by others to declare it a safety hazard. The nature of the violation is not in the hazard that yelling fire may create, but in the violation of the contract you made with the theater owner.

I thank Murray N Rothbard for his wonderful analysis of this subject.
http://mises.org/story/2569

[Patrick]

Pelosi refuses to authorize the impeachment of war criminal George Bush because she is herself complicit in many of his crimes. As House Speaker, she had special intel briefings from the Bush Regime that thoroughly acquainted her with much of what was going on. And that's the real reason why Pelosi doesn't authorize impeachment, as those facts would ultimately be thrown in her face. May Cindy Sheehan draw enough votes away from Pelosi that she gets sacked in November.

[Matt]

Why is it when someone shouts at a democrat suddenly the news wants to know about about good manners?
What about all those morons like code stink and that other waste of DNA cindy sheehan?
They've all acted like a bunch of retards and you don't hear the so called fair media asking about proper behavior when those animals crash presidential events.

Also, I find it ironic that everyone wants to impeach a president who cannot officially go to war without congress (including democrats) approval.
If you say that congress was misled, then that means democrats just go by whatever they are told and do not research anything for themselves. That would make it very clear as to why they (the dems who hold the house) have the lowest congressional rating EVER!!!!!

Pelosi is an embarrassment to women and to history and America is shamed for electing such a poor first representation of a woman in her position. Lets just hope America learns its lesson before making the same mistake with this possible first Black President.
As for cindy sheehan, well, as far as I'm concerned the wrong sheehan is dead.

[Alex]

I'm not suprised that Mrs. Pelosi skirted the issue of impeachment. She is just as much to blame as Bush/Cheney. The majority of democrats including her were complacent to the startup to this disasterious war that we are in right now. You have people such as Al Gore, Dennis Kucinich, Barak Obama, and Barbera Lee standing up and voicing their concerns along with hundreds of thousands of war protesters. They were labled 'unpatriotic' by the media in this country and their voices were silented. Who were the real traitors? Who really supported those brave soldiers as they now toil in a huge mess? History will judge Bush/Cheney years not too kindly. History will also show that Mrs. Pelosi and her ilk did nothing to stop the madness of the last 8 years.

[Blacky Chatsworth]

Impeach for what, everyone all had the same information and everyone voted to go to war. Now that it is taking so long they want out....wa wa wa. We have liberated millions of people from an evil dictator andwe will continue to act as such for hundreds of more years. Certain people in the USA tend to forget what happened on 9/11 and how many lives were taken that day. We went to war with a country that embraced and harborded terroists. We will continue this fight through the 21st century as we are in constant attack from these evil people. Instead of supporting your fellow countrymen and women that fight for our very liberties abroad people have turned their back and want to impeach the President of the United States. Now how do you think we would look to other countries let alone to the terroists that want to place harm on our country.....probably not a good idea. You should take all of this bad energy and turn it into good like saving a tree.

[oregon4obama]

DANG....Pelosi has got some fire......I like that, Its what we need

here's a thought about impeachment

We created a huge fuss about Clinton getting oral sex from an intern and we thought it was such a huge scandal and that he deserved to be impeached

then there is George Walker Bush.....He started a war based on two, recently proven, false pretenses....Sadam had wmd's and he had ties to Al Quaida....Both were proven false at the beginning of the year by the pentagon......

The patriot act was formed that allows illegal wire tapping on citizens, invasion of privacy, racial profiling and search and siesure without warrents....also under this administration we are torturing our captives sending a message that we will stoop to the levels of our enemies.....

Not to mention that this president has paved more ways for corporations to get tax breaks, expansion benefits and a golden umbrella from being sued by women who have been harrassed or assulted on the job or for minorities to sue for similar reasons..........

He also wants to modify the endangered species list so he can drill more here at home......We have 3% of the worlds oil, even if we managed to drill in ALL the spots, which we wont, we will save 3% on costs after about 10 years.......but thats not all, just because we drill at home doesnt mean we get to keep our oil, NO it goes to the same world market as all the rest of the oil to be purchased to the highest bidder......so this whole drilling idea is a "drillusion"

so why haven't we impeached bush????

I think impeachment doesnt do anything, but the facts are unsettling

[dharper]

What a stupid protest. I am not a Bush supporter but impeachment is totally out of the question and ill advised at best.

Impeaching a president requires months and months of non-sensical debate which almost always has very little substance. Go back and review the months, and expense, required to have Nixon finally resign over a breakin of the Democratic headquarters. There was no national security secrets within that HQ but it was the cover-up and lying that ultimately consumed him.

