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Insight Magazine is a News World Communications publication. New World
also publishes The Washington Times.



Issue Date: January 23-29, 2006

Impeachment hearings: The White House prepares for the worst



The Bush administration is bracing for impeachment hearings in
Congress.

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

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

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.

"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."

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."

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.

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, 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.

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

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

"We will tell the American people that while we have done everything
we can to protect them, our policies are being endangered by a
hypocritical Congress."

________________________________________________________

Insight Magazine is a News World Communications publication. It also
publishes The Washington Times.

Harry

Mr. Gore, who lost the 2000 election to Mr. Bush, 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.

"We will tell the American people that while we have done everything
we can to protect them, our policies are being endangered by a
hypocritical Congress."