Pushing Impeachment, Again

Good news for all the Republicans who fear that the Democratic party is in the ascendancy, Democrats will gain seats in Congress next year, and elect a President: the party is dying.

That's right, according to a contributor at the Daily Kos, the party is withering away -- all because they refuse to impeach the President:

[Pelosi's] position on impeachment is killing the Democratic Party too, by driving away not just progressived members of the party, but independents who voted for Democrats last November expecting some action in defense of the Constitution.

I see this anger welling up among progressives and independents everywhere I travel, as people say they've simply had it with the Democrats. The support of the party for a bill continuing funding for the war through September was terrible. The Democrats' rush to pass a bill granting Bush the authority to spy without a warrant on Americans, and to expand the power to spy domestically well beyond phones and internet to even include break-ins was a last straw.

Does anyone recall the exit polling for the 2006 election showing what percentage of independents voted to send a message for impeachment? CNN's exit poll showed Iraq, corruption, terrorism, and the economy. In the minds of the Left, this all conflated into a message in support of impeachment.

And since Congressional leaders have no interest in impeachment, some are pushing for Democrats to quit the party in protest:

My own little call for people so sign an "I Quit This Party" petition has seen a jump from 300 to now 400 signers. (Sign up on the column to the right.) When it gets to 500 I'll be sending the list off to Pelosi, as well as to the offices of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Democratic National Committee Chair Howard Dean.

Four or five hundred party defectors may seem like small loss, but it reflects a larger trend across the country.

The author offers a 'stick' to induce Speaker Pelosi to come along:

Either Pelosi--who is facing an election challenge by Cindy Sheehan in her own San Francisco district--better do an about face and open the path to impeachment of Bush and/or Cheney. Otherwise, she and her fellow party leaders are going to find themselves either ousted in primaries, or back in the position of minority "leaders" in 2009.

How many impeachment crusaders will be prepared to travel to San Francisco and help Mother Sheehan challenge Pelosi? Republicans can only hope that there are enough become a burr in the leadership's side all the way to the 2008 election, complicating efforts to enact an agenda that the American people support and distracting them from fundraising and candidate recruitment.