New Poll: Majority of Americans Endorse Impeachment Inquiry

In the previous post, it was noted that Lindsey Graham called Donald Trump a “nutjob” and a loser,” as well as a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot.” Moreover, he predicted that if the GOP nominated him, “we will get destroyed … and we will deserve it.”  That, of course, was before Graham and other Congressional Republicans sold their souls and became Trump apologists or worse. Now, a new poll suggests that the GOP's much deserved self-destruction may be closer at hand than boot licking Republicans want to admit.  Indeed, 58% of Americans support the House of Representatives impeachment inquiry and 49% believe Trump should be removed from office - and this is even before the hearings likely expose much more unsavory and improper actions by Trump.  Here are highlights from the Post about the poll findings which must have some in the GOP close to soiling their underwear:

A majority of Americans say they endorse the decision by House Democrats to begin an impeachment inquiry of President Trump, and nearly half of all adults also say the House should take the additional step and recommend that the president be removed from office, according to a Washington Post-Schar School poll.

The findings indicate that public opinion has shifted quickly against [Trump] the president and in favor of impeachment proceedings in recent weeks as information has been released about Trump’s efforts to pressure Ukrainian government officials to undertake an investigation into former vice president Joe Biden, a potential 2020 campaign rival, and Biden’s son Hunter.

The recent revelations appear to have prompted many Americans to rethink their position.

The poll finds that, by a margin of 58 percent to 38 percent, Americans say the House was correct to undertake the inquiry. Among all adults, 49 percent say the House should take the more significant step to impeach [Trump] the president and call for his removal from office. Another 6 percent say they back the start of the inquiry but do not favor removing Trump from office, with the remainder undecided about the president’s ultimate fate. The results among registered voters are almost identical.

The findings highlight the partisan divisions that surround the Trump presidency and any impeachment inquiry, but also the degree to which there are defections among Republicans.

More than 8 in 10 Democrats endorse the inquiry and nearly 8 in 10 favor a vote to recommend that Trump be removed from office. Among Republicans, roughly 7 in 10 do not support the inquiry but almost 3 in 10 do, and almost one-fifth of Republicans say they favor a vote recommending his removal. Among the critical voting bloc of independents, support for the impeachment inquiry hits 57 percent, with 49 percent saying the House should vote to remove Trump from office. . . . there has been movement toward an impeachment inquiry among all three groups, with support for the inquiry rising by 25 points among Democrats, 21 points among Republicans and 20 points among independents.

Two pieces of information triggered the impeachment inquiry and have sparked widespread public concern, according to latest survey . . . . The first was the rough transcript of a July 25 telephone call between Trump and newly elected Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, during which Trump asked for “a favor” that included requests for the Ukrainians to look into what happened during the 2016 election and to investigate Biden and his son, who sat on the board of a Ukrainian energy company.
Asked about the contents of the telephone call, a clear majority of Americans say Trump’s request to investigate Biden and his son was inappropriate (62 percent to 32 percent who felt it was not).

When it comes to Trump’s overall conduct as president, Americans offer a harsh verdict. Asked whether the president upholds adequate standards for ethics in government, 60 percent of Americans say he does not, while 35 percent say he does.
At this early stage in the impeachment inquiry, whose timing is fraught as the country barrels toward an election year, the public is siding more with congressional Democrats than Republicans when it comes to their responses so far.

Majorities of Americans say Democrats in Congress are making a necessary stand against Trump’s actions (61 percent) and are acting to uphold their constitutional duties (53 percent). Similarly, a majority (55 percent) say Democrats are not overreacting by starting the impeachment inquiry.

The survey finds cracks within the Republican coalition on the question of support for the impeachment inquiry, with younger and more moderate Republicans offering greater support. . . . 40 percent of Republican-leaning adults ages 18-39 endorse the start of the impeachment inquiry, compared with 23 percent of those ages 40-64 and 13 percent of those age 65 and older.

On the question of the appropriateness of Trump’s request to Zelensky to investigate Biden and his son, 45 percent of moderate-to-liberal Republicans and Republicans under age 40 say it was not appropriate.

65 percent of women favoring the impeachment inquiry, compared with 51 percent of men.

A majority (61 percent) of white college graduates favor the inquiry, while whites without college degrees, a mainstay of Trump’s support, are split: 47 percent in favor and 48 percent in opposition.

One can only hoe that support for impeachment - and removal of Trump from office - continues to grow.  He is a cancer that must be removed from the White House at any cost. 

