Six on Impeachment: Corporate Media Still Waiting for Trump to Knock Over a Bank; Nancy Pelosi will regret rushing into impeachment push; The perilous fight: Will the Trump impeachment process leave America riven again – or heal it?; Donald Trump’s l

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Six on Impeachment: Corporate Media Still Waiting for Trump to Knock Over a Bank; Nancy Pelosi will regret rushing into impeachment push; The perilous fight: Will the Trump impeachment process leave America riven again – or heal it?; Donald Trump’s luck has run out; Trump Explains Ukraine-Gate; Trump's actions with Ukraine epitomize framers' idea of impeachable offense

Corporate Media Still Waiting for Trump to Knock Over a Bank view post on FAIR.org by Jim Naureckas "Here’s a Doonesbury cartoon by Garry Trudeau from 1974: Doonesbury (7/23/74) Things never change, do they—or do they? In 1974, of course, there was an expectation that if Richard Nixon were impeached and put on trial in the Senate, there was a chance that at least some Republicans would vote to remove him from office—which is why Nixon resigned when it looked like impeachment and a Senate trial were a certainty. In 2019, of course, few see any likelihood at all that a Republican-dominated Senate would ever vote Trump out of office, regardless of what charges the House might impeach him with—even if he knocked over a bank, say, or shot the proverbial “somebody on Fifth Avenue.” What’s changed between 1974 and 2019? The biggest transformation was the realization of the longstanding Republican dream—perhaps first articulated in a memo drafted by Roger Ailes for the Nixon White House (Gawker, 6/30/11)—of a right-wing media network that would do an end-run around what was seen as a media establishment hostile to the GOP: “It avoids the censorship, the priorities and the prejudices of network news selectors and disseminators,” Ailes’ GOP TV proposal promised. The idea that the media establishment was inherently hostile to Republicans was largely a delusion; newspapers endorsed Nixon over Democratic challenger George McGovern 753 to 56, after all. But merely not having the selling of conservative policies as their primary motivation made corporate media an obstacle and therefore an enemy—and Ailes worked tirelessly to create a parallel media system that would deliver the news as the right wing wants it to be seen—”The Way Things Ought to Be,” as the title of a book by Ailes protege Rush Limbaugh put it. The main value of Fox News, the cable behemoth launched by Ailes on behalf of right-wing media mogul Rupert Murdoch, is that it teaches conservative viewers that no facts or logic can force them to believe anything they don’t want to believe. Much as the tobacco and fossil fuel industries created their own realms of pseudo-scholarship where smoking doesn’t cause lung cancer and greenhouse gasses don’t warm the planet, Fox creates a parallel universe where conservatives are always victims, never villains, and any evidence to the contrary is simply—as the shopworn saying goes—”fake news.” The corporate media establishment is devoted to the peculiar notion of “objectivity” (FAIR.org, 7/20/12)—which, somewhat counterintuitively, rejects the idea that there is an objective reality that journalists can meaningfully describe, and instead limits reporters’ role to repeating claims made about reality by various sources. On matters of national importance, these sources mostly consist of powerful government officials, including representatives of the major opposition party. This system allows reality as described in the most prestigious media outlets to be defined by the leadership of the two-party establishment—which turned out to be a good recipe for a stable, self-sustaining political class (one whose policy proposals could be counted on not to threaten the profits of media owners or sponsors). Stable, that is, until one party figures out that the system allows them to say whatever they want. The rise of the right-wing media machine allowed Republicans to create their own self-serving fantasy world—and the rules of the centrist establishment meant that that bizarro version had to be incorporated into the consensus media reality. When the president is accused of a crime, he need not disprove the allegations, but merely needs to  put forward a version of events in which he is the one fighting crime, and his accuser a traitor working on behalf of a shadowy cabal. This becomes the unquestioned reality of the right-wing parallel universe—and an on-the-other-hand option offered by the centrist press."

 Goodwin: Nancy Pelosi will regret rushing into impeachment push

VISIT NYPOST.COM

SEPTEMBER 26, 2019     Goodwin: Nancy Pelosi will regret rushing into impeachment push   What a difference a day could have made! Imagine if Nancy Pelosi had held her impeachment fire for 24 hours. Then she would have had the transcript of President Trump’s call with...

The perilous fight: Will the Trump impeachment process leave America riven again – or heal it?

"For three generations beginning in the last quarter of the 19th century – through a period of industrial disruption and political corruption rivalling that of our own time – millions of Americans lived and died without any serious contemplation of impeaching the president. In a little more than one generation – in a half-century, in our own time – the notion has been broached three times.

The Democrats are girding for another battle over presidential impeachment – a fearful act the 18th-century Founders intended to be used sparingly, a last resort that the writers of the Constitution reserved as a bulwark against tyranny and corruption. It is a grave act that will raise questions of political legitimacy and test the separation of powers, and a momentous undertaking that will beg a remorseless verdict from history.

Apart from decisions of war and peace, nothing these sitting lawmakers will do – no tax bill, no decision on trade matters, no appropriations or authorization legislation, no matter how vital it may seem at the time – will so shape their prospects and destinies. The beginning of impeachment proceedings will prompt decisions and divisions that will define the remainder of their political lives, elevating some of them to the heroic pantheon of American leaders, while degrading some of them and leaving them as history’s villains.

Like the House of Representatives’ 1868 impeachment of Andrew Johnson – he was acquitted in the Senate by one vote – the potential impeachment of Donald Trump comes in the middle of an election season. Like the 1998 House impeachment of Bill Clinton – he, too, was acquitted in the Senate, though by a safe margin – the proceedings will be viscerally partisan.

And like the 1974 march toward impeachment of Richard Nixon – he resigned in the face of certain House impeachment and likely Senate conviction – the proceedings involving Mr. Trump will shape a generation’s view of the Constitution, the presidency, the press, and both the principles and principals involved.

But unlike any of the three previous impeachment drives, this one is freighted with formidable class divides and questions particular to our time that go to the heart of democratic rule."

Opinion: The perilous fight: Will the Trump impeachment process leave America riven again – or heal it?

Opinion: The perilous fight: Will the Trump impeachment process leave Am... Donald Trump’s impeachment by the House seems like a foregone conclusion. But between Johnson, Nixon and Clinton...

 Donald Trump’s luck has run out

"The scandal comes with an election only a year away. It’s a controversy that will drag on for months. It will make the government even more dysfunctional that it has been. It will jeopardize the chances of the new North American free-trade deal, USMCA, being ratified.

It will push other important issues such as gun control and the climate crisis even further down the priority scale. It will serve to exacerbate, if it can be imagined, the already extreme degree of political polarization that exists.

It brings more rage and hell to the United States. But there’s a cancer on this presidency that has to be exorcised. The whistle-blower’s revelations offer the best hope to date of that happening."

Opinion: Donald Trump’s luck has run out

Opinion: Donald Trump’s luck has run out The lawless U.S. President is facing a scandal that comes with an election only a year away

Trump Explains Ukraine-Gate

Trump's actions with Ukraine epitomize framers' idea of impeachable offense, scholars say

"And many agreed Wednesday that pressing a foreign leader to investigate a political rival — while withholding hundreds of millions in promised U.S. aid — would clearly qualify as an impeachable offense.

“Impeachable misconduct entails a president’s serious abuse of power and a serious abuse of public trust,” said University of North Carolina Law professor Michael Gerhardt. He said based on what has been reported so far, “President Trump’s call did both of those things. It was an abuse of power because he used his position to benefit himself and not the country. It was a breach of trust because Americans trust their president not to engage in self-dealing, either through steering businesses to line their own pockets or through conspiring with or coordinating with foreign powers to intervene in American elections.”

Trump's actions with Ukraine epitomize framers' idea of impeachable offense, scholars say

Trump's actions with Ukraine epitomize framers' idea of impeachable offe... What's an impeachable offense? A president misusing his power to benefit himself.