Impeachment - Not There Yet.

I'm still a Never-Trumper, but I favor rejecting him at the polls over impeaching him in Congress. (Ideally, I’d have Congress impeach him next November, after he loses the election, just to denounce him and disqualify him for future office.)

Alleging corrupt intent is too easy and too tempting.

One strong argument against impeachment was made just this morning by Sen. Rand Paul in an interview with Jake Tapper: If your rival’s son robs a liquor store, can you be impeached for demanding he be investigated? Note that I said “impeached,” not “criticized.” A good president would react to news that his rival’s kid is a criminal with “The Justice Department is handling that, and I don’t want to comment on it.” But we don’t have a good president. We have a godawful president. Still, the sin of demanding an investigation of a real crime is way closer to “maladministration” — being a godawful president — than to high crimes and misdemeanors.

So the Dems must fall back to the specifics of the Trump/Biden case. We all know that Trump was not really interested in the Bidens’ corruption, because we all know that he is a corrupt individual who believes in corruption as a way of getting things done. But we can’t impeach him for being a horrible human being, something we knew in 2016. Nor should we take official action against him based on what “we all know,” because we all can come to “know” a lot of things that aren’t true.

I am not saying that we lack evidence that Trump’s motives in the Ukraine affair were electoral. My problem is that I cannot find a bright enough line between what Trump did and what he would have been doing if the Bidens were in fact worthy of investigation (whether or not actually guilty of anything). Too much of the Dems’ case depends on the claim “There is no evidence that Joe ever acted to favor Burisma.” When did the absence of evidence become evidence of absence? Absence of evidence is, indeed, the core of Trump’s weakest defense. We have been subjected to hours of baloney about his not explicitly stating that the aid to Ukraine was contingent on the investigations he was demanding. How can the Dems complain about that defense when their “proof” that Trump’s motive was corrupt is that “there is no evidence” that the Bidens were corrupt?

Maybe that’s why we hear so much about foreign involvement, with continual references to the mention of foreign intrigue in the Federalist. But the argument is circular. The Dems say that Trump is seeking political assistance from Ukraine. Trump says he is demanding help with uncovering American corruption. We have cooperative intelligence arrangements with foreign governments. Australia tipped us off to Russian meddling. That information had positive, but not dispositive(!), political effects for Sec. Clinton. So getting help from foreign powers in matters that have political ramifications is not an impeachable offense. No, it comes back to the fact that Trump is a lying SOB. But all politicians are allegedly lying SOBs. In this case, the allegation of lying is supported only by the absence of evidence that the alleged lie (viz. that the Bidens are corrupt) is true.  That's an evidentiary hole that leads, in my view, straight to the voting booth. 

Politics ain't beanbag

I carry a very strong presumption in favor of the voters being the ones to punish political chicanery.  In a democracy, everything a leader does should have political consequences, and everything a leader does should take into account the extent to which public opinion will favor or condemn it. The matter is subtle: leaders must lead, but they must not coerce. We are seeing this issue play out with healthcare. We know the system is broken, but we are not ready for Medicare for all. If Sen. Warren changes her position on M4A to reassure union workers that they will not be forced to give up their plans, that may sound like opportunism to some, but it sounds like “listening” to others. Who’s to say that the politics did not change her mind about the best policy to pursue? Answer: the voters. NOT the Congress of the United States.

Getting re-elected is what politicians do. News accounts of the machinations relating to impeachment never fail to mention their political ramifications. The GOP is concerned with protecting its vulnerable senators, and the Dems are concerned with protecting their vulnerable representatives. Are these people’s exercise of their public responsibilities not being affected by their political self-interest? How is that different in kind from what they are accusing Trump of doing?

Was Mulvaney wrong? Do we not do “it” all the time? Yes, Mulvaney was “admitting” that there was a quid pro quo for releasing the Ukrainian aid, but that still leaves the “we do it all the time” argument on its own merits. It’s a different argument from the one Trump first made, but it may still be a good argument, and the Dems who are calibrating their  impeachment moves with their political fates in mind are having a hard time refuting it. If it’s so bad to trade foreign aid for political favors, what do we think of basing impeachment decisions on political effects? Has the left wing not “extorted” an impeachment process out of Speaker Pelosi by threatening her speakership? Should they all be “impeached”?