This nation watched as Congress spent months with the Bill Clinton non-sense. In the final disposition I believe Congress 'reprimanded' him and he remained in office even tho it was more than evident that he lied and perjured himself.

Both of these actions literally brought governmental functions to a standstill and the general public paid the price in the long run.

As for Bush, he acted, correctly or incorrectly on the information he was given by the highest level of intelligence sources at his disposal. He shared that information with the proper committees of both the House and the Senate. The Senate almost in totality agreed that this nation should go into Iraq. If you are going to impeach Bush then you must also demand the resignaztion of every Senator who voted in favor of the amendment.

It is long past time that this nation, and particularly the Democrats, get over the 2004 election. Our elected representatives in Washington have been conducting themselves like a group of 14 year old jealous girls for the past four years. As a result Congress now has an approval rating of 9%. That should tell us all something.

QUIT SENDING THE SAME NINCOMPOOPS BACK TO WASHINGTON YEAR AFTER YEAR.

That is our "dumb" as my grandson would tell me.

[Hansel2]

This woman is a disgrace.

Whining that the other side won't let her do anything. SHE HAS THE POWER TO DEFINE WHAT'S VOTED ON! Nobody cares about her need for bipartisanship. The republicans will have none of it - which makes one thing a given : it has been the democrats responsibility to end the war as they were given the mandate for - and hold the proper parties accountable for their actions and lies.

She has no place getting her back up about this. I hope she thrown out of her position in the next election and her reputation destroyed. It's what she deserves for being such a coward.

[Teflon Ron]

Congressman Brad Sherman will hold a “Town Hall” meeting on Saturday, August 23rd at 2:00p.m.

18230 Kidtridge St. Reseda, California.

I'm going to five a what's for myself.

Why should we vote for any of these people again?
I'm mad as hell and i"m not going to take it no more!

[Sal B]

Impeach Bush/Cheney. What they have done to the American way of life is criminal and unconstitutional. Pelosi took impeachment "off the table" as soon as she was elected speaker, without consulting or caring about legalities.

[John H Kennedy]

Pelosi is a Traitor to Her Oath & Our Constitution

Support Cindy Sheehan in opposition to Pelosi.

And

Use Your Power To Force Impeach Hearings Now or lose it forever

"As John Dean points out, Bush/Cheney have broken the same laws Nixon did, only Nixon's actions did not cost the lives of over 4000 brave American men and women" (and over 30,000 GIs wounded, one Million Iraqis Killed).

Bush and Cheney are the most impeachable US executives in American history. If the Incumbent House Democrats do not hold impeachment hearings soon it will be plain to all that they are Traitors to their Oath Of Office and to Our Constitution.

The failure of the House Democrats to hold Bush and Cheney accountable for the WMD Lies is unforgiveable. The Democrats lied to us about Stopping The Iraq War in 2006 and then proceeded to fund it thru 2009. Even the Democratic Base will not support them in the November election.

No matter what Bush/Cheney Crimes evidence comes out the Incumbent House Democrats will try to ignore it. It is time for some tough love for Incumbent House Democrats.

How can we make Impeachment Hearings Happen?

Arrayed against impeachment literally, is nearly the entire Democratic Party establishment as well as most Republican Congressmen. But the Democrats control Congress and can start Impeachment Hearings with a simple majority vote. They have the votes. We just have to make them do it.

Most rank and file Democratic voters want Impeachment but are being ignored by the Democratic Congress.

In addition, many of the so called progressive organizations are also in cahoots with the House Democrat and Pelosi (such as: MoveOn, ACLU & UFPJ ) and are against impeachment. It will take a very hard fight to over come this and some real courage on the part of Democratic voters.

MoveOn could cause Impeachment Hearings all by itself but refuses.

UFPJ once said it was for impeachment but refuses to take its 1,400 local activist groups to the street to support impeachment hearings. Is it lying?

ACLU (don't get me going) was the primary leader in causing impeachment hearings for President Nixon, but today refuses to do so. If the hundreds of violations of Our Constitution by Bush and Cheney are so much worse than Nixon... Why in Hell isn't ACLU supporting it? What underhanded deal have they made with the Incumbent House Democrats and Pelosi?

In Colorado we have actually been doing negative campaigning against all incumbent Democratic Congressmen who reject impeachment.

