I remember John Perkins.  He was a real jerk.  A gold-plated, super-slick lying little butthole shill for corporate gangsters; a snake-oil salesman with a movie-star grin, shiny loafers, a crooked calculator and a tooled leather briefcase full of high-blown bullshit.  

This was two decades ago.  The early 1980s. I wore sandals, uncombed hair down to my cheap collar and carried a busted ring-binder filled with honest calculations and sincere analysis.  It was Economic Hit Man Perkins vs. Economic Long-Hair Palast.  I didn't stand a chance.  The EHM was about to put a political bullet hole through me wider than a silver dollar.

CNN allowed the eight Democratic presidential campaigns to vote: Should CNN continue to place its preferred candidates together in the center of the stage in order to keep the candidates it ignores off camera at the edges, or should it follow the model PBS used last week and choose candidate positions on the stage by random drawing? Dodd, Gravel, and Kucinich were joined by Hillary Clinton in opting for the random drawing. Edwards and Obama were joined by Richardson and Biden in opting to stick Edwards, Clinton, and Obama in the middle. The vote was four to four. What to do? Appeal to the public? You're kidding, right? CNN cast the deciding vote itself and will stick with the podium positioning that suits its stance of choosing our elected officials for us.

The PBS debate at Howard University last week chose candidate positions on the stage by random drawing and sent a video of the random drawing to each campaign. It also gave the candidates equal time and respect, and asked them all about the same topics. Not exactly rocket science, but a pretty stunning breakthrough for a presidential campaign debate. You can watch it

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George Mason (1725-1792), the father of the Bill of Rights (1791-2002), argued at the Constitutional Convention in favor of providing the House of Representatives the power of impeachment by pointing out that the President might use his pardoning power to "pardon crimes which were advised by himself" or, before indictment or conviction, "to stop inquiry and prevent detection."

James Madison (1751-1836), the father of the U.S. Constitution (1788-2007), added that "if the President be connected, in any suspicious manner, with any person, and there be grounds to believe he will shelter him, the House of Representatives can impeach him; they can remove him if found guilty."

Of course, Bush has long been connected in a suspicious manner to Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Karl Rove, and others. Madison would probably have called for Bush's impeachment when Bush first refused to investigate or hold anyone accountable for leaking Valerie Plame's identity, or rather when Bush lied us into the war in the first place, or when he confessed to illegal spying, or when he detained people without charge and tortured them, or when

The official list of cosponsors of H Res 333 to impeach Dick Cheney cannot be updated until July 10 when Congress gets back to Washington.  But Congress Members can contact Dennis Kucinich's office in the meantime and sign on.  And citizens can encourage them to do so.  In fact, this is the week in which you should visit your Congress Member's district office and demand that he or she sign onto Kucinich's articles of impeachment or introduce their own.  And they should not just sign on, but make a public statement in support.  Here's everything you need to know: http://impeachcheney.org

The official count of cosponsors, including Kucinich, is at 10.  But Rep. Jim McDermott spoke on the floor of the House last week and committed to signing on.  That makes 11.  Congressmen Bob Filner and Jim Moran now also say that they are signing on.  That's 13.  And Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. has spoken out in support of impeachment.  He is clearly either signing on or introducing his own articles of impeachment or both.  That makes probably 14.