Setting Up a Presidential Sting

Jesse Walker | March 5, 2008

Reuters reports:

Voters in two Vermont towns on Tuesday approved a measure that would instruct police to arrest President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for "crimes against our Constitution," local media reported.

The nonbinding, symbolic measure, passed in Brattleboro and Marlboro in a state known for taking liberal positions on national issues, instructs town police to "extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them."

I guess the next step is to lure the president and vice president into town on some pretext or another. Offer your suggestions to the Brattleboro and Marlboro police in the comments.

Comments

Episiarch|3.5.08 @ 11:14AM|#

Tell them to hire Keifer Sutherland and have him call the White House and do one of his "Mr. President..." phone calls, of course with "Jack" needing the President to come there.

Bush will be highly concerned that superagent Jack Bauer, whom he knows is real as he saw him on TV, has found yet another "destroy America" plot and will come right away.

thoreau|3.5.08 @ 11:16AM|#

Have a Dateline NBC investigator set up an explicit chat with the President, and lure him to a liaison in Vermont.

|3.5.08 @ 11:22AM|#

Brattleboro and Marlboro should pass resolutions wanting to present Bush and Cheney with honorary awards on the steps of their corresponding city halls.

|3.5.08 @ 11:22AM|#

How about deer hunting season? Granted, now you have armed members of the executive branch, but who said this was going to be easy?

Ali|3.5.08 @ 11:24AM|#

Any WMDs in Brattleboro? Saddam must have hidden them wmds somewhere.

thoreau|3.5.08 @ 11:24AM|#

Cheney's dangerous when he's equipped for hunting. I say no go.

Stick with the Dateline NBC reporters.

Or do what they do with guys who have outstanding warrants: Send them a notice that they've won a prize drawing and need to show up in VT to collect their plasma TV.

Episiarch|3.5.08 @ 11:25AM|#

Or just tell Bush that there are some last vestiges of limits on executive power hiding out in these towns. He'd be there in a jiffy to smoke 'em out.

|3.5.08 @ 11:26AM|#

Free pie.

|3.5.08 @ 11:34AM|#

How about deer hunting season? Granted, now you have armed members of the executive branch, but who said this was going to be easy?

Hey, no way. I've seen Cheney with a shotgun with birdshot. There's no telling what kind of damage he could do with a deer rifle.

(I see thoreau beat me to it but I had to get my version in)

|3.5.08 @ 11:34AM|#

Cake and ice cream, since, as we all know, cake>pie

|3.5.08 @ 11:40AM|#

No, no. Punch and pie.

alan|3.5.08 @ 11:40AM|#

The cake is a lie!

Use the same trick Elliot did by luring ET with Reese's Pieces, only for Bush, substitute Cocaine.

|3.5.08 @ 11:42AM|#

I'm reminded of the episode of Metalocalypse where Ofdensen lures Dr. Rockzo to an intervention by telling him that the boys are going out for hookers and ice cream.

|3.5.08 @ 11:44AM|#

Tell the White House that they've found the 'real' final copy of the constitution that got rid of that pesky Legislative and Judicial branches.

Barring that, knock down a few buildings, lie about a tornado blowing through town and invite him in for a photo op.

alan|3.5.08 @ 11:44AM|#

boys are going out for hookers and ice cream.

Nine out of ten killing sprees are instigated by friends making false claims of hookers and ice cream.

|3.5.08 @ 11:46AM|#

Warty, that was brutal.

|3.5.08 @ 11:47AM|#

The other one is caused by someone taking Dr. Rockzo's banana. WHO TOOK MY BANANA I'LL KILL YOU..oh there it is, sorrrry. Ca-ca-ca-ca-ca-ca-yeeeeeeaaaah!

|3.5.08 @ 11:47AM|#

Mr. President, please put down your expanding executive powers gun and wait a few moments while our party team comes to take you to the party. There will be cake.

Bingo|3.5.08 @ 11:49AM|#

I heard that a Middle Eastern owner of an organic vegetarian falafel shop has taken down his comatose wife's copy of the 10 commandments and is threatening to pull her plug. Not only that, but rumors say that one of his customers might have shopped at Saddam Hussein's second-cousin's covenience store in Toronto and possibly saw a can labeled "WMD" sitting on the counter. Word on the street is that they scrape off "In God We Trust" on every piece of American currency they encounter and have never worn a stars-and-stripes lapel pin.

