(Crossposted over at dKos.)
Before the Iraq War began, I put my Congressional Delegation on notice as to how I felt at the time. Now, sadly, three years later, I have had to quote my own predictive warning back at them, about Iran.
Here is that key quote:
“The time has come to say that the People of these United States have always stood, and continue to stand, against Empire, and to recognize that unprovoked attacks on nuclearly inchoate Nations impels our Enemies not only to develop the technologies of Mass Destruction on a wider, faster and more secretive scale, but predisposes those Enemies to threaten our own cities and People with unspeakable ruin.”
Continue below to read my original 1-March-2003 letter to California Senator Dianne Feinstein, but first that letter’s sad, sad little sister of 12-April-2006:
zentiger
zentiger’s Street
in a Town in
California
zentiger’s phone
zentiger at earthlink dot net
The Honorable Dianne Feinstein
331 Hart Senate Office Building
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510-0504Thursday, April 13th, 2006
Dear Madam Senator:
I truly wonder whether you are capable of understanding with what great sadness I write to you today, only to quote my own frighteningly accurate warning to you, Madam. One that I sent to you dated March 1st, 2003, well over three years ago:
“The time has come to say that the People of these United States have always stood, and continue to stand, against Empire, and to recognize that unprovoked attacks on nuclearly inchoate Nations impels our Enemies not only to develop the technologies of Mass Destruction on a wider, faster and more secretive scale, but predisposes those Enemies to threaten our own cities and People with unspeakable ruin.”
I can only shake my head in awe at the simpletons who’ve formed United States foreign policy, with your collusion. This is not, to coin a phrase, rocket science. If we threaten and attack nations that we accuse of developing nuclear weapons, while allying with or holding multi-lateral talks with nuclearly-armed despots, we are driving non-nuclear nations to develop nuclear capability as quickly as possible! In other words, on the slim chance that this has not been abundantly clear for the last three, if not five, years:
The United States has a foreign policy of
ACTIVE NUCLEAR PROLIFERATION.Now I read that this Executive-run-amok is actively planning to make a first-strike nuclear attack on a sovereign foreign democracy! At what point do you, My Dear Senator, do your duty and say, “In the name of the American People, I say STOP THIS MADNESS!!!” At what point do you realize that this is NOT about your political fortunes, nor those of your party, but about the fate of the Nation?
Nay, the world…It is in this light, Madam, which I hope illuminates in such a way as to make clear that my insight into this problem is not a difficult one to achieve, that I must repeat my demands of you on that fateful day back at the beginning of March, 2003:
- Do not ever again let this irresponsible Executive wield the Power of War without an express declaration by congress. No more ‘pre-emptive’ attacks. What hogwash.
- Give my People back the rights that my forefathers spilled their blood to preserve for their posterity. Do not attempt to curb inalienable civil rights in the name of Liberty. This is political blasphemy and insults my daughter’s 400-year American Heritage. It is also nonsense.
* Repeal the ‘PATRIOT’ Act.
* Insist that FISA is obeyed as the Law of the Land.
* No domestic spying.
* No tapping of phones nor reading of electronic or paper mail.
* No unannounced entry into homes.
* No one held without habeas corpus, nor without their basic rights
afforded them, regardless of status. We are Americans, damn it!3. Above all else, exhort your colleagues in the House of Representatives to immediately draft Articles of Impeachment under Article II. Section 4. of the United States Constitution. And when the impeachment trial comes to your Senate, Convict, for God’s sake, if these men are found as guilty of Treason, Bribery, and other high Crimes, as they’ve already admitted.
