Crystal-ball reading politics
Jun. 5th, 2018 09:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
talkswithwindDon't expand unless you want some cynic in your feed.
I keep hearing that Trump won't ever be impeached with Republican control of the House. I have to disagree with that. I actually think that's the only way it'll happen.
Hear me out.
There are three possibilities here.
Republicans maintain control of both House and Senate
Leadership won't let Articles hit the floor. The only way it will is through the discharge petition process. Given a Republican majority, that will require some R's to sign it. Every Democrat votes for it and enough R's to get it to the floor. Hopefully enough R's to make a statement.
Then it gets to be voted on. Since impeachment in the house is a simple majority, the act of getting it to the floor through the discharge process is a clear hint that it'll pass. Depending on how the discourse is going, more R's may sign on. It then gets sent to the Senate.
The Senate doesn't get a choice in rejecting it, they need to hold a hearing. But the scheduling of it is in the hands of the majority leader. Mitch is just the kind of asshole that'll bury it the way he did a certain Supreme Court nominee. Discharge petitions work in the Senate as well, though. If that sort of grassroots veto happens and we get a trial sooner, and the civil discourse turns bad enough, it'll get brought to the floor.
This is where senatorial stateliness comes in. The R's are in the majority. They know this, and the older among them know what history feels like. Again, this depends on the civil discourse and whatever is revealed by the Mueller report being not just gun-smoke, but gun receipts, target-practice, the GPS log of the car driven to the event, the gun itself, shells, security footage of the perp doing the deed, DNA records indicating a match, and five eye-witnesses putting him on the scene. The 22% of the populace will still think it's a liberal deep-state conspiracy, but they'll be the only ones not baying for a Do Something. We could get to 2/3rds in an environment like that.
Democrats gain control of the House, Republicans maintain control of the Senate.
(Fresh) articles are introduced the day after the Mueller report is in, and passed on a party-line vote.
Mitch stonewalls it. Public discourse doesn't have the discharge petition drama of the first scenario, so momentum isn't there. The House passing Articles is seen as the Democratic equivalent of years of 'repealing' the ACA. If a discharge petition manages to get it to the floor, it is less likely to get to 2/3rds as a result.
Democrats gain control of both chambers.
Fresh articles are introduced the day after the Mueller report is in. It's passed on a party-line vote.
Senate schedules a trial lasting a week. Media cycle is consumed. The minority party (Republicans) doesn't play ball and defends their guy. Impeachment vote fails to even pass 60.
The impending impeachment of Richard Nixon was impending in large part because the Democrats controlled both chambers, and political discourse was such that what Nixon was doing was seen as an unforgivable sin by a very large majority of people and even the politicians. This second ingredient is very much not the case right now.
It has been darkly joked that if Trump shot someone on 5th Avenue in New York, in broad daylight, that 22% of the populace would label that a liberal conspiracy before moving on to the argument that the President is the law and is allowed. We wouldn't get the broad public outcry we got in the 1970's.
This is why I believe our best chance of actually getting the jerk out of office is to endure two revolts in the congressional chambers. It simply can't be done as a single-party procedure, and the Republicans had years to learn that the minority's biggest power is saying no to things that need more than a majority vote. It will take the minority party pushing this, along with a few defectors from the majority party, to get the public momentum needed to cross the 2/3rds line in the Senate.
I really hope I'm wrong.
I keep hearing that Trump won't ever be impeached with Republican control of the House. I have to disagree with that. I actually think that's the only way it'll happen.
Hear me out.
There are three possibilities here.
Republicans maintain control of both House and Senate
Leadership won't let Articles hit the floor. The only way it will is through the discharge petition process. Given a Republican majority, that will require some R's to sign it. Every Democrat votes for it and enough R's to get it to the floor. Hopefully enough R's to make a statement.
Then it gets to be voted on. Since impeachment in the house is a simple majority, the act of getting it to the floor through the discharge process is a clear hint that it'll pass. Depending on how the discourse is going, more R's may sign on. It then gets sent to the Senate.
The Senate doesn't get a choice in rejecting it, they need to hold a hearing. But the scheduling of it is in the hands of the majority leader. Mitch is just the kind of asshole that'll bury it the way he did a certain Supreme Court nominee. Discharge petitions work in the Senate as well, though. If that sort of grassroots veto happens and we get a trial sooner, and the civil discourse turns bad enough, it'll get brought to the floor.
This is where senatorial stateliness comes in. The R's are in the majority. They know this, and the older among them know what history feels like. Again, this depends on the civil discourse and whatever is revealed by the Mueller report being not just gun-smoke, but gun receipts, target-practice, the GPS log of the car driven to the event, the gun itself, shells, security footage of the perp doing the deed, DNA records indicating a match, and five eye-witnesses putting him on the scene. The 22% of the populace will still think it's a liberal deep-state conspiracy, but they'll be the only ones not baying for a Do Something. We could get to 2/3rds in an environment like that.
Democrats gain control of the House, Republicans maintain control of the Senate.
(Fresh) articles are introduced the day after the Mueller report is in, and passed on a party-line vote.
Mitch stonewalls it. Public discourse doesn't have the discharge petition drama of the first scenario, so momentum isn't there. The House passing Articles is seen as the Democratic equivalent of years of 'repealing' the ACA. If a discharge petition manages to get it to the floor, it is less likely to get to 2/3rds as a result.
Democrats gain control of both chambers.
Fresh articles are introduced the day after the Mueller report is in. It's passed on a party-line vote.
Senate schedules a trial lasting a week. Media cycle is consumed. The minority party (Republicans) doesn't play ball and defends their guy. Impeachment vote fails to even pass 60.
The impending impeachment of Richard Nixon was impending in large part because the Democrats controlled both chambers, and political discourse was such that what Nixon was doing was seen as an unforgivable sin by a very large majority of people and even the politicians. This second ingredient is very much not the case right now.
It has been darkly joked that if Trump shot someone on 5th Avenue in New York, in broad daylight, that 22% of the populace would label that a liberal conspiracy before moving on to the argument that the President is the law and is allowed. We wouldn't get the broad public outcry we got in the 1970's.
This is why I believe our best chance of actually getting the jerk out of office is to endure two revolts in the congressional chambers. It simply can't be done as a single-party procedure, and the Republicans had years to learn that the minority's biggest power is saying no to things that need more than a majority vote. It will take the minority party pushing this, along with a few defectors from the majority party, to get the public momentum needed to cross the 2/3rds line in the Senate.
I really hope I'm wrong.
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Date: 2018-06-22 09:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-06-23 02:13 am (UTC)