[Peace-discuss] impeachment

Sat Mar 16 20:54:04 UTC 2019

Bob,

That is an excellent analysis and strategy !

David J.

From: Robert Naiman [mailto:naiman at justforeignpolicy.org] 
Sent: Saturday, March 16, 2019 10:11 AM
To: David Johnson
Cc: C G Estabrook; Peace Discuss; Ian Welsh
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] impeachment

Yes, it makes a difference. I wrote about this, see the link. One thing is Nancy Pelosi's formal power, under the rules, and the other thing is her political-ideological power to "impose the Party Line" [i.e., her line], which is fueled by money, exactly as you say. 

But money is not the whole story. Part of it is gaslighting, psychological warfare, groupthink, herd behavior, Democrats thinking that they need to comply with Nancy Pelosi more than they have to. This part is not usually exposed, because usually Nancy Pelosi and her henchmen work effectively to keep issues and ideas off the table that could expose it - like impeachment. This is why, if you hate Nancy Pelosi's totalitarian rule over House Democrats on foreign policy, the idea of impeachment is potentially very interesting, because it's an opportunity to split House Democrats from Pelosi, where the other dynamics are not so strong. The moneyed interests don't have a clear dog in the fight. The Pentagon-industrial complex doesn't have a clear dog in the fight. AIPAC doesn't have a clear dog in the fight. The South Florida Democrats who are catering to right-wing Cuban exiles on Venezuela policy don't have a clear dog in the fight. So this could be a great fight to pick with Nancy Pelosi. A whole bunch of Democrats want to impeach Trump, and the interests that ordinarily keep Nancy Pelosi strong don't have a big dog in the fight. So she is vulnerable. It might be possible to weaken her, by starting a real fight among House Democrats about impeachment. 

Look what happened in the fight over the demand of Nancy Pelosi and the AIPAC Democrats to censure Ilhan Omar. "Everybody who's anybody" expected Nancy Pelosi and the AIPAC Democrats to get their way. Of course. In a confrontation between Nancy Pelosi and the AIPAC Democrats on one side and Ilhan Omar on the other, who's going to win? Nancy Pelosi and the AIPAC Democrats, of course. Who has all the power? Nancy Pelosi and the AIPAC Democrats. Who has no power? Ilhan Omar. Who's going to win? Nancy Pelosi and the AIPAC Democrats. Of course. Duh. Slam dunk. Case closed. Put a fork in it, it's done. 

But that's not what happened. What happened instead was that there was an uprising, an intifada, if you will. There was a backlash of support for Ilhan Omar, maybe not agreeing with exactly what she said, but opposing singling her out for criticism with a House resolution. If you want to have a House resolution against bigotry, these people said, fine. Have it be against all bigotry, not just anti-Semitism, so we're not just singling out Ilhan Omar. And that's what happened. That's what happened because of the uprising. 

And that's why we should press on the idea of impeachment now. So we can try to provoke another uprising against Nancy Pelosi's totalitarian rule over House Democrats, which is a big, big obstacle to efforts to end the wars and prevent new ones. 

===

Robert Reuel Naiman
Policy Director
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman at justforeignpolicy.org

(202) 448-2898 x1

On Sat, Mar 16, 2019 at 9:37 AM David Johnson via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

Election night, November 2006 Mid-Term Elections ;

Within minutes of the national media announcing that the Democratic party had won control of the House and Senate, the news coverage switched live to cover Nancy Pelosi’s response. As soon as she walked up to the podium the very first words out of her mouth were ; “ Impeachment is off the table, impeachment is off the table “.

She alone may not be able to block impeachment but her INFLUENCE and CONTROL of the vast majority of Democratic House members ( via corporate campaign contributions and committee assignments, etc. ) DOES make a difference in that she CAN block and / or defeat any impeachment resolution.

David J.

