Enough! Congress must act!

On By R Michael FinleyLeave a comment

President Trump is self-destructing before our eyes.  His inconsistent comments on the racist violence in Charlottesville, Virginia,  reflect a troubled mind.  His disregard for core American values as understood today – and not as in 1860  –  challenge our democracy and all that we have struggled to achieve these past 241 years.

My voice has been silent for many months not because I was not outraged by events but because so many others have been expressing it more eloquently than I could.  Our nation’s professional journalists, commentators and pundits have done a truly outstanding job in exposing the danger to the republic from Donald Trump and in reporting the monumental ignorance and mendacity he has displayed.  I am in awe of our press: the journalists who seek only facts, the analysts who try to make sense of it all, and the pundits, both conservative and liberal, who time and time again strike to the heart of the matter.

The events of  August 2017 are only the most recent evidence of our President’s inability to carry-out the solemn duties he was elected to perform and he swore to faithfully discharge.  President Donald  Trump, I believe, already deserves impeachment.  He also appears mentally incapacitated suggesting he possibly should be removed through the procedures prescribed by the 25th Amendment to the Constitution.  Neither of impeachment or removal is likely to occur soon enough.  His actions thus far have injured our country, earned the distrust of our allies, emboldened our enemies, sewed discord and hatred among our people, sought to demean the rule of law, and deliberately undercut our intelligence and diplomatic agencies.  His erratic behavior has damaged the agenda his supporters elected him to achieve, almost as if he had systematically set out to sabotage himself.

For those of us who opposed his election, a substantial majority of the electorate, we might easily take satisfaction in the horrible mess he has created all by himself.  That,  we cannot do.  Our nation is too precious; the stakes are far too high.  Yes, Trump’s fall would bring us President Pence and the likely passage of a very conservative Republican agenda; so be it.   We Democrats did not earn the confidence of the country in 2016, the Republicans did.  Democrats must work to win the next election and others to follow.

So what can we, Republicans and Democrats, do now to bring this nightmare to an end?  Some propose the Congress, especially the Republican leadership, just ignore the President and get busy.  That has some merit but it is not enough; too much other than legislation is at stake.  Do we really want to leave that man in charge of our national security, our armed forces and our foreign policy?

Certainly the Special Prosecutor and Congressional committees should continue their work, perhaps laying the groundwork for impeachment  Each member of the President’s cabinet will need to search his or her  soul and conscience to reach a judgement about this man’s fitness for holding the world’s most important office.  The means our Constitution provides for removing a president were designed to be cumbersome and complicated.  The situation we face is unique and unprecedented.  Donald Trump is himself a national emergency.  We should try something new, something unprecedented.  The Congress needs to tell the President he should go.  The House and Senate should pass a Concurrent Resolution calling on the President to resign, citing only the reason that he has lost the confidence of the Congress and of the American people.  A mere resolution of censure for his racist remarks would be totally inadequate, failing to address the key issue of the President’s complete unfitness for office and the urgent necessity for him to vacate his office.  A Concurrent Resolution is a form of Congressional action not requiring a Presidential signature; it is not subject to veto.

A resolution  declaring no confidence in the President and calling on him to resign should be initiated only by Republicans.  This should not be seen as a partisan issue but as an American issue aimed at preserving the security and prosperity of our country.  All Democrats should support such a measure despite the likely consequence that Republicans likely would achieve many of their policy objectives.  Such a measure would have no legal force but it is impossible to imagine President Trump not succumbing to such an unprecedented action.   His failure to respect the wishes of Congress could only quicken efforts to remove him forcefully through Constitutional means and increase the likelihood of his severe punishment for crimes that might be uncovered by the current investigations.

For the good of the nation Trump must go, the sooner the better.

Make America Great Again

On By R Michael Finley2 Comments

Ever since Donald Trump announced his campaign slogan “Make America Great Again” something about it has troubled me. But what?  The slogan implied that somehow the United States was no longer great.  He apparently was thinking of some past time- some much better time- but what period did he mean?  Could it have been the time of our founding?  After all, we defeated the world’s foremost power to win our independence.  Then some of the wisest men who ever lived, perhaps even smarter than Trump himself, and anticipating the “Art of the Deal”,  fashioned our Constitution through a series of compromises.  No, not that period because that deal, great as it was, had a fatal flaw: slavery.

Perhaps Trump was thinking of all those western movies, some starring Ronald Reagan, which glorified our centuries long westward expansion: the Gold Rush, the transcontinental railroad, and the taming of a continent.  No, that period included the purposeful extinction of the American Indian.

Trump was born in 1946, the first year after World War II, when America was a super power beyond belief.  For the next decade we enjoyed unparalleled prosperity while much of the rest of the world lay in ruins.  Life was good.  Life was great!  Whatever problems we had would be taken care of by our national Grandpa, Ike.  He had the warmest smile and was the embodiment of strength, wisdom and graciousness.  He was the greatest general ever and would make sure the communists left us alone.  In my hometown our door was never locked, all was safe.  For me and perhaps for Trump that seemed like the ideal time.  At least for me it coincided with that wonderful period of childhood when I enjoyed the love of warm and doting parents who were, of course, the best people who ever lived: life was far better than great, it was perfect.  Perhaps this is the magical period of greatness to which Trump harkens back.

But underlying that time, so idyllic in memory, was so much unrest, unrest that has defined the civic life of our country for these past sixty years.  The civil rights movement and the fight for equal rights for women are proud parts of our ongoing efforts over the last 240 years to make and keep America great.  Our history has always been about struggles by individuals and groups to do better than the last generation. We have never been rooted in the idea that there is one final ideal time.  Our attention, from the Founding Fathers to now,  has always been on shaping a better tomorrow.  The existence of today’s issues from climate change and income distribution to police treatment of minorities and how to regulate migration are not symptoms of something drastically wrong with our country.  These and other issues are part and parcel of how Americans shape a more perfect union.

Trump’s suggestion that somehow we need to get back something we lost, to return to a past period that was better, is a total misreading of what America means and is.  America is an idea; it is change; it is a striving for an always better, more inclusive, society.  America is about the future, not the past as incredible as our many achievements have been.