Impeachment is inevitable

Impeachment may be inadvisable. It may apply a cheese grater to the nation’s partisan wounds. The process may be conducted foolishly. It may feed a Republican thirst for revenge against a future Democratic president. It may motivate Trump’s base to salivating enthusiasm. The broad, American middle may yawn and switch to ESPN.

All of this matters, especially if it increases the chances of Trump’s reelection. But it matters like a fate, not like a choice. In T.S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral,” a priest says of unfolding events, Let the wheel turn.” Archbishop Thomas Becket later comments: The fool, fixed in his folly, may think/ He can turn the wheel on which he turns.”

Because Trump has chosen to be transparently corrupt, congressional Republicans cannot dispute the facts of the case (as they did during special counsel Robert S. Mueller IIIs investigation). They may still insist: No quid pro quo . But this is more of a rally chant than an argument.

Michael Gerson

September 27, 2019


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