I was only 6 when Clinton was impeached. Here’s what I think of impeaching Trump

First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton watches President Clinton pause as he thanks those Democratic members of the House of Representatives who voted against impeachment in this Dec. 19, 1998, file photo. | Associated Press

Impeachment is mostly horrible for the country, though there is one bright spot at the end of the tunnel if America has the will to go there

I admit, this conservative millennial is new to the impeachment business. I was just six years and seven days old when the U.S. House impeached President Bill Clinton. Curiously, “Blue’s Clues” made no mention of the matter.

So, having no lived experience from which to draw in the wake of last week’s impeachment inquiry, I’m cracking open my history books (better read as Google), dusting off my pocket Constitution (which is an actual pocket Constitution) and relying on my foundational principles to make sense of the political hurricane.

Turns out, it’s mostly horrible, though there is one bright spot at the end of the tunnel if America has the will to go there. But first ...

President Trump asking a foreign leader to investigate his main political opponent’s son seemed a dumb and reckless thing to do, perhaps nothing more. Then came the whistleblower report. It’s what my elders had been waiting for — Ah ha! A cover-up! White House officials, as it happens, may have moved to “lock down” the phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi upped the ante, calling it a “cover-up of a cover-up.”

To those my senior, flashbacks of President Nixon stashing away his tapes probably swirled in their heads as they waited for the rumble in the D.C. jungle to start, popcorn in hand.

Me? Just add this to the list of dumb and reckless things to do, which, if we’re taking an honest inventory of this presidency, is uncomfortably long. If the alleged move doesn’t fit the intentionally vague definition of “high crimes and misdemeanors,” it certainly fails the test of propriety and leaves me with little faith in this administration’s competency to guide the U.S. to greener pastures. It cements the case to find a replacement.

Associated Press

In this April 29, 1974, file photo, President Richard M. Nixon points to the transcripts of the White House tapes after he announced during a nationally-televised speech that he would turn over the transcripts to House impeachment investigators.

In the meantime, I’m anticipating a sticky slog through the next few months as evidence uncovered by House committees fails to persuade partisans to emerge from their bunkers.

Misery, for sure, but trusting in the process now that it’s begun is the only way forward. The Framers, being the diligent students of human nature they were, knew men were not angels and so assumed government would need “auxiliary precautions” to guard against dumb and reckless behaviors. So let the mechanisms work as they should, and let the chips fall where they may. America will keep chugging along.

But be prepared for an ugly ending. Whether it’s removal, resignation or reelection, Trump will not “go gentle into that good night.” Quite the contrary, “rage, rage” will likely be his mantra.

And that’s the cost of impeachment. It’s also a consequence impeachment supporters must be ready to own. There’s no predicting the size of rain cloud they’ll cast over the country, but it’s more than likely partisans will be further divided, the Republican Party will have irreconcilable fractures and the Democratic Party will paint itself into a far-left corner from which it will be hard to escape. Already low public trust in government could plummet further, and the 2020 election cycle would mostly be a self-aggrandizing dance around the issues voters actually care about.

So, what’s the bright spot? In impeaching the president, Congress has a chance to take back the powers it’s willfully surrendered over the course of a century. For evidence, look to the outcome of President Andrew Johnson’s impeachment in 1868. Members of Congress censured a president who engaged in dumb and reckless behaviors, and in doing so weakened the presidency for the ensuing decades. Congress ran the show.

Let the mechanisms work as they should, and let the chips fall where they may. America will keep chugging along.

Then came FDR, and every president since has tried to replicate his towering influence on public policy, as Elaine Kamarck, senior fellow of governance studies at the Brookings Institution, notes. The more the president inserts himself in Congress’ business, the less power lawmakers have. The result is governance by executive order and enforcement by judges — an anemic system at best.

Returning to “congressional government,” as then-professor Woodrow Wilson called it in the 1800s, is the boon America could gain from today’s impeachment battle. Congress is the body responsible for listening to the people. It has the constitutional duty to make laws. It’s largely failed on both accounts, and it’s time for it to take its rightful place as the predominant branch of American government.

Letting that moment go would be a dumb and reckless thing, indeed.

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