In their delusive demands for the impeachment of President Trump, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats are substituting partisan politics for the commands and intent of the U.S. Constitution. This became self-evident when Pelosi announced her impeachment folly the day before she even set eyes on the alleged evidence, which turned out to be no evidence at all.
The usual gaggle of misanthropes like Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff of California and Jerrold Nadler of New York have been searching for a reason – any reason – to impeach Trump ever since his improbable election in November 2016.
With a shove from the chronically vapid Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Pelosi and her confederates have now settled on the most implausible of all their impeachment schemes peddled during Trump’s presidency – that his conversation with Ukraine’s president somehow constitutes an impeachable offense. It does not. Not even close.
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Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution defines the basis for impeachment as an act of “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” Anything less than that is not an impeachable offense. Were it otherwise, those who authored that esteemed document would have so stated.
Sadly, then-Republican Rep. Gerald Ford, as House minority leader in 1970, forever mangled the impeachment provision when he mistakenly observed: “An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history.”
This was precisely what our framers did not intend. This is what they feared. They did not want a sitting president to be removed because a capricious Congress controlled by an opposing party disliked a chief executive or disagreed with his policies.
Yet, Ford’s misguided thesis has now been warmly embraced by legions of Democrats who despise Trump. They have dishonestly conjured up a pretext to undo the 2016 election result and drive him from office.
The charade may eventually succeed in the House, where Democrats holds a comfortable advantage and a simple majority is all that is needed to impeach. But conviction in a trial in the Republican-controlled Senate will fail miserably because a two-thirds majority is constitutionally required.
This was the wisdom of the framers. They knew that unscrupulous politicians would inevitably try to subvert the democratic process for purely political reasons. The framers made it exceedingly difficult for such politicians to achieve that end.
As I argued in an earlier column, Trump’s request that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky assist in an official and ongoing Justice Department investigation launched by Attorney General William Barr is neither criminal nor unusual.
Indeed, Trump’s appeal for help from Kiev conforms with a treaty two decades old that obligates Ukraine to cooperate with U.S. investigations or prosecutions in any criminal matters by furnishing relevant evidence upon request. This is what Trump did.
Moreover, asking for Ukraine’s help was no clandestine maneuver. On May 24 the president reminded assembled reporters on the White House lawn that Barr was investigating the origins of the Russia “collusion” hoax
“And I hope he looks at the U.K., and I hope he looks at Australia, and I hope he looks at Ukraine,” Trump said of Barr. “I hope he looks at everything, because there was a hoax that was perpetrated on our country.”
The president made it clear that Ukraine was suspected of having been involved in election meddling, along with other foreign actors. Much of this is described in my book, “Witch Hunt.”
In several hearings in April and May, Barr candidly informed Congress that he was conducting this investigation. He appointed U.S. Attorney John Durham to lead the probe.
We now know that Barr asked Trump to initiate introductions between him and foreign leaders in furtherance of his probe. The president did so by approaching Ukraine’s president, while Australia initiated contact with the U.S. on its own accord.
Barr personally contacted officials in Great Britain, and he twice traveled to Italy to solicit assistance. His most recent trip occurred last Friday in the company of Durham.
There was nothing inappropriate about any of this. It was logical, sensible, and not at all uncommon. Other presidents have done the same thing. Our Justice Department has enlisted foreign help in numerous investigations over the years. It is pure sophistry for Democrats to declare such an endeavor is an impeachable offense.
Biden isn’t entitled to a “get out of jail” free card simply because he is now running for president.
Did Trump mention former Vice President Joe Biden and his son toward the end of the conversation? Of course he did. He was right to do so.
If, in addition to meddling, Ukraine possesses evidence that the former vice president’s bragging about a “quid pro quo” was a corrupt act intended to benefit his son by extorting $1 billion in U.S. taxpayer funds. It is incumbent on Trump to ask Zelensky to investigate.
Biden isn’t entitled to a “get out of jail” free card simply because he is now running for president. Hillary Clinton coveted such a card, and it should never happen again.
