-Caveat Lector-
July 24, 2007 -- Conyers orders arrest of pro-impeachment, anti-war
activists
publication date: Jul 24, 2007
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July 24, 2007 -- Conyers orders arrest of pro-impeachment, anti-war
activists
House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers yesterday ordered
U.S. Capitol police to arrest 45 anti-war and pro-impeachment
protesters for "disorderly conduct." Among those arrested in Conyers'
office in the Rayburn House Office Building were Gold Star activist
Cindy Sheehan and former CIA officer Ray McGovern.
Conyers urged the protesters to support the election of Democrats in
2008 rather than impeachment, a standard Democratic National
Committee line urged by status quo enthusiasts like the Democratic
Leadership Council and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
Conyers stands on interesting ground in charging citizens with
"disorderly conduct." According to a colleague of Conyers, the long-
serving congressman, who represents Highland Park, Hamtramck, and
sections of Detroit and Dearborn, at one time regularly smoked
marijuana in his House office, referring to the stash he kept in his
desk drawer as "boo."
Although he puts on the air of being a liberal progressive, Conyers
is also tied to the agenda of the American Israel Public Affairs
Committee (AIPAC) and other like-minded groups. Conyers has one of
the largest Arab-American constituencies in his district and for that
reason, AIPAC has painstakingly ensured that Conyers' senior staff is
composed of those who act as "firewalls" and "gatekeepers" against
the potentially significant political influence of Arab-American
groups in Michigan's 14th congressional district.
Conyers' actions yesterday in having anti-war activists arrested is
in keeping with Conyers' past "flaky" behavior this editor has
personally noticed in covering Congressional affairs over the past 17
years.
Comments
Steve Smith (Albany)
We've been after Defazio on the issue of impeachment for a while
now. We keep getting the tired old "there are other ways" and "it
won't work because we don't have the votes" and even "What crimes?
Congress told them they could". As for the saying "everyone in
congress is a crook but my senator/representative", I'm starting to
think they are crooks too.
Neil Roberts (Brookline, MA)
I thought Conyers was one of the few good ones . . . maybe the
pods from Invasion of the Body Snatchers got him.
Susan Modikoane (Houston/TX)
I thought he was too. Wasn't he the guy who started the initial
impeachment proceedings years ago?
Constantine Paleologus (San Francisco, CA)
Impeachment is a non-starter, and will do nothing to elect more
Democrats in 2008. A move to impeach President Feeb is the
conservatist wet dream.
The Democrats can best serve the interests of the people who
voted them into power in 2006 by working to get us out of Iraq and by
doing something productive about health care, energy issues and the
environment. Any appearance of competence will draw a distinction
with the Christianists and conservatists that will persuade more
voters to turn away from Republican candidates.
And for anyone who says there is no difference between the
Democratic Congress and the Republican Congress it replaced, I have
two words for you: Robert Bork.
Thomas Lees (Lafayette Hill, PA)
Impeachment wouldn't be a "non-starter" if more Democrats had
any guts. There must be fifty reasons impeachment, conviction, & ICC
proceedings against Cheney/Bush are justified, and Conyers arrests
Cindy Sheehan. Go figure. What a spineless bunch of Democrats.
Tom
anonymous (Elkton)
I can't believe this either, I really thought he was a pretty
good guy too! Just goes to show you that they (all the politicians)
talk out of both sides of their mouths! Wow! What a disappointment!
anonymous (Elkton)
just to add to my last comment: This is why we need more parties
like in Europe. Right now we have really one party for the power
elite only! "we the people" have nothing to help us!
Kait (Michigan)
I agree with you anonymous(Elkton). Didn't Conyers just have a
visit by the FBI at his office recently?
Ralph Nader has been trying in vain now for so long to bring a
viable third party candidate to the presidential elections. If anyone
believes that the democrats will make any difference they are kidding
themselves. The democrats and republicans all belong to the same
clubs, taking money from the same people. Will electing a Democratic
president in 2008 end the assault on working people?
lets look at BILL CLINTON for example He was elected in 1992 on
a platform of "putting people first." His campaign promised health
care reform, gay rights legislation and an end to Republican threats
to abortion rights, among many other things. Yet over the next eight
years, Clinton left behind a trail of broken promises on all these
issues. Many people have forgotten this. They look back to the
Clinton years as a time when the right wing didn’t dominate U.S.
politics and working people’s living standards got significantly
better. Actually, these impressions are false. Whether you look at
class inequality, or government programs for the poor, or the rights
of women and minorities, or military intervention abroad, the
generalized ruling-class offensive in the U.S. didn’t begin in
January 2001, but stretches back through the Clinton years and
beyond. ON SOME issues, Bill Clinton isn’t merely guilty of breaking
campaign promises. In important ways, he and his pals stole parts of
the Republican agenda wholesale, smoothed out the rough edges and
presented it as their own.