Madam, with all due respect, if you had done these things when I first asked you to, it would have been called, “Upholding one’s sworn duty to protect the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic…” and many of our children who are not, would be whole and alive. So once again, I exhort you; The Time has come. And thus I must regrettably add a fourth demand to my sad, sorry list above:
4. Stop this government now. Shut it down. No good whatsoever can come of a United States Government with no congressional oversight, whose People are routinely lied to and otherwise misinformed and actively propagandized, and the Constitution of the United States of America is treated as a mere suggestion, and a poor one at that. Bring all Congressional and Executive business to a halt, until some maturity and sanity can be restored to the halls of government. The time has come; Shut it down. SHUT… IT… DOWN…!
The Time has come, Madam, the Time has come.
Most Gravely and Shamefully Yours,
zentiger
zentiger
zentiger’s Street
in a Town in
California
zentiger’s phone
zentiger at earthlink dot net
And here is that original missive, dated unfortunately 1-March-2003:
zentiger
zentiger’s Street
in a Town in
California
zentiger’s phone
zentiger at earthlink dot net
The Honorable Dianne Feinstein
331 Hart Senate Office Building
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510-0504Saturday, March 1st, 2003
Dear Madam Senator:
When a man with the power of the President of the United States threatens the sovereignty of nations with the blood of his countrymen and women, over the objections of a majority of the American Allies, and the voices of millions in the streets of the capitols of the world, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind requires that we finally declare that the Emperor has no clothes.
When a man with the power of the President of the United States affects to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power, the appointment of Justices beyond the consent of Congress, and the People’s rights inferior to the asserted authority of the Executive, to transport his own Citizens beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offenses, even to the very assassination of his own people by Executive and Military fiat, that is a man whose character is marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, and is thus unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
When a man with the power of the President of the United States equates millions of people marching in the streets of his own Nation’s cities with a marketing contrivance, the time has actually come to call an end to the whole villainous charade.
The time has come to say that the People of these United States have always stood, and continue to stand, against Empire, and to recognize that unprovoked attacks on nuclearly inchoate Nations impels our Enemies not only to develop the technologies of Mass Destruction on a wider, faster and more secretive scale, but predisposes those Enemies to threaten our own cities and People with unspeakable ruin.
The time has also come to remember that the American People have always preferred Privacy over Security, and Freedom over Survival. I’m sure you don’t need to be reminded that among the reasons why the Founding Fathers so carefully limited the Powers of the Executive, and reserved others to the States or to the People, were their understanding that War is the gravest of human endeavors, Empire is anathema to Democracy, and Tyranny will always be the first Enemy of the People of the United States.
The time has finally come to realize that the greatest Danger to the People of the United States now comes from their own Executive’s unenlightened self-interest.
I must therefore, however respectfully, demand that you and your colleagues wrest the power to wage War back from the Executive Branch , and into the hands of the People’s representatives where our Constitution, quite correctly, intended it to be.
It is from these circumstances, and for these reasons, that I also direct you, on behalf of the People of these United States, to repeal the inappropriately-named “Patriot Act”, and take immediate action to end the grotesque “Total Information Awareness” scheme.
I ask of you as well, in the strongest possible terms, to exhort your colleagues in the House of Representatives to immediately draft Articles of Impeachment under Article II. Section 4. of the United States Constitution whereby the President may be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.
I thank you, Madam, in advance, for giving these matters of the most dire seriousness the profoundly concerned regard that they necessitate. Please do not let my repeated Petitions be answered only by repeated injury. Our political ancestors, the original American Patriots, did not turn away from their solemn and necessary duty to heave off the shackles of Tyranny in the 18th Century, nor may we in the 21st.
Most Sincerely Yours,
zentiger
zentiger
zentiger’s Street
in a Town in
California
zentiger’s phone
zentiger at earthlink dot net
I also wrote nearly identical letters to Senator Boxer, and my Representative, Congresswoman Woolsey (with whom I’ve had quite an exchange over impeachment, and she has recently jumped on my bandwagon).
The 2006 letters to Boxer and Woolsey were quite a bit less caustic than Feinstein’s, and I actually thanked Woolsey, although in a back-handed ‘stay on your toes’ kind of way.
Now on to my question: