How, exactly, did I get here?
My political journey has
somehow taken me from canvassing for Obama north of Fort Knox, KY in 2008, to
voting for Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Primary outside of West Point, NY
in 2016, to – gulp! – “defending” Trump against impeachment in 2019. What a
long, strange, trip it has been, as they say. Truth is, I couldn’t sleep last
night and have been watching CNN’s wall-to-wall impeachment coverage since 4AM.
When the clock struck a reasonable hour on East Coast time, and once I couldn’t
contain the frustration any longer, I called my father.
Now, Dad and I are political
opposites. No, that’s too mild. We are toxically antithetical. A bit of back
story: he and I have gone months without speaking in the past over arguments
surrounding the Iraq War and other polarizing political topics. It’s gotten
ugly at times. Years ago, we called an armistice and agreed, for the most part,
to limit our daily conversations to grandkids and the NY Yankees. Dad voted
Trump; I was a Bernie-bro who held my nose then cast for team Hillary. Yet,
against all odds, we agree, mostly, that – though for perhaps different reasons
– the Democrats’ impeachment crusade is equal parts distraction and farce. As
we took turns venting this morning, it struck me that, in hyper-polarized – Red
Team / Blue Team – America, our middle-ground discussion must be about as rare
(or mythical) as a unicorn.
Look, I know I’m about to get
hammered as soon as this piece hits the web. I’m not all that naive. Most
left-leaning publications wouldn’t likely have touched it; the few mainstream
liberal friends I have left may bolt; and online critics – whether famous or
nameless – will once again slap me with the standard labels:
Trump-apologist, Putin-stooge, Russian-asset, and/or blatantly un-American. So
it goes. Nonetheless, no matter the cost (count me a free-speech-nostalgist),
whatever principles I possess demand that I throw my two cents in.
Allow me one caveat (which my
pops won’t like): personally, I think Trump is utterly unfit for
office – in part, due to his temperament, but mainly because of his policies.
What a novel thought, I know! So, I’ll save you the suspense – I ain’t gonna
vote for the guy … ever. Furthermore, I think Trump’s committed plenty of
impeachable acts, mainly in the foreign policy arena, from overseeing
U.S.-abetted, unsanctioned war
crimes in Yemen, to escalating America’s bombing of several nations
upon whom Congress has not declared war. Problem is, as I’ve written,
the same can mostly be said of Baby Bush and “Saint”
Obama. And we all know the DNC-machine has zero stomach for criticizing the
latter, no matter how mildly.
All that said, I truly believe
that Ukraine-gate, like Russia-gate before it, was a dangerous
charade – smoke and mirrors – from the start. The entire Russian
collusion angle, no matter hard MSNBC liberals wished it were otherwise, never
amounted to much of anything. In fact, the whole masquerade served (and serves)
mainly as a cudgel for establishment Dems and their media lackeys’ attempt to
delegitimize a duly elected president from the very moment he was elected. I know,
I know – the Electoral College is a travesty, an undemocratic anachronism. I
agree wholeheartedly. Still, according to the rules of the game, Trump won.
Period.
Matters deteriorate from
there, unfortunately. So polarized, so tribal, has Washington become, that the
Democrats marched down this impeachment road knowing full well that they didn’t
stand a chance of removing Trump. No one seriously believed the Republican-led
Senate, especially with ice-cold Mitch McConnell at the helm, would convict
this president. Proof positive came this morning, when first Nancy Pelosi, then
Rep. James Clyburn, hinted they might even withhold the
impeachment articles from the Republican Senate indefinitely, or, forever. Say
again? So what was all this for, then, exactly?!? Clearly, the entire
process constituted little more than political masturbation from Jump Street.
Though, admittedly, it’s been – and will continue to be – a boon for the media.
Like pornography, impeachment-theater makes for great (if guilt-ridden)
entertainment – which is precisely the business the media is in these days.
There was hardly an ounce of
statesmanlike bipartisanship in yesterday’s vote;
and there won’t be any going forward, either. Not a single Republican crossed
the aisle to censure the president. Only two Democrats voted against
impeachment. This nearly clean party divide is as instructive as it is
disturbing. Consider an historical comparison: even before Nixon’s
(far more deserved) impeachment came up for a full floor vote in the House, key
Republican senators told him he’d lost their confidence. He resigned almost
immediately. It’s hard to imagine such a scenario on either side of the aisle
in our tortured present.
