Freedom
fries, anyone? The faux royalty of the Macron visit was just so much camo
for the panic in the White House, still reeling from the raid on Michael
Cohen’s office. Steve thinks that it is time to start asking what impeachment
would actually look like, and he doesn’t like what he sees.
It was a week of pomp and
circumstantial evidence in Washington, D.C., as the President of
the United States preened while hosting
a major state occasion for the only Western European leader who makes the
pretense of taking Trump seriously. The face that the White House put forward
to the public was all Macron and
cheesiness, as Trump lavished the French President with the trappings of
royalty, rewarding him for initially appearing to sign up for the role of
Trump’s poodle. At the same time, Macron
was viewed as maneuvering to score points back on the Continent by becoming
known as the only global leader who can exert influence on Donald Trump (other
than, uh, Vladimir Putin, that is). Macron, however, established that he was not le President’s chien when he threw
shade on Trump’s policies in his address to Congress, dissing his host on the
increasing U.S. isolationism, scolding the U.S. for its withdrawal from the Paris
Climate Accord, and reminding the chamber that the United States did actually sign the Iran nuclear deal, and that commitment should mean something. Trump no doubt found it, well, gauling. It probably made him want to croak, Monsieur.
While the White House had hoped that the dazzle and glamour
of a state dinner avec les chic Macronesians
would buy a few news cycles with no mention of Michael Cohen, Stormy Daniels,
or Scott Pruitt, fresh meat appeared in the form of Trump’s nominee to head the
Department of Veterans Affairs, Admiral Ronny Jackson. Reports surfaced that
Jackson’s drinking problem once cause him to wreck a government car, that he
doles out prescription medications so often that he was nicknamed the
“Candyman,” that he is responsible for abusive work environments, all in
addition to having no experience leading and managing a large organization, let
alone the second most sprawling entity in government. These may be the exact four
resume items you would use to screen for the
absolute worst possible candidate to head the V.A.
But this news cycle had still more spin. Trump himself
seemed to pump a cartridge or two of ammo into his own foot in a series of
weekend tweets in which he boldly predicted that Michael Cohen would not “flip”
on him. Trump apparently failed to grasp that a “flipper” cops to lesser
charges in return for testifying about the crimes of the person who is being
“flipped on.” In other words, Mr. President, when you tweet that Cohen won’t “flip”
on you, you are pretty much acknowledging that you have committed crimes that he
could testify about. Then, just hours after Macron had blown his last French
kiss, word hit that Michael Cohen was going to plead the fifth in the Stormy
Daniels matter. Say au revoir to the glitz, Mr. President... you are back in the swamp.
For all the Presidential bravado, it is now becoming clear
that the raid on Michael Cohen’s office has Trump vibrating like a tuning fork.
Recently Trump has been characterized as being “unhinged” so often that he
appears to have no time available for being “hinged.” Trump’s assertion that
Cohen won’t flip is merely his subconscious bubbling forth with the admission
that there is criminal activity to find in Michael Cohen’s office, and with
that terrifying realization, there is little else on Donald Trump’s mind.
We have expressed our belief that the primary reason that
Donald Trump wants to remain President is because it is the best way that he
can avoid prison for himself and his children. In the past, Trump may have comforted himself with
the belief that he could bluff through the collusion inquiry by parrying any
and all witnesses with an aggressive “he
said, he said” rebuttal. Thusly, he reasoned, without direct evidence of his
own involvement in collusion, the Senate would not convict him in an
impeachment trial for obstruction. The argument? How can a man be obstructing
justice if there was never proof that he had committed a crime?
But the raid on Michael Cohen’s office opens up an entire
new world of vulnerability for Donald Trump. The warrant that gave law
enforcement agents access to Cohen’s office was
reported to have been based on possible violations of campaign finance laws
triggered by the payment of hush money to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, and to the possibility that Cohen acted illegally in attempting to suppress the
Access Hollywood video.
These, however, seem like night court parking violations when compared to much more dangerous areas of liability, as Cohen is assumed to have
played a role in any possible money laundering schemes that the Trump
Organization may have been involved with. Indeed, Cohen is even suspected of
being involved in potential areas of direct contact – and potential collusion –
with the Russian government during the run-up to the 2016 election.
