While the options presented by the author are innovative, they ignore that there are already 2 existing methods to get around the "Executive Privilage problem".

1) Inherent Contempt. Either house of Congress can vote an individual in contempt at any time with the full weight of compelled testimony through imprisonment. This process does not involve either the Executive or Judicial branches at all.

2) Forming an Impeachment Investigation Sub-Committee. Per House rules and Jefferson's Manual, a sub-committee of the House Judiciary Committee can be formed to investigate the validity of impeachment charges. Executive Privilage claims have no weight under an impeachment investigation. (Any Executive claims to the contrary can cause #1 or actual impeachment to be invoked.)

The Supreme Court and history have said that Executive/Legislative confilicts are inherently political. In a true showdown, however, the Constitution gives the Legislative branch the power to always win -- if it believes it will not pay a political price for exercising the power it has.

The only question is not if Congress has tools, but if it has the political will to use the tools that exist.

I agree, the tools exist already, and so this is either one great big farce or Congress/the Senate is composed of liers and cowards..

I think that there are more than just those two alternatives. The first is that the democrats don't have the power to do any more than bring the charges. The republicans will vote as a block to defeat impeachment charges and it will all be for nothing.

I would prefer they bring on the impeachment, even knowing that they can't win, but I do understand the price they would pay.

I agree that impeachment is the ultimate remedy Congress has at it's disposal, though I do want to clarify that I meant that the remedies listed above were meant as actions independent of impeachment itself.

The author made an attempt to devise additional methods for Congress to extract information from the Executive in light of Exectutive Privilege claims Congress believes to be inappropriate. The two methods I describe are only presented as tools for shining daylight on Executive activities - though impeachment is one of the possible actions Congress could pursue in light of the information they uncover.

Looking at a concrete example, the House has a tool immediately at it's disposal to compel Harriet Miers to testify. There is no legal, proceedural, or logistical barrier to the House voting to compel her to appear. A simple majority vote of the House on a charge of Inherent Contempt alone would authorize the Sergeant-at-Arms to physically take her to the House floor completely independent of any action by another branch or the Senate. In the case that she still claimed privilage, the House could vote by simple majority to have her imprisoned until the end of its current session in January of 2009 to compel testimony. From a process perspective, this could all happen immediately.

This leaves only the political question. Would the Congress pay a political price for the action to compel the testimony? That is a question of the ability of Congress to align its actions with voter opinion and not a question of Congress having the ability to extract information.

how would miers be arrested? suppose she hid in the White House? would the congress send a tank (do they have one?) to ram the doors open? the prez controls the army so he has ultimate power. congress is helpless. nor can they impeach the Dunce. they lack votes in the senate to convict. get realistic!

Thank you for the clarification. I would be in favor of calling the White House on this one. There is every reason to believe that they did, in fact, use the justice department for political purpose and I think that was in violation of the law if not the purpose of the justice department.

I really don't think that there would be much of a penalty for the dems to pay to go after the testimony, even if it did mean Harriet goes to jail.

I agree with tempanon's assessment. You do do need the political will to do anything successfully in our government. And where does political will come from? National/Public will.

That is why Congress is not doing anything. The President may have low ratings, but is there a public outcry (other than in the Fray!) calling for his Impeachment, or even Censure? I think the answer right now is no.

Therefore critics of this Administration have no other recourse than to wait for the next election. If the People are really fed up with this President then they will most likely elect a Democrat next time around. If not, it goes back to which candidate can present himself/herself best to the People. Lacking even that, it will come down again to the way its been the last two elections, split right down the middle due to very effective campaign strategy/tactics/funding.

The same thing applies to Congress. If the Public approval rating for Congress is lower than the President's, yet there is no call for resignation, then we will have to wait until the next election. Again, if the campaigning strategy/tactics/funding of the office holders are able to overcome the Public opinion then it goes back to the same old thing.

I hate to break it to everyone, but our Constitutional Representative Democracy is sort of a command by negation process. We put someone in office. If he/she fails to meet certain expectations, that does not mean he/she is automatically (and immediately) removed. Our Constitution provides certain processes for attempting to do this, however.

The severity and speed of how to accomplish this will, again, depend on the political/public will.

So I would ask all the posters who are calling for impeachment. Is the political and more importantly Public Will there to accomplish this?

I would add that the only politician in this country with political will is Bush, it shows that even bad politicians can be effective.

He is the worst president in history but the public will is also lacking, and our congress has shown itself to be (and this is getting to be typical) all words and no action.

Lets hope that we can elect a president with good judgment and an honorable heart.Lets hope we can elect members orf congress that are honest and brave.

To bad lil'bush did'nt get a blow job from some scanky intern.he'd bee gone by now.Go figure

I am sure he has never had one from anyone.

smelly:

I am sure he has never had one from anyone.

Wow, nothing like enlightend political discourse . . . .

LOL!

Once again, I find myself in total agreement with you TC!

Touche!

That was the only political discourse that conservatives and republicans engaged in from 1998-2000.

Give me a clue as to what you think is appropriate,tell me one thing that Bush has done that merits a discourse.