There are plenty of takes on the impeachment of Donald Trump, but for posterity’s sake, here is another. Donald Trump has been impeached with 230 votes in favor.
I think the impeachment and removal process is an extraordinarily serious thing. I thought the impeachment of Bill Clinton was frivolous, I never supported the impeachment of George W. Bush, and I wasn’t particularly supportive of calls for Trump’s impeachment early on in his Presidency. All that throat clearing aside, I think it was appropriate in this case. Trump was using the power of his office and national security money to shake down the President of Ukraine to have him interfere in a U.S. election on Trump’s behalf. Using the power of the Presidency to invite a foreign power to meddle in a domestic election is exactly the kind of thing the Framers had in mind when they put the impeachment process into the Constitution.
Trump supporters mostly didn’t even try to defend Trump’s actions. They made some half-hearted effort to say that Trump just had an abiding interest in fighting corruption. But this was severely undercut by Trump’s general indifference to appearances of impropriety and the fact that his concern for corruption seemed to begin and end with Biden, not to mention the Trump family’s own struggles with nepotism. What they lacked in convincing argument, Trump enthusiasts tried to make up for in volume, loudly complaining about the process. It’s the sort of defense that will look familiar to anyone who has ever seen a sovereign citizen challenge his speeding ticket. (You don’t have any jurisdiction over me! The flag in the courtroom has gold fringe!) Also, the “it’s a Republic not a Democracy” rhetoric used to promote the sanctity of the Constitution’s electoral college process after Trump lost the popular vote was conveniently forgotten in favor of an abiding concern for the “will of the people” when faced with the Constitution’s impeachment and removal process.
I don’t think the Senate will remove Trump. Tribalism being what it is, I don’t think there is a particular political upside for Democrats. But sometimes you have to do the right thing, and impeachment in this case was the right thing.
(Side note: Tulsi Gabbard voted “present,” which shows you that the Democratic primary voters who have stayed away from her in droves kind of had her number all along.)
I hope they sit on the impeachment and don’t send it to the Senate while they continue to investigate, hopefully finding their way to Trump’s finances, which is probably the mother lode. The people who should be morally outraged with this man’s conduct aren’t. Perhaps that is why a knowledgeable person, in 2016, said that the Constitution was made for Hillary Clinton’s misdeeds, but not for Trump and the damage he could do, and is now doing.
If there’s a design flaw in the Constitution that Trump has exposed, it’s that it did not envision the rise of political parties and elected officials putting their loyalties in their party before their country.
I think that’s already been shown with the Electoral College, and I think it will next be shown with this impeachment trial.
Mitch McConnell has earned the nickname of the gravedigger of American democracy well.
At the time, I supported the impeachment and removal of Bill Clinton. I don’t anymore. Unlike many Democrats, I do think what Bill Clinton did was wrong, very wrong. He perjured himself. You don’t have a right to lie under oath when the lie is about sex. And let’s not forget that Clinton was carrying on an affair with a subordinate in t he workplace. He should have been censured for his outrageous conduct.
But impeachment should be about conduct that directly relates to actions one takes, or doesn’t take, as President. It should be about the job. Clinton’s conduct failed to meet that standard to be impeachable.
Clearly Trump’s conduct is worthy of impeachment. I can’t imagine much worse conduct than a President shaking down a foreign leader for dirt on a political opponent, and putting America’s national security at risk in the process. Although I was barely a teenager during Watergate, what Nixon did pales in comparison to what Trump has done and continues to do. We owe Nixon an apology. As bad as his behavior was, at the end of the day Nixon did care about what happened to this country. Donald Trump does not. He only cares about himself.
I found a wikipedia article listing every presidential, congressional and judiciary scandals. While Wikipedia is not the final source, there have been quite few. But nothing approaches what Trump has done. It came out over the weekend that the White Hoouse order to withhold Ukranian military aid came two hours after the “perfect” call.
Two hours in federal government time (considering the IRS, Post Office and other agencies), is like a nano second. Donnie watches more Fox TV more than two hours.
Ukraine is at war with Russia. Russia has already taken the province of Crimea. Russia has an on-ground military relationship with Syria.
In concert with these Russian actions, Trump has withdrawn military advisors from Kurds in northern Syria. Trump claimed he was going to seize Syrian oil. Syria does not have enough oil to lubricate all Syrian moped chains. It is 59.5th, tied with the Ivory Coast.
I picture has emerged that anyone should be able to see. Trump is, for some reason, putting the political interests of Russia over allies. Lots of people have speculated what that might be. I don’t care why Trump is advancing Russia’s interests in the former Soviet state.
Trump has committed the most impeachable offense that has surfaced our 243 year history.
If Republican senators will put the interests of the nation ONLY to get reelected, in 2020, how many more years will American democracy hang around.
Spot on, (or as in Blazing Saddles, ditto!). The comment about Tulsi Gabbard also resonates with satisfaction.
Listening to Republican representatives leaven their votes against the articles of impeachment with what they perhaps hoped was red meat for Fox News country, I couldn’t avoid the sense that the Republican party of Richard Lugar is self-destructing, replaced at least temporarily by a totally disingenuous band of obsequious Retrumplicans. Our system works best with two viable political parties. I wonder how, when, and if we can again get there.