I love the twists and turns right wingers go through that supposedly provide reasons NOT to impeach, to justify, to marginalize, to act as if this is all normal. Does anyone think if the coin was flipped and they had this much going on with a Dem in office they wouldn’t have been into impeachment long before this?
 When the villagers went after Frankenstein they were kinder than today’s right wing has been, or would be. They know all about how to do a REAL “high tech lynching.” After how many years of E-gate and Benghazi Follies right up to the election this much is obvious.
 Life under Trump reminds me of a Palisades Amusement Park ride called the Wild Mouse. It took 90 degree turns at high speeds, flipped around and around. Only this ride is more frightening, propelled by pure bull pucky and there’s no safety bar. Well, maybe one being demanded for he who gleefully keeps the ride beyond full speed. Trump is a one man evil carnival, as in Something Wicked This Way Comes. He is one of the goblins in Dean Koontz’s Twilight Eyes.
 I’m going to use the most sensible of all the idiotic reasons Republicans used to insist impeaching Clinton was necessary: to get it all into the historical record. To make sure America knows there were those who believed his behavior so intolerable, so illegal, impeachment was a necessity. Conviction was really beside the point.
 At a bare minimum the same is true of Trump.
 A big mistake people make regarding impeachment is that impeachment itself, the report and the process prove guilt. Impeachment is a political proceeding, and usually little more than a partisan act. The Starr Report was just that and little more: a ‘report’ on what Starr’s people claim to have found. Yes such reports are viewed as proof, but they really are investigatory claims.
 No more than Mueller’s final report: if he’s allowed to write it, will be proof. Congress will have to decide the outcome.
 So let’s be a fair; “fair” unlike highly partisan Starr and his REAL witch hunters, and just say when it came to Bill Clinton we had accusations that didn’t result in conviction. In any other case usually that is treated as innocence, instead the accusations are treated as proven fact. I am well aware that the same may happen with Trump, but once again I argue that getting it into the record was at least as important as it was for Republicans.
 Of course when it comes to the nature of the accusations comparing Clinton and Trump as even remotely coequal is absurd. That would make trying to avoid having a consensual affair exposed that didn’t get past what we used to call “third base” compared to Benedict Arnold or the Rosenbergs. If the worst is true the end report will describe something more like treason.
 But, if not, there are still so many reasons why impeachment MUST happen, so many examples. Let’s use just this one attempt out of many: an attempt to obstruct justice…
 There were no meetings with the Russians.
 It’s proven there were.
 The meetings were about nothing more than adoption.
 That’s proven false.
 Trump knew nothing about the meetings…
 And that call from a blocked number during the meeting was from…???
 Every day he and his fellow dig themselves in deeper, like the accusation he ordered people to lie for him to obstruct justice when testifying. All this had to be investigated, adjudicated even if the facts merely hint it’s true.
 By the way, where is all this self righteous, “A president must be held to a higher standard,” and “What about the example he’s setting for our children?” Trump goes out of his way to have no bars: not just lower it, and to provide a bad examples.
 Enough to convict? Doubtful, even taking into consideration the changed makeup of Congress. Enough to impeach? Of course. High crimes and misdemeanors, remember? Given that and the precedent Republicans themselves set in the 90s, hell yes, unless we want one party government. That’s what we essentially have if any president from only one party can be impeached, but not the other. Just like it’s what we have if a president should get whatever he wants by shutting down the government and holding us all hostage.
 In the 90s the big cry from the same party now trying so hard to avoid it now was, “rule of law.” One party rule of law is no rule of law at all.

                                       -30-
 Inspection is a column that has been written by Ken Carman for over 40 years. Inspection is dedicated to looking at odd angles, under all the rocks, and into the unseen cracks and crevasses, that constitute the issues and philosophical constructs of our day: places few think, or even dare, to venture.
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