Bush’s impeachment is Stanley Cup of politics

Mark Prokop
Managing Editor

As I watch yet another scandal unfold in this incompetent presidential administration, I’m beginning to realize the Democrats’ attack on George Bush and Alberto Gonzales has a very familiar feeling, and it comes from the world of sports.

 

The lies and contradictions are flying all over the place. Apparently, the loyal “Bushies” never had time to have the cover-up meeting to coordinate their messages the way they have in every scandal they’ve squirmed their way out of.

Seeing this unfold with a Democratic Congress, one that has the spine to attack Bush’s cronies for their malfeasance, fills me with the same rush that I see looking at my New York Rangers sitting just inside the playoff standings.

Yes, I’m an avid political observer and a rabid Rangers fan. But living under Bush these past six years has filled me with the same rage and despair I felt watching the Rangers miss the playoffs for years while the New Jersey Devils hoisted Stanley Cups.

Those playoff misses were always close. My Rangers always made a late push and flirted with that final playoff spot, only to fall in the end. I got this same feeling of disappointment as I watched each scandal develop in this presidency. I have wanted this man removed from office since the day he was sworn in after stealing the 2000 election. Each of these scandals felt like another year of barely missing the playoffs.

I watched as Dick Cheney held secret meetings with energy company executives to set our nation’s energy policies, as Bush’s deregulation allowed Enron to cheat its way to collapse. I watched as 9/11 unfolded and I had that sinking feeling in my gut that Bush was lax in letting it happen, and I felt that feeling was justified when it was revealed he was warned bin Laden was “determined to attack inside the U.S.” in a memo months before the attack.

I watched as the administration revealed the name of an undercover CIA operative to get back at a diplomat who had the gall to expose a lie in the State of the Union. I watched us invade Iraq with too few troops and no clear plan, and those troops fruitlessly looking for weapons of mass destruction. I watched Cheney’s former company Halliburton get massively expensive no-bid contracts. I watched as pictures of our soldiers torturing Iraqis were revealed to the world, and watched as the investigation pointed to Donald Rumsfeld’s directives as the reason why. I watched as Bush figured out a way to keep torturing people against our Constitution. I watched as he threw out habeas corpus.

And now I watch as it is revealed that Gonzales’ office fired U.S. Attorneys for doing the unthinkable—investigating Republicans’ criminal activity instead of only focusing on Democrats.

This scandal isn’t as good as most of the ones on the laundry list I just laid out. But this year’s Ranger team isn’t as good as the Stanley Cup team from 1994, either.

You have to take what you can get. And this scandal just might get us into the political playoffs: impeachment hearings for George W. Bush.

Last year, the Rangers were a playoff team, only to be swept out in the first round by the Devils. In the 2006 midterm elections, incoming House speaker Nanci Pelosi declared “impeachment is off the table,” sweeping out the hopes of many of those Democratic voters.

But this scandal might be worth pursuing. With the Rangers poised to make a playoff run if they can stay hot over the last few games, they have a chance to go deep. With this happening, I might just get to see a political playoff that, while less exciting, has a far greater positive effect on our country: George W. Bush’s removal from the presidency.

A Ranger Stanley Cup is the more likely outcome—and that’s saying something—but just like that 1994 team, I would hold this 110th Congress in the same awe if they could pull off such a feat.

I might even buy Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid a pair of 2007 championship rings.