I was wrong about impeachment
...and pretty right about Iowa
I was wrong about impeachment.
I was conflicted about pursuing impeachment for a long time, but was persuaded by Yoni Applebaum’s argument, among others. Still, while I was convinced it was necessary for Democrats to pursue impeachment in order for Congress to fulfill its duties, hold the president accountable, I also thought it would likely lead to a further degradation of democratic processes and institutions. My basic position was that it would be worse to not pursue impeachment, but pursuing impeachment would still do more harm than good. I was wrong.
I was wrong for two reasons.
First, the House Managers did an admirable job, particularly Adam Schiff and Hakeem Jeffries. Schiff wasn’t perfect, but he conducted himself as a statesman, and truly sought to make arguments to persuade, not simply use the opportunity to beat Republicans over the head. Jerry Nadler was as unhelpful during the Senate trial as he has been since the start of this process. His apparent usurption of Schiff, giving a (bad) closing argument that wasn’t his to give, displayed the kind of selfish antagonism that Republicans and conservative media rely on to try to convince their audience that impeachment was merely a partisan witchhunt, a result of “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” (Note: It has been reported that Rep. Nadler’s wife is very sick, and though I have not read any report citing the stress this has added as a reason for his actions, I would certainly understand if it played a role and be sympathetic to that.) Yet, for any fair-minded observer, Schiff’s steady confidence and cogent presentation overcame the lesser appeals of some of his fellow Democrats.
The second reason I was wrong was because of Mitt Romney, and his act of moral courage. I would urge you to watch Romeny’s full remarks…they’re not quite what you might imagine based on some of the news reports and tweets. It was one of the most inspiring moments in recent political history not for its aggression, but its restraint. Romney expressed conviction based on a reasoned process. He talks about reading Federalist Paper #65 over and over again. He walks through his processing of the various arguments made during the trial. He makes absolutely clear that he’s not using his own conscience or faith as a weapon—he’s humble enough to express that the dictates of his conscience should not necessarily bind anyone else’s. He counts the cost of the decision, without welcoming pity or adulation.
In beginning a process that was destined to fail to remove Trump from office, what I failed to appreciate was that Democrats also offered Mitt Romney and his colleagues the opportunity to say what is true about the president’s conduct. It is no small thing, clearly, that Mitt Romney did that. Perhaps we will look back on this moment as a spark that inspired others, including average citizens, to stop allowing party affiliation to dictate their conscience.
For more, read Mike Gerson on Mitt Romney’s decision.
One Bad Justification for Acquittal
One common refrain from Republicans in the Senate has been that they did not want to vote to acquit the president because they were afraid it would spin our country even deeper into political conflict and tribal hatred. Sen. Rubio, for instance, wrote that he considered the “bitter divisions and deep polarization” that our country faces. He wrote that this was a partisan impeachment—partisan, of course, because Republicans like him would not vote for removal—and that he would vote to acquit the president because removal “would inflict extraordinary and potentially irreparable damage to our already divided nation.”
One reason for our polarization today is that people refuse to tell the truth when it conflicts with their partisan interests. When the truth happens to be something that can also be politically helpful, they’re happy to claim it. When it’s not, they run from it.
Our tribal polarization reflects this dynamic, so that claims that are true are deemed merely partisan tales, optional realities that can be denied and dismissed. To break this fever, it is not enough to merely not participate in the worst abuses that can be found on your side, though one gets the sense this is the primary strategy of many of the “reasonable” GOP Senators today. Instead, the fever will break when facts can be facts even when they’re inconvenient. The fever will break when the truth is stated as truth regardless of which party it favors. The fever will break when statesmen and stateswomen act in inconvenient ways.
For Senators like Marco Rubio to refuse to vote to remove the president, not because they believe such a vote would not be just on its merits, but out of concern that polarization would deepen is precisely the sort of political decision that exacerbates polarization. It allows Republican voters to use Rashida Tlaib or Jerry Nadler as an excuse to avoid looking at the plain facts of the case, and instead treat this all as just another partisan game. And this is how the state of our politics gets rationalized: yes, our favored politicians promote chaos, but at least they promote chaos in our favor. The chaos is a constant; the political side it favors is the only variable.
A Hidden Life
I couldn’t help but think of Terrence Malick’s A Hidden Life this week just as I couldn’t help thinking about it every week since I’ve seen it.
One striking aspect of the film is how everyone around the protagonist tells him that his stand won’t change the outcome of events. Why are you putting your family through this, why are you putting yourself through this, they ask, when it will change nothing. The protagonist, Franz, makes no grand case for himself. He does not browbeat his interlocutors. He is simply bound by truth, by what he knows to be right. He knows he is not responsible for changing the course of the Nazi regime, but he knows he’s responsible for the role he plays in it. He knows he’s responsible for the decisions he makes.
National Prayer Breakfast
I won’t write too much about President Trump’s appearance at the National Prayer Breakfast today as Mike Gerson did a pretty good job of covering much of the territory I would cover.
