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[Watching French Calvary deploy in front of them] Goodyear: What about it John Henry?

John Henry Thomas: Looks like we ourselves got mixed up in somebody’s else’s war.

Christian: Yeah Sure does.

Short Grub: What are we going to do now?

John Henry Thomas: Well that’s already been decided.

The Undefeated 1969

Because of the falling polls and the Wile-E-Coyote nature of impeachment there has been some speculation concerning if Democrats will in fact hold an impeachment vote and instead settle for censure.

Don’t count on it.

To be sure they will give it their best shot, in fact I suspect that the purpose of the scholarly witnesses that are going to be called before the judiciary committee’s primary job is not to justify impeachment but to provide the cover necessary for the Democrat votes against it.

Constitutionally Impeachment is a political process, not a judicial one and “high crimes and misdemeanors” are not defined so, it doesn’t matter if the best the Democrats can do is prove that Donald Trump had a nose bleed on the White House carpet, under the rules the Democrats have the right to impeach him for that if they they want.

Nancy Pelosi knows and understands this which is why she tried so hard to avoid open impeachment, particularly after the Mueller goose egg. But once the process had begun she understands that there is no turning back politically. The question is only the best way to do it.

If the Schiff hearings had moved public opinion it would be easy. She might have grabbed a republican vote or two and presented it , with the media’s help, this as a solemn decision to remove a corrupt leader.

But without limited public support, a booming economy, polls showing that minorities that are vital to the Democrat election plans moving toward Trump she is down to playing the best hand she has in the hopes that the GOP in general or the President in particular make a mistake.

Her best hand is to make the best possible case for “censure” and pol test it among Democrat activists. If somehow after the hearings this week poll results tell them they’ve convinced enough democrat fire-eaters that censure is a valid alternative to impeachment (very unlikely) she will go full bore on a cencure vote with every Democrat and perhaps even a stray republican will take place and the left will declare victory.

This would be the 2nd best case for the Democrats and the 2nd least likely which is to say it ain’t gonna happen because while it’s the party’s smartest move it requires woke activists in the party to see reason and reality.

Good luck there.

Of course there is always the remote possibility that the Democrats actually find something that IS impeachable enough to convince the public it’s worth doing or that the White House does something so egregious as to change the polling on impeachment. That’s the best case scenario for the left and the least likely for the reasons.

1. If the Democrat/Left/Deep State HAD something of this nature, they would have produced it, or leaked it over the last three years
2. All the evidence so far suggests that the only impeachable acts that have taken place were the previous administrations attempts to corrupt this election, too much deep state digging might uncover this fact.
3. President Trump has demonstrated that however the left might paint him, he’s much too savvy to make that kind of mistake.

With God all things are of course possible and if this miracle falls into Nancy Pelosi’s lap she will happily accept it but she’s smart enough to not count on it.

Finally there is the chance that enough Democrats will rebel to force her to abandon impeachment although rather than risk a vote that fails. This isn’t going to happen either. It would be the most destructive result for the left and would practically invite primary opponents or at worst 3rd party challengers on an “Impeach Now!” platform. The Damage to the left from such a result would be worse than anything else.

So what WILL happen? Here is the sequence:

1. Dems make their best case for censure backed up by their report and the scholars who give them cover for it.
2. Swing state Dems argue strongly for censure saying that this is where the evidence has taken them.
3. Pelosi after confirming that the fire-eaters will not settle for censure holds the impeachment vote and passes it with 219 Democrats, not a single one from a swing district. Said vote is delayed as long as feasible to discourage primaries from the left on Swing democrats voting “No”.
4. Democrats do their best to beg borrow or steal enough votes to keep Election 2020 from becoming an electoral disaster and/or hope some event (say Ginsberg’s death) takes place that galvanizes Democrats to the point where they can pull it off.

This is how I see it happening, it’s basically their 2012 Obamacare strategy which was able to work because:

1. Black votes couldn’t bear the thought of the 1st black president failing to be re-elected
2. Race trumped faith among Black Christians
3. The GOP managed to nominate the weakest candidate in their field one that not had pushed for a state version of Obamacare (that I’m still living under) but was unwilling or unable to fight back against anyone but his own base.

Alas for them this time they have a candidate that not only has a strong economy and has proactively reached out to minority Democrat voters but one that is willing to fight back relentlessly.

Bottom line, the Democrats have dealt themselves a bad hand but will play it out the best they can and hope they get lucky. That’s the smartest political move they have left and whatever else you might say about Nancy Pelosi, you can count on her to play the best hand she has, with the media’s help of course.

Update: After Wednesday’s clown car weaponizing the 1st Lady Pelosi has apparently decided to fast track this to minimize the chance of her team providing any more ad material for the GOP in the hearings.

She wants this over and done.