Now it is time for impeachment

I argued against Trump impeachment in <this post>. The Ukraine allegations have shifted the balance, and of course I am far from alone in reaching that conclusion. I find myself in agreement with most of the articles and "friendly" op-eds in the New York Times. I don't think I have much to add beyond what they say, which makes it tempting to skip this blog post. But I'll make it anyway.

I argued before that if you can't get a conviction, it's best not to impeach. But the Ukraine case changes things. Trump is using the power of his office with foreign governments to help get him reelected in 2020, and that undermines our democracy going forward, not just in retrospect.

I can't say I'm newly outraged. My outrage meter has been pegged to the top of the gauge for a long time now. Reasons to be outraged about Trump are layered one on top of the other... there are many layers. Instead of feeling outraged, I'm rather hoping this is an opportunity to get rid of Trump and Trumpism more effectively in the 2020 election -- and perhaps to constrain his behavior between now and then.

A big part of the problem is that the crucial constituency here are those ardent pro-Trump voters who vote in disproportionate numbers in Senate primary contests. Republican senators are very wary of provoking their ire. So the politics centers heavily on what those pro-Trump voters think.

What do they really think? What would it take for some significant portion of them to abandon Trump? I don't really know.

When Trump was elected, I worried that he might simply order the military to arrest Congress. The leftists and centrists would be outraged, but would it be enough? Would Trump voters have just cheered him on as President For Life? There are of course ways to subvert democracy without arresting Congress, and Trump has already used some of those methods (as in withholding a contract from Amazon because of Jeff Bezos's politics), but the subtlety might well be lost on Trump voters.

The readiness with which Trump and allies (including notably Fox News) will lie and obfuscate is concerning. A look at the Fox page shows their guns are blazing as never before. Earlier today there was an "Aha!" story claiming Schiff did the same thing as Trump. Why? Because some prankster claiming to be from Ukraine with dirt on Trump called him a couple years ago and he said he would be interested in that information. There is just no parallel. When someone offers information to someone in the intelligence community, they naturally take it. Whether they find it credible when they get it and what they would do with it are separate questions, but accepting the information is not a problem.

There are three key parties on the Republican side of this issue. First, Trump is a strange, despicable human being. Second, there are Trump voters, and I don't know what makes them tick. They might just be very ignorant, and think there's nothing more important at stake than how it feels good when Trump zings people they don't like. There are people (and not just right-wingers) who think "Don't vote, it just encourages them" is a funny bumper sticker. Third, there are the Republican senators. I'm convinced they aren't ignorant and they know enough history to understand the danger of tyranny. You imagine most of them would personally prefer a Pence presidency to a Trump presidency, if their voters would let them get away with it. And now it's time for them to look in the mirror. On the one side, democracy itself is at stake. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance and the spotlight is now on them. On the other side, their jobs might be at risk if they can't sell an anti-Trump position. Lots of us face job insecurity, and risk losing our jobs if we do the right thing. We can sympathize with people who don't do the right thing if losing the job means financial ruin. But ex-senators do not face financial ruin.

Positive things could happen without Trump actually being removed from office. If Republican senators privately tell him that they will vote against him if he goes too far, it could moderate his behavior without the senators having to pay the political price.

If we assume that Trump is defeated in 2020, the picture still does not look very good unless the Democrats retake the Senate. We face ongoing gridlock in this highly polarized era unless Senate, House, and President are all from the same party. I suppose Republican senators might worry about losing to a Democrat in the final election, as well as worrying about losing to a Trump supporter in the primary. I don't have strong intuitions about how the impeachment process will play out in terms of the Senate count. If tribalism continues, Republican-leaning states will continue to elect Republican senators.

But far more is at stake here than partisan politics. Much as I dislike Pence's politics, I do not have any reason to think he is inclined to disrupt international relations and the integrity of the political process. I just hope there is not some other demagogue ready to take Trump's place if he goes.