Misogynist Response to Impeachment

The following is the email exchanges between my friend and a former candidate for the House of Representatives, Bill Winter (D). Two others also chimed in along with me. The issue was whether it was responsible or proper to have impeachment as a discussion in the national dialogue.
The exchange seemed to be going along well until Mr. Winter decided to attack Ms. Wasfi in his last response. It’s an example of the internecine dialogue that often takes place in the progressive/peace/liberal movement.
Debate is an excellent format of resolving issues or at least hearing one another but obviously there are some who feel debate is a game to be won or lost.
I think the issue of misogyny must be interjected into this particular exchange of emails given the defensive and inappropriate remarks ultimately coming from the man who would be a congressman.
I’m going to highlight the areas in which I feel Mr. Winter discounts and demeans a young Iraqi-American woman who just happens to disagree with him.


BGWinter1964@aol.com wrote:
From: BGWinter1964@aol.com
Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2006 12:27:09 EST
Subject: Re: December 10th

In a message dated 12/3/2006 9:15:19 A.M. Mountain Standard Time, dahliaswasfi@yahoo.com writes:
So why not host an educational seminar on the myriad grounds for impeachment, for those who want the world to change to a place where justice is served, and lay a foundation for rejoining the international community?(Wasfi)


Winter’s response:
So we further divide America--perhaps to the point of destroying it, shut down Congress for a year, give the right wing the issue it needs to get back a majority, spend 80 million dollars, and ignore all the real problems facing America, just to get rid of a guy who will be gone in two years anyway, and so we can replace him with....wait for it....Dick Cheney!!! AND allow them to nominate a new vice president who will have a head start on being the next President!

Dumbest damn idea I ever heard, and one of many reasons that I think I'm done with politics!

You can move forward governed by rage or you can move forward governed by reason, but only one will allow you to actually govern!

And you can have impeachment--or you can have health care and alternative energy and yes, a solution in Iraq, and all the other real issues that are so important---but you can't have both.

Which will it be?

Has Bush committed impeachable offenses? Damn right he has! Will impeaching him make America and the world a better place? Absolutely not!

You pursue whatever crusade you want, but I'm going to go find a way to give real people the things they need to make their lives better and impeachment just doesn't get us there!Bill Winter


In a message dated 12/3/2006 9:15:19 A.M. Mountain Standard Time, dahliaswasfi@yahoo.com writes:
So why not host an educational seminar on the myriad grounds for impeachment, for those who want the world to change to a place where justice is served, and lay a foundation for rejoining the international community?(Wasfi’s original response)


Further response from Winter:
While you are fighting for impeachment, here are just a few of the things I want to go and figure out:

I want to know why the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence don't apply to gay and lesbian Americans.

I want to know why speaking Spanish makes you a second class citizen in America.

I want to know why it's okay for police to put 50 bullets into a black man's car on his wedding day in America.

I want to know why an Iraqi life or an Afghani life or any other life is worth less than an American life.

I want to know why people still die in America from malnutrition and because they can't afford health care.

I want to know why we fiddle and do nothing as the polar ice caps melt.

I want to know why a kid in Douglas County is entitled to a better education and more opportunities than a kid in downtown Denver.

This is only a start to the list of things that consume my days and haunt my nights.

You can go impeach George Bush and throw him out on the pavement, and you STILL won't have answered any of these questions or the hundreds of others I have!

God knows I made a lot of mistakes in the past year--in the past 42 years--but one of the biggest was getting careful. I won't be careful any more.

So if impeachment tops your list of priorities, then by all means fight for it---but count me out, because it doesn't even MAKE a list of my priorities!

Bill Winter


dunnilsson@comcast.net wrote:

Friends,

While Bill's list is of course very important, even crucial, to restoring our democracy and Constitutional rule of law, I don't see any reason that an educational seminar on the myriad grounds for impeachment, as Dr. Wasfi put it, can't be part of it. I don't see her desire to impart knowledge about, or even just to discuss the extent of the damage done to our democracy, etc. as fighting for impeachment to the exclusion of all else. Frankly, it is my belief that this should eventually be part of the national conversation, and I regret that Speaker-elect Pelosi and Senator Reid seem to have "taken it off the table", as it were.

It is my belief that now that the voice of reason will once again be heard in Washington, the first order of business should be to take care of the American People, in the ways Bill has outlined and more. However at the same time, those responsible for the damage done to our American values, Constitution and way of life, should be held accountable for their actions and inactions. For it is indeed many of those very actions and inactions that are the cause of many, if not most, of the situations Bill mentions.

