Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/05/08/endgame-should-the-avengers-i.html
Tom the Dancing Bug, IN WHICH The Avengers devise a plan to defeat Thanos by impeaching him (Avengers 4 Spoiler-Free!)
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For most of my life when the media referenced “The Avengers” they were referring to the 60s spy show, not my favorite comic book. It’s a little surreal now that the Avengers have reached such unprecedented popularity. Anyway, it’s cool that Bolling draws them in very accurate comic book costume, not movie form, so I suspect he’s a comic fan too (not that that’s unexpected for an artist who draws comics). Or maybe it was just easier to find reference art for the comic costumes. Either way, Trump sucks.
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Politics isn’t the same as a superhero movie.
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I get the humor, but if I can speak seriously for just a minute, impeachment is the only first step, followed by Senate conviction. And if you can’t get Senate conviction ( and be honest, there is no chance in hell of that), impeachment IS a mistake because it then emboldens the Trump supporters. It makes their rhetoric stronger.
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If only it were possible to snap your fingers and make all your problems go away.
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Psst: They’re already emboldened. It’s time to embolden the rest of the country.
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I don’t know. Do you choose not to put a cop on trial for murdering a black kid because you know someone on the jury will refuse to convict? That’s what prosecutors do, look where it gets us.
The idea that justice is served by being strategic instead of by following the law is, I think, a facet of the problem, not the solution.
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Wrong. The point is to bring this all to light. Impeachment hearings will allow all the evidence to be brought to the public, and not have it swept under the “no collusion” rug. Even if the Senate refuses to convict (which is a certainty), it will show the larger voting public just what has happened, and more importantly, just who in the administration and Congress has enabled it and covered it up. The inquiries this will bring up at the trial will lead to further arrests (since they’re not limitedin scope like the Special Counsel was) and show just how cancerous the GOP truly is.
Will this swing the core Trump/GOP voters? Unlikely, as they’re zealots willing to forgive and hand-wave away any evils as long as “their guy” wins. But it will make everyone else take more notice and embolden them to action in the next few years.
Then let’s look at the flip side: No impeachment. FOX News and the rest of the GOP apologists will use the lack of impeachment as a talking point about how this whole thing was so obviously a “witch hunt” that not even the Democrat-controlled House believed he was guilty of anything. This inaction will also cause a large number of progressive voters to lose faith in the Democrats and turn into apathy at the polls (as it did with Hillary Clinton in 2016). A lack of impeachment proceedings is going to play right into the Trump/Putin camp’s hands in the next election.
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The idea that we can’t serve justice and that congress cannot act as a balance to the power of the executive branch simply because it may not be the best political move for the Democratic party is abhorrent.
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Poor Hawkeye, can’t catch a break.
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THIS. All of this.
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Exactly. His fanatical base will never leave him, not even with yesterday’s revelation about Trump’s colossal losses. You won’t bring anyone new to his base by impeaching, all you might do is sway a few wavering moderate Republicans to distance themselves from him. And the way discussions happen in 2019, doing the right thing (even if it doesn’t result in his removal) will generate more positive feeling among the masses who are sick of all the injustice.
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One of the reasons that the public has so much cynicism for the legislature is because so many of their decisions seem based on strategic political calculus rather than principle.
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Others have already said it so well, but it bears repeating: emboldens?
You realize that the Justice Department is seriously considering a treason investigation into the “spying” the FBI did on the Trump campaign? When it was part of ongoing surveillance of known foreign agents Carter Page, Paul Manafort, and Michael Flynn?
Trump floated adding an illegal and unconstitutional 2 years to his first term, and his supporters are eating it up. At what point is their rhetoric going to get stronger?
Sorry, but fuck that. This is exactly what impeachment was written into the Constitution for. There isn’t much historical precedent (n=2), but each time impeachment has occurred without conviction, the presidencies of the impeached were weakened significantly.
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I imagine a reality where impeachment proceedings were brought successfully against Trump even if it didn’t pass the senate that the 2020 election would look much different than the one where no impeachment proceeding took place. Without it Trump will with great success gloat that he was the victim of a witch hunt but came out without even a charge brought against him and will paint all democrats as being obstructionists wasting the taxpayers time and money on a political stunt that went nowhere. With impeachment proceedings he will have to actually defend himself in the face of the charges brought against him which will color all coverage of him throughout the campaign. I wish I could say that would be enough, but if they don’t do it at all he will likely win (even if by a small margin) and the next 4 years will be him undoing every protection and stuffing every crony he can into every corner of the government without fear since the time to challenge him came and went. If they try to bring it up after the election he will declare that by being elected the people have mandated that they agree he committed no crime and he will be even more unaccountable.
It’s not mentioned often enough by people but Obama was strongly opposed to the post 9/11 Iraq war during the Bush presidency when many other Democrats didn’t want to rock the boat, and the American people who really didn’t want it in the first place put him in power feeling like he would handle the war responsibly. Most of America wants a check on Trump right now but Dems are afraid for the same reasons they were then and they shouldn’t be. By dragging it out it only helps Trump, gives him more time to maneuver and to control the dialogue which will only help him in this coming election. Without impeachment the shenanigans that were played this last election will be validated as legitimate tools for winning and we will see it more not less in the future.
As for Trump supporters, I cant imagine how not trying to impeach Trump will bring them to our side ever so avoiding it because they might get upset, they are already upset and standing outside your house with pitchforks. Trying to give them what they want when what they want is to burn your house down isn’t a good survival tactic.
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Yeah, I feel like people have this wrong idea about impeachment because of how popular Clinton was in 2000. I can’t see a way to argue that impeachment made Clinton more popular. It’s just that when you go to impeach a president who is already extremely popular, you might not do too much to their popularity through that process.
Trump is not an extremely popular president.
Yeah, maybe for once say to Trump supporters that you believe they are adults who can handle some negative feelings.
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There’s a strategy you use when dealing with a normal person. Then there’s a strategy you use for dealing with a crazy person. Pelosi is trying the “normal person” strategy. It won’t work. Careful calculation of leveraging shame and legal precedent won’t matter to people who feel no shame about anything, and don’t even consider the law to be valid or applicable.
Really, Trump and his supporters should be thought of as hostile invaders, intent on colonizing the land and destroying the local culture and government, because that’s what they’re doing.
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Everyone shits on that guy…
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