One thing for which Democrats can always be relied upon is their commitment to animal welfare. Wherever there is a cat in a bag, one can always trust a Democratic Party politician to let it out. Numerous cats have been set free after various statements from Democrats along the lines of “we don’t want to take your guns,” “we are defending the Constitution,” and “we’re not socialists.” Several more such insincere claims could be added to the list but, suffice to say, if a Democrat tells you something, assume that he or she intends to do the exact opposite.
Chuck Schumer
So it is with Chuck Schumer, leader of the Senate Democrats. At a Labor Day event in Brooklyn, ‘Cryin’ Chuck’ happened to be walking around with a bullhorn when a bystander shouted a question at him: “When Y'all gonna impeach Trump?" a man asked Schumer as he walked past. Without hesitation, the senator raised the bullhorn and answered: “the sooner the better.”
The bystanders did not seem satisfied and the man who had called out the question then told Schumer “that’s not answering the question.” Schumer responded: “Gotta get a few Republicans …”
A Losing Issue
As the entire nation – and, more specifically, the two main political parties – prepare for the 2018 midterm elections, the issue of impeachment of President Donald Trump looms large. Many Democrats understand that vowing to impeach Trump is not going to help their election prospects. Nevertheless, impeachment is what the Democrats are going for. Try as they might, they are failing miserably in their attempt to downplay their interest in attempting to remove the president from office.
In May of 2018, House minority leader Nancy Pelosi told CNN’s Chris Cuomo “I do not think that impeachment is a policy agenda.” Regardless of what one may think of Pelosi as a person or how one regards her political ideology, there is no denying that – when it comes to political instincts – she is one of the sharpest individuals on Capitol Hill; her tenure in the House and as leader of House Democrats clearly demonstrates that. Even in the face of a string of political defeats, Pelosi has not been toppled from her leadership position.
What Pelosi told Cuomo was absolutely correct: Impeachment is not a policy agenda. Pelosi’s party cannot afford to make it a part of their policy agenda. That does not mean that it will not top the list of actions the Democrats will take, should they attain a majority in the House. It would be an empty – and highly divisive – gesture; even assuming the opposition party could muster the majority vote they would need to impeach Trump, the process means nothing if the Senate does not convict, and there is, realistically speaking, no chance of that.
The Certain Failure of Impeachment
For this reason, it is somewhat likely that Democrats would not even get the simple majority needed in the House. The smart thing, for House Democrats, would be to abandon the idea altogether unless they have an overwhelming majority. Should they – with a majority of anything less than 20 seats – bring articles of impeachment up for a vote and fail, it would be the most embarrassing episode in the party’s modern history – even more so than the defeat of Hillary Clinton in 2016. Failure to get the votes for impeachment is not such an unlikely scenario if the Democrats only managed to scrape together a thin majority of House seats; how many Democrats would decide that voting to impeach a president who is certain to avoid conviction in the Senate and then go on to win a second term is a wise idea?
On the other hand, the Democratic Party, along with the wider progressive/socialist movement, appears ever more reckless. Seeming to care nothing for how far out of the mainstream they are drifting, the party does appear, most of the time, to be engaged in the longest-lasting act of suicide known to mankind. Failing to win a vote on impeachment, or impeaching and then having to deal with President Trump for another six years, is an equally nightmarish prospect for any Democrat in Washington D.C. Yet, the party cares so little about how it will be perceived that Schumer and Pelosi do, in fact, have every intention of impeaching a president they have never been able to accept.