I believe that we must be leery of prosecuting "political" crimes  criminally or by impeachment.  Trump certainly sought to extort a political favor from Ukraine, with no benefit to the USA. But given a system of government in which political gain (i.e., public approval) of one’s official decisions is at least relevant to most such decisions, a president seeking to “steal” an election by coercing a foreign government to help him slime a rival does not in my judgment rise to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors. This is especially true when, as here, the voters will in fact get to vote on the guy and his publicly exposed conduct months after any impeachment process will have ended.  (If we can't vote Trump out, do we really deserve to govern ourselves?)

The strongest argument for impeachment, in my view, is that the President is attempting to rig the next election, i.e. that we cannot “let the voters decide,” because if we don’t oust the sonofabitch, the voters won’t actually be able to decide. But our politics features the sage observation “he stole it fair and square.” One test of a political leader is the ability not to be taken advantage of by bad actors. If Trump can steal the election from you, then Putin could probably steal the world from you. 

I believe Trump won the nomination because none of his opponents could actually humiliate him, despite his being the worst person ever to run for the office. There they were, up on the stage, being asked if they would back the GOP nominee whoever it turned out to be. Only Trump refused to raise his hand. Any decent candidate would have joined him and said, loud and clear, that if the Party nominates Trump, he or she would do everything in his power to defeat him. Instead, these would-be “leaders” showed a level of cowardice completely incompatible with the presidency. The question might as well have been “Who is too stupid to see that Donald Trump should not be President of the United States?” They answered that question honestly, and the rest is history.

The Democrats and the electorate both need to redeem themselves for their horrid performance in 2016. If either fails to do so, then a strong case can be made that we do not deserve to govern ourselves. Who knows? Maybe that is in fact the case.  Maybe democracy has hit the wall of diminishing returns, where everything people can agree to do has been done, and all that's left to do are things we must be forced to do. There is no rule of nature that says otherwise. Seems an important thing to discover, though, and having Trump on the ballot in 2020 strikes me as the best possible way to discover it. 

How do you say "nightmare" in Spanish?

The Democrats's first round of debates was a never-Trumper's nightmare. Bad as it was all around, a few embarrassments stand out.

First was the plethora of VP contenders, book floggers, and otherwise supererogatory deadwood. I like the idea of political parties, but only if they have some coherence.  Tom Perez has admitted that he wanted all of those people on stage, and he wanted fireworks, because it generated "earned media."  Is that what we have political parties for? To earn the attention of the ratings whores who run our media?

No, Mr. Perez.  If the 2016 election should have taught party leaders anything, it's that the party should limit the field to people with the support of its leaders. Nancy Pelosi, good as she is as a Speaker, is a feckless party leader.  Her voice should count, and it should be loud.  The party is not served by Eric Swalwell's proof that back-benchers should be seen and not heard, Maryanne Williamson has no business on the debate stage, Andrew Yang should run for dog-catcher before President, and on and on.  And Bernie Sanders?  What part of "party" does the DEMOCRAT party not understand?  Of course, the party should work to defeat him; he isn't even a member!  Yikes.

And then there's the circular firing squad, led by Kamala Harris. After feigning reluctance to criticize a fellow Democrat, Sen. Harris implied last week that Mr. Biden was "celebrating" segregationists.  She didn't have the courage to accuse him of doing so; he simply said that she didn't think anyone should do it. (Sometimes, context is everything.) But by the night of the debate, she had dropped all pretense. After clearing up, for those of us in doubt, the burning question of whether Mr. Biden is a racist - she said he is not - she accused him of "praising" segregationists and then, again after protesting that the debate shouldn't be a food fight, proved that point by throwing him under the bus, rehearsing a forty-year-old grievance, choreographed with the Tweet of a picture of herself as pickaninny in pigtails.  Food fight? No. Knife in the back?  Sure.  The left says she won the debate.  Wrong. Donald Trump won it.

The debate about healthcare was not about healthcare.   Everyone up there was for universal coverage. The debate was about whether private insurance companies were a sufficient cause for our broken system. Those opposing private insurance did so out of hatred for their profit motive.  There was no substantive discussion about the quality of care, the negotiating prowess of private entities vs. the corrupted government, or anything else.  Single payer is one thing, but a government-run health system - can you say "VA", little girl? - is something quite again.

A special vote of thanks to the moronic José Díaz-Balart. He asked each of the candidates whether someone whose only violation of the law was entering the country illegally should be deported, conjuring up images of good people living long commendable lives, but describing as well thugs with MS-13 tats the minute they exit the tunnels.  They haven't committed any crimes here either. So all those lawyers on the stage put on their pander suits and said they would not deport those people.  Mayor Pete at least had the sense to frame his response as a use of resources, but the right answer was simply "How long have they been here? Twenty minutes or twenty years?" If practical, illegal entry should be a tort, the remedy should be deportation, and there should be a statute of limitations. The first day of law school, students are told that they will learn how to think like lawyers, but some learn only how to think like politicians. They all sounded like they were for open borders, or at least for some kind of game where, if you can make it over the fence, you get to stay.

Meanwhile, again in response to a "yes or no" question, they all say that their government-run health plans would cover illegal immigrants.  Mayor Pete got to say that his plan would "cover them" by letting them buy in like anyone else, but, one assumes that the poor among them would be equally subsidized. I know he's the intellectuals' darling, but that may just mean that his sophistry is more sophisticated. The herd effect pretty much requires that we treat anyone here so that their illness or disability does not affect the rest of us.  As Anatole France wrote, the law in its majesty forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal bread.  If we don't want people doing those things, we must make poverty less common and less oppressive. The same is true of illnesses, especially infectious disease.  Out of what kind of spite do we not treat tuberculosis in an illegal immigrant?

But the issue is subtle and connected to the deportation problem. So long as deportation is a risk, illegal immigrants will not seek help, and the unhelped can be a dangerous presence. So maybe a case can be made for a high wall and amnesty for those who get over it, not for their benefit but for ours.  A common sense position would hold that the fewer people get in, the more we can do for them. But common sense isn't how one gets elected here anymore. Qué lástima.

Speaking of which, we should not let the whole Spanish business go unremarked. I suspect that I know as much Spanish as Cory Booker, probably a bit less than Beto O'Rourke, and a lot less than Mayor Pete (who only spoke Spanish when addressed in Spanish). But I know enough to recognize a thick "American" accent, and I found it embarrassing to hear these people conduct US politics, however poorly, in a foreign language.  This is not Canada.  Ici on ne parle pas l'espagnole. Aquí, nosotros parlamos inglés. At least that's what the independent voters we want to lure away from Trump do.

To answer my title question, then, the debates me dan pesadillas; they gave me nightmares. They resurfaced everything Hillary did wrong. Even when the occasional candidate mentioned the "working men and women," it was in the context of zero-sum class warfare, not bigger-pie optimism. Wages are paid from gross revenues.  You can't pay factory workers more if you lower the price of what they make. That's not to say that some prices aren't out of hand, just that restoring collective bargaining, not taxing the rich, is the winning Democrat message.  Don't kill the goose; fatten it and change the sharing rules.

In short, two tough nights for conservative never-Trumpers. I will vote for whichever of these left-wing wackos gets the nomination, just as I voted for HRC, who was not a left-wing wacko but, to her shame, consternation, and comeuppance, played one on TV. I prefer misguided to evil, and one does not choose among the candidates one wants; one chooses among the candidates one gets.

Did I mention las pesadillas?

Naming Names - the Public Michael Cohen Hearing

A lot happened when Michael Cohen appeared before the House Oversight Committee, so much that something might have been overlooked.  The media have dissected the stuff that sells papers, but there was something that plucked a certain civic string that hasn't been plucked in almost seventy years. The press ignored it, perhaps because ignoring it butters their bread.  But I am oddly and gnawingly discomfited by it.

