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I knew all the characters--Rep. Sam Ervin, the Southerner who offered the nation more country wisdom than Pieter Brueghel or Ben Franklin; Sam Dash, a committee council; John Dean, who with his neatnik wife caught the country's attention with color-coordinated outfits; and a rather clumsy blue-collar guy named Alexander Butterfield, who brought down the Nixon White House with the simple testimony that all of this tomfoolery was--guess what?--on tape. End of story.
Geographically, I was in Arizona, but emotionally, I was in Washington because politically I was a confirmed leftie. Me and just a handful of others across the nation had voted for South Dakota's George McGovern a year earlier, my first national election, when even McGovern's home state wouldn't have him and voted instead for Nixon, who beat the tar out of my guy by carrying every state, save Massachusetts. Wipe out.
That election hadn't gone down easy, but neither had it dampened my anti-war sentiment. It had come as something of a surprise that a heart condition meant I wasn't eligible for the draft. But for some time already--through college and two years of high school teaching in Wisconsin--I was among those who flew an anti-war banner.
What's more, right then, in that very class, I'd become friends with a kid--a man--named Ron Ridenhouer, who, as a helicopter gunner in Vietnam, had heard about a place called MyLai, collected accounts of what went down there from buddies who knew first hand, and then sent that info out to a couple dozen congressmen. His work led to the imprisonment of William Calley and aired public laundry that documented flat-out mass murder. Some called Ridenhouer a rat, a switch, a stoolie, even a traitor. I liked the guy, but he was scared. There were lots of people who had different opinions.
Politically, I really disliked Tricky Dick, so in June of 1973 I was all in on Sam Ervin's Watergate hearings, listened as soon as we walked out of class. Soon, the President's defenses fell away and left him skinny and naked before the world, doing that stiff-shouldered victory thing, both arms above his head, as he left Washington on the helicopter.
When push came to shove, I didn't side with President Bill Clinton, hadn't voted for him, in fact. I thought his lying to the nation about his hot stuff with Monica Lewinsky, not to mention a bevy of other women he not-so clandestinely rolled in the hay, was wholly reprehensible.
But I disliked sanctimonious Ken Starr and the holy-roller Republicans more, so when Clinton wasn't forced to step down, as Nixon had been, I was relieved. But I never trusted the "big dog," as people used to call him. He was the kind of guy an old friend of mine used to say could shake your hand and pee on your foot all at the very same time.
I was all ears when the press got close to the blue dress and finally brought it out of the closet. I wanted the guy caught with his pants down, and he was. But I thought his dalliance--and flagrant lying about it--insufficient grounds to toss him out.
In three hours, they'll start up again--the third round of impeachment hearings in my lifetime. Not much drama this time, I'm afraid. Donald J. Trump is the lousiest excuse we've had for a President since Andrew Johnson, who, by the way, was also impeached but not run out of office. Trump is a crook and a dullard, a man who can barely write a sentence and knows nothing about history or government or law. He is, as Hillary and at least a dozen Republicans once claimed, totally unfit for office.
But approximately a third of the nation believes he walks on water. The economy is flying because he's pulled out a hundred safeguards and let purebred capitalism have its unfettered day. He's done political bribery of another nation in an attempt to secure his own political fortunes. No one can deny that.
But the outcome of what will soon begin is already established. Republican reps are scared to death of the 80 percent of their base who believe Trump's the Savior. What's more, they're scared of him because he wields that 80 percent like a machete through a week-old bag of bananas.
So there will be much talk, but the decision will finally be up to the people of this nation, come November 2020. All Congressman Schiff can do is raise some dust. There'll be no shootout at Washington's OK Corral this time, so no one will go down, not surely the guy with the orange hair.
We're going to have to do that job ourselves. If the Donald is going to go, the people will have to do it.
When push came to shove, I didn't side with President Bill Clinton, hadn't voted for him, in fact. I thought his lying to the nation about his hot stuff with Monica Lewinsky, not to mention a bevy of other women he not-so clandestinely rolled in the hay, was wholly reprehensible.
But I disliked sanctimonious Ken Starr and the holy-roller Republicans more, so when Clinton wasn't forced to step down, as Nixon had been, I was relieved. But I never trusted the "big dog," as people used to call him. He was the kind of guy an old friend of mine used to say could shake your hand and pee on your foot all at the very same time.
I was all ears when the press got close to the blue dress and finally brought it out of the closet. I wanted the guy caught with his pants down, and he was. But I thought his dalliance--and flagrant lying about it--insufficient grounds to toss him out.
In three hours, they'll start up again--the third round of impeachment hearings in my lifetime. Not much drama this time, I'm afraid. Donald J. Trump is the lousiest excuse we've had for a President since Andrew Johnson, who, by the way, was also impeached but not run out of office. Trump is a crook and a dullard, a man who can barely write a sentence and knows nothing about history or government or law. He is, as Hillary and at least a dozen Republicans once claimed, totally unfit for office.
But approximately a third of the nation believes he walks on water. The economy is flying because he's pulled out a hundred safeguards and let purebred capitalism have its unfettered day. He's done political bribery of another nation in an attempt to secure his own political fortunes. No one can deny that.
But the outcome of what will soon begin is already established. Republican reps are scared to death of the 80 percent of their base who believe Trump's the Savior. What's more, they're scared of him because he wields that 80 percent like a machete through a week-old bag of bananas.
So there will be much talk, but the decision will finally be up to the people of this nation, come November 2020. All Congressman Schiff can do is raise some dust. There'll be no shootout at Washington's OK Corral this time, so no one will go down, not surely the guy with the orange hair.
We're going to have to do that job ourselves. If the Donald is going to go, the people will have to do it.
1 comment:
Where is the crime?
The only crime I see is that the democrats all need a new pair of shoes. They are consistently shooting themselves in the foot.
I can not wait for the 2020 election.
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