The most obvious example is welfare "reform." In the 1994
congressional elections, Republicans exploiting discontent with the
stagnating economy and Clinton’s failure to implement health care
reform made huge gains, winning control of both houses of Congress
for the first time in 40 years Thus, with a few months to go before
the 1996 election, Clinton agreed to the Republicans welfare "reform"
legislation which tore up decades of government assistance to the
poor. The booming economy of the late 1990s hid the impact of welfare
"reform" for a time, but its real consequence was to make the lives
of the most vulnerable people in the U.S. that much harder--with Bill
Clinton’s blessing.
The Clinton administration was more aggressive in expanding U.S.
economic power, using free trade and international institutions like
the World Trade Organization, World Bank and International Monetary
Fund as a battering ram around the globe.
Here is just a short list of some of the democratic attendees to
the One World Order ,Bilderberg conference -- Bill Clinton 1991. Bill
Richardson in 1999 and 2000. Hillary Clinton 1997. Diane Feinstein
1991. George Stephanopoulos 1996,1997. George Soros 1994, 1996,2000,
2002. Thomas Stephen Foley 1995, 2002. Samuel Augustus Nunn, Jr,
1996, 1997. John Kerry 2005.
Here is a partial list of some of the members of another dodgy
group The Council on Foreign Relations
PRESIDENT COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS MEMBERSHIP
George W. Bush
Bill Clinton
George H.W. Bush
Jimmy Carter
Gerald Ford
Richard Nixon
Dwight Eisenhower
Herbert Hoover
Dick Cheney (Vice-President)
Al Gore (Vice-President)
As you can see just from my small partial lists ( and believe me
there are many more members, major coporations and media people
ect...), how these people are all compadres. They belong to these
eliltist clubs that espouse strange new world order dogma.
People who want to fight for real change in society shouldn’t
vote just for the "lesser evil."
yeranalyst (Madison)
Constantine, When I chastised my Congressman for not getting
behind impeachment, he sent me a letter that was almost verbatim what
you wrote. It was so verbatim that I would guess that you are either
working for the DNC or more likely the DLC.
The idea that any kind of legislation of a progressive variety
is going to get passed before 2008 is ludicrous. So far the only
thing the Dems have passed is a watered down minimum wage bill that
was attached to a military spending bill to make it bullet proof.
Why do you think that initiating impeachment hearings would hurt
the Dems chances in the election. It would make me and my friends
more likely to vote for them.
Aside from that, impeachment isn't and elective course of action
it is incumbent upon Congress to impeach a President if they believe
he committed a crime. Not to impeach him is unconstitutional and
perhaps criminally actionable.
Kait (Michigan)
Like Mike Gravel said "Wake Up People". Who are you going to get
to impeach him? Who are you going to get to replace him? They all
belong to the same club. If you notice the ones that don't, like Mike
Gravel and Dennis Kucinich, are just about ignored by the media!
Terry Hildebrand ('Ewa Beach)
Frankly, this WMR post and most of the comments above seem to me
to inappropriate and overwrought. Protesters get much more attention
for their cause when they do get arrested for disorderly conduct,
than when they don't. It is part of the theatrics of protest which m
ake it effective. It might have been just the response that Cindy
Sheehan and Ray McGovern desired. In any case, "disorderly conduct"
is a very minor offense without any serious penalty.
WMR reported just a few months ago that Conyers was being
harrassed by a stalker who was trying to intimidate him. What
happened to that? And why does Wayne Madsen badmouth Conyers now? It
makes no sense to me. Fortunately, Conyers has shown no evidence of
having been intimidated to me. However, Conyers and Pelosi and other
Democratic leaders have to be careful not to be seen as overly eager
to oust Bush and Cheney lest they be bitterly accused by their GOP
opponents of being out to grab power for themselves. We all know that
our fascist-leaning mainstream news media would assist the GOP in
putting all their attention on the motives of the Dems threatening
impeachment instead of the outrageous abuses of power and crimes
committed by Bush/Cheney, et al.
Rep. Conyers has been reported a couple days ago of having
addressed a pro-impeachment group in California and indicated he was
poised for bringing impeachment proceedings against both Bush and
Cheney in the very near future. Conyers has also reportedly said that
when the Kucinich-introduced House Resolution 333 proposing to
impeach Cheney gets three more co-sponsors (it now has 14, including
Kucinich), he will move the measure forward in the House. I recommend
people read this blogger's (Joseph Cannon's) pro-impeachment post:
http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/2007/07/impeachment-and-ominous-
executive-order.html
Wayne Madsen
It should be noted that Conyers, a founding member of the
Congressional Black Caucus, did nothing to support two of its members
who came under assault by AIPAC and their ilk: Georgia's Cynthia
McKinney and Alabama's Earl Hilliard. Both were replaced by more
docile representatives more to Conyers' and AIPAC's and the DLC's
liking: Hank Johnson and Artur Davis, respectively.
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