How Dems can escape the impeachment trap

Ever play with matches when you were a kid and burn yourself?

You learned not to play with matches again.

Pain can be a great teacher, but not if you are a Democrat planning to impeach (ex) President Donald J. Trump a second time, having failed to convict him the first time. They have created a trap for themselves.

Let me interrupt the narrative to say if Democrats really, truly believe in the charges, last time and this time, and have only high, patriotic motives, and sincerely believe a crime has been committed, then they should go ahead with a show trial, even knowing they are likely to fail (again).

Principle matters, if this is truly principle.

One reason to question that is this: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi insisted the House rush the indictment, with a week left to go before Trump stepped down, out of fear of what crazy things he might do in his last week. Pardon himself? Start a war with Iran? Create a buying frenzy for Game Stop?

But once she got — without a single witness — the single Article of Impeachment in hand — she sat on it until Trump was gone. Suddenly her panic hit the pause button, allowing her motives to be questioned. 

Democrats would be smarter to censure, which Sen. Tim Kaine (Hillary’s running mate) has proposed, and which could pass. But there’s little appetite for that among Democrats, because in addition to the high motives I am willing to believe, there is also an irrational, seething desire for revenge. They hate Trump.

So the charade begins, starting next week.

There is divided opinion as to whether it is Constitutional to impeach a former president. The majority of Constitutional academics feel it is Constitutional, but the majority of them are leftists, I believe, based on the majority of faculty being Democrats.

They point to one previous  case, 150 years ago, when a Cabinet member was impeached after he left office. They are less likely to mention that he was not convicted. 

Democrats are so giddy, jumping up and down, clapping their hands and shouting that Trump is the first president to be impeached twice, they forget he is likely to be acquitted twice, which will make him appear the winner and them appear to be losers who invented false charges to smear the president. 

Do they really want to see another picture of Trump holding up a Page One with the word “acquitted”? Because that is the likely outcome.

Impeachment mainly is designed to remove a president guilty of “high crimes and misdemeanors,” and nobody knows exactly what the hell that means. Can we remove a president already gone?

If we can, what stops the House from impeaching George W. Bush?

Trump is being impeached for what he did while in office, some say. Others believe W committed war crimes, so impeachment should be on the table. 

Democrats have a second iron in the fire. In addition to removing him from office, which already has happened, they also want to prohibit him from ever running again.

Why? Because he is unfit for that office? I agree with that, but who gets to lead should be a decision made by the American people. Could it be the real  reason they want him benched is because they feel he could win?

In reading about impeachment, I see the Constitution says the trial in the Senate is to be presided over by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

Chief Justice John Roberts has declined to preside, and he is no knee jerk Trumpster. His absence makes the trial seem like a kangaroo trial.

For me, anyway.

President Joe Biden has called for unity, but has remained neutral on the move to impeach, which is divisive. 

He doesn’t want to alienate his base, sure, but a majority of Americans approve of the impeachment. 

The majority is not always right.

Biden should exercise his leadership and ask Democrats — he is the leader of the party, not Nancy Pelosi or Chuck Schumer — to abstain from voting for impeachment and instead vote on a motion of censure.

That would pass and would produce a Page One headline Trump would not want to show off.