I'm talking about Cohen naming the names of Trump's henchmen.  The prosecutors with whom Cohen is cooperating have all the names.  Congress could certainly get them in a list provided privately.  Why, then, did the Democrats - you know, the ones who railed about Comey saying bad things about someone he did not think should be indicted - feel so free to have some more names of people who may or may not eventually be indicted, disclosed publicly?  Wouldn't "Can you give us a list of people who have evidence of Trump's skulduggery?" have sufficed? Did these people's children have to hear their Dads' names on TV? Do these people deserve to be hounded by reporters on Michael Cohen's say-so?

Our pols do not seem to recognize the difference between a precedent and a one-off.  Consider the filibustering of judges. Mitch McConnell - a truly dreadful human being, but I digress, sort of - used the filibuster to prevent confirmation of qualified judges rightfully appointed by President Obama.  That was subversive and inexcusable.  Harry Reid's "nuclear" response to McConnell, dispensing with the filibuster for appointments other than SCOTUS justices, was unanimously opposed by Republicans. Allegedly, they thought it was a bad idea.  Yet, when they got control of the Senate, they did not undo it.  Reid's rule change came back to bite the Dems in the butt, and, good government being always the farthest thing from Mitch McConnell's mind, the Republicans have kept Reid's rule in place. Apparently, it, and they, have mellowed with age.

So, a one-off response to an unprecedented GOP abuse of the filibuster became a precedent rather than a caution.  The same thing is happening with the President's border wall "emergency."  The Democrats simultaneously rant about how the President has no power to do what he is doing while wetting their pants over the possibility that their President will get to do the same thing with guns and opioids and climate change.  Given what they see as a good chance of winning the White House eventually, the ideologues on both sides of the Congress are eager to take Congress out of the President's way when he's on their side.  This ridiculous, unconstitutional fraud is all too likely to become a precedent, because the members of a feckless Congress would rather abdicate their responsibilities than perform them.

But back to Cohen.  There was a difference between the HUAC and McCarthy hearings, on the one hand, and the Trump hearings today. The substantive issues today are not political.  The people that Cohen named are not accused of subversion or disloyalty, just maybe covering up venality. How is it that the naming of possible traitors is now seen, rightly, as loathsome, whereas the naming of cogs in the Trump money machine is applauded as a "road map" for Congress? Still, the theatricality of public naming was the same. Here's a piece from Chapter 10 of Victor Navasky's Naming Names:

The testimony of Kimple, Silver, and Erwin, combined with intelligence from the FBI and countless other government sources ... meant that the last thing the Committee needed to do its job was to accumulate more names. Moreover, almost all the witnesses who named names publicly preceded their public testimony with a private, executive-session rehearsal, which means that the public hearings were indeed largely ceremonial. ... Names were turned on and off like water by the Committee's counsel and investigator, depending on the symbolic goal of the day. 

And of course, named names get published with alacrity.  What else can one expect of the commercial media? That they should give a fig about the private consequence of public gossip?  They don't have enough evidence to name these people themselves as miscreants, but they sure as hell have absolutely incontrovertible evidence that Michael Cohen says they are involved in shady dealings. The things said by Michael Cohen may not be true, but his saying them is news.  If those things are names of people with real lives, reputations, and families put at risk, all the better. "Run that tape again!  We don't ever get names.  This is unprecedented!" Yeah, because it's such a fucking awful thing to do.  But it's not unprecedented now.  Just like getting rid of the filibuster for judges, it's a bad idea, a one-off, a desperate measure for desperate times, and maybe not even appropriate then. Reid's (reversible but not reversed) nuclear option was right, the other firsts regrettable.)

Sadly, the whole Trump Presidency is a one-off, occasioned, I believe, by the GOP's sabotage of the an unready President. The question is whether we will learn from it not the President can do, but what the electorate must not do.

Update:  Here we are one day later, and Sen Durbin is on CNN being asked, in connection with possible disclosure of the Mueller Report, to comment on Rod Rosenstein's argument that the DOJ has no business saying anything publicly about any citizen against whom it cannot make a solid criminal case. That, of course, was the Democrats' view of Comey's sin, and the reason for their objection to the DOJ handing over its Hillary files to Congress. Yet, Durbin has no problem saying that "the precedent has been set" for not respecting Rosenstein's corrective advice, as if bad behavior is somehow locked in place by some invisible ratchet.  Literally, words fail me here, so I'll stop.