-LD


Mike Collins wrote:
Subject: Impeachment is Your Constitutional Responsibility
Date: Mon, 4 Dec 2006 08:24:22 -0700
You're Wrong, Nancy Pelosi; Impeachment is Your Constitutional Responsibility
By Bill Hare
12/03/2006 08:04:35 PM EST
The November 15 issue of The Washington Spectator features an article by Elizabeth Holtzman, who, as a congresswoman from New York, was a member of the House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Representative Peter Rodino of New Jersey during that tense period in the seventies when the issue of impeachment was being considered.
The Judiciary Committee approved three articles of impeachment against President Richard M. Nixon, which would have resulted in a trial before the Senate had the besieged and increasingly unpopular chief executive not been coaxed into resigning.
Republican elder statesman, Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, along with the party's leaders in the Senate and House, Hugh Scott of Pennsylvania and John Rhodes of Arizona, achieved that result in a private White House meeting that devastated Nixon.
Goldwater glumly summed up Nixon's prospects by telling him that he could count on no more than perhaps 8 votes in a Senate trial and that it would be best for the country for him to promptly resign, which he did.
As a lawyer with the rare background of personal experience in a historical first with the only president in American history resigning, it is only natural for Holtzman to set her sights on what is occurring today amid the severe and frequent demolition of the U.S. Constitution, with a special emphasis on the Bill of Rights, on the part of the current regime.
Holtzman was a featured speaker at the recent rally held on the steps of Constitutional Hall in Philadelphia calling for the impeachment of George W. Bush. She continues to articulately make that case.
Prior to the solid victory of the Democratic Party in the November mid-term election, in which she thereafter was assured of becoming the first Speaker of the House in American history, Representative Nancy Pelosi of California said in the October 22 edition of CBS' 60 Minutes:
"Impeachment is off the table.... It is a waste of time. Wouldn't they just love it if we came in and our record as Democrats coming forth after twelve years is to talk about George Bush and Dick Cheney. This election is about them. This is a referendum on them. Making them lame ducks is good enough for me."
Read with any kind of careful scrutiny, Pelosi's aforementioned statement embodies grand ignorance, audacious arrogance, or a combination of the two. Pelosi appeared to be paying little if any attention to what candidates were saying on the campaign trail about the major issues that would ultimately get them elected.
Contrary to what right wing propagandist David Brooks wrote in his jaundiced analysis of the November 7 results in the New York Times, that voters had "exchanged moderate Republicans for conservative Democrats," a CNN exit poll on Election Day revealed a distinctly different result.
The CNN poll revealed that the largest number of voters surveyed, 42 percent, rated corruption and ethics in government as the most important issue determining their vote. According to The Washington Spectator, "Scandal-conscious voters favored Democrats by a 22 percent margin. As the indictments go, so goes the nation."
To summarize, voters were seeking significant change. They were not interested in preserving a status quo-take care of business approach. The remarks of Pelosi unfortunately appear to be reflective of a status quo attitude.
Pelosi should be reminded that officeholders take an oath to preserve and defend the U.S. Constitution. In so doing, it is the responsibility of a Member of Congress to oversee that the document crafted by our Founding Fathers is not shredded in the interest of political expediency.
With so much scandal having pervaded the Washington scene recently, it is up to Members of Congress to launch investigations and follow the ensuing trails wherever they lead.
Given what we already know, any kind of conscientious efforts by the likes of Congressmen Henry Waxman of California and John Conyers of Michigan, two notable congressional investigators, will likely result in evidence pointing toward the commission of acts falling within the purview of impeachable offenses.
Nancy Pelosi needs to be brought in touch with current realities. Angry voters made the difference in the Democratic victory of November 7. These individuals are seeking justice. That means following the trail of corruption wherever it leads, including the White House.
This is not a game of political "gotcha," as Pelosi seems to be indicating in her remarks on 60 Minutes. This is not political gamesmanship. This is what voters who made the difference, those who voted for Democrats, do not want. This is not what officeholders are expected to do in conformity with their oath of office to preserve and defend the Constitution.
Lastly, the comment that Bush and Cheney being lame ducks is "good enough" totally misses the point. Two years is plenty of time to trash the Constitution some more. If evidence clearly indicates previous trashing to the level of impeachable offenses, is a license to be granted due to lame duck status?
In my next article I will analyze the points raised by Elizabeth Holtzman in her Washington Spectator article and dovetail them alongside those raised earlier in that sphere in this column.

Mike Collins
www.ranger25.com
www.COVFA.com


Dear Bill, Stan, and BetheChangers,

Thank you to LD and Mike Collins for being the change....that is, for offering courteous and respectful discourse rather than the abusive belligerence and arrogance that characterizes American "diplomacy" around the world. This country was not built on the ideals of freedom and democracy any more than the new Iraq is. It was founded on the basis of economic gain via the genocide of the indigenous peoples of North America and Africa (who were brought here in chains). That institutionalized racism and misogyny persists to this day, and it is the basis for explaining why American society is what it is. The American dream is for an elite few (mostly white, male, and rich), and it is built on the nightmare of everyone else.

So, what will we, as Americans, do to bring about justice?