We have a Congressman Udall who is running to be a Senator from Colorado. He supposedly has a liberal background but is moving right as fast as he can. He avoids all protesters who want to stop the Iraq War funding and who support impeachment. The difficult aspect is that the Colorado Democratic Party, the Denver Media, and most Colorado Progressive organizations are helping him avoid us, However, we have had contacts from strong Udall supporters and bloggers asking us to back off. We know we are having an effect on Udall's Campaign.

The race for the US Senate from Colorado is statistically "too close to call", so we have a real chance to make a difference here. We believe that since the race is "so close" that we actually can stop Udall from winning and going to the Senate.

The way we are doing this is by doing "Negative Protesting" at our weekly impeachment events, at all of Udalls public events. We only have to sway the vote of a very small percentage of voters to keep Udall out of the Senate. This is doable.

Up until about two weeks ago, the honking at our weekly events had quadrupled since January. Then we used much "tougher" anti-Udall language on our signs and the honking doubled again. So much so that the Denver Police came and threatened arrest if we continued to use "honk to impeach" signs and also threatened us with citations for "disturbing the peace". A strong indication that we are getting to the Democratic establishment and that the public is with us.

Given that impeachment advocates have worked hard to lobby Congress to hold hearings and have done so for many years with no results, we think it is time for all impeachment advocates to try a different tactic, to get tough with Incumbent House Democrats.

The House Democrats have ignored us for years. Unless we threaten to un-elect them with negative campaigning they will continue to ignore us. The only thing they care about is getting re-elected.

Unless Angry Liberal Democrats, Independents, Republicans, Greens and the rest of you get off the couch and carry signs in front of all Incumbent House Democratic Congressmen's offices with harsh language such as

"UDALL is a Traitor to Our Constitution because he Refuses To impeach"...

There Will Be No Impeachment and No Accountability.

It is up to you.

John H Kennedy, Denver CO, 43 yr Democratic voter,
Obama delegate to the Denver County Democratic Convention, organizer of the
IMPEACH COLORADO COALITION http://ImpeachCO.com

..

[Right Wingers are the plague]

“It's to bad the left can't use logic in their thinking. Emotions are a poor means to deciding important issues.”
Yeah, it takes amazing guts and an advanced mind to repeat conventional logic. Most left wingers know the issues far more than the people who think conventionally, who accept the information and the range of debate they hear from the elites who own the press. If you are fundamentally opposed to the current polices of the government, the range of the debate or the brain dead and issue less spectacle that is election season in the US you will be forced to logically defend your position. You’ll also be forced to have a good argument as to why the current polices are crap, void of any new ideas and are created in opposition to the attitudes of the public almost across the board. You, and people like yourself, on the other had repeat a bunch of bumper stickers and attack anyone who doesn’t as stupid. How brave and genius of you.
Tell us left wingers, how is opposing this immoral war “void of logic”? Is it the trillions spent, the hundreds of thousands (at least) of dead Iraqis, the fact that we’ve done all we could to OPPOSE democracy (attempted to cancel the elections, put through economic polices with the CPA in opposition to the wishes of the Iraqis, even the Iraqi Chamber of Commerce, un-democratically pushed through Bremer’s “orders” at the CPA that this government claims is legally binding to all future Iraqi governments, which have destroyed Iraq’s economy, who’ve managed Iraq’s debt in opposition to international law and who have been attempting to privatize Iraq’s oil even though over 70% of Iraqis are opposed)? How about the worst, most expensive and inefficient healthcare system in the industrialized world? Who in their right mind would oppose that? “Free trade”, which has destroyed this country as well as Mexico (the huge increase in immigration and the destruction of Mexican farmers thanks to subsidized US agriculture)? According to a Wall Street Journal article a majority of REPUBLICANS are opposed to “free trade”. Again, only an overly emotional left winger would oppose these things.
We shouldn’t be angered at all that our government has killed innocent people, stolen resources, operated in opposition to international law and committed mass fraud and corruption. We should be “polite”, maybe sending a strongly worded e mail or something. THAT’S how democracy works to idiots in the US.

[BX3]

This is very simple. GWB did not win the 2000 election. The supreme court decided he should be President and the Iraqi government had nothing to do with 9/11. I weep for the stupidity of my country.
Bush and his warmongering crew should be impeached just to keep them from attacking Iran before leaving office. If Pelosi won't do it she should be impeached as well.

[Sam]

IMPEACH!

Nancy, stand up for us! You have not delivered what we, the American people, demanded when we voted Democrats into office in 2006. We gave you the Speaker's chair.

YOU OWE US.