# New York Times article: Impeachment risks becoming a new norm in the future **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 19, 2019, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097 "2019-12-19T17:51:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Enter\_the\_Flagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Enter\_the\_Flagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enter_the_Flagon)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2019, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/41 "2019-12-22T21:46:39Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Now with Trump you cant tell me other presidents havent tried to use another country for political influence but that wasnt such a big deal. Presidents were expected to make personal deals. So you’ve absolutely, positively, made up your mind based on total supposition? My experience with people who color outside the lines is that they’re convinced that everyone else does, too; like they can’t even conceive of a person who’d hold themselves to a higher moral standard. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2019, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/42 "2019-12-22T22:09:44Z")
“it’s clear that the police have come to the correct conclusion.” Edit to previous post for clarity. Bad wording. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2019, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/43 "2019-12-22T22:10:18Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > This is what my thought was during Clinton and the Lewinsky scandal. > > Back in the day, when Kennedy or another president fooled around on their wives the press would ignore it and the other party didnt push it. Well that all changed. > > Now with Trump you cant tell me other presidents havent tried to use another country for political influence but that wasnt such a big deal. Presidents were expected to make personal deals. > > But now the threshold is low and whoever takes over from day one you will hear “Impeachment”. What previous president asked a foreign country to investigate a political rival, using congressional approved aid as leverage? ---
**Author:** ![str8cashhomie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7cd45c/32.png) [@str8cashhomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/str8cashhomie)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2019, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/44 "2019-12-23T02:00:06Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > What previous president asked a foreign country to investigate a political rival, using congressional approved aid as leverage? The only really comparable case is Reagan who allegedly used backchannels to get Iran to hold on to their hostages while Carter was president and Reagan was running against him, but the case isn’t nearly as open and shut. The case for Iran-Contra is open and shut but that’s another matter and isn’t as obviously corrupt. If it has been the norm for presidents since, they’ve done a great job hiding it. ---
**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2019, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/45 "2019-12-23T18:02:13Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > For heaven’s sake - liberals were trying to impeach [before Trump even took office](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/01/20/the-campaign-to-impeach-president-trump-has-begun/). Grass roots liberal groups, not a Democratic congress. And yet, as the linked article says, “In 2016, some top congressional Republicans discussed impeaching Hillary Clinton before the election was even held.” > [@Urbanredneck](#): > > This is what my thought was during Clinton and the Lewinsky scandal. > > Back in the day, when Kennedy or another president fooled around on their wives the press would ignore it and the other party didnt push it. Well that all changed. > > Now with Trump you cant tell me other presidents havent tried to use another country for political influence but that wasnt such a big deal. Presidents were expected to make personal deals. > > But now the threshold is low and whoever takes over from day one you will hear “Impeachment”. Things didn’t just change, Clinton crossed a line. He didn’t just fool around on his wife, he exploited a government employee–\*his \*government employee–who was an intern. And the impeachment was not about a sex scandal, it was about perjury and obstruction of justice. In the same way, Trump has crossed a line, because he has just no idea where the lines are. I would be interested to hear your examples of presidents who threatened to withhold U.S. aid from a foreign leader unless he made public statements that disparaged an election opponent. ---
**Author:** ![BwanaBob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bwanabob/32/2985_2.png) [@BwanaBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BwanaBob)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2019, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/46 "2019-12-23T20:06:51Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![RioRico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f04885/32.png) [@RioRico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RioRico)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2019, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/47 "2019-12-24T02:38:20Z")
Had Hillary won a greater supermajority and eked-out a delegate win, the inauguration would have been Friday 20 January 2017 and the articles of impeachment would have been filed no later than the end of that month. Excuse? Emails or something. Whatever. > [@str8cashhomie](#): > > Yeah, it’s a little strange that the developing narrative seems to be “what precedent does it set if impeaching the president for a crime works in the dems favor” as opposed to “what precedent does it set if the president commits a crime and faces no consequences.” Whereas the consideration should be, “so GOPs are OK with the next Dem prez pulling exactly the same shit as Tramo?” This assumes there will ever be another Dem prez, that suppression and disenfranchisement will be overturned. Maybe GOPs feel immune, that they’ll hold power forever - or at least until they’re dead. They know they can’t win free and fair elections. [Justin Clark, a senior political adviser and senior counsel to Trump’s reelection campaign… can be heard on tape at the event saying, “Traditionally it’s always been Republicans suppressing votes in places."](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/trump-adviser-voter-suppression-in-2020-930453/) Impeachment can’t become a new norm in a one-party nation. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2019, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/48 "2019-12-24T02:57:59Z")