This obviously requires immediate action from the Executive Branch, or else the terrorists have already won.

|3.5.08 @ 11:53AM|#

Instead of inviting him, you could just invite everyone he knows to the awesomest of awesome parties, and then when he feels left out and compelled to sneak in... you gottem!

|3.5.08 @ 11:54AM|#

Because I love you all, here's the episode.

Abdul|3.5.08 @ 11:56AM|#

Have a Dateline NBC investigator set up an explicit chat with the President, and lure him to a liaison in Vermont.

Here's a record of that chat--

GWB: so, R U into abstinence?
littlegirl77: omg, no!
GWB: rly? Abstinence is teh awesome.
littlegirl77: can you come to my house and teach me about it?
GWB: am packing Bibles now.

|3.5.08 @ 11:57AM|#

Just a quick point of clarification:

"extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them."

This would be who, exactly?

Warmongering Lunatic|3.5.08 @ 12:15PM|#

"No state shall . . . pass any Bill of Attainder[.]"
-- Constitution of the United States, Atricle I, section 10.

"A bill of attainder, is a legislative act which inflicts punishment without judicial trial and includes any legislative act which takes away the life, liberty or property of a particular named or easily ascertainable person or group of persons because the legislature thinks them guilty of conduct which deserves punishment."
-- Cummings v. Missouri, 71 U.S. 277 (1867)

And their complaint is that Bush and Cheney are ignoring the Constitution?

|3.5.08 @ 12:19PM|#

Sounds like we have a sequel for Super Troopers!

Super Troopers 2: Quest for Bush

When a local police department arrests George Bush and Dick Cheney, the Vermont State Police are called into action to rescue them from certain jailhouse sodomization... much hilarity ensues...

Elemenope|3.5.08 @ 12:20PM|#

WL --

Arrest is not punishment, and an arrest warrant is not a bill of Attainder. So far as I am aware, the towns in question simply called for their arrest. Am I wrong?

Simon|3.5.08 @ 12:22PM|#

Bin Laden and Ahmedinejad are getting a civil union in Brattleboro RIGHT NOW!

CoaC|3.5.08 @ 12:36PM|#

Hey George! There's a candidate in Vermont that actually WANTS your support!

|3.5.08 @ 12:37PM|#

Of course, such resolutions are entirely silly, illegal, and unenforceable. That said, I'm watching the old Mission: Impossible series on DVD, and the IMF team conned evil drug lord, Lloyd Bridges (who knew?) to cross the border by moving some signs around.

Warmongering Lunatic|3.5.08 @ 1:00PM|#

Elemenope --

A "Call of the House" quorum-collecting arrest warrant differs in that no crime is alleged; a judicial arrest warrant differs in that it is a judicial act.

The key elements seem to all be there in this particular case. This was an exercise of legislative power; an arrest is a denial of liberty; this denial is directed at certain specific persons; and it is so directed because the town thinks the named persons guilty of conduct which deserves punishment.

|3.5.08 @ 1:01PM|#

"extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them."

This would be who, exactly?

I'm thinking Baghdad.

|3.5.08 @ 1:02PM|#

Tell em that Boss Murdock wants to see em.

|3.5.08 @ 1:21PM|#

Tell em that one of the cutest gals in the history of music wants to see em:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40K2S0-5Xo0

(That was contrived, huh?)

|3.5.08 @ 2:46PM|#

Hang a giant banner that reads, "Mission Reaccomplished!" Tell them that they won the war and that the evil doers whats been wanting a nucular bomb are gonna be there to sign surrender papers.

Or maybe a fat chick in a blue dress with a box of cubans...

|3.5.08 @ 3:37PM|#

Luring Bush to Vermont? Easy. Just let him know there is a baseball team, paid for by public funds, that he can be the manager of. It's happened beofre.

|3.5.08 @ 3:45PM|#

brotherben,

Wrong president.

Vermont Gun Owner|3.5.08 @ 5:22PM|#

WL, I was thinking the same thing. Even if it is ok, it is certainly damn close to a bill of attainder. A warrant cannot be issued by a legislative body, correct?

Anybody with a better legal understanding care to enlighten us?

DannyK|3.5.08 @ 6:56PM|#

Tell him Bandar's in town. He'll do anything for that man.

|3.5.08 @ 7:46PM|#

Evidently, several Vermont bergs are having a contest to see who can make the biggest joke of themselves.

cls|3.5.08 @ 7:56PM|#

I would lure them to Vermont by telling them there are "hanging chads" available. Sure seemed to work for Florida.