I will just add here that the president’s using the event as a campaign rally was shameful. Directly claiming that the people there better vote for him was a degradation of the occasion. I helped write four prayer breakfast speeches for President Obama…we would have never used that forum in that way. This President weakens everything he touches, and makes it that much harder for anything to last beyond his own personal use. This is true of the Breakfast. It’s true, I fear, of the faith-based office. And it’s true of many of the issues he claims for himself, such as the issue of life, which I’ll be writing about soon.
Iowa and NH
That is for a later date, however. The last issue I’ll cover here is Iowa. Please forgive me, but I am unable to write about the technical snafus related to the caucus as I am certain my eyes will pop and my brain will melt if I’m forced to write about it.
I will say that if you’re a paid subscriber, you received a pretty good preview of the what would happen. I warned that Biden’s support could collapse beneath him. I wrote that while Buttigieg had been on the decline, I thought he had his momentum back. I did think it was possible Klobuchar would break into the top 4, and while she didn’t do that, she came awfully close.
I will be updating my state of the race rankings after New Hampshire, but for now let me offer some thoughts as we head into the weekend leading up to NH:
I would be very surprised if the order of the top five matched the order of the Iowa results. In fact, I expect to see a pretty significant shake-up.
Biden took a hit in Iowa, but NH loves a comeback story. They may not deliver it for Biden, but I would not count him out. NH primary voters love being told that they can correct a rash decision made by Iowa.
Biden, Klobuchar and Buttigieg should not all be in this race come Super Tuesday. Unfortunately for Biden and Klobuchar, it’s difficult to see Buttigieg dropping out before Super Tuesday now unless a) he doesn’t finish top two in NH, NV or SC b) he has an absolutely dismal showing in SC. Biden’s not going to drop out before Super Tuesday unless a) Klobuchar overtakes him in NH and NV or b) he can’t grab first in SC (or NH or NV). Therefore, it is really important for Biden that he beat Klobuchar in NH next week, and it would be a huge boost if he retook charge of the moderate lane by topping Buttigieg in NH as well.
As the moderate lane is now clogged up (see above), Warren’s path is now more difficult as well. She had a fine third place showing in Iowa, but while she doesn’t need to beat Sanders, she really does need to pick up some ground. Additionally, if she loses to Buttigieg again, and especially if she comes in fourth, there will be real pressure on her to drop out of the race.
The debate tonight is the only obvious hingepoint of the race prior to New Hampshire. Expect to see a combative Biden, but he must be careful—it’s a fine line between showing fight and frantically grasping out of anger and embattlement. His lines of attack against Sanders and Buttigieg are straightforward enough: the former is an easy target for Trump who is aligned with causes and issues many Americans find extreme, and the latter is unprepared and untested for the presidency. We know Warren has shown that she’ll join in on criticizing Buttigieg, and Klobuchar has taken both lines of attack as well…the wild card here is whether Warren is now willing to go after Sanders more directly, perhaps even in tandem with Biden.
Last note: Don’t be surprised if Biden takes real incoming, despite his poor showing in Iowa and polls showing him in fourth in NH, as his opponents try to seed the idea that by staying in he will only harm his legacy. They all would like to force him out before SC, as difficult as that will be.
We’re in the thick of 2020 now. We’ll continue to do our best to keep you up to speed and ahead of the curve. Thanks for reading. Thanks for your support.
All of this. Deeply ponder how USA Spiral Dynamics Consciousness levels will effect votes & Gandin’s “End of the Myth”.
I've only just discovered this excellent newsletter. Thanks!!!! My comment here's a bit late but anyway...
I appreciate the concern that voting to convict would further polarize the country, but I think this need only have been a concern if there was a requirement only for a simple majority to vote to remove Trump from office.
If, say, 5 Republican Senators had voted to convict, this would not have been polarising because Trump would have remained in office. If 20 had voted to convict I think this would have been sufficiently bipartisan to provide a real foundation for healing after the Trump had gone.
So I think every Senator should just have voted on the merits as they saw it, and not concerned themselves with polarisation.
Of course, the same applies even more so in the House. What a great Christian witness it would have been if some representatives who identify as Christians had voted for the articles of impeachment. In doing this they need not have been saying that Trump should be certainly removed from office, but that his behaviour was utterly unnacceptable, and removal should at least be considered by the Senate.
I'd also tentatively suggest that removing Trump might actually have help Republicans retain the White House in November. I think the Coronavirus crisis would have allowed Mike Pence to shine as a unifying figure, and made him a much stronger candidate than Trump will be. I'm speculating there, but it's certainly true that doing the right thing sometimes helps you in unexpected ways.
My final point is that it really annoys me the way some criticized the possibility of removing Trump from office as inherently undemocratic. This ignores the fact that all the House and much of Senate was elected more recently than Trump.
But it also seems somewhat inconsistent, in so far as many of the same people were happy to see Trump elected even though he had a great many less overall votes than Hillary Clinton.
I would have thought that, on its face, Trump''s election was a somewhat undemocratic outcome. Yet it was an outcome that was legitimised by the Constitution. Similarly, I can see how removing an elected President, on its face, would seem undemocratic. But the impeachment process is just a much a part of the Constitution just as much as the Electoral College. If the former is illegimate, then surely the latter is too!