From: Peace-discuss [mailto:peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net] On Behalf Of Robert Naiman via Peace-discuss
Sent: Saturday, March 16, 2019 8:10 AM
To: C G Estabrook
Cc: Peace Discuss; Ian Welsh
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] impeachment

Here's a key thing that everyone needs to know about this. 

IT"S NOT PELOSI'S DECISION WHETHER TO IMPEACH TRUMP OR NOT. 

Impeachment concerns the Constitutional privileges of the House. A resolution introducing articles of impeachment is a privileged resolution, JUST LIKE A CONCURRENT RESOLUTION TO WITHDRAW U.S. FORCES FROM AN UNAUTHORIZED WAR. It must go to the floor for a vote if the sponsor insists. NANCY PELOSI CANNOT BLOCK IT. 

See here: 

Let’s Impeach Trump If He Continues the Yemen War

https://www.facebook.com/robert.naiman/posts/10158094853692656

===

Robert Reuel Naiman
Policy Director
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman at justforeignpolicy.org

(202) 448-2898 x1

On Fri, Mar 15, 2019 at 8:16 PM C G Estabrook via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:

<https://chomsky.info/1990____-2/>

"If the Nuremberg laws were applied, then every post-war American president would have been hanged."

The point is easily extended to all recent presidents. Of course Trump should be impeached (like Obama) for ‘aggressive war,’ under Nuremberg’s defintion.

—CGE

> On Mar 15, 2019, at 6:53 PM, Ian Welsh <noreply+feedproxy at google.com <mailto:noreply%2Bfeedproxy at google.com> > wrote:
> 
> Ian Welsh
> There Is No Downside To Impeaching Trump For Democrats
> Posted: 14 Mar 2019 04:57 PM PDT
> Nancy Pelosi recently said:
> 
> Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.
> 
> I note, first of all, that Nancy Pelosi ruled out impeaching George Bush, so her reluctance to impeach for clear crimes is consistent with her record. I never understood why others thought that Pelosi would be pro-impeachment. The idea that she’s some partisan fighter is contradicted by her record. Pelosi is what she has, she has beliefs, and those beliefs include that the right is respectable and that left are unrealistic losers (as when she dismissed the Green New Deal.)
> 
> But let’s leave Pelosi aside for a moment. The Democrats have control of the House. They can impeach. They cannot convict in the Senate, but impeachment is certainly possible.
> 
> Why would they want to?
> 
> Because it would cripple Trump and Republicans. During the period of the impeachment, Republicans would be able to get virtually nothing done, except by executive fiat.
> 
> Because the impeachment hearings would completely dominate months of news cycles: constantly hammering in every illegal, crooked, corrupt and cruel thing that Trump has done.
> 
> This is largely a no lose, if you were actually partisan: there isn’t a lot that House Dems can get thru anyway while the Republicans control the Presidency, Senate and Supreme Court. You can’t actually get most of your legislation thru without crippling compromises so this is fine.
> 
> Control the news cycle; make sure bad legislation doesn’t pass for months; keep Trump tied down fighting impeachment and on top of that spend months talking about every shitty thing he has done.
> 
> Some may argue impeachment might “backfire”, that Americans “want to see legislators working”, but that sort of argument has been made for decades. Contempt for Congress isn’t going to get much worse (it hardly can), and if working means doing the wrong thing, it’s better not to.
> 
> In the face of all the positives, like dragging Trump thru the mud, crippling his ability to do anything, and controlling the news cycle, impeachment starts looking, politically, like an obvious thing to do.
> 
> And if you actually care about justice, well, Trump is at the very least, a walking emoluments violation. He is clearly profiting from being President. Carter had to sell his peanut farm, Trump hasn’t even put everything into blind trusts and many of his businesses are clearly profiting from his Presidency.
> 
> Bush should have been impeached. Trump should be impeached. Ironically, Clinton, who was impeached, shouldn’t have been (lying about consensual sex is a ridiculously low bar.)
> 
> Pelosi made the wrong decision with Bush. She appears in danger of making the wrong decision here. I doubt she’ll change her mind, but I hope I’m wrong.
> 
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