Lost amid the cacophony of condemnation of Trump is the fact that the Criminal Division of the Justice Department examined the official record of the Trump- Zelensky telephone call and concluded there was no crime, not even a violation of campaign finance laws. “All relevant components of the Department agreed with this legal conclusion,” said the Justice Department.
Some constitutional scholars have ventured that a president’s abuse of his official powers might rise to the level of an impeachable offense, even though it may not fall under the conventional statutory definitions and strict language of crimes and misdemeanors.
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This is not an entirely misbegotten argument. Yet, it has no application to what President Trump is accused of doing. He had every right to ask for foreign assistance in his attorney general’s official investigation. This was not an abuse of power, but a proper exercise of power.
Conversely, it is Democrats who are abusing their power of impeachment by deliberately contorting its constitutional meaning to serve their own political purpose.
Barr is determined to get to the bottom of how the “witch hunt” against Trump began. In his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee at the conclusion of the probe by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Barr posed an imperative question:
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How did we get to the point where the evidence is now that the president was falsely accused of colluding with the Russians and accused of being treasonous and accused of being a Russian agent?” Barr asked. “And the evidence now is that it was without a basis.”
Americans deserve to learn the truth of what happened. A handful of foreign governments may help provide the answers.
It is not an impeachable offense to ask.
#1: Vicomte13 To: WWG1WWA (#0)
What is "an impeachable offense"?
Whatever a simple majority of the House of Representatives says it is.
All that is required to impeach a President is for a majority of partisans to vote for impeachment.
Impeachment is not a criminal process. There are no rights, there are no laws, the only "due process" right of the accused is to not be considered "impeached" if a majority of the House doesn't vote to impeach him.
"Impeached" means "The House of Representatives votes that it thinks you're a scumbunk, and now the Senate will decide if you stay in office or not.
That's it. That's all. All of this pretense that there is something REAL behind impeachment, some actual legal due process, is naivete. Impeachment is a PURELY political process, and the vote is PURELY political.
When the Republicans did it to Clinton because they hated him, they guaranteed that the Democrats would do it to a Republican soon. And now here we are.
As politics becomes more polarized, you can guarantee that we will see more and more impeachments - whenever the House and the Presidency are of different parties, the chances of impeachment will be sky high in the years to come.
Impeachment doesn't matter.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-02 14:36:11 Reply Private Reply
#2: nolu chan To: Vicomte13, WWG1WGA (#1)
In real life, you are precisely correct. Impeachment is a political process. If the House votes to impeach Trump for picking his nose, and the Senate convicts, there is no appeal. It is final. One may claim that nose picking is not a high crime or misdemeanor, but there is nowhere to take the complaint.
nolu chan posted on 2019-10-02 18:35:45 Reply Private Reply
#3: Tooconservative To: Vicomte13, nolu chan (#1)
Functionally, the House serves as a grand jury and votes to send charges against a president to the Senate, known collectively as the articles of impeachment (the equivalent of criminal indictments from a grand jury). The Senate may then act on those articles (or not, as nolu pointed out recently) with the Chief Justice officiating at the Senate trial.
After Pelosi lost her previous speakership over the ObamaCare vote - which took out her entire Blue Dog wing that had made her Speaker - you have to wonder how many of the current smaller crop of Blue Dog Dems are ready to walk the plank with voters over casting a vote to impeach Trump. Some of these House members are in Red states and in traditionally GOP districts that Trump carried strongly; they were elected in a classic midterm wave by a Dem party out of power in 2017 and 2018 and desperate to gain control of the House. And they've accomplished very little other than make unfounded accusations about Russia. And now they're going to impeach? I think those Blue Dogs will think twice before they sign up for that. So far, we've seen only a few Blue Dog Dems waffling publicly. Doug Jones (D-AL) is already saying he doesn't think the voters of Alabama want him to vote to convict Trump and remove him from office but Jones is the only Senate Dem to talk that way, perhaps Manchin might also refuse to consider impeachment but he's likely to do whatever Schumer says.
