Talk:Movement to impeach George W. Bush

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This page was previously nominated for deletion. Consider the following prior discussions before re-nominating:

Keep, AfD 31 July 2005.
Keep, AfD 12 May 2006.
Keep, AfD 19 October 2006.

Archives

1 14th Amendment, Section 4
2 City referendums for impeachment =
3 polls and significance
4 Article should be featured
5 There is a section in favor of impeachment
6 POV post-November
7 Sections on grounds for impeachment should explain what the alleged crime is
8 Movement Filed

[edit] 14th Amendment, Section 4

"The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned."

In trying to further burden our posterity with debt, and cede control of trillions of dollars to the securities interests of the US, Bush specifically questioned the public debt instruments held by the Social Security trust fund. Not NPoV language -- but comments not whored out to content strippers (in violation of all that GNU represents) -- so OK in the Talk section -- right?? 4.248.44.247 19:38, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

[1]

[edit] City referendums for impeachment =

Urbana, IL,
Chaimpaign, IL,
some place in vermont
Berkeley, California
Wisconsin Rapids, WI

Anycase, these should be researched and included. Kevin Baas^talk 15:49, 14 September 2006 (UTC

Does it really matter that four cities and a vague city in Vermont want Bush removed? The Constitution delegates the right of impeachment to the House of Representatives, not to cities.Dace48 00:51, 20 November 2006 (UTC))

I've added info on Berkeley and San Francisco's referenda. Inclusion in a Wikipedia article does not turn on the item's feasibility or merits, it turns on the item's notability. I know that the California propositions are fairly notable (as proved by the press coverage and sources I have supplied). I don't know about the other referenda, but the Berkeley and S.F. ones both call upon the House of Representatives to initiate impeachment proceedings, so technically, they are feasible. Schi 20:32, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] polls and significance

regarding [2]:

It is not statistically significant that it is not statistically significant. only a tiny fraction of things are statistically significant. So why mention the obvious? I think putting the obvious in violates the rule of balance: the information should be significant and interesting.

Secondly, regarding the second part, "it should be noted...", should it? why or why not? do we have a citation providing evidence that it should be noted? it's opinion. and it is kinda redundant because it's mentioned (if very subtly) in the sentence above. Kevin Baas^talk 16:52, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I think the whole mention of Clinton should be dropped. This article is not about him, and mentioning a statistically insignificant fact adds no value to the article.--RWR8189 18:14, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

I'd be fine with that. Kevin Baas^talk 21:10, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV

It seems to me that this article is one-sided and presents no one opposing or any viewpoints that oppose impeachment. Is there a way to add in those opposing viewpoints? I am sure that not everyone is for this, least of all George Bush. Fundamentaldan 18:19, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Well if you can find anyone opposing impeachment who is part of the movement to impeach... Kevin Baas^talk 19:01, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, if you can find any specific anti-impeachement commentary, it would be great. At the moment, I have the impression that the people who oppose impeachment generally consider it too unlikely to be worth mentioning. Perhaps someone could find some quotes to that effect?

24.59.105.229 13:01, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV

I just had some changes reverted for totally invalid reasons. I'm putting this here as a warning and a defense of the changes. Rationale for changes are as follows: (1) Remove weasel words. Everyone knows that Bush violated FISA; he admitted it. His claim was that FISA didn't apply, as noted only two sentences later. (2) Replace extremely biased wording with neutral wording. "As Commander in Chief in the War on Terror" is spectacularly biased, as is "to protect the American people". 24.59.105.229 13:01, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV

In that Wikipedia endeavors to be an encyclopedia rather than a forum, this topic should be confined only to news of official government actions (municipal, county, state) which might actually lend legal weight or progress toward an impeachment process.

Discussions of the merit or wisdom of such subordinate government actions should not be posted.

It might however be of utility to post a section with links to the most active and authorative web discussions on the topic. Subsections could be "Openly Pro Bias", "Openly Against Bias", "Attempts at Moderated Balance", and "Unmoderated Free For All". Some thought might be given to overall seperation of links into "Membership Required" and "Open Forum" as many people find the forum membership screening of some sites offensive/invasive/suspicious.

I suggest all controversial topics not involving discussion of technical tradeoffs be handled this way.