In short, Cohen
appears to be patient zero for just about any and every area of possible Trump
malfeasance. Pundits were salivating at the prospect that this could lead to a
plea bargain and eyewitness evidence from Trump’s most intimate advisor outside
his own family. Have smoking gun, will travel.
In the grand liberal wet dream, Cohen would lead the conga
line of dunces who have served as Donald Trump’s enablers, fixers, thugs, campaign
advisors and Cabinet officers as they parade one by one in front of a Senate
impeachment trial and sing their songs of money laundering, fraud, obstruction
of justice, and the big “C,” – the cancer on this Presidency – collusion. When
the roll call rolls and the bells toll in this Democratic fantasy, 68 Senators
give Trump the thumbs down, and the President is measured for an orange jump
suit in the Federal Confinement Resort and Spa in Cumberland, Maryland. The
next day, tens of millions of Trump voters denounce the former President and
admit to their neighbors that they had made a terrible mistake in voting for
him. Beams of sunlight slice through the clouds and the United States of
America reverts back to the precise cultural coordinates that had been in place
on November 7, 2016.
Dream
on,
lefty.
The odds that Donald Trump’s presidency will end as a
result of impeachment in the House and conviction in the Senate are remote.
While the House can vote to impeach with a mere majority, the actual conviction
and removal from office requires a two-thirds vote in the Senate. Depending on
the outcome of the mid-term elections, the Democrats could well capture a
majority in the House, and the Senate will be in play. It is not impossible
that sixteen to eighteen Republicans would vote for Trump to be evicted from
office, but it would probably require that Robert Mueller present
incontrovertible evidence that Donald Trump personally and knowingly was
overtly involved in collusion with Russia to tamper with the 2016 election.
In today’s perversely polarized politics, that absolute
level of incontrovertible evidence seems virtually unattainable.
Moreover, given those perversely polarized politics, one
must ask the question of whether the impeachment and conviction of Donald Trump
would actually be a good thing for the
United States of America… liberals and conservatives alike.
Far from serving as a process of correction,
reconciliation, and healing, the impeachment, conviction, and removal of Donald
Trump could just as easily be the guns
of a new Fort Sumter... an apocalyptic rupture of the long-festering divide in
this country.
Simply put, if Donald Trump continues to convince his base
that the Mueller probe is a liberal Deep State conspiracy-based “witch hunt”
designed only to nullify Trump’s electoral victory, then we are woefully naïve
to believe that even “unassailable proof” of collusion would not be rejected by
die-hard Trump supporters as manufactured evidence. Rather, we should all
expect that an impeachment could be the match that lights the gasoline-soaked
tinder.
What follows is an imagined but sadly plausible assessment
of what America might look like the day after the first time a President had been removed from office through the impeachment process.
We pick up the action on this imaginary day with the roll
call vote in the Senate. The evidence
that has been presented by Robert Mueller is overwhelming. Witness after
witness swears on risk of perjury (and losing their plea deals!) that they
personally told Donald Trump about the coordination efforts with Russian hackers. Emails are presented that
document the electronic trail of corruption. The lead editorial in The Wall
Street Journal demands that the Senate evict Donald Trump from office. However,
throughout it all, Donald Trump has remained his same essential self:
combative, denying, lying, accusing, distorting, and playing the role of
victim. He has denied every single charge. Millions of his faithful supporters
believe him, and believe he is being railroaded.
Before the roll call gavel crashes down, fourteen
Republican Senators have already announced their intention to vote to convict.
All eyes are fixed on the four Republican Senators who have refused to reveal
their intention. Rand Paul is the first of the hold-outs to be called. A keen intellect who actually lives by a set
of principles, Paul concludes that the
prosecution has effectively made the case that Donald Trump is guilty of committing high crimes and
misdemeanors. Grimly, and without fanfare, he votes to impeach.
Ted Cruz, however, has withheld his vote simply to ensure
that all eyes are on him when he exacts his revenge. “Impeach!” he shouts out
lustily, allowing himself the surging release of his bitterness from Trump’s
savage insults to his wife and slander of his father. Only one more vote is needed.
