Nancy Pelosi has initiated a formal impeachment inquiry. I've been an impeachment naysayer all year. But when Pelosi changes positions, I change too. I'll explain.
I opposed impeachment because the Senate trial looked like a disaster. Several Senate Democrats (Manchin, Tester, Jones) seemed ready to vote for acquittal. This would marginalize the charges against Trump going into the 2020 election and make it harder to put pressure on Republicans.
I opposed impeachment because the Senate trial looked like a disaster. Several Senate Democrats (Manchin, Tester, Jones) seemed ready to vote for acquittal. This would marginalize the charges against Trump going into the 2020 election and make it harder to put pressure on Republicans.
Moreover, most of the rules for conducting an impeachment trial can be changed by a Senate majority vote. This lets Mitch McConnell turn the trial into whatever he wants, if he can hold a majority. After the Kavanaugh confirmation, I anticipated the horror of my Democratic friends when the impeachment trial became whatever celebration of Trump's innocence McConnell wanted. It would be a hideous mockery of accountability.
All of this comes down to Senate vote totals. Get 4 Republicans to join united Democrats, and you have a majority that takes control out of McConnell's hands. And a bipartisan majority vote against Trump -- while insufficient for removing him -- would at least send the right message rather than the wrong one.
Pelosi counts votes better than any politician in my lifetime. Remember McConnell losing Obamacare repeal on the Senate floor after John McCain gave him the thumbs down? Pelosi doesn't let that happen. What she does is governed by her knowledge of the vote totals -- what they are, and what they'll become in a variety of possible future situations.
I think she's moving now because the Ukraine scandal has finally loosened things up in the Senate to where we have a shot at winning over Republicans. Senate Republicans are more fractured over this scandal than anything else, with Burr, Sasse, Romney, and Toomey cited in the media as alarmed. If this doesn't hold up for some reason, Pelosi might wait for a better setup in the future. But this as good an opportunity as anything we've seen.
This scandal hits close to home for Republican Senators. They don't want a future Democratic President using federal money to bribe foreign rulers for dirt on them. If only they cared so much about brown children in cages! But if this is what will make them turn on Trump, it's what we go with. It's how to get an impeachment process that really damages him and his party.
I've been actively following Congressional politics for 15 years now. It's been 15 years of watching Pelosi make the right move on every big issue, because she could see how the votes would go. It's how she stopped Bush from privatizing Social Security, how she turned the Democratic Party to favor withdrawal from Iraq, and how she passed Obamacare when everyone thought it was doomed.
Now she's on the march. I march with her.
All of this comes down to Senate vote totals. Get 4 Republicans to join united Democrats, and you have a majority that takes control out of McConnell's hands. And a bipartisan majority vote against Trump -- while insufficient for removing him -- would at least send the right message rather than the wrong one.
Pelosi counts votes better than any politician in my lifetime. Remember McConnell losing Obamacare repeal on the Senate floor after John McCain gave him the thumbs down? Pelosi doesn't let that happen. What she does is governed by her knowledge of the vote totals -- what they are, and what they'll become in a variety of possible future situations.
I think she's moving now because the Ukraine scandal has finally loosened things up in the Senate to where we have a shot at winning over Republicans. Senate Republicans are more fractured over this scandal than anything else, with Burr, Sasse, Romney, and Toomey cited in the media as alarmed. If this doesn't hold up for some reason, Pelosi might wait for a better setup in the future. But this as good an opportunity as anything we've seen.
This scandal hits close to home for Republican Senators. They don't want a future Democratic President using federal money to bribe foreign rulers for dirt on them. If only they cared so much about brown children in cages! But if this is what will make them turn on Trump, it's what we go with. It's how to get an impeachment process that really damages him and his party.
I've been actively following Congressional politics for 15 years now. It's been 15 years of watching Pelosi make the right move on every big issue, because she could see how the votes would go. It's how she stopped Bush from privatizing Social Security, how she turned the Democratic Party to favor withdrawal from Iraq, and how she passed Obamacare when everyone thought it was doomed.
Now she's on the march. I march with her.
