Tag Archives: Trump impeachment

national news

C’mon, Mr. POTUS, you’ve been impeached

I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, Mr. President, but let me be as crystal clear as I possibly can.

The House of Representatives has impeached you on two counts: one for abuse of power, the other for obstructing Congress.

I watched the vote happen this past week in real time. So did millions of other Americans. One former Republican voted to impeach you; two Democrats bolted on one count, three of them voted “no” on the other one.

Still, the impeachment stands for the record. It stands for history. You’re going to your grave eventually “impeached president,” or words to that effect, on your obituary.

I don’t get this strategy you and your legal team are employing, suggesting that Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s refusal to send over the impeachment articles immediately to the Senate means you aren’t actually impeached. Of course you are!

It’s a silly game designed to confuse everyone. I trust your lawyers know better, but then again they work for you and are obligated to do your bidding while they represent you in this matter.

Your lawyers are citing the arguments of a Harvard law professor who says that until articles are submitted to the Senate, there is technically no impeachment. What the heck does that mean? The articles are going to the Senate, Mr. President. The speaker simply wants some clarity on the nature of the trial the Senate plans to conduct before she sends ’em over. The Senate will get them in due course. I want them sent over sooner rather than later, too.

How about ending this idiotic game-playing? Let’s get down to brass tacks: Your task is to persuade us — including me — that you really didn’t ask Ukraine for political dirt on Joe Biden and that your blanket order to deny cooperation with congressional subpoenas aren’t impeachable offenses. I believe they are.

You’ve been impeached, Mr. President.

So … with that I wish you a Merry Christmas.

We’ll see you on the other side.

national news

‘Our Constitution works’

I am fond of recalling the words of a brand new president who took office in the wake of a dark time in American history.

Gerald Rudolph Ford placed his hand on a Bible, recited the presidential oath of office, then stood before the world to declare that “our Constitution works.” He succeeded Richard Nixon, who quit earlier that day to avoid being impeached. The Watergate scandal brought down the Nixon presidency.

Yes, the Constitution worked just as it should during that time.

It is working now as another president faces the unforgiving assurance that every morning he awakes for the rest of his life, he will be an “impeached president.”

Yes, the Constitution works, just as President Ford declared on Aug. 9, 1974.

No matter the outcome of the Senate trial that is pending, the Constitution will have done its job. If the president is cleared, it will have worked. If he is convicted and removed from office, it will have performed as the framers constructed it.

Almost no one believes the current president will be kicked out of office. A failure to convict him doesn’t mean failure for the Constitution. It means only, to my mind, that an insufficient number of senators were willing to put duty to the nation ahead of fealty to a president. That doesn’t besmirch the Constitution, under which the House impeached Donald Trump and the Senate conducted its trial.

It is good at times like this to take a step back and look at the big picture. The framers crafted a brilliant governing document. It’s a bit clunky at times, but that’s the nature of a representative democracy, which is as Winston Churchill described it: a lousy form of government, but better than anything else ever produced by human beings.

My faith in the system remains as strong as ever, regardless of the outcome that more than likely awaits the nation at the end of this process.

I shall cherish the words that President Ford spoke moments after assuming the nation’s highest office: Our Constitution works.

national news

What is there to hide if the phone call was ‘perfect’?

(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

There is so much about Donald Trump defense strategy and the approach taken by his Republican allies in Congress that I do not understand.

The House of Representatives has impeached the current president on abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The Senate is supposed to put Trump on trial. Democrats want to call witnesses. Republicans are fighting that push.

All the while, Trump calls the impeachment a sham, a joke, a hoax, that there’s nothing to see, that the operative phone call with Ukraine’s president was “perfect.”

If Trump and Ukrainian President Vlodyrmyr Zelenskiy engaged in that perfect conversation, then why in the world are POTUS and his GOP allies resisting the demands to hear from witnesses in the Senate trial?

If they clear the president of wrongdoing, wouldn’t it make sense to hear them do so? If there is nothing to hide, then why does Donald Trump act and sound like he’s, um, hiding something from public view?

The appearance of a handful of key witnesses, critical White House aides, wouldn’t necessarily drag the trial into the far distant future. They might work in Trump’s favor; or, they might have precisely the opposite effect.

What’s more, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who today is resisting any witnesses in the Trump trial, was all in for witnesses when President Clinton went on trial in 1999 after the House impeached him. Is he driven solely by partisan concerns?

Why, that just can’t be, given McConnell’s criticism of the House impeachment, which he said was fueled by partisan hatred of Donald Trump. Isn’t that what he said?

If the Senate is going to put the current president on trial, then let’s have witnesses. Let’s see the evidence. Let’s then ask senators/jurors to deliberate over what they see and hear and then let’s demand they make their decision based on what has been presented.

