The Democrats\u2019 punch-drunk base has demanded that President Donald Trump be impeached ever since the 2016 election when they suffered a knock-out in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and then went down again in the recounts.<\/p>\n
Then they couldn\u2019t turn the Electoral College rogue, and failed with something called the Emoluments Clause, and botched their smears of Trump\u2019s judges and couldn\u2019t convince anyone that the new first lady is last and the last first lady is first.<\/p>\n
Of course, they attempted all that not for the purpose of succeeding, but for the purpose of making them feel virtuous. That\u2019s what they do.<\/p>\n
Former President Barack Obama brilliantly capitalized on this mindset. Instead of arguing that proposals with which he disagreed would not work, he simply condemned them as unvirtuous. He declared at least 46 times, \u201cThat\u2019s not who we are.\u201d<\/p>\n
Saying, \u201cThat\u2019s not who we are\u201d is who Obama is. It worked with his Dems, because their discourse isn\u2019t about problem solving; it\u2019s a revival meeting.<\/p>\n
Not all the Dems have been drinking the virtue Kool-Aid, however. Take Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House of Representatives. A savvy politician, Pelosi knows that impeachment is a loser for the Dems, virtue be damned.<\/p>\n
Because Pelosi can count. Impeachment by the House requires only a majority, and the Dems hold that majority. But it would go nowhere in the Senate where the Dems are 19 seats short of the necessary 67.<\/p>\n
So the president won\u2019t be removed and everyone who can count knows it. What, then, does impeachment accomplish?<\/p>\n
It would certainly gin up the wild ones in the Dem base \u2014 a group that can\u2019t get ginned up about an old establishment white guy with high-beam teeth that are often obscured by his implanted foot, a grouchy old socialist with three houses and two heart stents who honeymooned in the Soviet Union and a woman who claimed for much of her professional career, falsely and oddly, that she was a Native American.<\/p>\n
But the Dems\u2019 timing for their gin party is lousy. If the people want to remove this president, there\u2019s a sure way to do it just 13 months from now. Ask Jimmy Carter.<\/p>\n
If the people don\u2019t want to remove Trump in that upcoming election, they certainly don\u2019t want a bunch of partisan Dems to do so sooner in another cheap spectacle. Think of \u201cI am Spartacus\u201d last year by a Dem candidate for president, or the weird parody of the Ukraine issue with which the Dem head of the oxymoronically named House Intelligence Committee launched a hearing last month, or a Dem congressman\u2019s worry that Guam might tip over.<\/p>\n
Pelosi knows all that. That\u2019s why for years she refused ongoing impeachment feel-good calls from her intoxicated base. The end result would be a loss for the Dems.<\/p>\n
But Pelosi finally gave in. Sort of.<\/p>\n
She announced in a big press conference that \u2026 (drum roll) \u2026 she was unilaterally declaring \u2026 (drum roll) \u2026 a formal impeachment inquiry.<\/p>\n
Yawn.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s not setting up a formal committee for her formal inquiry. And she won\u2019t take a formal vote of the House of Representatives for her formal inquiry because, well, she might lose. And she\u2019ll give no formal time frame for her formal inquiry. It\u2019ll just be handled when politically convenient, when the political winds blow and when the Dems\u2019 media arm, CNN, needs to fill air time.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s no vote, no new subpoena power, no time-table, no specific allegations.<\/p>\n
The excuse for this charade, a place called Ukraine (think Russia-lite), appears to be another Dem dud. The so-called whistle-blower turns out to be a Dem stooge who never actually saw the foul he blew his whistle on and whose whistle-blowing letter was written by a Dem lawyer.<\/p>\n
There was no \u201cquid pro quo.\u201d It wasn\u2019t like, for example, a certain recent Dem presidential candidate who took numerous quarter million-dollar fees for giving canned speeches to corporations currying political favor.<\/p>\n
So why did Pelosi bother renaming the Dems\u2019 tawdry little show to something that might be dubbed \u201cThe Permanent Impeachment Inquiry\u201d?<\/p>\n
She did it to give permission to her party to do what her party does: party. She knows that their melodramatic sermons \u2014 always with one eye in the mirror \u2014 are simply because that\u2019s who they are.<\/p>\n
Drunks love a revival meeting. Followed by shouting. Followed by self-congratulatory virtue signaling. Followed by more drinks. Followed by trashing the house \u2014 the House of Representatives in this case.<\/p>\n
Fine, but what follows all that is a hangover. Love him or hate him, this president won\u2019t go down in a drunken brawl. He won\u2019t be removed except by a vote of the people.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s as it should be. Even the Dem fans who enjoy impeachment-palooza know it\u2019s just low-brow amusement. It\u2019s like a clown show with a bear in a tutu snapping towels in a junior high locker room while kids in the corner do unspeakable things with matches.<\/p>\n
But the 2020 election is serious. There, the grown-ups \u2014 sober moderates who decide such things \u2014 will get their say. They\u2019ll judge Trump and his antics, as they should. And they\u2019ll also judge these Dems and theirs.<\/p>\n
Correspond and subscribe at theAspenbeat@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n