I've begun to consider whether Pelosi really will get votes for articles of impeachment that are serious enough that they don't sound like petty partisan sniping to the indy voters. Pelosi may find it harder to scrape up those impeachment votes than most people think. Or she might just make a show of trying to impeach without actually pushing her Blue Dogs to walk the plank for her. This would be Pelosi staging a little impeachment hearings show trial for the cameras and the party base but with no intention of actually twisting Blue Dog arms hard enough to pass articles of impeachment. Pelosi would get most of the benefit of impeachment without doing anything to endanger her speakership.
Pelosi and McConnell are uniquely powerful figures in each branch of Congress. And they both have goals they are pursuing, McConnell even more than Pelosi (look at McConnell's success on packing the judiciary and the hardball he is playing with the FEC who he no longer allows to hold meetings, heh-heh). Neither wants to risk their position as party leader in Congress. Which means they both have strong personal incentive in keeping the largest majority possible in their own house of Congress. At some point, Pelosi has to ask herself what she gets out of impeachment and whether it's worth walking the plank herself and ending up as minority leader in the House again.
I think the optics of trying to impeach and remove a sitting president in the midst of an election season with his possible replacements (Warren, Sanders) in position to vote to remove him from office is really over the top, even for the NeverTrumpers. To do so after a 3-year investigation into Russia-Russia-Russia and have that flop so badly and then switch to Ukraine-Ukraine-Ukraine (where there are more serious questions about Biden than Trump) really does sound like something the voters could punish the Dems for, really badly. They could lose the indy voters en masse. Which is why I wonder if Pelosi will just stage a little hearing process, make a lot of accusations, and then just barely miss passing those articles of impeachment, sparing her Blue Dogs and some moderate Dems a painful vote in an election year, some of them as they run in Dem primaries in the spring.
The politics of an actual impeachment and trial could be quite brutal for the Dems in 2020, even with their libmedia and social media monopolies operating at full tilt in favor of impeachment.
Tooconservative posted on 2019-10-02 19:58:15 Reply Private Reply
#4: nolu chan To: Tooconservative, Vicomte13 (#3)
nolu chan posted on 2019-10-02 23:15:05 Reply Private Reply
#5: Tooconservative To: nolu chan (#4)
You know that the Court always refrains from involving itself in the rules process of Congress. They think it's a can of worms for the Court to ever involve itself in what is usually rank partisanship that nevertheless is lawful under the Constitution. The Constitution does not forbid a majority in Congress from making up a bunch of slanted procedural rules and displaying some very crude partisanship.
Tooconservative posted on 2019-10-03 01:05:05 Reply Private Reply
#6: Vicomte13 To: nolu chan (#2)
Well, in real real life there may be someplace to take the claim: the People, and more specifically, the armed forces and intelligence services, which are under the command of the President. If THEY remain loyal to the President, in real life, then what comes next is the overthrow - with a great deal of bloodshed probably - of the Congress of the United States and the Constitutional order, by the Executive branch and its agencies, in reaction to an excessively unpopular act by the Legislature.
And if the public supports the President and the armed forces in their unconstitutional life then, in real life, we will have experienced what is called a "coup", and there's nowhere to take the complaint that the Executive action was illegal other than the battlefield.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 09:07:35 Reply Private Reply
#7: Vicomte13 To: Tooconservative (#3)
No. She can't. I'm the quintessential Independent voter. I voted for Trump for my reasons, and as I've seen the Republicans, when they had the majority in Congress, resist him at every turn I've come to despise them more deeply than I ever did before. And now that I see the Democrats trying to pull this impeachment bullshit, I will answer truly: BOTH parties have tormented Trump because he represents me, and they - neither of them - want to bend to my will. Me and mine elected Trump specifically to bend the country to our will, and to take it away from Republicans and Democrats, who are fuckwads.
There is NOTHING that the fuckwad Democrats can do or say that will make this anything other than a partisan hitjob on Trump, aimed ultimately at me, and people like me will wipe the Democrats out electorally if they do it.
And if the Republicans actually join in and throw out Trump, I would prefer the end of the constitutional Republican in a military attack on Congress and a Trumpian dictatorship than to have MY will overridden by the minoritarian Congress trying to exert ITS will over against the will of the Independent majority.
If it comes to that, the Constitution is dead anyway, and I'd rather be ruled by the Army and the Navy than by the Democrats or the Republicans. Fuck them all.
Justicia fiat ruam caelum!
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 09:13:46 Reply Private Reply
#8: A K A Stone To: Vicomte13 (#7)
A K A Stone posted on 2019-10-03 09:18:00 Reply Private Reply
#9: Vicomte13 To: Tooconservative (#3)
They will.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 09:18:31 Reply Private Reply
#10: Vicomte13 To: A K A Stone (#8)
FURIOUSLY angry. The Democrats are attempting to stage a coup, and they are abetted by agents within the Intelligence agencies. The Democrats should be driven from office. The internal traitors should be liquidated.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 09:19:31 Reply Private Reply
#11: Vicomte13 To: Tooconservative (#3)
We could have a civil war over this.
If we do, let's be sure to have a proper Reign of Terror this time, to silence the losing side forever.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 09:21:37 Reply Private Reply
#12: Vicomte13 To: A K A Stone (#8)
Lots of people know this name. The government leaks like a sieve when they want to GET Trump, or GET the people doing the right thing.
Where are the patriots in the intelligence services when the very constitutional order of the country is being trashed by partisans?
The whistleblower's name should have already been leaked.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 09:24:25 Reply Private Reply
#13: A K A Stone To: Vicomte13 (#12)
A K A Stone posted on 2019-10-03 09:27:29 Reply Private Reply
#14: A K A Stone To: Vicomte13 (#10)
A K A Stone posted on 2019-10-03 10:16:07 Reply Private Reply
#15: Vicomte13 To: A K A Stone (#13)
Ah, the Walrus-man playing games. Nobody ever elected him to anything. Throw him in solitary naked for national security reasons, just like they did that...whatever that mincing tranny's name was.
John Bolton represents nobody but himself and a small class of unelected men who believe themselves to be the true keepers of national security. They need to be stripped of all power and silenced. And if they won't stay silently because they arrogantly believe they have some special status, they need to be silenced permanently as threats to national security.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 11:00:23 Reply Private Reply
#16: Vicomte13 To: All (#15)
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 11:04:19 Reply Private Reply
#17: Tooconservative To: Vicomte13 (#11)
I need to switch to your brand of coffee. : )
An impeachment that goes nowhere in the Senate isn't worth a civil war.
Tooconservative posted on 2019-10-03 11:39:29 Reply Private Reply
#18: Vicomte13 To: Tooconservative (#17)
True.
An impeachment of this nature that DOES get through the Senate is worth a civil war, a Reign of Terror, a Purge, and a new country.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 12:13:47 Reply Private Reply
#19: nolu chan To: Vicomte13 (#6)
Perhaps my intent would have been better stated as there is no legal recourse. Neither SCOTUS nor a lower court can take the matter up. The whole thing is a political matter, assigned to the legislative branch.
nolu chan posted on 2019-10-03 12:40:43 Reply Private Reply
#20: Vicomte13 To: nolu chan (#19)
Probably the whole thing will crumple in Congress and the people will turn the Democrats out in November next year. I hope they turn the Republicans who blocked Trump out too.
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 12:48:14 Reply Private Reply
#21: Vicomte13 To: All (#20)
Now, give me what I voted for, or die!
Vicomte13 posted on 2019-10-03 12:48:48 Reply Private Reply
#22: Tooconservative To: Vicomte13 (#20)
Well, I think your daughter is armed and well-trained. So you could send her to disembowel those commie goons. I'm not sure that you even have a shotgun. Wine and cheese and salmon and greens and other good-eats can only win the Battle of the Bulge.
OTOH, the Battle For Connecticut will probably get cancelled when the citizens realize they got disarmed many years ago and are thus only capable of slapping each other around while yelling cutting insults.
Tooconservative posted on 2019-10-03 13:22:24 Reply Private Reply
#23: nolu chan To: Tooconservative (#5)
It is good that they usually refrain, as they are legally barred from deciding issues of political opinion which are assigned to another branch of government. The judicial branch is without legal jurisdiction in such matters.
nolu chan posted on 2019-10-03 14:26:49 Reply Private Reply