The Impeachment of President Donald J Trump

[Sophie Scholl]

The move to vote for the allowance of witnesses and then complete turn around after the Republicans said it would be a disaster for Dems and that it would prove the Republicans' case is what rankles me. It gives the impression that Democrats were either afraid of Republicans, not working as a unified front, guilty of the Republicans' claims, or incompetent. None of those play well to the vast majority of people and for good reason. Personally, I found the Democrats' case to be mostly sound but the delivery dry and without much emotional impact for the most part. Democrats always seem to want to be the smartest person in the room and win via technicalities and dry, boring presentations. That's all well and good for a traditional style debate or a closed courtroom court case, but their total inability to make their appeals in common terms with any degree of charisma by those delivering it is one of the reasons they consistently loose potential converts in the court of public opinion. You may respect the know-it-all jerk who has the impeccable debate arguments and retorts, but you sure as hell don't like them or want to support them. There's also the lack of charismatic people within the Democratic Party to lead things in my opinion. Schumer? Pelosi? Rankin? Feinstein? Leahy? Biden? Schiff? All of the senior people and those chosen to head things up just lack the charisma of their Republican opponents in my eyes. It doesn't make their arguments wrong, but it does make people tune them out. New blood and new leadership is needed. Find your charismatic people. Use them. They don't need to be the masterminds of the arguments being used to present them. The failure in marketing is absolutely astonishing and I think a fairly big part of why Democrats fail to draw and keep people interested despite those people more than likely supporting the ideas behind the crusty dull legalese presentation of positions. Get a few Antonys and ease up on the non-stop Brutuses.

[Valmy]

I mean even when we did have a charismatic leader, Barack Obama, we still did shitty (post-2009 anyway). I don't know what the answer is.

[Syt]

Side note: by putting the blame on Trump, McConnell also absolved the likes of Cruz, Hawley et al.

[Solmyr]

What's the Republican strategy, then? The Trumpists already hate McConnell and other establishment Republicans, there's no way to change that anymore. Why vote to acquit?

[Sophie Scholl]

I mean even when we did have a charismatic leader, Barack Obama, we still did shitty (post-2009 anyway). I don't know what the answer is.

He's pretty much all the Dems had though. No one else was up to the task. Also, they thought they could work with Republicans and find compromises. That was a critical failing and led to nothing getting done and watering down and delivering either broken or weak versions of all of just about all of Obama's promises. I guess that ties into the other problem: Democrats still think Republicans are playing by any set of rules. They're not. They haven't been. The Democrats' refusal to update their own tactics and playbook to reflect this when combined with uninspired old leadership means they'll never accomplish their goals and never gain any legitimate power for long. Legislation is done via Executive Order or self compromised and watered down laws when Dems have power and both are big time symptoms of what is wrong with both the party and the country. Maybe this will be a wake up call for them. I find it incredibly unlikely though since they slept through the last 30 years of wake up call already...

[Valmy]

What's the Republican strategy, then? The Trumpists already hate McConnell and other establishment Republicans, there's no way to change that anymore. Why vote to acquit?

Focusing on how evil the Democrats are and telling everybody if they do not rally together than the radical left wins or something like that.

Navigating this trial so it would not split the party right away was a tricky business for them.

[Valmy]

The Democrats' refusal to update their own tactics and playbook to reflect this when combined with uninspired old leadership means they'll never accomplish their goals and never gain any legitimate power for long. Legislation is done via Executive Order or self compromised and watered down laws when Dems have power and both are big time symptoms of what is wrong with both the party and the country. Maybe this will be a wake up call for them. I find it incredibly unlikely though since they slept through the last 30 years of wake up call already...

I know. I keep hoping somehow this time will be different.

[frunk]

Both impeachments were so half-hearted.  I get that the Republicans aren't going to convict, but if you go to the trouble of actually impeaching you should prosecute it to the full extent that you can.  In both cases the impeachments were over serious issues, and they've made it seem more likely political stunts rather than something to aggressively pursue.

[The Brain]

So the US decided it wants to remain a banana republic. Cool.

[Sheilbh]

I mean even when we did have a charismatic leader, Barack Obama, we still did shitty (post-2009 anyway). I don't know what the answer is.

I think Democrats have learned their lesson. Everything I've read has emphasised that the priority has to be doing things rather than winning one (1) Republican vote to claim bipartisanship. I get the feeling that Democrats in the Senate especially have realised that negotiating with Collins or Murkowski is like the Charlie Brown and the football. And that voters might love the theory of bipartisanship, but don't reward you for getting a Republican vote or for trying. I think that's the lesson from Obama. Now if Democrats can do it is another question.

The answer isn't a charismatic leader, it's passing legislation - so winning Joe Manchin's vote on everything you can

[The Larch]

And that voters might love the theory of bipartisanship, but don't reward you for getting a Republican vote or for trying.

Do voters love bipartisanship, though? It has always stricken me as a political insider thing, I doubt that regular Joe Voter gives a fig about the theory of bipartisanship.

[Sheilbh]

And that voters might love the theory of bipartisanship, but don't reward you for getting a Republican vote or for trying.

Do voters love bipartisanship, though? It has always stricken me as a political insider thing, I doubt that regular Joe Voter gives a fig about the theory of bipartisanship.

I think there's loads of polls showing that they want parties to work together, put the national interest ahead of party interest etc etc. As I say I think they like it in theory/in the abstract - but they do not care at all in practice.

[Admiral Yi]

I think there's loads of polls showing that they want parties to work together, put the national interest ahead of party interest etc etc. As I say I think they like it in theory/in the abstract - but they do not care at all in practice.

Agreed.  It's a meme, like absolutely everything else in American discourse.

[The Minsky Moment]

The move to vote for the allowance of witnesses and then complete turn around after the Republicans said it would be a disaster for Dems and that it would prove the Republicans' case is what rankles me. It gives the impression that Democrats were either afraid of Republicans, not working as a unified front, guilty of the Republicans' claims, or incompetent. None of those play well to the vast majority of people and for good reason. Personally, I found the Democrats' case to be mostly sound but the delivery dry and without much emotional impact for the most part. Democrats always seem to want to be the smartest person in the room and win via technicalities and dry, boring presentations.

It seems like we were watching different things.  It was Trump's counsel who relied almost entirely on technical legal arguments - jurisdiction, the Senate rules for pleading articles, and the Brandenburg first amendment standards.  The Dem managers dispensed with all of that, I didn't hear a single technical argument. As for emotional content, my own reaction was that Neguse and Raskin on summation leaned too far in that direction- YMMV but there certainly was no lack of emotional content.  If your point is that the Dem managers weren't petulant and rude like van Deen - well that is certainly true.

I wonder how many people calling for witnesses have actually seen real life trial witnesses testify.  It is rarely a reciting and emotional spectacle.  Real life is not the Hollywood version of it.

[The Minsky Moment]

Also people seem to forget what actually happened in the Obama years. It wasn't about Obama trying to get all birpartisan - he used the two years of a slim legislative majority to get done whatever he could get the Blue Dogs to go along with and ram through the reconciliation process - including Obamacare.  That strategy shows its limits when you get the predictable loss of control 2 years in.  With the even slighter majority now it is about figuring what you can get Joe Manchin to sign onto and hope for divine intervention in 2022.  The Democrats simply lack the votes to ram through a highly ambitious new new deal (of any color)