Tulsi Gabbard, at least,
showed some political courage – even Meghan McCain referred to
Tulsi’s “balls-of-steel”
– and voted
“present”, rather than with her party. Rep. Gabbard wasn’t prepared to vote
“Nay,” and, admittedly, that may be due to limited political expedience – a
last lifeline to what remains of her Democratic connections. Seen in another
light, though, hers amounts to a plea for moderation, for bipartisanship. She’d
said, previously, that her decision on impeachment would depend, in part, on
whether there’d be cross-aisle consensus. And of course there wasn’t. In the
email I received from her campaign this morning – worth quoting at length – she
explained it thus:
A house divided cannot stand.
And today we are divided. Fragmentation and polarity are ripping our country
apart. This breaks my heart, and breaks the hearts of all patriotic Americans,
whether we are Democrats, Republicans, or Independents. So today, I come before
you to make a stand for the center, to appeal to all of you to bridge our
differences and stand up for the American people. My vote today is a vote for
much needed reconciliation and hope that together we can heal our country.
When the smoke clears, and
Election Day 2020 passes, I, for one, wouldn’t be surprised if Tulsi Gabbard
leaves the Democratic Party and joins her friend Bernie Sanders as an
Independent.
The enormous elephant in the
proverbial impeachment room, though, is the little matter of what U.S. policy
towards Ukraine and Russia should be. That ought to be at least part of
the rub, no? There are, I’d submit, serious questions worth asking about
Obama’s – and the entire establishment’s – preferred strategy on this front.
The late-stage Obama team – and, certainly, had she been elected, Hillary’s
gang – seemed intent, in the wake of Crimea and Ukraine, on drumming up a New
Cold War with the world’s other major nuclear power. Is this warranted; is it
smart? Count me doubtful. Furthermore, who, exactly, are, America’s
“partners” in Ukraine? Well, it might be inconvenient to admit, but a solid
chunk are legitimate fascists, neo-nazis,
in fact.
Okay, Trump shouldn’t have
used the language he did with Ukraine’s president; his transactional style
strikes me as immature and unstatesmanlike. That said, is it truly in the
interest of the US to arm military factions – some army, some militia – in a
proxy war with Russia? It didn’t end
so well last time Washington played that very game a few decades back
in Afghanistan. Ukraine is as near to Russia as Mexico is to Texas. Thus, logic
– or even a simple glance at a map – should put to rest the notion
that the whole proxy campaign has anything to do with the well-worn fiction
that the US must fight the Russians “there,” rather than “over here.” No, I’m
sorry: the Democratic (and Republican-National-Security-insider) plan strikes
this author as a terrifyingly dangerous form of brinksmanship.
Another potential result of
the impeachment show is what it forebodes. In the future, expect both parties,
whenever they are in the opposition, to treat every election loss as evidence
that the new president is illegitimate. Impeachment proceedings might just
become the new normal – hardly, if my memory of high school civics serves me,
the intent of the Founding Fathers. Sure, maybe Mitch McConnell started down
this trail with his post-Obama-election statement that
“The single most important thing we [Republicans] want to achieve is for
President Obama to be a one-term president.” Even if we grant them that, the
Democrats have exponentially upped the ante. Mark my words, Americans will come
to regret that escalation when Washington politics fracture (is it even
possible?) ever further in the years to come.
Finally, I’d be remiss if I
didn’t address the distraction aspect of the all-Trump-all-impeachment,
all-the-time, phenomenon. Trump isn’t going anywhere; in fact, I predict he’ll
win by an even larger margin in 2020. Nothing tangible, after all, will come of
this vote. Not a thing will change. So here’s the real pity: as the show
unfolds over the next several months, impeachment will suck all the air out of
the actually important problems and stories of the day. Meanwhile,
the forever wars will rage, and US foreign policy – along with the world,
itself – will sink ever deeper towards hell in a hand basket. Impeachment will
bury the true scandal of the moment – the Afghanistan Papers,
remember those? Yemen will keep getting bombed; Iraq will drift towards yet
another collapse; Israeli apartheid will cement ever further; and India’s Prime
Minister Modi will escalate his potentially civil-war-inducing suppression of
Muslims.
Through all that, count on one
thing: America will remain paralyzed, distracted. Last night, all the female
Democrats in the House – at Pelosi’s behest, one assumes – wore black to
mark the “seriousness” of their faux somber occasion. Turns out the attire was
totally appropriate, if for the wrong reasons. Black befit the moment, not
because Trump behaved badly, but because the Democrats just ushered in the Age
of Impeachment, of sustained partisanship, of ignoring the real scandals and
existential threats before this wayward republic of ours. With that, I yield
the floor.
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