It quickly becomes clear that Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa
has withheld her vote for one purpose only: to be seen on national television
as the Trump loyalist who will give one, last full-throated damnation of the impeachment
process as a witch hunt. Knowing that the world is watching, she decries the
entire tribunal as partisan, biased, and illegitimate. She votes against
conviction.
It all comes down to Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, who
patiently milks the telegenic moment for all it is worth, pausing to soberly
note the gravity of the moment and that the fate of this Presidency, and indeed
the nation, rests in his hands. Citing the weight of evidence and the sanctity
of the rule of law – and never once revealing the profound satisfaction at
knifing the man who dared call him “little” – Rubio votes to impeach. Donald
Trump is stripped of the Presidency.
The moment is electric, triggering a shocking firestorm of
reaction at both ends of the political spectrum. In New York City, the crowd on
Park Avenue extends from Trump Tower all the way to Grand Central to the south
and swells into Central Park to the north. An immediate patriotic and uplifting
chant of “U.S.A.!” is rapidly drowned out and supplanted by bitter and
unforgiving voices screaming “Lock him up!,”
which carries on for nearly 45 minutes.
The news is carried live on Fox News, which senses a
defining audience moment. With raging rhetoric, Sean Hannity wastes no time in
categorizing the impeachment as an illegal coup. Whipping his faithful into a
frenzy, he easily convinces his weak-minded storm troopers that their vote in
the 2016 election has been brutally stolen by the liberal media, the Deep State
elitists, the biased FBI leadership, the Washington establishment, and the
conflict-of-interest ridden Mueller investigative team. He urges their faithful
out into the street, warning that they could encounter the roving militia of
the leftist police state. This is why we
have a Second Amendment, he notes smugly. If Obama had gotten his way, you would not have your guns to protect
yourself from the leaders of the coup.
Donald Trump, of course, is not placed in ball and chain.
He has not been convicted of a crime. He is a free man, simply no longer President of the United States. Ever since the Special Prosecutor was
appointed, Donald Trump has been preparing for this moment. He has waged a
non-stop war against the motives, legitimacy, alleged biases, practices, and
factual basis for the impeachment charges. He has never flinched... never
admitted to any wrongdoing, consistently claiming that the allegations were
“fake news,” the supporting documents and evidence was all phony, and the
testimony against him was compromised because it had all been forced under
pressure of criminal prosecution.
Sean Hannity announces that he now has former President
Trump on the phone.
“Mr. President,” Hannity says, instantly revealing his own
bias, “Mr. President, what do you think of this travesty?”
“Well, Sean, it’s a
disgrace. It’s a coup, that’s what it is. I bear no bad feelings towards Mike
Pence, who is a good man. But he is not the legitimate President of the United
States, and everybody knows that. I am sure Mike would agree with me. It’s
going to be tough for him to govern when so many people believe that I am still
the rightful President of the United States.”
Hannity is eating it up, with an image of ratings near
Super Bowl levels. “Mr. President, what message do you have for your
supporters? What should they do now?”
Trump pauses for effect. “Well, Sean, I am sure that the
people know that this is a coup, and I think people who have just been the
victims of a coup... well, they know what to do.”
Meanwhile, over on CNN, Anderson Cooper has scored the big interview
with Mike Pence. Pence is hoping that his mournful, heavy-heart pose will
thread the needle, appearing to share the outrage of the Trump die-hards while
nonetheless emphatically asserting the legitimacy of his newly declared oath of
office. “Anderson, many Americans are
hurting today, because they question the process that led to the impeachment
of Donald Trump. It is certainly not my wish to have to step into this role
under such challenging circumstances. But the Constitution that I have sworn to
uphold has mandated that I serve, and I humbly ask for the support of all
Americans during this difficult time.”
