Impeachment. An ugly term, certainly, but one so frivolously cast that it’s meaning and impact are widely misunderstood. To impeach means to indict. “Well, like, ‘Duhh’ man. What am I supposed to think, now?”
In simple terms, an indictment is just a charge levied against an individual, that is agreed to by a selected panel of citizens sworn to listen without bias to evidence supporting the charge, and to vote their consciences according to the applicable laws pertaining to the crime that the charge alleges. How’s that? Still a little unclear? Perhaps an example will help.
A small business owner is awakened at night by a call from police informing him that there was a “break-in” at his building. He throws on some clothes and rushes to his business to observe that, in fact, (real, or “solid” evidence) a windows was jimmied somehow, and other damage done to the window frame and to objects and materials inside the building. There are no clear fingerprints or blood drops or other identifying foreign matter that could immediately identify who did the observed damage. A search is performed to see if something were stolen, and a police report filled out.
Eventually a person is arrested during a similar break-in, and the state, through the District Attorney’s office, brings him before a Grand Jury composed of that select panel of sworn citizens, and the charges are presented, including such evidence as has been gathered. That evidence may be circumstantial or it may be direct evidence such as eye-witness accounts of the commission of the crime, or of the sale of items stolen from break-in victims, or even testimony from people who heard the accused talking about committing the crimes. That panel, the Grand Jury, “hands up” an indictment to the District Attorney, who will become the prosecutor in the trial of the accused, and he or she files the case with the appropriate court. The accused will be represented by his defense attorney, whom he has hired or whom the court (the state) has provided to him at taxpayer expense. This is called “Due Process” in the United States.
Following a “just” trial according to the rules of jurisprudence, the accused, if convicted, may still appeal his conviction on various technicalities, including poor legal representation.
What has any of this to do with the impeachment show we are anticipating, now?
“Impeach” was a cry hurled toward Trump and toward anyone who would broadcast it, even before the brash, vulgar, non-Washington-molded President-elect was inaugurated. “For what?” would be the response from his supporters. “For “collusion” with Russians!”
That the charges hurled against Trump were mirror images of the actions of the Clinton Campaign, the Clinton-dominated Democratic National Committee, AND of the nefarious elements of the F.B.I. and C.I.A. and of the Obama administration, itself, in no way mitigated the inflammatory calls for impeachment that were hurled by politicians and elected office-holders throughout, so far, his first term as President. Barely had the dust settled from the utter collapse of the collusion with Russians construct, but new, nebulous charges have been leveled that are purported to justify… wait for it, impeachment!
The new charges stem from a phone call President Trump made to the new President of Ukraine in July of 2019. Ostensibly, and it is strictly subjective, Trump threatened to withhold already approved military assistance unless President Zelenskey investigated apparent influence peddling by Joe Biden while Vice-President in the Obama administration. So far, at least, there is no proof that a so-called, “quid pro quo” was actually required, but that is the crux of the impeachment cries. Mr. Trump deserves some recognition for not folding before the onslaught.
But, it may be instructive to consider the alleged “crime” of demanding something from the government of Ukraine in some sort of exchange for American largesse.
Ukraine has long been considered corrupt, inasmuch that numerous officials enrich themselves at the expense of the citizenry, including bribery to get anything actually done, including, amazingly, defending the integrity of the nation against Russian incursion and encouragement of civil war on behalf of the supposedly ethnic Russian minority. The U. S. stood still while Russia separated Crimea from Ukraine, and virtually still as irregular Russian insurgents created a nearly autonomous region around Donetsk. President Trump has finally begun to send armaments to Kiev for defensive purposes against the restive Russians.
Ukraine has last been independent for fewer than 30 years. Upon the breakup of the Soviet Union, the new Republic of Ukraine inherited a bureaucracy of corrupt officials and apparatchiks whose prior graft was tiny compared to the opportunities under a more open-market, open-for-business environment. But Ukraine is also an example of the most unholy alliances our own government has made with international socialist organizations who, for 30 years have been undermining governments to install socialists. George Soros is at the center of those efforts and our own tax monies have been funneled to his groups in multiple countries (Egypt, Macedonia, Ukraine, Chile, Somalia, Libya, and… wait for it, the United States!)
Bit by bit, President Trump and the relative handful of honest patriots who serve with him, have exposed the wholly un-American efforts of those who agree with international socialism and who actively support it with every form of subterfuge and disingenuousness true Americans can only imagine. Mr. Obama was the most blatant socialist, ne’ communist, we have ever elected… and Mr. Trump is the antidote to his two terms of American decline. Joe Biden thoroughly agrees with Obama’s work and his missions to Ukraine as Vice President, where Soros and U. S. efforts had taught young socialists how to topple a government in 2014, are perfectly legitimate areas of inquiry for an America-first president to follow.
The shady-looking insertion of Hunter Biden, a sketchy individual in his own right, into a corrupt gas company spawned by a corrupt Ukrainian oligarchy, in a country into which the U. S. was poised to pour several hundred millions of taxpayer monies, made the need to obtain some sort of clarity that the money wasn’t an example of good money after bad, a virtual duty. The parallel issues of “Crowdstrike” actions to interfere with the 2016 elections simply accentuated the need to encourage the eradication of corruption before more money were turned over. If Trump had NOT asked for a “quid pro quo” he should be judged a fool.
Now there is a form of “grand jury” attempting to , quite unfairly it appears, assess “evidence” against the accused President. There isn’t much to the process so far that adheres to what we enjoy as “due process” in the matters of indictment and prosecution. To date there has not been described a crime for the “grand jury” to evaluate the nature of any evidence for, yet they struggle onward, certain that the unpleasant America-firster, Donald Trump, is guilty of something – if not everything.
Eventually, and probably just as interest in the “historic” impeachment inquiry begins to fall off, the House of Representatives, that august and impartial grand jury, will vote to “impeach,” as in, they will “hand up” an indictment. But the hand-up goes not to a prosecutor but to the Senate. There a “trial” will be held, presided over by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Roberts. The once and future “grand jury” will take the responsibility of “prosecutor,” having filled the role of persecutor for three years to no avail. They will employ various attorneys to make the House’s case in the Senate. Should be a great show.