Scaring Ourselves to Death over Impeachment

Richard Cohen ’s latest column is sillier than usual, which is really saying something. (Hat tip to Jason Kuznicki, who sums up Cohen ’s argument as “Trump is SO bad that we must not impeach him.”)In purple, paid-by-the-metaphor prose, Cohen calls our 45th president “a dust storm of lies and diversions with the bellows of a bully and the greasy ethics of a street-corner hustler,” someone whose “possible crimes line up like boxcars being assembled for a freight train.” And yet, “we would impeach Trump at our peril. ” Why? Because the president ’s hardcore supporters would view impeachment and removal as the reversal of a democratic election. Worse, some of them—possibly with Trump’s encouragement—might resort to violence. We could see “a lot of angry people causing a lot of mayhem” if Trump is impeached and removed for an offe nse falling “short of a triple ax murder,” Cohen warns. Put aside the notion —itself anti-democratic—that a violent minority should enjoy a sort of heckler ’s veto on a legitimate constitutional process: Cohen ’s vision of Weimar-era street brawls is almost certainly overblown. The political science blog hosted by Cohen’s own paper recently poured some cold water on the Trumpist-insurrection scenario here.Still, Cohen ’s trepidation aboutany impeachment effort —even against a president he believes wholly corrupt and dangerous—is all too common. What other constitutional provision is considered so near...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs