Rev. Moon's Insight Magazine says the White House is gearing up for an impeachment battle. It's an unsigned article citing anonymous sources so what's the real agenda here? Let's see if we can find Karl Rove's fingerprints...

Impeachment hearings: The White House prepares for the worst

The Bush administration is bracing for impeachment hearings in Congress.

Impeachment hearings? Who's talking about impeachment hearings?

"A coalition in Congress is being formed to support impeachment," an administration source said.

A coalition in Congress? Since we're in touch with the Members of Congress in the House who are most likely to impeach Bush, I think we'd know about such a coalition. But right now, there isn't a single Member willing to advocate impeachment. That's why we're launching The Henry Gonzalez Project - to find one Member who is as brave as former Rep. Henry Gonzalez.

Sources said a prelude to the impeachment process could begin with hearings by the Senate Judiciary Committee in February.

OK, they're not talking about the House - but about the Senate. Under the Constitution, impeachment begins in the House. So what's going on here?

They said the hearings would focus on the secret electronic surveillance program and whether Mr. Bush violated the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Administration sources said the charges are expected to include false reports to Congress as well as Mr. Bush's authorization of the National Security Agency to engage in electronic surveillance inside the United States without a court warrant. This included the monitoring of overseas telephone calls and e-mail traffic to and from people living in the United States without requisite permission from a secret court.

Sources said the probe to determine whether the president violated the law will include Republicans, but that they may not be aware they could be helping to lay the groundwork for a Democratic impeachment campaign against Mr. Bush.

OK, now a motive for the article is emerging: Karl Rove is trying to scare Republican Senators away from asking hard questions about NSA wiretapping, because otherwise they will be unwitting dupes "helping to lay the groundwork for a Democratic impeachment campaign against Mr. Bush." Is that clear, Arlen?

"Our arithmetic shows that a majority of the committee could vote against the president," the source said. "If we work hard, there could be a tie."

OK, so the White House is concerned about losing a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee. A vote on what exactly?

The law limits the government surveillance to no more than 72 hours without a court warrant. The president, citing his constitutional war powers, has pledged to continue wiretaps without a warrant.

The hearings would be accompanied by several lawsuits against the administration connected to the surveillance program. At the same time, the Electronic Privacy Information Center has filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit that demands information about the NSA spying.

Sen. Arlen Specter, Senate Judiciary Committee chairman and Pennsylvania Republican, has acknowledged that the hearings could conclude with a vote of whether Mr. Bush violated the law. Mr. Specter, a critic of the administration’s surveillance program, stressed that, although he would not seek it, impeachment is a possible outcome.

"Impeachment is a remedy," Mr. Specter said on Jan. 15. "After impeachment, you could have a criminal prosecution. But the principal remedy under our society is to pay a political price."

This is all very confusing. It is unlikely that the Senate Judiciary Committee would "conclude with a vote of whether Mr. Bush violated the law." What would be the point of such a vote? The only possible reason would be to refer the issue to the Justice Department for a possible criminal indictment. But in what parallel universe would Attorney General Gonzales indict himself?

Mr. Specter and other senior members of the committee have been told by legal constitutional experts that Mr. Bush did not have the authority to authorize unlimited secret electronic surveillance. Another leading Republican who has rejected the administration's argument is Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas.

Hmm - that's two Republican votes on a committee that is 10-8 Republican, so the White House could lose a 10-8 vote. That assumes all the other Republicans support warrantless wiretapping: Hatch, Grassley, Kyl, DeWine, Sessions, Graham, Cornyn, and Coburn. Do all of these guys really love Tyranny and hate Freedom? Hatch, Kyl and DeWine are all up for election this year and may have tough races. Do they really want to run as the Tyrannical Three?

On Jan. 16, former Vice President Al Gore set the tone for impeachment hearings against Mr. Bush by accusing the president of lying to the American people. Mr. Gore, who lost the 2000 election to Mr. Bush,

Very sorry, but Gore won Florida when all the votes were counted. Karl Rove definitely wrote this article!

accused the president of "indifference" to the Constitution and urged a serious congressional investigation. He said the administration decided to break the law after Congress refused to change the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

"A president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government," Mr. Gore said.

"I call upon members of Congress in both parties to uphold your oath of office and defend the Constitution,” he said. “Stop going along to get along. Start acting like the independent and co-equal branch of American government that you are supposed to be under the constitution of our country."

Impeachment proponents in Congress have been bolstered by a memorandum by the Congressional Research Service on Jan. 6. CRS, which is the research arm of Congress, asserted in a report by national security specialist Alfred Cumming that the amended 1947 law requires the president to keep all members of the House and Senate intelligence committees "fully and currently informed" of a domestic surveillance effort. It was the second CRS report in less than a month that questioned the administration's domestic surveillance program.

The latest CRS report said Mr. Bush should have briefed the intelligence committees in the House and Senate. The report said covert programs must be reported to House and Senate leaders as well as the chairs of the intelligence panels, termed the "Gang of Eight."

Administration sources said Mr. Bush would wage a vigorous defense of electronic surveillance and other controversial measures enacted after 9/11. They said the president would begin with pressure on Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Well, that proves the purpose of this article is to scare Senators. I wonder who on Karl Rove's staff wrote this propaganda - and how much Rove paid Rev. Moon out of our tax dollars to publish it?

Mr. Bush would then point to security measures taken by the former administration of President Bill Clinton.

They've been trying to pin this one on Clinton for a month - but that dog won't hunt. Even former Rep. (and current CIA head) Porter Goss said the Clinton's NSA did not eavesdrop on innocent Americans.

"The argument is that the American people will never forgive any public official who knowingly hurts national security," an administration source said.

Oh really? Then why is Karl Rove still in the White House - with a security clearance???

"We will tell the American people that while we have done everything we can to protect them,

Oh really? So why did Bush stay on vacation after he got the August 6 2001 memo titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US"? And why did Bush let Bin Laden escape from Tora Bora? And why did Bush invade Iraq, which posed no threat to the U.S., while letting North Korea and Iran escalate their nuclear programs?

our policies are being endangered by a hypocritical Congress."

Hypocritical? Congress isn't spying on millions of innocent Americans - George Bush is!!!!!!!!

Update 1: Moonwatcher extraordinaire Joseph Cannon asks "'Why is Moon pushing the [impeachment] idea now?' After all, the Korean Khrist has long been close to Dubya's daddy."