What Next for the Democrats?

It is becoming increasingly clear that Attorney General William Barr basically lied about much of what is contained in the Mueller report and as more details emerge, Trump is clearly a lawless and dangerous force in the White House.   That said, rushing to impeach him - like the usually suspects, including Elizabeth Warren are already doing - could prove counterproductive and politically damaging.  Before any such effort is made  (if made at all), House Democrats need to carefully undertake further investigations and make the case for (i) Trump's unfitness for office, and (ii) why impeachment rather than merely voting Trump out of office in 2020 is the responsible move.  The goal would be to convince non-politically voters, including soccer moms more worried about PTA events and children sporting events that the destruction of America's democracy, why impeachment would not be a raw political exercise and put pressure on Republicans to belatedly stand to protect the constitutional order.  A column in The Atlantic makes the case for this reasoned and judicious approach.  Here are highlights:

What next? The substance of the Mueller report is only now beginning to penetrate through the fog of lies and distortions coming from the Attorney General William Barr, backed by his loyal lieutenant Rod Rosenstein. Even the redacted version makes visible the despicable behavior that emanated from the Trump campaign and the Trump White House, not to mention Trump himself, and the shocking penetration of Russia into our elections—with no visible response then or now from Republicans in power. But most Americans will not read or even get the gist of the Mueller report, or know much of what is in it, as they lead their own lives largely unfocused on politics and government.

So what should Democrats do? There is ample evidence of behavior on the part of the president that fits any reasonable definition of high crimes and misdemeanors—and most likely there will be a lot more, when the Southern District of New York and other jurisdictions of the Justice Department finish their work—at least if Barr does not stymie them. There is a constitutional responsibility for the House to follow up.

But a formal impeachment inquiry in the House Judiciary Committee would be politically perilous—and while politics cannot override duty, Democrats cannot risk the kind of 2020 backlash that would come if a large share of the voting public came to see the House as Javert-like, abandoning its focus on health care, jobs and the other issues that dominate most Americans’ lives in a monomaniacal quest to get Trump. A quick move to impeachment would be used by Trump and his acolytes, from the Senate to Fox and talk radio, to incite and outrage the GOP base.

That said, a failure to act, to do anything meaningful to bring this president and his gang of corrupt miscreants to heel, would rightfully enrage most liberal voters. Remember that the rage Republican primary voters felt at their party establishment in 2016, over broken promises to bring Obama to his knees, led to the nomination of Trump. A parallel rage among Democrats could lead to a deeply divided party and a disastrous presidential nomination.

There is, I believe, a reasonable path forward that, besides being politically palatable, has the added advantage of being the right thing to do. It starts with a coordinated and in-depth examination of the Mueller report by the House.

What we need is for the Judiciary, Intelligence, and Homeland Security Committees to conduct a series of deep dives into the areas of communication and coordination between Trump and his campaign with Russians and their surrogates, like Wikileaks; the multiple categories and areas of obstruction of justice that Mueller outlined; the threats to our intelligence operations and our justice system from Trump and his operatives; and the moves by Russia to interfere in and influence our elections used by Trump and unchecked by Republicans. Other committees, such as Ways and Means and Banking, need to be ready to do the same thing as more information emerges from the SDNY and the New York Attorney General, among others, about Trump’s financial dealings, including with the Russians, and about Russian money-laundering.

Democrats need to stage and coordinate hearings across committees and subcommittees, to make sure they do not overload Americans’ ability to pay attention. Most important, they need to structure the public hearings in a dramatically different way than usual. Each committee needs to use experienced counsel—a good examples might be former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara—and limit if not abandon opening statements, except from the chairs. No five-minute rounds of questions going down the line of every committee member, . . .

Give the counsel an hour to set the frame and ask in-depth questions. Either follow that with another round for the counsel or have a small group of committee members take 15 or 30 minutes to ask questions in a sustained way with coordinated themes. This system might cause hard feelings among members who will not get their five minutes in the sun—and would reduce the public role for chairs—but it is better-suited to accomplish the larger goal. And that larger goal is to build a compelling record, through vivid testimony, of what Trump and his people, including his children, did and did not do, said and did not say truthfully, that are the core of Mueller’s report.

That kind of forum should be supplemented by another. Committees should do a series of roundtables, discussions with leading experts with deep experience in the Justice Department, including the FBI, in the White House, in the intelligence world, and elsewhere, to discuss in depth whether the behaviors they have seen in the Trump administration are typical or unusual, acceptable or unacceptable.

