Rudy:

"Even if you want to quibble about the statistics, you find me the person who leaves the United States and goes to England for prostate cancer treatment, and I'd like to meet that person."

Then he should meet my friend. I'll call him James. He's a old friend of mine, English guy, living in LA. This is an absolutely true story.

Back in 1999, James developed a lump on his throat. He didn't have any medical insurance, so he postponed having it looked at. When he did, visiting a doctor in LA, the doctor looked at James' non-insured status and decided that his problem was an abscess. He prescribed antibiotics.

This went on for 8 months. For 8 months, James took different dosages and medicines prescribed by this doctor, and the lump only got bigger. Finally the doctor said, "Let's lance that abscess. Give me $5,000."

As James is a British citizen, he decided to save the $5k, and fly home to Britain to have the abscess lanced. He got back to London, went to the doctor, and their first comment was "this could be cancerous. Let's do some tests." A quick test later, and James was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma. (Not prostate, sure, but still deadly.)

So James stayed in London to deal with this. The government put him up in a flat and paid for healthy food for his recovery, recognizing that his chances would be better if he didn't have to beg on the street. On days when he had a chemo treatment, he would be picked up and dropped off in a taxi, as the understanding was that after chemo, he would be in no state to drive. After about 6 months of this treatment, James' cancer went into full remission. He's now back in LA.

Checking if James' lump was cancerous should have been a standard procedure for the LA doctor. My own doctor checks me for cancerous lumps each visit. However, because James would have not been able to pay for cancer treatment, the doctor decided there was no point in even going down that path. Had James not had access to the British NHS, he would now be dead.

Rudy and James need to get together for a beer.

What ever will shooter242 do...

...when he wakes up one day and realizes what a nightmare he's helped create.

Same as any modern-day right-wing authoritarian would do: blame Bill Clinton.

The anonymous Bush supporter (seems they're choosing anonymity more and more these days, understandably) is suggesting that there is absolutely no cause to begin impeachment proceedings, before the discovery of those proceedings has actually begun. This says everything you need to know about Anonymous.

There is a mountain of cause to begin impeachment hearings. The NSA spying program is in direct violation of the 4th amendment, or so it appears to Congress and the public. Torture of detainees is in direct violation of Geneva, whether the detainees were POWs or unlawful combatants. (Fact is, Anonymouse, Geneva covers both and prohibits torture against both, something you would like to ignore.) And the statements Cheney made to Congress in the runup to the Iraq Disaster (in which the oath is completely implied) may well have been knowingly fraudulent at the time he made them. A great deal of evidence has come out over the past year indicating that Cheney did in fact know that the WMD claim had serious credibility problems, at the exact same time he was testifying about its certainty to Congress. These are just a few items.

Does the above paragraph PROVE that Cheney must be removed from office? Of course not. However, they are just a few indications of unanswered questions, the answers to which could absolutely demand impeachment and imprisonment, depending on what they are. These answers can be uncovered through impeachment hearings.

Anonymous doesn't know the answers to these questions either. He would prefer to pretend these questions don't exist. And therein lies the crux of his argument.

Anonymous has fully implied that a republican executive branch's activities should not be scrutinized for lawfulness. (I specify "republican" as, like all hypocrites, I assume Anonymous supported the Clinton impeachment for lying under oath, the same crime from which he would now like to excuse Cheney.)

As the rest of you continue to engage with Anonymous, keep in mind what he's advocating for: a republican king. What else would you call a supreme executive who wields power in direct contravention of the Constitution?