By Kirk Ross
Staff Writer
The Century Center, about as filled as it ever gets, was the scene Tuesday night for an actual debate about the impeachment of the vice president and president of the United States.
From the outset, journalist Michael Tomasky (call him progressive or liberal) knew he faced a potentially unfriendly audience. In his opening statement, he said he was counting on the crowd’s Southern manners, for his role for the evening was to assert that impeaching Dick Cheney and George Bush is a disastrous idea.
Tomasky’s argument — peppered with acknowledgments that it’s likely impeachable offenses are many — was that a crucial opportunity to swing a revolted populace to the left would be spoiled by the act of impeachment. Too many would see it as a partisan act, and true progressive change in areas like health care, wages and global-warming policy would be threatened.
True to his prediction, the cheers for Tomasky, who writes for the Guardian newspaper, were not nearly so resounding as those for Republican legal scholar and former congressional counsel Bruce Fein, who argued that it was the duty of those elected to Congress to stand for what is right for the country and not just one’s party.
The precedents set by the administration, Fein said, were like weapons. Should they go long without rebuke, “this democracy does not have a long shelf life.â€
Fein hammered away at the idea that politics should trump duty to the Constitution and referenced at least twice the non-partisan nature of the sacrifices at Valley Forge, Cemetery Ridge and Iwo Jima. Reciting a litany of recent abuses — CIA torture tapes destruction, torturing suspects, granting telecommunication companies immunity for their compliance with domestic spying — Fein said that taking impeachment off the table has only served to embolden the administration.
He called the “inside-the-beltway†reasoning against impeachment “unpersuasive.â€
“The prudential arguments against impeachment are hollow,†he said.
Tomasky said he was trying not to make an inside-the-beltway argument, but was being realistic about the actual chances for impeachment. The votes are not there, he said, adding that he found many politicians’ pledge to put country ahead of political advantage “sadly optional.â€
The debate was moderated by former journalist and Carter administration official and now UNC professor Hodding Carter III. It was sponsored by the Coalition for the Constitution and was streamed live on the WCOM website. It opened with a selection of gospel music provided by the St. Joseph AME Zion Church Male Chorus and was officially convened by County Commissioner Moses Carey, who noted that Orange County was among the local governments that have called on federal officials to take up the question of impeachment.
Though in disagreement of the direction to take, both debaters wasted no opportunities to condemn the Democratic leadership for not standing up to the challenge. Tomasky called the leadership “feckless†and more concerned with saving their majority than investigating the crimes of the administration.
The exchange, lasting about an hour and a half, was followed by questions from the audience.
Afterward, those filing out said that while the event and the turnout showed there might be hope for the spirit of public participation, the facts as laid out were not so uplifting.
Delores Graham said she was frustrated that impeachment proceedings had not begun, in part because they might restrain the administration from starting a war with Iran.
One couple, he a veteran of World War II, said the times were unfolding in an uncanny resemblance to Sinclair Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here, adding that both parties have sold out the country to “nationless corporations.â€
Still a bit taken aback at the size of the turnout, John Heuer, one of the organizers, said he was pleased with the evening.
“This was what we were hoping for.â€
Impeachment begins the restoration of world respect for the USA; that inspires multinational help for us in Iraq; and that facilitates our responsible withdrawal.
From my perspective, this entire event looks like a self-indulgent waste of resources (electricity, gasoline, water, etc.). There won’t be any impeachment in the next 12 months, and a new President will take office next January. Think of the good that might have been done if the 500 hours (250 people times two hours each) had been put to a productive use. Instead, the committed preach to one another and absolutely nothing in the federal government (or around here) is even slightly different. It is sad to see so little practical perspective around here on the potential to accomplish something of lasting value.