The Other Bomb Drops

The Other Bomb Drops (emphasis mine):

Michigan Democratic Representative John Conyers (news, bio, voting record) has called the latest revelations about these attacks 'the smoking bullet in the smoking gun,' irrefutable proof that President Bush misled Congress before the vote on Iraq. When Bush asked Congress to authorize the use of force in Iraq, he also said he would use it only as a last resort, after all other avenues had been exhausted. But the Downing Street memo reveals that the Administration had already decided to topple Saddam by force and was manipulating intelligence to justify the decision. That information puts the increase in unprovoked air attacks in the year prior to the war in an entirely new light: The Bush Administration was not only determined to wage war on Iraq, regardless of the evidence; it had already started that war months before it was put to a vote in Congress.

It only takes one member of Congress to begin an impeachment process, and Conyers is said to be considering the option. The process would certainly be revealing. Congress could subpoena Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Gen. Richard Myers, Gen.Tommy Franks and all of the military commanders and pilots involved with the no-fly zone bombings going back into the late 1990s. What were their orders, both given and received? In those answers might lie a case for impeachment.

But another question looms, particularly for Democrats who voted for the war and now say they were misled: Why weren't these unprovoked and unauthorized attacks investigated when they were happening, when it might have had a real impact on the Administration's drive to war? Perhaps that's why the growing grassroots campaign to use the Downing Street memo to impeach Bush can't get a hearing on Capitol Hill. A real probing of this 'smoking gun' would not be uncomfortable only for Republicans. The truth is that Bush, like President Bill Clinton before him, oversaw the longest sustained bombing campaign since Vietnam against a sovereign country with no international or US mandate. That gun is probably too hot for either party to touch.

Clearly, the ball of string is starting to unravel. Whether or not the Clinton administration is culpable in all this is now irrelevant. He is no longer in office. This country deserves to know the truth, whatever that may be. If this is about oil, then maybe the American public will awaken from its stupor. We've wasted over $300B on this war. That money could have been better spent than lavishing it on Haliburton's inept reparations. If oil is indeed becoming a problem, as I suspect it is to a much greater extent than most people know, then we would be better off knowing.