> [@CookingWithGas](#): > > Things didn’t just change, Clinton crossed a line. He didn’t just fool around on his wife, he exploited a government employee–\*his \*government employee–who was an intern. And the impeachment was not about a sex scandal, it was about perjury and obstruction of justice. That isn’t how Republicans spun it. The entire investigation that led to the perjury was supposed to be about how he had committed adultery. And the perjury was him lying about having committed adultery. It’s entirely understandable that a conservative like the one you are replying to bought that. I did, too. I wrestled with whether or not I could be okay with such an immoral man being in charge of our country. Because, you know, I actually believed the Christian values I was taught, that adultery was this great wrong and that our leaders should be held to a higher moral standard, like the Bible does for priests and deacons. I actually would have found the real argument, including the possibility of rape of one intern, more persuasive. Make it about him pressuring women into sex, and even liberals would have been more likely to see a problem. But they made it politically a referendum on his having an affair. And, this time, the Republicans are trying to do that again, making it politically about whether you like Trump or the Republican party, rather than about his attempt to fabricate proof of lies about his political opponent and abusing the office of the presidency to do so. Or trying to override congress by making their legally passed support contingent on favors for him personally. Before they were misleading because they thought it would help get Clinton impeached and removed. Now they are being misleading because they think it will help prevent Trump from being removed–or at least give them a fig leaf when they refuse to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2019, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/49 "2019-12-24T12:38:30Z")
> [@CookingWithGas](#): > > Things didn’t just change, Clinton crossed a line. He didn’t just fool around on his wife, he exploited a government employee–\*his \*government employee–who was an intern. And the impeachment was not about a sex scandal, it was about perjury and obstruction of justice. I think this was also in retaliation for the democrats going after republican Senator Packwood for sexually harassing his female assistants. It still amazes me that all the feminists who were against Packwood looked the other way with Clinton. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2019, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/50 "2019-12-24T12:54:38Z")
Urbanredneck: > [@](#): > > I think this was also in retaliation for the democrats going after republican Senator Packwood for sexually harassing his female assistants. More likely it was meant as retaliation for Clarence Thomas. And not so much retaliation, as means of exposing the Democrats’ hypocrisy on the subject. And it worked like a charm. It’s very much the reason why Hillary Clinton’s Trump-Billy Bush bombshell got zero traction with the voters she needed. > [@](#): > > It still amazes me that all the feminists who were against Packwood looked the other way with Clinton. There’s a reason politicians have, as a class, the reputation that they have. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2019, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097/51 "2019-12-26T19:54:44Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Heck, if we’re talking doomsday scenarios, chew on this: There is a potentially troubling element in Section 4 of the 25th Amendment, troubling in the sense that it’s a necessary provision but I can see the potential for abuse: > > “Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments _ **or of such other body as Congress may by law provide** _, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office…” > > Emphasis added. I can see a hostile congress (that is to say, a congress of a different party than the president) deciding to establish a Presidential Fitness Evaluation Board (PFEB), run by staff of its choosing with the purpose of constantly analyzing presidential actions to see if they indicate a lack of fitness. I expect any president would veto this, but let’s assume the congress can override. Then the PFEB can constantly subpoena presidential staff (possibly the president himself) and ask over and over if a particular decision taken by the president might indicate unfitness. The PFEB will have whatever powers congress gives it by law. Picture another endless round of Benghazi-style investigations, ramped up several orders of magnitude, with the constant threat that the PFEB can transfer power to the vice-president, not because they particularly\* like\* the vice-president, but because they like the idea of declaring the president unfit for office and forcing him to repeatedly deny it. It could very easily become abusive and I think at some point the Supreme Court would have to step in. > > Frankly, I’m a little surprised the Republican-controlled congress didn’t give this a shot during the Obama years. If things continue as they are, I kind of expect a future Republican congress to try this on a future Democratic president. I just hope me writing this doesn’t give them any ideas that hadn’t previously occurred to them. I’d hate to be partly responsible for destroying America. You hit the nail on the head with the mention of Benghazi type hearings. Utterly pointless, unlike the current situation that involves a serious crime. And sorry, I cannot take seriously lying about consensual sex between two consenting adults. Anyway, congress can establish whatever kangaroo courts it wishes; they gotta get the VP hand-picked by the president to go along with it; lead it in fact. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-york-times-article-impeachment-risks-becoming-a-new-norm-in-the-future/845097.md?page=2)