Some thoughts on impeachment

As the possibility of impeachment becomes more concrete, I'm sensing a certain amount of negativity toward the idea on the left.  Some seem to worry that (a) it can't really happen because the Republicans who control Congress will never go along with it, and (b) even if it did happen, it might actually be a bad thing because the Republican regime would become more effective with a less incompetent and divisive leader (Pence) in place, while the resistance would grow weaker without the baroquely obnoxious figure of Trump to energize it.  Both of these concerns are misguided.

First, as to the idea that impeachment will never happen because Congressional Republicans will not allow it -- as noted in the last link round-up, the number of Republicans needed to bring it about is surprisingly small.  The votes of the large Democratic minorities in Congress count too, and we only need enough Republicans added to that to get to a simple majority in the House and a two-thirds majority in the Senate.  Further, several have already shown enough defiance toward Trump that they could well be brought along in an impeachment vote too, especially as Trump continues to do outrageous and ridiculous things.

There's abundant anecdotal evidence that most Republicans in Congress are exasperated with Trump and would far prefer Pence as President.  No experienced Republican politician could relish the thought of such a man and his antics being the public face of the party for another three and a half years.  Many must be concerned at the risk of disaster if Trump's hand remains on the nuclear trigger for that period.  Finally, some are genuinely outraged at the spectacle of Russian meddling in the election (Republicans tend to be nationalists), equivocation about neo-Nazis, and the Arpaio pardon (which has driven another nail into the coffin of Republican hopes of winning over Latino voters).  Some dismiss all Republicans as uniformly evil, but if the party were homogenous, it wouldn't constantly be paralyzed by internal divisions as we've seen.  There's a vast gulf between the ideology-blinded fervor of the (grotesquely misnamed) "freedom caucus" and the genuine moderation of, for example, Collins and Murkowski, who voted down ACA repeal partly to protect Planned Parenthood.

Second, as to the fear that Trump's removal would make the Republican regime more effective and weaken the resistance, remember that Pence, too, is a polarizing figure.  As the embodiment of the God-hates-fags Christian Right, he would never have had any chance of winning a Presidential election on his own.  Before being picked by Trump for VP, he was best known for Indiana's anti-gay "religious freedom" law -- but he's also widely despised among his fellow religio-wingnuts as a weakling for later caving to pressure from big business to abandon the law.  His obsessions are more theocratic and anti-gay than Russophilic and anti-immigrant, but would likely prove just as divisive among Congressional Republicans.

As for the resistance, the issue that has actually been most effective at energizing it -- ACA repeal -- has little to do with Trump.  The tsunami of public opposition and pressure that helped force Congressional Republicans to back down on repeal would have happened regardless of who the Republican President was.  The same applies to future threats to Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, etc.  The danger to the public, and thus the level of public pressure to defend those programs, will be the same regardless of whether it's Trump or Pence standing ready to sign the devastation into law.

Will Pence be a less effective tool than Trump to rally Democratic voter turnout in 2018 and 2020?  Probably so, but the difference will be less than many fear.  A theocrat who, just as much as Trump, owes his position to Russian election interference will be deeply unpopular in his own right.  For whatever reason, Pence has so far defended Trump even while other prominent Republicans have grown more critical -- the stench of Trump's rhetoric and actions will stick to him better than to most other Republicans.  He'll be unpopular enough to lose to a Democrat in 2020, even if by a smaller margin than Trump would have.  As for Congressional elections, again, most of what the Republicans there have done to make themselves toxic to the voters has little to do with Trump.

Observe, too, that the Republicans seem to be swinging back into O'Donnell/Akin mode, using primary challenges to dump electable relative moderates in favor of complete loonies.  It's looking very possible that Moore will beat Strange in the Alabama primary and that Ward will beat Flake in the Arizona one.  Alabama is so red that Moore might win the general anyway, but if this kind of thing happens in more purplish states, it could create real opportunities for us, Trump or no Trump.

More importantly, a Trump impeachment will leave the Republican rank-and-file bitterly divided.  As Trump's poll ratings sink, hard-core Trumpanzees remain a minority, but a large one, within the Republican base.  And Trump will not simply vanish after impeachment.  He'll keep right on tweeting and holding rallies, whipping up his people with a full-bore Dolchstoßlegende featuring Republicans who turned on him as arch-traitors.  The party will go into 2018 and perhaps even 2020 with a big chunk of its base enraged against its establishment.  (In fact, I think the fear of this scenario is the main reason why the Republicans haven't impeached Trump already.)

But the most important reason why we must support impeachment has to do with the President's personal control over nuclear weapons.  Pence, at least, is basically a "normal" Republican no more likely to use an H-bomb in a fit of anger, or start a war out of stupidity, than any other President, while Trump's belligerent and erratic nature make him unacceptably dangerous in that position.  This issue is more important than anything that happens or doesn't happen within the US.  The risk Trump presents to the lives of millions of people in Seoul or Tehran outweighs our domestic political concerns.