With no witnesses or evidence presented at trial, then there’s nothing to consider.

Where I come from, that sounds like a sham.

national news

This SOTU speech will be one for the books … believe it!

When do you remember the bizarre juxtaposition of a president’s political predicament and a State of the Union speech before a joint congressional session and, indeed, before the entire world?

Donald Trump gets to deliver a State of the Union speech in early February while being impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors; or, the Senate trial required by the House of Representatives impeachment will have concluded and Trump will still be president; or the trial won’t yet have begun, but it will hang over the joint session like the proverbial storm cloud.

Holy smokes, man!

Trump will get to deliver his version of what he thinks of the condition of our nation. He’ll be speaking more than likely to roughly half the chamber. That would be the Republicans who support him. He won’t give much of a damn about the Democrats who will be sitting on their hands (more than likely) during the applause lines Trump will deliver from the podium.

It has been customary for members of the House and Senate of the president’s own party to whoop and cheer his comments while the “loyal opposition” sits quietly. You can bet the farm/ranch/mortgage/your life savings that we’ll see that in spades during the upcoming State of the Union speech.

It’s going to be a bizarre event. Yes, it’ll be worth watching.

Although I hate making predictions of this sort, I am pretty sure the president is going to make quite the ruckus about impeachment while he stands before the nation. I will await the reaction from the legislators assembled before him.

Get the popcorn ready.

national news

McConnell accuses House of rushing … so he wants to do the same?

Where do we stand with this Senate trial of Donald Trump, the third president in U.S. history to be impeached?

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell accused the House of Representatives of rushing through an impeachment process to achieve the outcome it received. Then, well, what do you know? Now he wants to do the same thing with a hurry-up Senate trial with no witnesses called, no evidence introduced.

The House impeached the current president on two counts: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Congress then split from Washington for a two-week Christmas break.

What is most maddening, though, is the notion that McConnell doesn’t intend to be an “impartial” juror, which is part of an oath he will take when Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts takes the gavel and presides over the Senate trial. McConnell’s mind is made up. Let’s get this deal done, he said, acquit the president and then get on with legislating and, oh yes, that election.

At one level, I want this trial to be over sooner rather than much later. However, I do believe it is only correct for there to be witnesses from whom the Senate will hear testimony. Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer wants to hear from White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and former national security adviser John Bolton. What is so damn wrong with that? McConnell is having none of it.

I realize we aren’t talking about a trial that follows all the rules of a strict judicial proceeding. However, the judge in this case — Chief Justice Roberts — will issue an oath for the jurors to take; that oath will include a pledge to be impartial. How can McConnell take that oath with a straight face when he promises to work with the White House and to take his cue from the president’s legal team?

I am shaking my head.

By all means, let’s get this trial done. Let us get it done the right way and in a way that mandates a fair trial that allows witnesses to testify in public and for the Senate to examine all the evidence that House members assembled in reaching their decision to impeach Donald Trump.

religious news

Trump’s reaction to criticism reveals what many of us suspected

Donald Trump’s bizarre response to an editorial published in a mainstream evangelical publication appears to affirm what many of us have thought all along about the current president of the United States.

Which is that he doesn’t know a thing about the publication he is criticizing.

Christianity Today has come out with an essay calling for Trump’s removal from office. It was written by the magazine’s editor in chief, Mark Galli. It’s a brutal critique of Trump and the circumstances surrounding his impeachment by the U.S. House of Representatives.

What did Trump do in response? He called it a “far left magazine.” He said the magazine founded by the late Rev. Billy Graham knows nothing about a “perfect transcript of a routine phone call.”

My point is that Christianity Today is not a “far left magazine.” It is a mainstream publication that appeals to the broad, diverse world of evangelical Christians. Galli has sought to make the point that the evangelical movement is not a monolith. It comprises a wide-ranging school of thought among Christians who adhere first and foremost to the tenets of Christianity, starting with their devotion to Jesus Christ.

Does anyone who knows anything at all about the president believe that he shares that view, that he has any understanding of the Bible, or the teachings that Jesus and his apostles offered the world? No!

Trump is, as the author Jonathan Alter described him this week, a “religious reprobate.”

So, for Trump to refer to Christianity Today as a “far left magazine” only reveals to many millions of us what we know already: that Donald John Trump is a pandering fraud.

national news

Trump’s latest ‘worst’ event finally hits bottom … I hope

(Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)

There have been more “worst” moments of Donald Trump’s time as a politician and as president that I cannot keep track of them all.

He denigrated John McCain’s service to the nation; he mocked a New York Times reporter’s physical ailment; he chastised a Gold Star couple; he has issued insults left and right; his incessant lying; he most recently implied that a late congressman might be resting eternally in hell.

