By any objective measure, rogue elements at the very top of the Executive Branch have seized control of the United States government:

• For all we know, Dick Cheney is using a frontloader to deliver state secrets to the Saudis, or the British or Israel. Since 2003, he has refused to accede to security oversight regarding secret documents from his own administration.
• If you think Cheney wouldn’t do anything to harm the country, you are wrong. In 2003, he instructed his minions, including Scooter Libby, to unmask a CIA agent who was working on a covert project tracking blackmarket sales of weapons of mass destruction. There is no reason not to expect that one of the weapons that the agent, Valerie Plame Wilson, would have otherwise helped capture will be set off in Times Square one day.
• Late yesterday, the White House confirmed that Pres. Bush has also refused oversight on documents.
• For years now, when Bush has signed a bill into law that he doesn’t like, he has simultaneously countermanded it with a “signing statement” indicating his intent to break the very law he just signed. He has done this over over 700 times.
• Pres. Bush has admitted violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act over 1,000 times.
• The United States Dept. of Justice is being run out of a a boiler room at the RNC.
• To further his party’s political ends, Bush divided the country and then took us to war using an indictment against Iraq that was full of lies.

And yet what this state of affairs evinces from a wide spectrum of the American public is a shrug. “What can ya do?”

For many people, shrugging off the outrage comes from fatigue. While the Republicans controlled everything, it seemed it would never end. When the Democrats took over last year, their margin in the Senate was too slim to fully take control. The conventional wisdom now is that Bush will serve out his term, albeit under constant barrage from his critics.

But this could be changing. If action is taken against the rogue elements at the top of our government before they are scheduled to step down in January 2009, it will only be with the blessing of the Republican minority.

Bush has polled under 30 percent in four polls this year. A majority of Republicans continue to support him, roughly 60 percent in a recent poll. But this number was 20 percentage points higher six months ago.

If it continues to go down, we may find that despite Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s assurances last year, impeachment is on the table.