Remember the important qualifier for officials to be subject to impeachment? High crimes and misdemeanors? According to Vanity Fair contributor, T.A. Frank, perhaps we should add "offensive" to the reasons for impeachment.
Frank is honest in admitting in his July 6 article that, so far, the Trump-Russia collusion theory has turned into a big nothingburger. He also suggests that there might not ever be any impeachable high crimes and misdemeanors as a basis to remove President Donald Trump from office. So what to do? What to do? Simple. Impeach Trump for being merely "offensive." Frank make his case in IS DONALD TRUMP TOO OFFENSIVE TO BE PRESIDENT?
The subtitle asks the question: If we impeach Donald Trump, the real cause will be his breaches of decorum. Is that grounds enough?
Frank proceeds to answer that question in the affirmative:
...I doubt any president has had more people saying, only months in, “This guy’s gotta go.” I admit I’m often one of those people myself, even though I consider Trump’s proven misdeeds to be technically minor so far.
What we’re learning, it seems, is how much propriety, even in purely ritualistic form, matters in a president. What some of us (like this writer) are struggling with is the question of whether an absence of sobriety can ever justify something so drastic as premature removal from office.
If his mere style is offensive to liberals, then he must go:
As absurd as it may be only months into a presidency, impeachment is already getting lots of attention, and it’s as much because of unhinged tweeting as it is because of policy.
And since there is no policy that falls into the realm of high crimes and misdemeanors, let's just go straight to the nonexistent "offensiveness" reason for impeachment:
Officially, of course, collusion with Moscow or obstruction of justice is the reason we’re supposed to want to go after Donald Trump. But allegations of outright criminality are far ahead of what the evidence permits so far.
Translation: There is so far no evidence of criminality. Okay, so let's just skip the annoying constitutional technicalities and go straight to perceived offensiveness as a reason to remove Trump from office:
If Trump is impeached, we’ll tell ourselves it’s for breaches of the law. But the truth is it’s going to be for breaches of decorum. And it’s getting harder and harder to dismiss the thought that that may be cause enough.
Thank you for being honest, Mr. Frank. Imaginary breaches of the law would only be a lame excuse to initiate impeachment proceedings against President Trump. The real reason will be not any high crimes or misdemeanors. It will be because liberals find Trump offensive and his very presence in the White House is intolerable to them.