All of this is, in my view, a necessary predicate to the formal impeachment inquiry that could then follow. If done well—even as the House brought up measures to shore up the Affordable Care Act, to protect children from family separation, to improve the lives of working families, to begin to address infrastructure needs and clean energy, along with oversight of failures in disaster relief, border activities, college loan policy, and corruption in many departments—then impeachment would look powerfully more like a logical and necessary step, less like a vindictive, partisan move.

Democrats should not jump the gun on impeachment. But it would be a serious dereliction of duty if they did not move now to set the stage for what should happen when the time and setting are right.

Trump's Hostage Attempt Is Going Miserably Wrong

Donald Trump, a/k/a Der Trumpenführer, latest effort to cause Democrats to surrender to his narcissistic will has been to offer temporary relief to so-called Dreamers while seeking funding for his permanent wall - a wall that Chinese history tells us would be futile (for Fox News viewers, I'm referring to the spectacular failure of the Great Wall of China to keep invaders out).  The self described great negotiator can't negotiate himself out of a wet paper bag and seemingly is hell bent to put his incompetence and petulance on worldwide view.  Meanwhile real families and a growing number of businesses are feeling very real economic pain as Trump continues his temper tantrum.  A column in The Atlantic by long time conservative and former Republican David Frum predicts that Trump will have no choice but to surrender in the near term.  Even his support among his racist base is slipping.  Here are column excerpts:

President Donald Trump is trapped. He shut the government to impose his will on the incoming Democratic majority in the House of Representatives. That plan has miserably failed. Instead, Trump has found himself caught in the trap he supposed he had set for his opponents.

Now he is desperately seeking an exit.

Trump attempted Exit One on January 8. He spoke that evening to the nation from the Oval Office, hoping to mobilize public opinion behind him, pressing the Democratic leadership of the House to yield to him. That hope was miserably disappointed. Surveys post-speech found that Trump had swayed only 2 percent of TV viewers. In the 10 days since the speech, Trump’s approval ratings have dipped to about the lowest point in his presidency. The supposedly solid Trump base has measurably softened.

Having failed to convince the public, Trump is now trying Exit Two. This idea is even more harebrained than the last, if that is even possible. Instead of appealing in prime time to the whole nation, Trump on Saturday afternoon advanced a detailed set of proposals intended to shift a critical mass of backbench Democrats to break with their leadership and deal directly with him. You don’t need to do much more than articulate the idea out loud to appreciate its utter unrealism.

The Democratic majority is newly elected and highly cohesive. Why on earth would any appreciable number of Democrats break away from their leadership to do business as individuals with a president none of them trusts about an issue none of them thinks should be negotiable: reopening the government? They will not do it, and it should have been obviously predictable from the start that they would not do it. Trump could not even get moderate Democrats to come have lunch with him at the White House this week.

Fox News, and talk radio, and MAGA Twitter will rant enjoyably about how mean it is for Democrats to reject Trump’s latest self-help scheme. That will be nice for the president to hear. But Fox News, and talk radio, and MAGA Twitter cannot protect him from the real-world consequences of the shutdown he forced. They cannot erase the video showing Trump proudly talking about how he would be the one to do it. They cannot sustain his poll numbers among the large majority of America that is non-Fox, non-MAGA.

The shutdown was a demand for unconditional surrender. Unfortunately for him, [Trump] the president lacks the political realism to recognize that he doesn’t have the clout to impose that surrender. He’s the one who will now have to climb down, and very soon, probably within days. The end of a hostage taking is not a surrender. But it will surely feel that way to the hostage taker—and deservedly, too.

House Aproves Stand Alone DADT Repeal 250 to 175; Poll 77% of Public Supports Repeal

