The horizon is not so far as we can see, but as far as we can imagine

Tag: Impeachment

The Terrible Bind America’s Elites Are In

One point worth highlighting right now is that, despite the push to impeach AND convict Trump, Hawley, and others, it’s unclear that it will happen — even unlikely.

These folks did push the invasion of the Capitol, and it’s more and more obvious that some of the invaders had rather sinister plans had they been able to grab Senators, Pence or Reps; the zip-ties make this rather clear.

They made US elites feel unsafe in a way that hasn’t been true since 9/11. US elites regularly kill, impoverish, and hurt millions of people, but for them to even be so much as scared is intolerable.

The problem is, this is colliding with another principle: The principle of elite immunity from consequences. Elites don’t really go after other elites. Trump, pre-Presidency had committed dozens of crimes, but was never prosecuted, because everything he had done, did others had done also.

Essentially, every senior Wall Street and banking executive is guilty of fraud in the lead up to the sub-prime crisis, and they were all let off with slaps on the wrist. George Bush was unquestionably a war criminal and so were many of his senior officials, and I’d argue the same is true of Obama.

Even Clinton’s “emails,” widely dismissed as “no big deal” is the sort of offense which, if done by someone junior, would — at best — end their career and would more likely lead to jail time.

US elites send other elites to jail very rarely, and political elites do this almost never.

So there’s a real bind here. On the one hand, some Republican elites put the rest of the US federal political class at risk. On the other hand, well, who wants to set a precedent that a US president, senator, or representative can be truly held to account? Impeaching is one thing, convicting another (which is why Biden is wishy-washy about impeaching and convicting Trump).

Who knows? After all, where it would end if elites started holding each other accountable, when they all know that almost every one of them has violated many laws and far more norms?

For elites, the law is a sword they use against their lessers, not a weapon intended to be used against them. It is a shield against the hoi-polloi and has nothing to do with justice or equality before the law.

Feel for them, in their terrible dilemma: What is more important? Their physical safety or their legal immunity?


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There Is No Downside to Impeaching Trump for Democrats

Nancy Pelosi recently said:

Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.

I note, first of all, that Nancy Pelosi ruled out impeaching George Bush, so her reluctance to impeach for clear crimes is consistent with her record. I never understood why others thought that Pelosi would be pro-impeachment. The idea that she’s some partisan fighter is contradicted by her record. Pelosi is what she has: She has beliefs, and those beliefs include that the right is respectable and that left are unrealistic losers (as when she dismissed the Green New Deal).

But let’s leave Pelosi aside for a moment. The Democrats have control of the House. They can impeach. They cannot convict in the Senate, but impeachment is certainly possible.

Why would they want to?

Because it would cripple Trump and the Republicans. During the period of the impeachment, Republicans would be able to get virtually nothing done, except by executive fiat.

This is because the impeachment hearings would completely dominate months of news cycles–constantly hammering in every illegal, crooked, corrupt, and cruel thing that Trump has done.

This is largely a no-lose strategy, if you were actually partisan: There isn’t a lot that House Dems can get through anyway while the Republicans control the Presidency, Senate, and Supreme Court. They can’t actually get most of their legislation through without crippling compromises, so this is fine.

They need to take control the news cycle; to make sure bad legislation doesn’t pass for months; keep Trump tied down fighting impeachment and, on top of that, spend months talking about every shitty thing he has done.

Some may argue impeachment might “backfire,” that Americans “want to see legislators working,” but that sort of argument has been made for decades. Contempt for Congress isn’t going to get much worse (it hardly can), and if working means doing the wrong thing, it’s better not to.

In the face of all the positives, like dragging Trump through the mud, crippling his ability to do anything, and controlling the news cycle, impeachment starts looking, politically, like the obvious thing to do.

And if you actually care about justice, well, Trump is at the very least, a walking emoluments violation. He is clearly profiting from being President. Carter had to sell his peanut farm, Trump hasn’t even put anything into blind trusts and many of his businesses are clearly profiting from his Presidency.

Bush should have been impeached. Trump should be impeached. Ironically, Clinton, who was impeached, shouldn’t have been (lying about consensual sex is a ridiculously low bar).

Pelosi made the wrong decision with Bush. She appears in danger of making the wrong decision here. I doubt she’ll change her mind, but I hope I’m wrong.


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Is Impeaching Trump a Good Idea?

I’m really not sure it is.

Trump has been vastly incompetent at his job. He hasn’t appointed almost any administrative appointees, he’s embroiled in endless scandals, and he’s basically outsourcing policy to Rand Paul and various thinktanks.

Not that he isn’t doing bad things, but the main thing is that he’s very ineffective and he’s his own worst enemy.

(I am not in the least concerned that a man who hasn’t filled almost any DoD posts is going to launch a coup, so I don’t consider this fear a reason to impeach him.)

Now, there is an argument that he should be impeached simply because, well, he’s committed impeachable offenses. Starting, in my opinion, with the emoluments clause: He very clearly receives money from foreigners every day.

But in political terms, he’s ineffective, and there’s good reason to believe that Pence would be much less ineffective. Pence is a theocrat’s theocrat and will push a set of horrible policies. Plus, Pence doesn’t have foot in mouth disease. Pence will fill up all these administrative slots post-haste with a combination of Christian college graduates and the regular Republican apparatchniks, and he will have enough sense to perform basic tasks properly, like have lawyers check over administrative orders thoroughly.

In short, Pence will be much more effective at doing harm than Trump is.

I think, in terms of harm reduction, a badly wounded, unpopular Trump is far less dangerous than Pence.


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