AN “IRONCLAD CASE” FOR WHAT?

by Sarah Roark |

At the California Democratic Party’s annual convention, Nancy Pelosi tried once again to tamp down internal dissent and demands for impeachment among party members – this time by offering vague but lofty promises to “go where the facts lead us” and build an “ironclad case to act” against Trump. (50 House Democrats and 1 Republican have now called for starting the impeachment process, so these calls are becoming much harder to just ignore.)

At the convention, Pelosi said, “In his report, special counsel Mueller warned us in the starkest terms that there was an attack on our election and an attack on our democracy. Why won’t the president defend us from this attack? What is the president covering up?”

Excellent question, Nancy. Did two years of waiting for Mueller Time clear it up?

Yet House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler is still saying, “Impeachment is a political act, and you cannot impeach a president if the American people will not support it. The American people right now do not support it because they do not know the story. They don’t know the facts. We have to get the facts out. We have to hold a series of hearings, we have to hold the investigations.”

I’m sorry, but THIS IS JUST MADNESS.

We don’t need more iron cladding. Facts are not what we lack. If anything, we have a confusing surplus of fact. Here’s a heresy for you: we don’t even need to know exactly what happened with Russia or the election to know that Trump needs to go right now!

Why? Because Trump has publicly committed crimes against humanity and national and international law. He does it often, and without apology. Sometimes without explanation.

He is responsible for openly acknowledged, unforgivable mass cruelties at the border and in Puerto Rico. He’s just flat broken at least one treaty I know of, and abruptly pulled us out of multiple others. Hell, he boasted on NBC about firing Comey specifically to stop Comey’s investigation of him.

THAT IS ENOUGH TO GET GOING, FOR GOD’S SWEET SAKE. If it isn’t – what on earth does that say about what we will tolerate from future presidents?

During Pelosi’s speech at the convention, one protester calling out “Impeach!” led to a few more, until about a hundred people joined in. Some denial is finally being broken through. But that spirit must now spread out into the streets. We cannot allow ourselves to be lulled into another two years of passivity. We have a duty (yes, I said a duty) to be impatient. Consider Point 3 from Refuse Fascism’s 5 Points on Impeachment:

“Impeachment cannot become another means by which the millions who hate what is happening become sucked into another waiting game as the Trump/Pence regime terrorizes more people. While people are arguing for impeachment, the decisive factor is whether or not a critical mass takes to the streets to stop this regime.”

In other words: we must #CandlelightRevolution with sustained, nonviolent protests to provide exactly the kind of pressure and popular numbers that the Democratic leadership have now explicitly said they’re waiting for. They should be doing their job regardless of polls, but we the people have the real final responsibility for moving that needle – selling our fellow Americans on the justice and raw necessity of Trump/Pence Must Go: In the name of humanity, we refuse to accept a fascist America.