We need more of it, don't cha think?

The U.S. system has only one mechanism for removing the executive: impeachment for "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors." These days, I'm wondering if that's enough.

While I strongly suspect that there is at least one solid impeachment case to be made against our current president, it will take time, maybe more time than the president has left in office. In the meantime... I'm not sure, but it seems at least possible that an overwhelming number of Americans don't want this president in office anymore.

Personally, I not only don't want him in office anymore, but I feel that the administration's continued tenure is a threat to our national security, and to our democracy. (Among other things, what if we did actually face an imminent threat that could only be repelled by military action? Who would trust the President Who Cried Wolf?)

If in fact a majority of Americans feel similarly, why should we have to put up with two more years of this administration? We're the people, right? Aren't we supposed to run this place?

I see value in the separation of powers (although a parliamentary system has its pluses too), and appreciate that legislators can't remove the president just because they think he's doing a godawful job, for example. The party that the president doesn't belong to is pretty much always convinced that the president is doing a godawful job, after all, so it makes sense, in the context of the balance of powers, for the burden to be on the legislative branch to prove a case against the president.

But unfortunately, since impeachment is the only mechanism by which the president can be removed, the burden is doubly on us, the American people, to elect a bunch of legislators, who will then conduct investigations, which then might lead to an impeachment case, or might not, or might take a very long time to do so, while we sit back biting our nails.

That's fine as far as the balance of powers goes, but what about the ultimate power residing with the American people? What if we the people, and not a particular political party, think the president is doing a terrible job that puts our nation in jeopardy, regardless of whether our legislature has proven "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors"? Shouldn't the president serve at our pleasure?

Perhaps what the US needs even more than the movement calling for the US to pull out of Iraq, is a movement calling for this administration to resign. 

There aren't any good solutions to the disaster in Iraq, but is anyone confident that the administration that wrought the disaster wouldn't also exit the disaster in the worst possible way? There comes a point when pressure to implement a particular policy isn't enough (sort of like how there comes a point when a habitual drunk driver gets his license revoked for good). When a leader has proven himself incapable of doing the job, period, step one to better policy is getting new leadership.

And perhaps we need a new mechanism for removing the president, like a way to trigger a federal recall election, for the future. Is there a way to craft a federal recall election mechanism that would tend to discourage frivolous recalls, but that would provide a direct way for the American people to hold the executive accountable? Impeachment, while it has its place, doesn't seem to be enough.