[NYTr] Another Congressman Pushes Conyers to Begin Impeachment of Cheney

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

sent by David Swanson - Jan 3, 2008
http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/29765

Rep. Mike Michaud's Strong Letter to Conyers Calling for Cheney
Impeachment Hearings

Congressman Mike Michaud <http://michaud.house.gov/article.asp?id=389>, 
a conservative and Blue Dog Democrat from Maine sent a letter over the 
holiday break to House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers
calling for impeachment hearings of Vice President Dick Cheney.

Michaud is not among the 25 cosponsors of Rep. Dennis Kucinich's H Res 
333 (also known as H Res 799), a resolution stipulating articles of 
impeachment against Cheney. Michaud is also not among a group of 
Judiciary Committee Members led by Rep. Robert Wexler who have called 
for hearings to begin, and who plan to send their own letter to Conyers 
this month. (Michaud is not on the committee.) But Michaud shares the 
position of congress members Wexler, Luis Gutierrez, and Anthony Weiner 
that hearings should be held first and articles drafted when and if 
called for by the evidence exposed. For reports on the progress of the 
various groups of congress members now pushing for impeachment of
Cheney see: http://impeachcheney.org

Maine has been a hotbed <http://afterdowningstreet.org/me> of 
impeachment activism in recent months.

Efforts have been led by an activist coalition
<http://maineimpeach.org> and a group of lawyers called Maine Lawyers
for Democracy. Citizens have staged sit-ins in the offices of Rep.
Michaud and also Rep. Tom Allen demanding support for impeachment.
Those efforts may be paying off, and Michaud appears in the letter
below to have grasped some of his constituents' main arguments for
impeachment.

While known as a conservative, Michaud has turned against the
occupation of Iraq and joined a small number of Congress Members in
voting against further funding. Iraq is also the first issue Michaud
mentions in his letter to Conyers.

While Conyers is widely understood to be obeying pressure from Nancy 
Pelosi in refusing to begin impeachment proceedings, Michaud has not 
written to Pelosi. Constituents of Subcommittee Chairman Jerrold Nadler 
were arrested in his Brooklyn office on Wednesday sitting-in to demand 
he begin impeachment hearings. Michaud has not written to Nadler. Like 
Wexler and his allies, Michaud has chosen to write to the Chair of the 
full committee, and the recognized expert on impeachment: John Conyers. 
Conyers has, of course, published a book documenting at 
length most of the abuses that Michaud refers to in his letter.
<http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/constitutionincrisis> 

Here is the full text of the letter, also available as the original PDF 
<http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/sites/afterdowningstreet.org/files/michaudimpeach.pdf>.

    Dear Chairman Conyers,

    I write today to request that you include vigorous hearings into the
    abuses of power by this Administration and include impeachment
    hearings of Vice President Richard Cheney in the Judiciary Committee
    schedule for the second session of the 110th Congress.

    As you are aware, the House of Representatives voted on November 7th
    to send a resolution of impeachment of Vice President Cheney to the
    Judiciary Committee. I urge you to commence these proceedings. There
    is no doubt that at the very least this Administration has
    dangerously expanded the scope of executive authority and flaunted
    the constitutionally defined separation of powers.

    Serious allegations have been raised against the Vice President
    regarding his role in mischaracterizing information that led to the
    invasion of Iraq, in similarly mischaracterizing information about
    Iran's nuclear program, the outing of a CIA agent as political
    retaliation, the abuse of detainees in contravention of the Geneva
    Conventions, and the illegal wiretapping of American citizens. As a
    recent poll indicates, 70% of the American public believes that the
    Vice President has abused his power.

    This is not an attack on Vice President Cheney or any other member
    of this Administration. Impeachment investigations must not be about
    the man or his personal life; they must focus on whether the office
    of the Vice President has illegally expanded its power or abused the
    law. Expansions and potential abuses of power by this Administration
    become precedents for future ones, which lead to further erosions of
    our constitutional rights. That is why these investigations must be
    held with the utmost seriousness of purpose and must lay all the
    facts on the table. We do not know what the result of any
    investigation will be, but this is the only way to restore the faith
    of the American people in their government.

    There must be no other purpose for these proceedings than to protect
    our Constitution and to hold individuals accountable if they have
    broken the law. Most importantly, we must act in a way that will
    heal the growing bitter divide within our country and end the
    disillusionment that many Americans feel toward their government.

    Thank you for your consideration of this issue of such great
    importance. I look forward to working with you to strengthen our
    democracy and our nation.

    Sincerely,
    Michael H. Michaud
    Member of Congress