Thank you for that thought provoking post JRL. Like you, I recall the allegations that President Clinton gave away military secrets to China, and at the time, the story was compelling.
On Sun, Nov 17, 2013 at 11:24 PM, jrl <[email protected]> wrote: > Well, okay, I have an opinion that's just about about Bill Clinton and > impeachment. I remember there was an impeachment-related proceeding (I > think it's technically the trial in the Senate) and it seemed that it was > all about sex and whether he was telling lies or truths). I've always > thought that particular impeachment effort was a big waste of time. But > there was another matter that he might have been impeached about ... I'll > get to that in a minute. > > When Clinton got elected I was happy and surprised. At the time I felt he > was my kind of president. A few years later, a more knowledgeable friend > told me that Clinton had improperly sold or given military secrets to > China. That one conversation was the only time I heard or read about that. > To me, improperly letting China have military secrets seems like it could > be an important thing, perhaps worth impeaching about. > > But what do we get? A whole long show about sex and talk about sex, and > nothing else. I think it was just a disgusting waste of time. I don't > really care about whatever he does or says about that. But they might have > done something really worthwhile by trying to impeach him about military > secrets going to China. If they did that, the American people might learn > something important about how their government works -- and that could lead > to other worthwhile things. > > Generally I think impeaching (meaning, having a trial of a high public > official) is a good thing because it helps to hold powerful people > accountable for how they exercise the power we give them. > > If there were some situation where a lot of people died, and our > government caused it, then that would be the kind of thing worth impeaching > about. So, when the Iraq war came along, and the reason for it kept > changing and the big idea about "Weapons of Mass Destruction" turned out to > look like a mistake, that would be the perfect thing to have one or more > impeachments about. The most obvious benefit to impeaching would be that > the American people would learn something about how their government really > works. Maybe the impeached official (probably Bush or Cheney) would be > found innocent, or maybe found guilty, but either way we would all be > learning about the process by which wars get started. > > And another thing: There was a trial of Saddam Hussein. I wasn't there > but I think I understand something about it: That trial was arranged in a > way that prevented Saddam Hussein from speaking out. And I think that's a > really bad idea. The big benefit of such trials should be that the way > things work would be exposed to the public, and as a result, governments > and societies would improve. But by him being silenced, we were denied > that discussion that would probably have revealed a lot about how things > work. > > Similarly, we were denied an open trial of Osama bin Laden. So we missed > out on that discussion too, and whatever it may have revealed about how > things work. All we got was scoring revenge points, while remaining > ignorant and therefore just as vulnerable as before. > > -jrl > > > On Sunday, November 17, 2013 4:46:02 PM UTC-8, MJ wrote: >> >> >> >> *The Icon of Truth-Telling ... *Butler Shaffer >> >> Bill Clinton, has advised President Obama to tell the truth to the people >> about insurance coverage (or lack thereof). The network news-babblers who >> report this must either have either a tremendous sense of humor, or >> blockheadedness, to be able to pass this on to us with a straight face. >> �Tell the truth?� In the words of that great stand-up philosopher, the >> late George Carlin, the entire political structure would collapse if >> truth-telling really caught on. >> > -- > -- > Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. > For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum > > * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ > * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. > * Read the latest breaking news, and more. > > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "PoliticalForum" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. > -- -- Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PoliticalForum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