Today the House of Representatives approved a stand alone repeal bill which would end DADT along the same lines previously passed by the House earlier this year as part of the Defense Authorization Act. The vote was 250 for repeal and 175 against with 9 not voting. The roll call on the vote can be found here. Now the measure goes to the Senate where Harry Reid says a vote will not be scheduled until next week. Not surprisingly, 165 of the no votes came from Republicans who don't give a damn about what 77% of Americans want. Nope, they're too busy sticking their noses up the hypocritical, lying asses of the Christianists. One Republican, Rep. Louie Gohmet (R-TX), apparently out to prove himself to be a total ignorant ass, regurgitated the tired lie that societies that accept homosexuality are doomed to fall, said the following on the House floor (via Think Progress):
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GOHMERT: To my friend who said that history would judge us poorly, I would submit if you would look thoroughly at history — and I’m not saying it’s cause and effect — but when militaries throughout history of the greatest nations in the world have adopted the policy that “fine for homosexuality to be overt” — you can keep it private and control your hormones fine, if you can’t, that’s fine too — they’re toward the end of their existence as a great nation.
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As we have commented before, serious historians label Mr. Gohmert's claims to be utterly untrue - or more total bullshit. The House vote reflects the will of the majority of Americans as demonstrated by a new Washington Post-ABC News Poll:
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Nearly eight in 10 Americans favor allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
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The results signal continued widespread public support for ending the military's 17-year ban on gays in the military and come as Congress prepares to vote again on legislation ending the military's "don't ask, don't tell" law.
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Overall, 77 percent of Americans say gays and lesbians who publicly disclose their sexual orientation should be able to serve in the military. That's little changed from polls over the two years, but represents the highest level of support in a Post-ABC poll. The support also cuts across partisan and ideological lines, with majorities of Democrats, Republicans, independents, liberals, conservatives and white evangelical Protestants in favor of homosexuals' serving openly.
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As for the next step for approval by the Senate, much depends on Harry Reid and when a vote is scheduled - members of the GOP are already whining about discrimination against Christians if Reid keeps the Senate in session into the Christmas weekend. Here are highlights from the Washington Post on the prospects in the Senate:
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Wednesday's vote sends the bill back to the Senate, where a vote will not occur until next week at the earliest, according to a spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.).
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Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) introduced the new bill last week, believing it will earn broader Republican support after the Senate completes consideration of the New START Treaty and government spending. Forty-seven senators, including Reid, are cosponsoring the bill.
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Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) said Wednesday she would join Republican colleagues Scott Brown (Mass.) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) in voting to end the ban if the Senate votes again on the bill.

Zero Major Gay Changes by Obama This Term

To say that Barack Obama has been a major disappointment from the prospective of LGBT Americans who believed his campaign lies - I mean promises - would be a case of understatement. Other than passage of the Hate Crimes legislation (which in reality does nothing for the vast, vast majority of LGBT citizens), Obama has accomplished nothing during the almost first two years f his administration. Worse yet, if all of his half-measures and lack of leadership result in major Democrat losses in Congress, the coming two years can be written off as well. We in the LGBT community will have been cynically and disingenuously suckered and played for fools. Fools who wanted to believe that Obama was honest and actually meant even a fraction of his statements on LGBT issues. Yes, Harry Reid has announced that the Senate will now take up the DADT repeal legislation in Congress, but even if passed, the legislation does not guarantee repeal or set any real time table. John Aravosis has a column at America Blog Gay that sums up the sorry situation quite well. Here are some highlights:
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With the imminent demise of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" compromise that did not, in any case, repeal DADT (even though the NYT and other lazy journalists like to claim it did), and the imminent demise of the Democratically-controlled House of Representatives, President Obama is about to have accomplished a record zero of his top promises to the gay community. A record that, if we lose the House, will likely remain at zero for the next six years, . .
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[A]fter all the pandering by all the pro-Obama apologists who said that we were wrong to ask the President to address our community's needs during his first two years in office, that we were wrong to warn of the imminent loss of a Democratically-controlled House, and how that loss would stymie gay rights progress for years to come, and that we were wrong to suggest that this President would never, ever get to addressing a real repeal of DADT and DOMA, and the passage of ENDA - after all that, it turns out we were right.
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Barack Obama is on the precipice of accomplishing a grand total of none of his major promises to gay and lesbian Americans in return for our supporting his candidacy with our votes and our money. I'm not smelling change.
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It clearly was Barack Obama's choice not to move ahead with any of his major promises to the gay community in the first two years of his administration. No one else is to blame other than the President for that simple decision. That decision may have killed any chance of ever passing ENDA, or repealing DADT and DOMA, for the entire four years that President Obama in office. It was Barack Obama's choice not to even touch DADT until this year, and then not to push for a full repeal, but rather some make-shift compromise that may, or may not, lead to some kind of change in the policy at some future date (though what kind of change, for the better or the worse, isn't a guarantee). We simply weren't important enough, and now it appears we are getting nothing.
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So what was the point of voting for President Obama, over Hillary, for example, if you're gay? If he wasn't going to keep his top promises to our community, then how was he any better than Hillary, or any other Democrat running at the time? Does anyone honestly think Hillary wouldn't have appointed more gays than any previous administration? Does anyone honestly think Hillary wouldn't have signed the Hate Crimes bill? President Obama has done nothing on gay civil rights that any other Democrat wouldn't have done in his stead. Such is not a definition of fierce advocate. It's the definition of business as usual.
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[A]s I've written before, I'm not a big fan of being betrayed by friends, even when I know my enemies would have treated me worse. I expect my enemies to treat me like a pariah. I don't expect my friends to do the same. And in many ways, it's worse when the indifference, and the lies, come from a friend rather than an enemy.
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If gay voters want to hand their money and their ballots over to someone who won't keep his major promises, who won't significantly advance the cause of their civil rights, who will outright work against those promises as we attempt to advance our civil rights in courts of law, but who at least won't be as big a bigot as John McCain, then they are certainly welcome to support him with all their hearts and wallets.
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I expect politicians to at least try to keep their major promises. I never said they have to succeed. But they have to at least TRY. Our fierce advocate seems fiercely indifferent. And I fear that an increasing number of Democratic voters now share his indifference.
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I believe that John is 100% on target and that many incumbent Democrats will be voted out of office on November 2, 2010 because of Obama's failed leadership. Again, we need a primary challenge to Obama in the lead up to 2012.

