First Things First

As time has passed, a consensus has grown that both George W. Bush and Dick Cheney deserve to be impeached and removed from office. (And those are two separate things, by the way. Impeachment is the proceeding that leads to removal.) The trials really would have begun long ago except for one small roadblock. Nancy Pelosi. If both Mr Bush and Mr Cheney get removed, Ms Pelosi would become president, and most diehard Republicans would be willing to imolate themselves before they would let that happen.

This weekend, the solution occurred to me. Start out by impeaching Cheney. Remove him and let Mr Bush nominate his successor. Since, according to the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, he would have to get the approval of a majority in Congress, he would have to choose someone less divisive, say a moderate Republican like Joe Lieberman or a conservative Democrat like Lincoln Chaffee. This would preserve a buffer between Ms Pelosi and the White House and also might get Mr Bush to understand that he is accountable to the Congress, the courts, and, most especially, to the people.

It's even possible that we could get by without impeaching him, and he could run out his remaining term properly upbraided and corrected.

It's Darth Cheney. He's the one we should be after.