The Cherry Orchard

I’m trying to keep a level head about the commutation of Scooter Libby’s jail sentence. Doesn’t seem fair to me. But I guess it’s Libby’s former boss, not Libby himself, who should be in jail.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is almost definitely going to resign. Yay. One more liar down.

I don’t usually gaze into crystal balls, but here’s a rare Cherry Orchard political prediction just for the fun of it. Dick Cheney will resign the Vice-Presidency “for health reasons” by mid-summer. Condoleeza Rice will replace him, in an attempted “sacrifice fly” by the White House administration. Whether the sac succeeds or not, time will tell.

You read it here first.

So the Scooter Libby verdict is in. Like many Americans, I am happy to hear that Dick Cheney’s former Chief of Staff has been found guilty (and I’m happy to rub this in Fox News’ face by displaying their write-up of this news). But, of course, the wrong guy is going to jail.

Scooter Libby lied under oath about the justification for the Iraq War, and he’s now facing up to 25 years in jail. Libby’s boss also lied repeatedly to the American people about the justification for the Iraq War, but since he did not lie “under oath” he doesn’t face criminal charges for perjury.

It sure seems to me that anytime a United States Vice President speaks to the American people about a decision to go to war, his words are “under oath”. What oath? Gee, I don’t know … the oath of office, maybe? It’s sad to see a hapless bureaucrat like Scooter Libby face jail time for his boss’s crime, based on the technicality that he lied under oath whereas his boss simply lied.

Enough about that. I still hope — naively, perhaps — to see both Dick Cheney and George W. Bush eventually cooling their heels in minimum security prison for their dishonest and harmful leadership of our country’s foreign policy. But maybe I need to let go of my anger and think about where this country will head next. This is a subject I touched on in a brief piece I just wrote for the PBS blog, Remotely Connected.

The subject of this article is an engaging documentary about an earnest but underfinanced young politician named Jeff Smith trying to beat the odds and get nominated by his Missouri district’s Democratic party to run for U. S. Congress. Does money really count for everything in modern electoral politics? If not, why do we hear so much about certain candidates “locking up” their nominations by fund-raising? If not, why did Tom Vilsack give up? If not, why does the press coverage speak of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as the only two viable Democratic Party presidential candidates?

I don’t want the race for the 2008 Democratic Party presidential nomination to be “locked up” in fundraising bonanzas. I want at least ten candidates in this race. I want to hear debates — big, loud, angry, intellectually substantial debates. I want John Edwards to keep throwing curve balls. I want to get Al Gore back in the game (and if I could choose any favorite among them all at this point, Al’s my man). I even want to get Yellin’ Howard Dean and John “Investigate and Indict” Murtha into the mix.

It’s only March 2007, and our two front-runners for the Democratic nomination are already too bland, too careful, too poll-conscious for my tastes. Voters, let’s reject the idea of an early victor and demand a better race.

Of course, bringing this whole thing back to my earliest point of the article, I have to say that I don’t think the next American president will be a Democrat. I’m guessing the next President will be a Republican — John McCain, perhaps, or Tom Ridge, or Condoleeza Rice. That’s because I’m still guessing (and hoping) that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney will be out of Washington D. C. and safely ensconced with Scooter Libby and a bunch of other felons in a minimum security prison sometime before the next Presidential election takes place. I’m still guessing Cheney will resign and go to jail first, and whoever Bush picks to replace Cheney will be our next President, because I think Bush will resign and go to jail soon after.

So our next President will be a Republican. But the winner of the 2008 Presidential election will be a Democrat. You heard it here first.

I’m surprised I haven’t heard this suggestion — a completely serious one — more often as we Americans review our policy options following the collapse of Republican party support for President Bush, the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld and the release of the Iraq Study Group report. There is widespread agreement that we face no easy options in the Middle East, and I think a strong non-partisan case can be made that a Bush/Cheney resignation is in the best interest of national security. In fact, it could make all the difference for our future.

The Bush/Cheney administration has lost too much credibility with the American people to effectively govern for the next two years. Would any Fortune 500 company in the United States retain a CEO with this kind of track record? Of course not, and as former business executives both George Bush and Dick Cheney must see the simple truth here. Resignation should not be a last resort, nor need it be a disgrace. In fact, resignation may be Bush and Cheney’s best chance to avoid the disgrace of history. They tried, they failed, they moved aside. It would prove that they put the nation’s well-being above their own personal considerations.

How should it happen? Cheney should resign first, and Bush should work with Congress and party leaders to select an acceptable replacement (John McCain? Colin Powell? Neither have perfect records, but both could be trusted to carry out the duties of the office, as could many other experienced Republican politicians). Once the new Vice-President is in office, Bush should follow with his own resignation.

This happened once before, of course. In fact, it’s fascinating to look into an intriguing question — what exactly were the behind-the-scenes machinations that led to Vice-President Spiro Agnew’s exposure in a financial scandal and subsequent resignation in the midst of President Nixon’s Watergate scandal? The subtext was always clear: Agnew was widely disliked and distrusted, and an Agnew Presidency in the wake of Watergate was inconceivable. He had to be cleared out of the way before Nixon could resign (the fact that an Agnew scandal — unrelated to Watergate — was conveniently uncovered at this time seems almost too good to be true).

I’d like to write more about this aspect of the Watergate scandal in a future post here here. There are many interpretations of the Watergate affair, but I’ve always seen the whole mess as the necessary convulsion of a world power stuck in an unwinnable war. It was definitely about Vietnam — specifically, it was about getting us out of Vietnam, which Richard Nixon could not do because he was committed to past promises and beholden to a pro-military power base. Woodward, Bernstein, Segretti and Sirica … in the end, it all amounted to a peaceful coup d’etat that allowed our country to declare defeat in Vietnam and move on.

It’s 2006, and we need our Gerald Ford. Of course, it took many months of agonizing press/legislative hounding before Agnew and Nixon resigned, and I hope we wouldn’t have to work that hard to get rid of our current failed leaders. Perhaps Bush and Cheney could be persuaded by their own associates and trusted advisors to make the move that is clearly in the best interests of the United States of America. Nobody’s asked them yet if they will resign as a fair consequence of their mistakes. That seems like a good first step, so here goes: President Bush and Vice-President Cheney, will you please consider resigning so as to allow the United States of America to best move forward?

It was worth asking, but it will probably require trusted advisers closer to the White House to make a stronger case. Are they ready to ask the President this question? Take a look at this guy’s face and tell me if you see an answer there: