Impeachment Deliberations from a Dark Corner

In my lifetime two presidents have been impeached: Bill Clinton and Donald Trump. Clinton was found not guilty of the articles of impeachment by a Democratic controlled Senate. Trump will, without a doubt, be found not guilty by the Republican controlled Senate. Richard Nixon could have been the third president to be impeached in my lifetime, but the then Republican leadership walked over to the White House, told him that if he did not resign, they would vote with their Democratic colleagues, that he would be found guilty, and that he would be removed from office. He resigned to spare himself that historical honor. If he had refused to quit, he would have been the first president, and perhaps the last, to be found guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors.

I’ve always argued that the United States needs a strong conservative party to represent the millions of conservatives in the country and to provide a counter to a left of center Democratic Party. What the nation does not need is a rogue right-wing ideological Christian fundamentalist authoritarian party whose leadership is comprised of oligarchs and those bought by oligarchs.

One can almost get nostalgic for the Republican Party of olden days. In the 60’s and 70’s, long before the Tea Party, the farce of family values, the cultural wars, and Trump, Republicans were capable, at least in extreme cases, of putting country before party. That party is long gone. Today’s GOP is not capable of doing so and might not even be capable of understanding the concept. Now, it’s personal office before country. Party before country. And especially, Donald Trump before country. Oh, from time to time Senator Susan Collins whispers that she just might join the Resistance and vote against the Great Demagogue in the Oval Office, but each time it comes to a vote, she falls in line. It’s not so much crying wolf as crying savior. How many times can you cry savior without saving even your own integrity before you are found out to be a fraud? Behavioral analysis must have a name for her condition. Only Graham Lindsey is more abject than Collins.  

There is no Republican resistance to Trump. None. So much had to be vomited down so many Republican toilet. Family values? You’ve got to be kidding. Character of the president? Let’s not talk about it. Personal integrity? Not important. Speaking the truth? How embarrassing. Full frontal nudes of the first lady? No problem. Diplomacy? Well yes, if it can fit into 240 characters. Policy on the fly? Who cares? Common decency. Never heard of it. They will give up anything and everything for power, even democracy. Perhaps especially democracy.

Putin is now these regurgitating toadies best buddy, to be trusted over our intelligence agencies—all of them. They are in love with Kim Jong-un. White supremacists in the White House soiling the carpets like feral dogs (feral: in a wild state, especially after escape from captivity or domestication). Remember the Put the White Back in the White House slogan during the Obama years? Well, they did. Pure White.

Christian evangelicals and fundamentalist (not all of them, but an alarmingly high number of them) in their embarrassing, humiliating, desperate, desire to “lay hands” on the man who mocks disabled people and grabs women’s pussies, who has been married three times, slept with prostitutes, and is accused of sexual abuse and rape by at least seventeen women, have exposed themselves. They now stand naked before us and it’s not a pretty sight. It was never about character, family values, and faith. It was always about power. Finally, they will kill Roe v. Wade so that fetuses may live, fetuses who will not grow to be separated from their mothers and fathers and put in cages because they were born on the right side, the God blessed side of a border, but may, nonetheless, live in poverty the likes of which impresses the world even now. Surely there is a special place in Dante’s ninth frozen circle of hell for these disgustingly transparent bags of holy shit. Shame on them. How do they look their fetuses in the eyes? I cannot find the words that can adequately explains their hypocrisy and disgrace.

(Official White House Photos by Joyce Boghosian)Saying all this does not imply I think Democrats are the American representation of the perfect citizen. I mean, the Democrats in the Senate impeachment trial where never going to find Clinton guilty. Though I do hope, perhaps naïvely, that if the case against Clinton had not been lying about a blow job, and had not been about the resultant 453 page report written by a Christian evangelical seemingly fascinated by the intimate details of fellatio, but had been about abusing the power of the presidency and undermining the republic, they would have told him to resign or he’d be kicked out of office. After all, five Democrats did vote to find Clinton guilty. It is impossible to imagine even one Republican voting to remove Trump. However, if one does, a whole lot of death threats will come his or her way.

Interestingly, Kenneth Starr, who did so much to teach American children the difference between giving head and doing the nasty, is now one of Trump’s lawyers defending him in the Senate impeachment “trial.” I’m not watching the “trial,” or listening to it on the radio, or reading about it. I couldn’t stand to hear Starr’s voice, nor the voices of so many Republican sycophants. It is just too much to bear. I only read the headlines and even those are enough to drive me to a dark corner where I can mourn for the nation in private.

The United States of America is in trouble. If the GOP and Trump win in November, the United States will be in deeper trouble. Americans claim that the country has been in crisis before and has always self-corrected. True, but because we self-corrected in the past does not mean we will do so in the future. We seem incapable of seeing the danger, so powerful is our national myth.

Alan Dershowitz, the another Trump impeachment attorney, literally declared that if a president is running for reelection and deems his or her reelection good for the country, nothing he or she does can be an impeachable offense (Dershowitz : "If a president does something which he believes will help him get elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment.") Such a legal argument in the United States should get every American, those in the Resistance and those wearing MAGA hats, running for shelter as American democracy comes crashing down. This is breath-taking stuff. Trump is claiming unlimited power and so far, getting away with it.

Authoritarianism, a rogue political party, the weakening of the separation of church and state, Nazis and white supremacists marching openly and proudly in the streets (some fine people according to Trump), millions of Americans being denied the vote, the caging of children approved by right-wing judges, attacks on the media and the constitution—the list can go on and on. The impeachment of Trump will change none of these things because the Senate will never find him guilty and will never remove him from office. In fact, the impeachment and “trial” are helping him. His approval rating is going up and recent polls indicate he may be closing the gap on Democratic candidates for the presidency. Still, the House had to send articles of impeachment to the Senate. Sadly, however, in honoring the constitution and American democracy, the House may have, in the long run, undermined the constitution and democracy. November will tell.

Democracies are always a few elections away from fascism.

 Copyright © 2020 Dale Rominger