There is an old Hebrew proverb which can be roughly translated as:
What is the difference between a wise person and a clever person?
A clever person can get themselves out of situations a wise person would not have got into.
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There are many points of similarity (as well as of contrast) between Boris Johnson and Donald Trump.
One common feature is their manoeuvrability.
They can perhaps be seen to get themselves out of situations which more prudent politicians would not have got into.
The impression conveyed is a constant short-term living-on-ones-wits, with a deft dodge here and will-to-power there, which would exhaust most other mortals.
But.
Each improvisation comes with a potential cost, for what deals well with one situation may not be helpful in another situation.
And this is the difference between tactics and strategy.
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To put this in more concrete terms: Johnson and his lawyers appear to have hit on a good defence to possible criminal liability over the Downing Street parties.
A previous blogpost sets out how useful this line – about the need to show leadership in a work situation – was in dealing with the police and any potential fines or prosecution.
But that defence came with costs.
One cost was that it provided no defence to his own birthday party: and so that was the one for which he was fined.
And another cost was that it offered no relief in respect of the House of Commons investigation: what was a good defence in one context had no traction in another.
Johnson’s attempts to “lawyer-up” for the committee fell flat, his legalistic and supposedly “devastating” submissions got him nowhere – nowhere, that is, other than outside of the House of Commons.
His tactics worked regarding the potential criminal liability, but his strategic approach to holding power was so inept that he went from being an incoming Prime Minister with a sizeable majority to not even being a member of parliament in less than a single parliamentary term.
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A similar thing can perhaps be seen now in the United States.
Trump somehow headed off not one but two impeachment exercises: he may have been impeached twice, but he was not convicted for either.
The latter impeachment was, of course, for the events of 6 January.
And so he avoided the punishment set out in the constitution for political misconduct.
But where the impeachments have failed, it appears that indictments have taken up the political slack.
It is maybe difficult to imagine that any of the current indictments against Trump – even the document retention ones – would now exist had Trump been convicted on impeachment.
(Logically, of course, the events of 6 January would have been different had the earlier impeachment ended with a conviction.)
Had Trump been convicted on impeachment – even if he had then received a Ford-Nixon type pardon – and thereby formally dismissed from office and unable to return, then it is possible that it would have seen that he had been punished enough.
An exercise of political misconduct – his role in the events of 6 January – would have then been dealt through the constitutional mechanism of impeachment – and so would have had a political solution.
Instead that political misconduct has been converted into criminal charges.
This is not to say that the criminal charges are not sound and evidenced – some of the cases look very strong and Trump’s position looks correspondingly very weak. Trump is in serious legal jeopardy.
The point is that these indictments (with the possible exception of the document retention charges) are really doing the job that should have been with the second impeachment, had Trump and his Senate allies not manoeuvred for an acquittal.
That tactical success, however, offers no defence to the criminal charges he now faces.
And instead of disgrace and permanent removal from office, he now faces criminal liability and even prison time.
The Georgia charges look especially bad for him, as there seems no pardon would be available – either from a president or the governor of the state.
In essence: it would seem that the impeachment process failed in the very circumstances such a political and constitutional remedy should have succeeded.
And, if you will pardon the pun, that is quite an indictment of the US constitution.
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The answer that I think you’re looking for is that all of the indictments are a result of the failure to impeach and convict. More generally, I have observed that Congressional dysfunction and hyperpartisanship are at the heart of most of what has gone from bad to worse to a new level of worst in America over the past couple decades. Checks and balances no longer work as designed.
The US adopted the English (British) impeachment process just as a process was beginning in London – the impeachment trial of Warren Hastings would demonstrate the uselessness of that process and its place in the dustbin of history though still on the books.
Whilst the Constitution needs an overhaul, the failure of the Senate to vote Yes on the grounds of impeachment that had passed the House of Representatives, was a political determination of the Republican Senators.
The notion of the Founding Fathers that by having a congregation of men seated for 6 years, as a calm and thoughtful counter to those in the House elected for 2 years, has been abused many times. Though it was able to correct itself until Newt Gingrich introduced a form of adversarial politics where compromise died and which is reaching its periapsis with the aggregation of the abhorrent aspects of nationalism expounded by Trump, the MAGA movement and think tanks, underpinned by an Ann Rand mythology.
You’ve hit upon it. The House and the Senate are meant to be adversarial, regardless of what party controls it. The combined Congress is meant to balance the executive. That hasn’t effectively happened in 30 years.
Early in the life of the Union, political parties were not so tribal. Politicians floated. Parties are no longer opponents. They are enemies. I might add “deadly”.
The UK Parliament has retained impeachment on the books but transferred the procedure to the Committee of Privileges. Boris Johnson was to every intent and consequence was impeached by the Conservative majority committee, and their report was ‘double ticked’ off by the Commons.
For the record, I agree entirely with Mr Green on the preference for impeachment over criminal trials wherever possible. The reason is that the risks to the constitution are far better contained within the impeachment process, as I fear may be revealed should the Trump trial fail.