Gays Kicked to the Curb by House Dems: Federal Gay Hate Crime Bill Dies

Once again Congressional Democrats take gay votes and money for granted and will not go to the mat for us on the Matthew Shepard Act. The whining about a veto by the Chimperator is - in my opinion - utterly disingenuous. I don't give a damn if Bush were to veto it. The point is he needs to be put on the spot and forced to veto the legislation. This way he has won without officially doing anything. Chicken shit behavior begets chicken shit results. I have posted contact information below for both Rep. Hoyer - who I might add doesn't even provide an e-mail contact address so as to I assume avoid actually hearing from voters - Rep. Clyburn and Speaker Peolsi. I would urge all U. S. voters to contact them and register your extreme displeasure. Ironically, I just got a call from a Democrat Congressional fund raiser a short while ago and I told them "no, I will not give any money. I am waiting to see some actual results - THEN I will send money." The caller got an earful and was not pleased. Well, neither am I at the moment. Here are some story highlights from 365gay.com (http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/12/120607hate.htm):

Washington) The Matthew Shepard Hate Crime bill was removed Thursday from defense authorization legislation. The Shepard Act would have added sexuality to the list of categories covered under federal hate crime law. It passed the House in May and the White House threatened to veto it. (story)

In an effort to get around a veto the Senate version tied the measure to the 2008 defense authorization bill. It passed in September (story) and then went to conference where the two versions of the bill needed to be harmonized for a final vote. Since then the bill has been tied up. (story)

Thursday Senate conferees reluctantly agreed to strip the Shepard Act from the defense bill, realizing that they lack the votes to pass the measure. In a private meeting Wednesday night, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and House Democratic Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) told Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) that if the Senate continued to insist on the hate crimes provision the defense legislation would fail.

"I am deeply frustrated and disappointed with this Congress," said Gordon Smith (R-OR). "The unwillingness of a few to compromise is keeping Matthew’s bill from becoming law. The fight doesn’t stop now. I will pursue every possible option to turn this legislation in law." Gay Democrats had a strong message for their party.

"The Democratic Leadership, which guided this legislation to successful passage in their respective chambers, are now burdened with a moral obligation to see their work completed," said Jon Hoadley, the Executive Director of National Stonewall Democrats. "If the National Defense Authorization Act is not the appropriate vehicle for passage, then we encourage the Democratic Leadership to work with our community to find the most expedient way to place this legislation on the President's desk within this Congress."

Here is the contact information. I urge you to voice your concerns and displeasure (I already have):

Rep. Steny Hoyer House Majority Leader, H-107 Capitol Building, Washington, D.C. 20515 • 202.225.3130

James E. Clyburn (SC-06) United States House of Representatives H-329, The Capitol Washington, DC 20515 (202) 226-3210

http://majoritywhip.house.gov/contact/

Nancy Pelosi, Office of the SpeakerH-232, US Capitol, Washington, DC 20515 (202) 225-0100

http://speaker.house.gov/contact/