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This is a place for members of Progressive Democrats of Hawai‘i to express their thoughts
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Today (August 18, 2007) Reps. Abercrombie and Hirono met with their constituents at events organized by the Democratic Party. I went to the first hour of Mazie’s meeting, at the Kaneohe YWCA. The meeting was co-hosted by “Windward Women,” and they did not want any impeachment bumperstickers or petitions or even flyers about Democratic positions on impeachment. Outside, however, I was greeted by friends who accepted my flier on the Constitutional crisis we’re in, and some signed an impeachment petition that I brought. There were about 30 people in attendance, and it seemed like I knew about half of them.

In her initial remarks, Mazie brought up impeachment herself, dismissing it on the grounds that we didn’t have the votes. I had to leave after she answered the first question, under the impression that I needed the time to get to Rep. Abercrombie’s event. But I heard that impeachment questions were raised by a number of other locals.

Abercrombie’s event was publicized as 1:00 PM, but was supposed to be 1:30 PM. Unfortunately, although arrangements had been made in advance to open a room at Washington Middle School, no custodian appeared to let us in. We had to hold the meeting outdoors in one of the school’s courtyards. Perhaps 40-50 people were present, as well as a camera man for ‘Olelo. There to greet us were people from NION/WCW wearing orange –er, peach–colored shirts and ribbons (peach, as in imPEACH). They and some of their friends had signs on orange peach-colored paper with large “IMPEACH” letters on one side, and “NO STRYKER” on the other side. They also had their large banner with 3-foot letters spelling IMPEACH, which were held up behind Abercrombie for the first half of the event, once it got started.

Abercrombie began by summarizing information from his latest newsletter, but he took note early on about the signs in evidence all around. I’ll focus my report here on his remarks about impeachment. First, he acknowledged the record level of passionate discontent about Bush. He said that he had been reading up on previous presidents who faced high levels of discontent, and he said that he’d found nothing comparable to current levels. He also recommended the impeachment special recently on Bill Moyers’ Journal. And later on, he admitted that he thinks both Bush and Cheney have committed impeachable offenses, and that the Constitution has been trampled on. But he cited 3 problems with impeachment:

1. Impeachment of both Bush and Cheney is criticized as a plot to make Democrat Nancy Pelosi, as Speaker of the House, President. This fits in with the accusation that impeachment is just a vendetta by Democrats.
2. Politically, it “can’t be done” because “we don’t have the votes,” and it would “paralyze Congress.” [I've heard this so many times from Democrats that it must be a Standard Official Democrat Talking Point.]
3. The Presidential nomination process has become accelerated and pushed earlier than ever before. The idea of conducting an impeachment process at the same time as a Presidential campaign is unprecedented and unthinkable. [This is the first time I've heard this one.]

But Abercrombie did mention a few new (to me) elements. First, he said that the Democratic leadership was looking for ways to “peel” Republicans away from the solid Republican block, but so far without much luck. The implication was that if they could figure out how to peal off a few more votes, impeachment would be back on the table.

The second thing that he said was that the logic of the 3 points above do NOT apply to Gonzales! However, he did not elaborate on this.

One questioner pressed Abercrombie on the ethics and morality of NOT initiating impeachment proceedings, in view of their trampling on the Constitution. I think this is where Abercrombie admitted that the Constitution had been trampled on, but he was defensive (sorry, I don’t remember exactly what he said.) Either here or shortly before or after, Abercrombie asserted that he was indeed fulfilling his oath of office (i.e., to defend the Constitution), but I don’t recall that he explained this claim. He referred to his “Hot Seat” answer in the Advertiser as still representing his position.

There were more questions on impeachment, including one by the ‘Olelo cameraman, but I have no further notes.

If you were present, please leave your comments with any corrections or additional information!

Bob Schacht