Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin explained why the Democratic House had to impeach the president: “The president’s continuing course of conduct constitutes a clear and present danger to democracy in America,” he said. “We cannot allow this misconduct to pass. It would be a sell-out of our Constitution, our foreign policy, our national security, and our democracy.”
Let’s look at this in more detail. The “president’s continuing course of conduct constitutes a clear and present danger to democracy in America.” We live in a Republic, not a Democracy. In a pure Democracy, each individual votes directly for their leaders and for every law that the leaders wish to pass. In the past in Switzerland, for example, all the males (women didn’t get the vote until the 1970s) would gather in the town square of the largest city in each canton (or state). The laws would be read to them and they would vote yes or no with a show of hands. In a country of over 330 million people, that would be virtually impossible to manage, so we vote for senators and representatives who go to Congress and pass the laws that we supposedly want them to pass. Has President Trump impeded the election of such congressmen and women since taking office? Has he announced plans to have himself named president for life and abolished the 2020 and all following elections? Of course not! He has done nothing to prevent the Constitutionally prescribed workings of our government.
Perhaps Rep. Raskin means that he has appointed an Attorney General who has appointed a prosecutor who is pursuing the investigation of the widely publicized wrongdoings of the FBI, CIA, and DOJ before the 2016 election and following it. Yet, investigating the interference of anyone in the free will of the American voter, whether it be by a foreign government or by rogue agents of our own government, is exactly what a president and an attorney general should be doing. That is not threatening democracy in America. That is preserving it! The very Democratic Party to which Congressman Raskin belongs are the ones who have been attempting to destroy our system by attempting to get the electoral college to change its votes to Clinton, by attempting to retroactively abolish the electoral college, by flooding the country with third world refugees who can be depended upon to vote (illegally) for Democrats, and by trying from the day he was inaugurated to impeach this president, finally choosing to impeach him over a phone conversation that is no different from conversations made by past presidents.
“It would be a sell-out of our Constitution,” Rep. Raskin continues. Oh? How is that the case? Is it because when his closest advisors were subpoenaed by the House, the White House went to court to prevent them from testifying based upon executive privilege? President Obama did exactly the same thing when the House was investigating Fast and Furious in which we sold guns to a Mexican Cartel which then used them to kill an American Border Patrol Agent, Brian Terry. Yet, President Obama wasn’t accused of selling out the Constitution, nor was he impeached.
Has the President sold out the Constitution by having his administration support the free speech of all Americans as guaranteed by the first amendment? Or supporting the rights of Christians to practice their beliefs as also guaranteed by the first amendment? Or supporting the rights of Americans to bear arms as guaranteed by the second amendment? Would a dictator-in-waiting deliberately support arming Americans, any Americans, even those who don’t like him? Yet this president is doing exactly that.
The next arguments advanced by Rep. Raskin are equally ridiculous. He charges President Trump with selling out our foreign policy and our national security. First of all, foreign policy is determined by the President of the United States. You cannot “sell out” your own policy. You might change it, but it is yours as president to set, to change at will, and to see carried out. President Trump’s foreign policy has been so bad that it has gotten a number of NATO nations to contribute more (and us less) to their own defense; has recognized Jerusalem as the capital city of Israel, something which Congress voted to do decades ago but which wimpy presidents have been putting off; no longer regards the West Bank and East Jerusalem settlements as illegal under international law (would we want the world telling us that Texas actually belonged to Mexico?) has negotiated new trade deals with the EU, China, Japan, Mexico, Canada and is working on one with India, all of which are benefitting American workers who have been harmed by past trade deals; and he has encouraged fracking which has made the United States an exporter of energy for the first time in decades, and has prevented us from engaging in any new, undeclared wars for the first time since FDR.
As for “selling out” our national security by his phone call to the Ukraine, let’s really consider that. Russ has addressed this in a previous blog, but it bears repeating. Does the Ukraine share a border with the U.S.? Does it serve as a buffer between the U.S. and Russia? If the Ukraine falls to Russia, will all of Europe, including Germany, France and Great Britain fall with it, leaving us isolated in the world? Absolutely not! The Ukraine is a country located in eastern Europe with borders on Russia, Moldova, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Belarus. Could you find any of those except Russia on a world map without a lot of searching? In addition, if the Ukraine is so important to our national security, why did President Obama sit on his hands while Russia seized the Crimea, a section of Ukraine that gave Russia a port on the Black Sea? If they are so important to our national security, why did President Obama only send them blankets and military meal packets rather than the guns and missiles they begged for to fight off the encroaching Russian army? President Trump “sold out” our national security by sending them those very guns and missiles. “So, let’s impeach him!” declare the Democrats.
As for the charge Rep. Raskin did not mention and that was dropped from the impeachment because it was so blatantly, understandably false, that of “bribing” President Zelensky of the Ukraine to reopen the investigation of the energy company, Burisma, on whose board Hunter Biden sat in order to damage the reputation of a possible political opponent, thereby interfering in the 2020 election, there are several points here that the Democrats conveniently ignore:
- Hunter, who had no experience in the field of energy, didn’t speak Ukrainian, and had never been to the Ukraine, won his seat on Burisma’s board after his father, then Vice-President Biden was appointed by President Obama to take charge of rooting out corruption in the Ukraine. Obama administration officials voiced concern when Hunter was given the job, but nothing was done. Burisma did get meetings with several administration officials. Hunter was paid $50,000 a month and with his company’s payments from Burisma, the total was around $83,000 a month.
- Then a Ukrainian prosecutor began to investigate the company and here lies the second point the Democrats try to cover up. Joe Biden went to the Ukraine to hand over the 1 billion dollars in blankets and meals, but refused to do so unless they fired the prosecutor. The prosecutor was immediately fired. Joe Biden laughingly told the story during a speech which is, of course, on video.
- Although Joe Biden remains the front runner, his many gaffes, his confusion sometimes about what state he is in, his insipid debate performances – – – all of these weaken him as the eventual candidate. Thus it is by no means a given that President Trump will face him in the election race.
- The U.S. and the Ukraine have a treaty by which they are to cooperate with one another in investigations into corruption in the Ukraine. President Trump was well within his rights, nay was perhaps obligated, to investigate possible corruption between the son of a vice-president and a foreign company. Vice-presidents, even those who may become presidential candidates, are not above the law, as was shown by the resignation of Vice President Spiro Agnew when he was charged with a felony in 1972.
- President Trump’s actual “favor” was for President Zelensky to investigate the involvement of Ukrainian officials in the 2016 election. While Democrats have tried strenuously but unsuccessfully to pin collaboration with Russia to interfere in the 2016 election on President Trump’s campaign, it now comes to light that in fact the Hillary Clinton campaign collaborated not only with a British ex-spy, but also with numerous Ukrainians to root out dirt on members of then Republican candidate Trump’s campaign members. The Ukrainians were very helpful to Clinton. One even wrote an op-ed in a national newspaper telling what a horrible man Donald J. Trump was. And, it was CrowdStrike, a company whose CEO was born in the Ukraine and who are funded by a Ukrainian oligarch, who were the only ones to examine the Democratic National Party’s server and determine that they had been hacked by the Russians. The FBI never touched the server and their cyber experts never examined it. One wonders why?
- Both the transcript of the call, which the one Democratic witness in the hearings who had actually heard the call, admitted was correct, never mentions the aid or in any way, doesn’t threaten President Zelensky, nor attempts to bribe him to investigate Biden by offering the money. No mention of foreign aid was in the phone call at all.
- President Zelensky of the Ukraine agrees that the transcript is accurate and says that not only did he not feel in the least threatened or bribed, he didn’t even know that the funds might be withheld until a month later.
- Most importantly, although Rudy Guiliani has been to the Ukraine, interviewed witnesses, and brought back reams of documents about the possible Burisma corruption to Attorney General Barr, the Ukraine never reopened the investigation itself. And, after President Trump was unable to encourage other NATO members to contribute to Ukrainian aid, the U.S. sent the aid.
A tempest in a teapot.
An impeachment without a crime.
The real sell-out of our Constitution!