Earlier this week, Ross Douthat, in claiming to be nonpartisan, but actually being quite partisan and perhaps firing a shot across the bow at Al Franken, said that, in hindsight, impeaching Bill Clinton was justifiable.
Well, for sexual peccadillos or for other reasons, I can find a bunch of presidents of both major parties who should have been impeached.
In any case, as Bob Somersby takes Douthat down a notch, nobody accused Clinton of sexually harassing or assaulting either Gennifer Flowers or Monica Lewinsky. On the other hand, while it was pre-presidential, Bob sullies his own narrative by not mentioning Juanita Broaddrick.
And, to frost old Ross and hoist him on his own petard, the first such president would have been a Republican in today's political economy — John Adams.
Portions of the Alien and Sedition Acts clearly violated the First Amendment. Adams had pushed for them and signed them into law. Impeach him!
Second? Thomas Jefferson. Slavery was legal, but the extortionate nature of his twilight-world relationship with Sally Hemings was arguably impeachable.
Andrew Jackson? Violated federal laws and the Supreme Court, complete with infamous retort to John Marshall, during Indian removal.
James K. Polk? First of several presidents to lie us into war. And per an Illinois Congressman who got the moniker of "Spotty" Lincoln, Mexico still didn't accept the Rio Grande as Texas' border. Yes, Santa Anna signed a treaty to that effect after San Jacinto, but, under international law, treaties signed under duress are never binding, and besides, the Mexican Legislature never approved it.
James Buchanan? Arguably, not just an aider and abetter of treason, but by not immediately firing, and trying in court, treasonous cabinet members like John Floyd, a committer of treason himself.
Andrew Johnson? The Tenure in Office Act was unconstitutional. He could have been impeached for something like deliberately undercutting the Freedmen's Bureau.
Ulysses S. Grant? Arguably for obstruction of justice in the Babcock investigation.
Teddy Roosevelt? Violation of the portion of his oath of office as commander in chief of the armed forces, over the Brownsville dishonorable discharges.
Woodrow Wilson didn't quite lie us into war, but he did certainly connive us into war. And, like Adams, a clear violator of the First Amendment.
Warren Harding? More idiotic than Grant, and no clear indication he came close to obstructing justice.
Franklin D. Roosevelt? Did not lie us into war. Race-based application of many New Deal programs, though, seem to be a clear violation of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Harry S. Truman? Probably not.
Ike? Covert war vis-a-vis both Mossadegh and Arbenz, and matters related.
JFK?
LBJ? Lied us into Vietnam. And plans to expand our presence there existed months before Tonkin Gulf.
Nixon? Besides Watergate, his Logan Act violations in the 1968 campaign, even if pre-election, were an arguable cause for impeachment. The Cambodia bombing certainly so.
Jerry Ford? The pardon for Nixon, if it was some sort of quid pro quo, certainly runs afoul of the Emoluments Clause.
Ronald Reagan? Iran-Contra.
George H.W. Bush? If any of his gropes and mistressing involved preferments? Impeachable. Lies about Kuwait for the Gulf War — both the PR-paid lies about Kuwaiti incubator babies, and whatever April Glaspie told Saddam Hussein — lied us into war.
Bill Clinton? Sure, Ross, you can have him.
George W. Bush? Lied us into war.
That's 18 presidents. Nine of them Republican or proto-Republican. Or, 19 and 10, assuming Trump's already racked up Emoluments Clause violations.
You playing, Rosty? What about you, Ken Starr?
See, Rusty, this is what happens when you combine being a political hack with being a dumb fuck.
In reality, this shows yet another failure of our Founding Fathers.
They assumed members of Congress would be disinterested civil servants, rather than politicians. They assumed that political parties similar to the type already existing in Britain, and to some degree the US (Tories and Patriots, or the Federalists and anti-Federalists even before the Constitution was approved didn't come from nowhere), wouldn't be part of the US body politic.
And, despite the evidence in front of their faces that they were wrong, they persisted.
And, a side note undercutting American exceptionalism? Nineteen of 45 presidents. More than 40 percent.
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