WASHINGTON _ With the impeachment trial of a sitting president opened to wide public exposure via television, this critical and historic national event has been turned into an orchestrated and partisan reality show.
For a start, the prosecuting House Democrats and Trump-defending Senate Republicans dutifully played their roles by alternately presenting and rebuffing the serial allegations of presidential misconduct by the defendant. Fair enough, with only a modicum of overdramatization.
Then, by way of an awkward and time-consuming procedure, individual senators of both parties were temporarily enlisted to present written questions to each side, posed by presiding Chief Justice John Roberts. Like some minor back-bench clerk, Roberts was obliged to read the questions aloud, often identifying the questioners, thus alerting the voters back home that their representatives were actively on the case.
The inquiries, warranted in the severity of the circumstances, sometimes were merely self-serving or echoed arguing points pro or con. They dragged on the inquiry to a repetitive drone, taxing the interest and indulgence of the vast television audience.
On the prosecution side, the lead impeachment manager, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, delivered an exhaustive but comprehensive chronicle of the two articles of impeachment against Donald Trump, for abuse of presidential power and obstruction of Congress.
The first dealt with the particulars of using $391 million in U.S. military aid to Ukraine for its defense against Russian territorial demands. The funds were temporarily withheld in what critics characterized as a bribe, specifically listed in the Constitution as grounds for impeachment.
The second concerned Trump's personal solicitation of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to make a public announcement of an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden, a prospective rival in the 2020 presidential election, and his son Hunter, who had been a highly paid board member of a giant Ukrainian energy firm despite a lack of experience in that field.
On the Trump defenders' side, administration lawyers were much less impressive, essentially arguing that the accusations did not rise to the level of impeachable offenses, while refuting or simply ignoring the factual substance of the allegations.
To bolster the defense, the president accepted the services of two high-profile lawyers celebrated for previous television appearances. The first, Kenneth Starr, was a featured prosecutor in the 1998-1999 impeachment of President Bill Clinton on allegations of sexual misconduct in the Oval Office. Clinton was subsequently acquitted by fellow Democrats in the Senate, then in the majority. The second was Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard Law professor who offered his wisdom on presidential impeachment during the Watergate scandal, dodged by President Richard Nixon when he chose resignation instead.
Each lectured the senators on the impeachment process as if they were schoolboys rather than members of what has called itself the world's most prestigious deliberative body.
As of Friday afternoon, all signs pointed to a similar partisan forgiveness as in the Clinton impeachment, or at least an unwillingness to convict a fellow Republican.
There was no serious attempt to challenge any aspect of the case against the president. Instead, his defenders merely rallied around him, peddling the notion that Trump, with his loyal political base, should not be denied the opportunity to seek reelection in November
Article I, Section 3 of the Constitution specifies that "Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Truth or Profit under the United States."
In other words, if Trump escapes impeachment, he is specifically sanctioned by the Constitution upon acquittal to put his case before the public for confirmation in the next presidential election.
He would be first president to run for reelection after having escaped removal from office in his first term. Clinton was reelected before facing impeachment. The only other American president impeached, Andrew Johnson in 1868, was spared removal by a single Senate vote but was denied a second nomination.
Thus, Donald Trump would be gambling that his impeachment, which will remain forever in the history books, will be disregarded by his faithful flock at the polls nine months from now.