If a criminal conviction per se (sentence aside) is no bar to Trump’s selection as candidate or election as president [under the constitution], I really wonder what happens if he’s actually sentenced to prison. There seems a fair chance of this happening, given the number of cases against him, and the likelihood of his guilt.
Could there be a US president in jail?
If one MAGA juror says “No”, then no.
You can be a candidate in the election while in prison; the socialist Eugene V Debs did so in 1920 (and won about 3.5% of the national vote).
What happens if you’re elected? There’s no precedent, obviously. But at the very least there’d be an argument for the grant of parole or temporary release or home arrest or the like for the duration of the president’s term of office, on the grounds that the public interest requires that the elected president should be able to carry out the duties of the office.
Possibly, but what should also happen in a *healthy* democracy is that there would be an immediate impeachment process once appeals are exhausted.
High crimes and misdemeanors would be proven to the criminal standard beyond, but Congress would still have to do it.
You could say the same for Bibi Netanyahu, and maybe Vladimir Putin, although the latter’s tactical sense seems to have deserted him recently.
Both parties the GOP, and the Tories, pretend to be the party of law and order in their respective countries. How’s that for a laugh.
Regarding your final quip, re: US constitution. I wonder if an “indictment” of the constitution is the correct way to frame the issue, and not more a question of an indictment of the people supposedly guarding said constitution.
That is not to say that the US constitution should not be modernized for myriad reasons, but I do think it provided the tools for Mr. Trump’s removal, as intended.
It was the people (GOP) that failed to live up to their constitutional duties — and continue to do so — undermining the very foundations of democracy, while at it.
If is a very big word. Had Trump been pulled up sharp much earlier the world would have been spared much amusement and expense.
BTW, for those who venture into the tabloids we have a similar phenomenon at home, a faded starlet is practically daring the courts to sent her to chokey. The courts and the prison system are in absolute terror of her turning up at the gates with the press in tow. A delicious if tawdry feast.
So it is with Trump, some people are too much of a nuisance to jail – so they won’t be, that is their power.
It seems that Mitch McConnell’s cop-out at the second impeachment vote, that because Trump was no longer president so impeachment was no longer the correct course & there is a criminal justice system to ensure criminal acts get punished is having possibly his intended consequences. Though I think McConnell miscalculated the depth of support an indicted and possibly even convicted Trump could maintain in the Republican Party.
McConnell may have given his beloved GOP a second hole below the waterline, which would be delightfully ironic.
Of course, Trump should have been convicted on impeachment, especially in the second impeachment trial. The article seems to imply, however, that had Trump then been removed from office, the various criminal charges would not have been brought. I think this conclusion is based on a misunderstanding of the reasons he was impeached and of the reasons he has been indicted. In the first case, the aim was to remove from office an individual unfit to be President. In the second case, the aim was to hold an alleged criminal culpable for breaking the law. Whatever the outcome of the impeachments, the US and Georgia justice systems were obliged to investigate and charge what were perceived to be criminal acts. And they did.
The US Constitution, which Americans believe to be the best constitution in the world, is rubbish. And I don’t mean that metaphorically; it should literally be thrown away.
With almost all judges being either elected or appointed by politicians, and the same for prosecuting authorities, and in some places heads of law enforcement as well, the justice system is hopelessly flawed.
It’s what gives microscopic intimations of legitimacy to the MAGA/QAnon claims that the criminal cases against Trump are fundamentally political – because the DAs or USDAs and the judges can all be accused of being Democrats (except for the one in Florida, but the MAGA/QAnon crowd are happy with her).
The Federalist Society does little else other than produce a list of favoured (read: neo-liberal if not with fascist tendencies) candidates for judge ships from which Republican Presidents, Governors etc. are expected to select their appointment. (The other thing it does is lobby law students all over the country.)
Then there’s the pardon power: this is patently a banana republic institution – similar in some ways to a departing PM’s Honours list, as Boris recently demonstrated and Liz Truss is trying to do the same thing. It’s so bonkers that if Trump were convicted of federal crimes, but was then elected President, he could *pardon himself*.
The First Amendment (known for freedom of speech) has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to mean that any amount of secret spending by any party in order to secure the election of any candidate, constitutes ‘free speech’ (Citizens United), while the Second Amendment, clearly fashioned by founding fathers who were nervous about further invasion from what is now Canada and perhaps naval incursions – where everyone had decided there should be no ‘standing army – to ensure that there would be armed men to constitute the first line of defence, has been ‘interpreted’ by successive right-wing Supreme Courts to mean that every American in America is entitled to buy as much weaponry and ammunition as they can get their hands on, including 50.cal rifles, and even miniguns, and many states have interpreted this as meaning that people can openly carry guns in the streets and shops of their cities – against a background of repeated events in which children in school are killed like shooting fish in a barrel.
Our constitution is ridiculous, but it’s not as dangerous as theirs and it’s a lot easier for us to change it.