But it is in steamy streets of small towns in the deepest Red States that the match lit by Hannity ignites the parched, dry kindling of
partisan and class rage. Word spreads through social media of a full-throated
rebellion against the leftist coup. A crude web post urges Alabamans to bring
their AR 15s to a rally in front of the First White House of the Confederacy at
644 Washington Avenue in Birmingham. Local police are no match for 3,000
gun-toting rednecks with more ammo than brains and even more beer than ammo. Police
fire tear gas, which serves only to vindicate Hannity’s warning that the Deep
State will attack. Shots ring out in Montgomery. By sunrise the following
morning, gun violence has spread to dozens of cities across the American south.
Former President Trump is back on Hannity the next night.
“Who can blame these patriots?” Trump blasts. “I mean, Sean, these poor people
– they know what happened. They know that biased Mueller and all the crooked
politicians – on many sides – have
rigged the system so that they could screw the American voter. If I were out
there on the streets in Montgomery tonight, I’d like to think that I’d have the
guts to attack the local militias that are being called out to enforce the
coup. Even if I didn’t have a weapon, I would lead the charge against the
militia… it’s not legitimate, you know?”
Hannity is nearing climax. “Mister President, it sure seems
to me that many of the Red States that gave you your electoral victory are
looking to you tonight… looking for guidance… looking for your legitimate
leadership… Mr. President, perhaps those states need a legitimate leader…”
“You know, Sean, many people are telling me that there is
great interest in many parts of our country for a government that is truly in
touch with the needs of the people. People in those states want a government
that serves the people… not the liberal
rich elite, not the Deep State, not the Washington establishment, not Wall
Street, not the biased fake news media. You know, Sean, I’ve heard that people are asking whether it is time for…
well, I think they would want to call it the United States of
Trump… You know, Sean, it’s not a bad idea...”
You get the point.
An unrepentant, raging Donald Trump, found guilty by the
Senate, terrified for himself and his family, would do just about anything to
avoid prison. Including fanning the
flames of civil unrest.
When we lust for impeachment, let us indeed be careful what we wish for.
Let us be clear: just because we are wary about impeachment
does not mean we are opposed to justice being served.
In our view, the best outcome is far simpler, though it is wholly
contingent on the issuance of a final
report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller that is so comprehensive and so compelling
case that at least eighteen Republican Senators acknowledge that Donald Trump
has been proven guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors.
Then, Mueller, alongside key Republican leaders like
McConnell, Cornyn, Grassley, Cotton, and Graham, walk into Donald Trump’s
office and dictate the terms of a deal.
If Trump puts the country through the hell of a fiercely
contested impeachment process, he and his family will be open targets for any
and every criminal charge and prison term that the special prosecutor and the
District Attorney in New York City are prepared to throw his way.
However, if he agrees to fixed conditions, he can avoid it
all. No criminal prosecution or jail time, for him, or any of his children. All
he has to do is agree to the following:
He must resign the Presidency immediately.
He must admit guilt to high crimes and misdemeanors, and
testify that the charges are true. He must clearly state that the crimes he
stands accused of are not lies and are not fake news. He must do so in a video
statement that is to be aired on all news networks.
He, and his entire family, must agree to never appear in
public again. No television. No interviews. No Fox News. No politics. Nothing. Just for the fun of it, Mueller could complete the deal by
offering him $130,000 in exchange for agreeing to keep his mouth shut.
Impeachment is our legal and constitutional solution, but
it will not bridge the catastrophic divide in the perception of reality that
Donald Trump has fostered. If Donald Trump’s supporters are convinced that he
has been unjustly victimized, then the next Democratic President will be
impeached fifteen minutes after being sworn in. The center will not hold, and
the rule of law will have been bent to the rule of personal opinion. The fabric
of the nation could be torn into permanent bifurcation, violent conflict, and insurrection.
Perhaps the only thing that will stop Trump supporters from
bitter alienation from the country is if they finally accept that he is a
morally bankrupt, corrupt, congenital liar who has deceived them.
And they will only believe it if they hear it from one
person: Donald Trump.
Robert Mueller, good luck in finding the evidence you need.
Then let’s all give careful thought to what happens next. Impeachment may make
liberals feel good, but it may be the one thing that could make a terrible
situation irretrievably broken.
Perhaps that would be the right time to sit down with Donald
Trump and talk about the art of the deal.