Well, the events that occurred in the House of Representatives I believe qualifies as the worst thing to happen to this individual’s presidency. The House voted to impeach Trump on two counts. It was a partisan vote, but it’s a vote nonetheless. Trump’s tenure as president is now marked indelibly with the label of “impeached.”

It could get worse. It likely won’t unless hell freezes over and the Senate actually convicts Trump either of abuse of power or obstruction of Congress.

Trump hit the campaign trail and at the moment the House was impeaching him, he was standing at a podium in Battle Creek, Mich., where he made the idiotic crack about the late John Dingell “looking up” at the world from, um, the depths of hell.

The day of Trump’s impeachment has been called historic, seminal, pivotal, monumental … all of the above and even some more superlative descriptions.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the Democrats are motivated purely by “partisan” hatred of Trump. Ironic, yes? This comes from the guy who has perfected partisanship to an art form.

So, what now? House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is withholding the articles of impeachment until she learns the rules under which the Senate will conduct its trial. She wants it to be “fair.” Well, duh? My hope is that McConnell agrees to conduct a “fair” trial.

As for the president, he will have the indelible mark of being an “impeached” head of state. It’s a designation he has earned. Of that I have no doubt.

national news

This is what you get from this POTUS … shameful rhetoric

Donald J. “Comedian in Chief” Trump is now an impeached president of the United States.

While the House of Representatives was voting to impeach him, the president stood in front of a campaign rally in Battle Creek, Mich., and riffed on all the folks who did him wrong, in his eyes.

Then the president stooped way down low. He brought up the memory of the late U.S. Rep. John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat who served in World War II and then held a House seat longer than anyone in U.S. history. He died this year. His wife, Debbie, is now serving in Congress and, yes, she voted to impeach Trump.

What did the president say about the late, great, Rep. Dingell? He talked about the military funeral he received; Dingell is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Trump said this: She (Debbie Dingell) calls me up. ‘It’s the nicest thing that’s ever happened. Thank you so much. John would be so thrilled. He’s looking down, he’d be so thrilled. Thank you so much sir.’ I said that’s OK, don’t worry about it,” Trump said, relaying the call.

“Maybe he’s looking up, I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe. But let’s assume he’s looking down.”

“Maybe he’s looking up.” Did you get that one? Yep, the president of the United States implied that the late Rep. Dingell might be in hell.

Debbie Dingell responded with this tweet: “Mr. President, let’s set politics aside. My husband earned all his accolades after a lifetime of service. I’m preparing for the first holiday season without the man I love. You brought me down in a way you can never imagine and your hurtful words just made my healing much harder.”

I will not offer a comment on that idiocy, other than to call it utterly heartless.

Doesn’t he just make you so damn proud? Me, neither.

national news

Where was the defense of POTUS’s character?

I might need therapy after today’s impeachment activity. I sat through much of the back-and-forth on the floor of the House of Representatives. I listened to Republicans and Democrats talk past each other.

Then came the vote. The House voted to impeach Donald Trump on abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

What I did not hear from any of the Republicans who argued against impeaching the president was a single statement in defense of Trump’s character. No one on the GOP side of the aisle said a single word defending the president against allegations that he extorted a foreign government for a personal political favor; no one argued on behalf of the president against allegations that he obstructed Congress in its pursuit of the truth.

They all attacked the process. They attacked the motives of the president’s critics. They were bizarrely silent on the issue of Trump’s character. No one said Donald Trump would not do these things.

Does that tell you anything at all about the man who now stands impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors? Or does it tell you anything about his standing among those who continue to resist efforts to hold this man accountable for the behavior for which he has been impeached?

local news

Do any minds ever get changed?

Watching the “debate” on the House of Representatives floor today over the impeachment of Donald J. Trump brings to mind something I heard many years ago from a Texas state legislator.

In early 1995 I had the pleasure of meeting the late state Sen. Teel Bivins, an Amarillo Republican. I went to his downtown Amarillo office, exchanged greetings with him and sat down for some discussion.

Bivins knew I had moved to Amarillo from Beaumont. I worked for the Beaumont Enterprise and then went to work for the Amarillo Globe-News. Bivins then brought up the name of a fellow state senator with whom he had a sometimes-testy relationship. He talked admiringly about the debating skills of Democratic colleague Carl Parker of Port Arthur.

Parker is a trial lawyer who possesses tremendous rhetorical skill. Bivins called Parker a “friend,” and then told me that he actually once witnessed how Parker’s intense debating ability changed the minds of one or two of his Senate colleagues on an issue that Parker was debating.

I thought about the tale Bivins told about Carl Parker and wondered if there are any such debaters squaring off today under the Capitol Dome. I ain’t hearing anything of the sort. They’re all dug in. No one is going to budge.

I am left to wonder if any minds could be changed were they to hear the thundering rhetoric that a Texas state senator could deliver when the chips were down.