Cindy Sheehan, board member of the Progressive Democrats of America, a group which tries to bring progressives into the Democratic party fold, recently challenged Democrats to impeach the President (3m5s of audio; a transcript follows). Thanks to Fred Nguyen and WBAI for the audio. Today’s Democracy Now! mentioned Sheehan’s statement, but did not play the audio.
In case you don’t believe me that she’s a PDA board member, check out the head shot on this blog entry. That head shot comes from Sheehan’s entry on the PDA’s website. So as long as the picture works, she’s probably still on the board. Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) is also on the board there. If they have board meetings maybe Sheehan can convince Conyers to support impeachment now rather than another round of the Democrat delaying tactic (the same one used around election time by Democrats and their supporters which says progressives should delay their criticism until after the Democrats are elected into office. This ensures that criticism does little good).
One wonders what’s more effective at getting results progressives say they want: serving on the board of the PDA (and the commensurate connections to people in power), or speaking truth to power openly in public and on the record?
Here’s a transcript of the audio:
I was on Sean Hannity’s show one time, and he said
Cindy, these people are evil. They train their eighteen year olds to strap bombs on their bodies and blow themselves up in crowded marketplaces.. I said,Sean, we train our eighteen year olds to fly planes and drop bombs on crowded marketplaces.. I said,What’s the difference?.[applause]
Today somebody from the Green Party said,
So I’m getting a sense here is that you’re feeling that you’re going to abandon the Democrats.. No, they abandoned us. They abandoned us first. It’s like don’t you dare criticize the Democrats. Don’t you dare hold the Democrats to the same accountability you hold the Republicans—you know, don’t you dare do that because they’re our only hope. No, they’re not. Almost as soon as she was elected, Nancy Pelosi started sayingimpeachment’s off the table. And so when we were hearing that when we were in front of the White House, after some of us got out of jail, we started thinkingNo more do we the people elect our representatives, and let them go to Washington and do what they want to do.. We have to let them know that we set the freakin’ table.[applause]
We can’t be polite anymore. We can’t go to Congress and say
Will you please impeach the President?. ‘Cause they’re not gonna do it. We have to totally ignore Congress. It has to be a backdoor impeachment process; it has to be an impeachment coming from the people. ‘Cause the Democrats have abandoned us.[applause]
Because they’re part of the problem. That’s why they’re not doing their jobs. When Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer and John Murtha receive contributions from defense contractors, it is in their interest to keep this war going. It’s in their interest to give George Bush billions, and I heard today, you know after John Conyers said
impeachment is a luxury, Dennis Kucinich and John Conyers have both said if George Bush invades Iran they’ll institute impeachment proceedings. So what are we supposed to do, get down on our knees and pray that George Bush invades Iran? There’s already been too many people killed!And then all the rhetoric is: oh, we can’t let Iran have one nuclear bomb. We can let Israel have hundreds, and America have thousands, but God forbid if Iran gets one. You know, shouldn’t we be taking the log out of our own eye before we look at the spec in Iran’s eye?
And so they said that before Iraq! They said if he makes a move on Iraq we’ll institute impeachment proceedings! What are they gonna say after Iran? Well, if they invade Syria we’ll institute impeachment proceedings? The time is now!
[applause]
The time is now!
[applause]
Impeach Bush. He has unilaterally expanded the war in Iraq. Don’t wait for Bush to invade Iran. The monster must be removed now!