The problem is, letting Bush off the hook will simply cause more damage. Letting Nixon off the hook helped create the present situation, where Bush knows he can do anything, anything at all with no fear of punishment. The next would-be imperial President we get may be better at it than Bush; handing someone like that yet more proof that he’s simply above the law is a bad idea. Which won’t stop us from doing so.
How was Nixon “let off the hook”? He had the choice of resigning or being removed, and took the former, that’s all.
President Ford pardoning him?
Is the president immune from prosecution for anything he did as president?
If the president is impeached (assuming he is immune in the above question) does that then open him to prosecution?
The criminal charges, even if he’d been the indicted kind of conspirator, were almost incidental. Being removed from power *was * the most severe punishment possible to him, not to mention necessary for the nation. But impeachment could still be taken seriously then.
He has some protection for acts performed in an official capacity, but it isn’t blanket immunity.
Impeachment has jack shit to do with the legal system. It’s a tool of statecraft, not criminal law.
Send them to the Hague, immediately upon request; the lot of them, from the lowliest guard to the Commander in Chief.
Exactly. I’m sure Bush is well aware that no matter what he does, he’ll be pardoned for it, even if he doesn’t pardon himself. We’ve made it quite clear that Republican Presidents are simply above the law; above all forms of restraint, in fact.
No, I just want the record straight, and all the facts out in the open. Bush himself isn’t all that important, its what he represents. And what can you do to him, that would equal justice? Even if I approved of hanging, you can only do it once. Send him to one of the Club Feds for rich white guys who get caught buggering their spreadsheets? Why bother.
First started a thread about impeachment when he first lied about the nukes, before he started lying about the WMD. Got pretty well pounded on, as I recall. Good ideas are seldom popular early on, and by the time they’re popular, they’re no longer good ideas.
Shit.