Well, this morning House Speaker and Freedom Caucus punching bag Kevin McCarthy made it official. He’s directed three committees to open impeachment inquiries into President Biden. This article from NBC News states according to McCarthy an impeachment inquiry is a “next logical step.” It seems to me like the House GOPers have been investigating for the better part of a year and haven’t come up with jack-sh*t in the “high crimes and misdemeanors” called for in the Constitution but I also don’t drink Trump-Orange Kool Aide by the gallon all day long so what do I know?
There is however a process and McCarthy, if for no other reason than to buy time (he does have the funding deadline at the end of the month to deal with) and hope all this dies down. For the moment however I guess he felt he had to do something to soothe the savage beast we know as the Freedom Caucus. But if you look closely at how this has progressed McCarthy can’t even be sure he’s got the votes in the overall House GOP!
McCarthy’s decision represents a major reversal for the speaker after he told the conservative website Breitbart earlier this month that he wouldn’t open an impeachment inquiry without a vote of the full House. It comes as he doesn’t appear to have enough votes to proceed on the issue, facing skepticism from across the GOP spectrum due to the lack of evidence implicating the president in Hunter Biden’s transgressions.
What all this really boils down to is trying to placate Donald Trump. Trump you see wants Biden impeached so he can start braying about it. Talking about how HIS having been impeached is no big deal because Biden got impeached too! That my friends is ALL this is about. Keeping Trump happy. That’s how afraid so many GOPers are of Trump and his MAGAs. The problem however and especially for McCarthy is that keeping Trump happy means for sure losing the House next year. He’s only got a small majority to begin with and if Santos isn’t gone before the election he will be after.
However, a Biden impeachment means at least fifteen or twenty other House Republicans are screwed. If the KKKrazy KKKaucus forces things to a formal vote (eventually) on Articles of Impeachment then that’s the ballgame. They can either vote no and lose their seat in a primary or vote yes and their District that voted for Biden will send them packing. McCarthy can say bye-bye to that Speaker’s Gavel he sold his soul to get.
But this ALL comes down to Trump and MAGA. There are 25-30 million MAGAs out there and spread all over the place. The GOP can’t win without them, but as we’ve seen in successive general and special elections they can’t win with them either! Now in practical terms, while five or ten millions would petulantly stay home next year the rest would grit their teeth and vote for a “RINO” even if their Jeebus was running but as a Democrat. So the bulk of the GOP and conservative leaning independents would make a decent voting bloc. Probably not enough to win next year but they could limit their losses if they’d just dump Trump and make a clean break set up for the next midterm and especially 2028.
But they just can’t bring themselves to do it. Hence the “I don’t know how to quit you” reference from Brokeback Mountain. Most conservatives WANT to break with Trump, put him in the rearview mirror (like they did with George W. Bush) but “don’t know how.” Of course, Bush cared enough about the GOP and conservatism to understand not only that it was best for all for him to not simply fade into the background as former Presidents mostly do, but disappear entirely. No showing up at big events, and especially at the nominating convention. Trump as we know refuses to go away and that means taking him out. Brutally, and accepting an election or two where it will cost the GOP.
They know what they need to do. They JUST CAN’T DO IT!”
Whatever Trump demands they will go along. And if Trump wants to see Biden impeached then that’s reason enough. No need for any actual “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Biden made Trump look bad by 1) Beating his ass in a free and fair election despite all the voter suppression and intimidation GOPers had set up, and 2) Doing a good job which made Trump look even worse. Little Donnie’s ego has taken a beating from Joe Biden and if getting payback costs the GOP the House next year (and perhaps the Senate too) and of course the WH then TOO BAD! In classic, hard-core conservative GOPer fashion Trump WILL get his and everyone else can just f**k the hell off.
The GOP just “can’t quit Trump.”
So we now have the spectacle of McCarthy starting the process. It will be interesting to see how much effort he puts into slow-walking things to prevent things getting to the point of an actual vote on actual articles of impeachment. Maybe, as Ursula and Murfster frequently point out once the fiscal problem (keeping the govt. funded) is solved McCarthy will get his ducks in a row and once his bases are covered tell the Freedom Caucus to go perform certain anatomically impossible acts on themselves. (Ok – f**k themselves) Now THAT would be a sight to see. But overall it won’t mean the GOP has decided to “quit Trump.”
nancy pelosi never had to do this. She had some hard core people from the left, but she kept them in line. legislation was passed. Boener, ryan and now mccarthy cannot keep their people in line. fascists all of them. never one thought about what is good for america, but what they can blow up. chip roy is one of them. he is the closest person I can think of as being a total nazi.
What is just so sad here is Kavin’ Kevie just doesn’t realize he is screwed no matter what he does. There is no win here for him. In fact, I am starting a countdown for just how much longer he will be speaker-I don’t expect it will be very long. He got into bed with people you cannot trust to wipe their asses cleanly-stupidity is something that comes back to bite you and crazy, like the freedumb caucus, comes back to bite you REAL effing hard. The House Democrats are going to watch the show until the republicans in real danger of losing their seats work out something with them regarding the budget (and I hope the dems hold those ‘pubes’ feet to the fire on the impeachment stupidity).
Let them have their “show impeachment”. It’s not like they are bothering to legislate.
I see three possible outcomes. The GOP-MAGAts get their face time on Faux “news” and they lack votes to make it happen.
They do send it to the Senate, where it goes about as far as Trump’s did. His braying will only impress his mouth-breathing followers anyway. Plus, it could actually help Biden.
Look how it turned out for Billy-Jeff Clinton.
And on the snowball’s chance he is voted off the island, we have to endure a few months of Kami Harris, who will be soundly primaried and we can get a good candidate on the Dem side (who actually knows what day of the week it is).
Michael’s post proves the point I made in another thread today: this whole thing is performative crap from the GOP but people are buying it as the real thing, because they’re calling it an “impeachment.”
It isn’t.
Nowhere close.
No House vote.
No formal inquiry.
No subpoena power.
It’s all smoke & mirrors.