69.23.125.173 03:28, 22 October 2006 (UTC) CJF

[edit] Article should be featured

I don't know how to get it featured and I'd rather not bother with it all, but I think the people who maintain it should get it featured. If it gets featured soon, maybe the impeachment will happen!! Anomo 08:32, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. The subject matter is too controversial, rapidly changing and people will think its being done for political reasons. It's no different than partisans who repeatedly put this article up for deletion to make a political statement. -- Stbalbach 15:02, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't change very rapidly. And it's certainly interesting. Though I generally agree with Stbalbach, if it's really a well-written article and fits the criteria for featured status, when then it should be a featured article. This does not mean that it is featured on the main page. Just that it's tagged and put in a category. Kevin Baas^talk 16:04, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Assuredly, Anomo, advocating that the article be featured in order to assist in getting impeachment started is about the most POV reason I could imagine. I am pretty certain that making it a featured article would have little to no effect on the public (i.e. let's not flatter ourselves about the impact of Wikipedia). I do think the article is fairly well-written, comprehensive and NPOV. --Habap 19:54, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] There is a section in favor of impeachment

Do we need an opposing view, or is it the very point that this article merely list the reasons to support impeachment. If so, doesn;t this violkate POV, or do we create an article to state reasons why it is silly silly silly to impeach now. Chivista 19:38, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

There is no "movement to not impeach GWB" since he has not been impeached! So no, it's not a POV split. If there is an official move to impeach GWB, this article will change dramatically, as then both sides will need to be represented, and it will no longer be a movement, by an actual impeachment. At that point there would be, say, 2006 impeachment of GWB as one article, and Criticisms against impeaching GWB as another article (assuming the criticisms section gets long enough to support a separate article, as it would). Until then this article is enough. Otherwise we just enter into an endless debate back and forth which is beyond the scope of an encyclopedia, this article just documents the people and actions who want to impeach GWB. -- Stbalbach 21:58, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] POV post-November

It is interesting now that the Democrats have won both houses and GWB is essentially a lame duck president, the Democrats have every opportunity to pursue impeachment, the President is wide open. But the house majority leader has said impeachment is "off the table", so it is unlikely to happen. Given this dramatic change in perspective, is the article still considered POV by anyone? The article has not changed at all from where it was before - the only thing that has changed is external events. I don't hear anyone complaining about POV now, the article has been very quiet. It makes me think the article never was POV, because if it was, then it would have to be re-written to reflect the November change in power dynamics. But that is not the case. Probably because the article is neutral and works no matter who is in power. -- Stbalbach 17:01, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

I do find it interesting that there has been the switch in direction (I assume it is being done because they will get more mileage out of a "bad" president in office than out of the risky endeavor of impeachment, which has many possible outcomes) and agree that most of the arguing over whether it is POV was due to the "current events" nature of it. I suspect that there will be some changes to reduce POV, but my reading was that it was a relatively balanced article, considering the controversial nature of the topic. --Habap 17:48, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sections on grounds for impeachment should explain what the alleged crime is

The Katrina section is confusing to me. It says:

"The alleged responsibility of the George W. Bush administration in the mishandling of Hurricane Katrina has been used ... to suggest failure by the administration to adequately provide for the need of its citizens. And as such they hold that the allegations of incompetence amount to an impeachable offense."

An impeachable offense requires a crime ("high crime or misdemeanor"). I don't understand how incompetence or mishandling would be a crime. Am I missing something here? Crust 19:43, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Let me generalize the above complaint. Unlike for example a vote of non-confidence for a Prime Minister under the Westminster system, to impeach the President in the U.S. it is not sufficient to show that he is incompetent, has made bad decisions, has lied, etc. For impeachment, he must have committed a crime. (Of course there is the caveat as in the article that impeachment is a political process, but I'm putting that aside and saying what the standard is supposed to be.) Some sections do explain what the alleged crime is, but others do not. Of course, Wikipedia is not about original research and it may be that some of the arguments supporting impeachment that people advance do not involve an alleged crime; in such cases, we should find a way to note this problem (ideally by quoting a critic of the argument).Crust 17:33, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Not to get to deep into the original research, but couldn't criminal negligence count? The other question, of course, is what counts as a "high crime". The Wikipedia article says that, at least historically, it has meant crimes against the State. Schi 18:44, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the response, Schi.

Re criminal negligence: Well, what law is he violating?

For another example under "Declassifying for political purposes" the article says

"Bush's misrepresentations on this point and his allegedly declassifying of information for a political purpose, is seen by some as impeachable offense."

But misrepresenting (or for that matter outright lying) isn't a crime. Is "declassifying of information for a political purpose" a crime? Not that I know of. If it is a crime, what is the law that makes it illegal and what are the standards that apply?

"Crime" vs. "high crime" is another question as you say. Crust 20:32, 28 November 2006 (UTC)