I'm pretty sure I've diaried on impeachment before (on second thought, I'm sure I did, here), and I recall saying Speaker Pelosi could not, and would not be leading any movement for impeachment if only to avoid the inevitable implication of ambition before all else.  Or something similar.

Well, she's about to get a real sticky wicket to deal with.  As is being reported all over the web, prominently here, the Vermont Senate has voted 16-9 to ask the US House to start impeachment proceedings against Bush and Cheney.  The vote, without debate, took 15 minutes or so.  The issue now moves to the Vermont House, where the Democratic Speaker has been trying to stymie the issue, so far with some success.  The resolution moved through the Senate, BTW, after a lot of direct, personal pressure from his constitutents upon the Democratic Senate President, who'd been holding up the resolution, too.

For those of you who either forgot or never knew, the Manual of Procedure written by Thomas Jefferson for the Congress does provide for State Legislatures to initiate impeachment proceedings in situations where the Congress is unable, unwilling or not so disposed.  They're following that procedure in the Vermont Legislature;  locals tried it in New Mexico (the matter was shunted off to committee) and in Oregon or Washington (a lot of pressure from Federal-level Dems put that initiative on ice there).

I don't know whether the resolution will pass the Vermont House, and I don't have a vote or a voice in that.  But I have one thing to say, in two parts:

In deciding whether Bush and Cheney should be impeached, any person holding a vote in the matter (and their constitutents seeking to exercise their petition rights, in one direction or the other) has to answer the following questions:

(a) Do you think the conduct of Bush and Cheney in their respective offices has been and is acceptable?

(b) Are you willing to say, as a matter of eternal precedent*, that conduct like Bush's and Cheney's should be considered as surmounting the threshold for acceptable conduct (or, said another way, that their conduct has not found the bottom of what's acceptable)?

As to each of these office-holders, if you answer "Yes" to both questions, then you must vote against impeachment.  If you answer "No" to either (a), (b) or both, then you must vote for impeachment.  

It's that simple.

Oh, and as a matter of (I suppose you'd call it moral philosophy), if you vote/stand against impeachment, you're equally complicit with Bush and Cheney in all they've done - you've ratified their conduct.

Choose wisely.

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* All precedents are eternal, and don't you forget it.  I've cited obscure cases from 1790-something and 1800-something to good effect in non-constitutional cases, if, as and when the occasion arose.