The danger of not impeaching now, in view of the dangerous precedent being set for extra-Constitutional behavior by future presidents - was made repeatedly on Bill Moyers' Journal on PBS last night. It's a compelling argument.

Moyers' entire program was devoted to a discussion with two brilliant Constitutional scholars, one on the right of the political spectrum and one on the left. They were Bruce Fein, who has been a scholar at both the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute and is the author of the recent Slate article calling for Cheney's impeachment, and John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation, and author of the recent book, The Genius of Impeachment. (These guys both have impressive resumes, I've only given highlights here, but the rest can be found at the link below.) They stressed that impeachment must not be done in a partisan manner; the issue is our Constitution, which should outweigh any consideration of party (they all bemoaned our current lack of political statesmen).

Although the entire program was full of excellent and thought-provoking material, there was one part that was expecially worthy of consideration. Nichols made the point that most people tend to think of impeachment as itself representing a Constitutional crisis, but that in actuality, the framers of the Constitution considered impeachment to be the cure for a Constitutional crisis already extant. Something for Pelosi to think about...

There's video of the program (and a text transcript) on the Moyers' site (I highly recommend the program), along with a wealth of articles and links to other impeachment-related material.

Bill Moyers is a national treasure. I'm going to send money to PBS to thank them for airing his show. He should start a journalism school.