In solidarity,
Dahlia



BGWinter1964@aol.com wrote:
From: BGWinter1964@aol.com
Date: Mon, 4 Dec 2006 15:21:48 EST
Subject: Re: Clarification
To: dahliaswasfi@yahoo.com


In a message dated 12/4/2006 1:06:40 P.M. Mountain Standard Time, dahliaswasfi@yahoo.com writes:
for offering courteous and respectful discourse rather than the abusive belligerence and arrogance that characterizes American "diplomacy" around the world.(Mr. Winter’s use of one phrase of a larger message from Ms. Wasfi. Apparently Mr. Winter finds this statement personally offensive and thinks it must be directly targeting him….I suggest he read Stan Goff at the Feral Scholar – http://stangoff.com. Stan presents clear evidence of exactly what Dr. Wasfi refers to in her statements.)





What I have found, Dahlia, is that anyone who disagrees with you in any respect is immediately labeled and called bad, and you heap upon those with whom you disagree exactly the abusive belligerence that you claim to decry. I am neither abusive nor arrogant, but I can disagree with you without being a bad person. I wish you the very best, but the only way you know how to reach out is with scorn and rage. I'm not built that way. I recognize that we live in a complex world and there are no black and white answers to any issues. I respect the right of others to disagree with me. You do not. You lump all of us who disagree with you into the same category--wrong and bad! I do not share your arrogant certitude about the world.
Sincerely,

Bill Winter

Dahlia’s email to me following this email from Mr. Winter

Perhaps this is an opportunity for me to learn.....what's your honest take on this?
I know I have a temper, but overall, with regard to my work, is it true that "the only way you know how to reach out is with scorn and rage" ?




My answer to Dahlia about Winter’s remarks:

Reading through the correspondence I don’t find anything that should have elicited such a personally defensive response. If there’s any offender of the courteous and respectful ideal of discourse it seems Bill Winter discounting a discussion of impeachment you suggested by throwing out his list of priorities was it.
His refusal to discuss the criminal actions of the administration is akin to Americans and most of Europe overlooking the holocaust being carried out against the Jews, gays, gypsies and any other “defective” group Hitler chose to target. We had the information much earlier than the time the troops liberated the camps. We sent boatloads of refugees away from our shores rather than acknowledge them.
This guy talks about cops shooting the black groom in NYC and calls it a crime and is right to say so but he won’t say the deaths of the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis caused by the lust for power and control of resources is crime enough to warrant a trial. One American life, black though he was, seems more important to Mr. Winter than the deaths of children in Iraq at the hands of American artillery and bombs.
This is the sickness of war Americans perpetuate; if these types of atrocities happen in ANY war regardless of the legality it’s not a crime - it’s just the way it is in war.
He talks about the poor and disadvantaged here in America but won’t acknowledge the responsibility Americans have in the destruction of all major infrastructures and social gathering places (i.e. schools) in Iraq and Afghanistan. He won’t acknowledge Americans have a moral responsibility to fund the rebuilding of Iraq by Iraqis (and Afghanistan by Afghanis).
The whole smokescreen of listing priorities more important than impeachment and pointing out how disruptive it would be is a cowardly approach to criminal acts that have devastated American families, Iraqi families and Afghani families. Rather than clean the whole house, Mr. Winter only wants to clean the front rooms while he keeps all the dirty linen hidden in the backrooms.
It wasn’t so long ago another ex-Marine declared the peace movement needed to focus on just ending the war and bringing the troops home instead of all the peripheral issues that are connected to the administration of this war. Scott Ritter seemed to think we could only work on one thing at a time or we’d confuse and blur the issue of stopping the war.
I contend the war’s effects are far-reaching and by tying them together we present an even stronger case against the war. Connecting the war to all the egregious situations Mr. Winter describes presents a strong case for the discussion of impeachment. Violation of international laws coming from Nuremberg and the Geneva Convention shouldn’t be ignored as Bush, Cheney and Gonzales so ardently desire.
We don’t let criminals off the hook even if it disrupts the status quo and call it justice. Winter, being a lawyer knows better but then we have to consider the American justice system’s inequitable rulings that are predominately against people of color or people lacking wealth. The system Mr. Winter is licensed to practice in is obviously not a system lending itself to justice. We need only visit the prisons and see the racial profile of the inmates.
I reject the continued line of thinking we can’t bring the perpetrators of so much unnecessary death and destruction to justice because of the disruptive nature of doing what’s right. We let Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon off the hook for the genocide in Cambodia they perpetrated when they ignored pleas of the Cambodians to stay neutral. And yet we spent millions or maybe billions pursuing impeachment for a consensual act of sex between a President and a woman other than his wife.
If the American people allowed that circus to happen they certainly need to allow a discussion of impeachment based on the crimes against humanity that have occurred since 2003. If an act of oral sex is reprehensible in the context of a President taking advantage of a low level aide, the deaths, torture and wounds of so many in these two wars is outrageous and needs to be addressed. It’s all connected whether Bill Winter wants to acknowledge it or not.

William Terry Leichner, RN
USMC combat vet –Vietnam (67-69)