Daily Archives: 20 January 2020

Political Parties

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Joseph Sternberg, in his WSJ op-ed last Thursday, opined that the Democrats aren’t the only liberal party in collapse, averring that Great Britain’s Labour Party and Germany’s Social Democratic Party are in similar straits. He claimed early in his piece that

three of the West’s major economic powers are undergoing leadership turnover within their main center-left parties.

While the US’ and Great Britain’s leftist parties are threatened with leadership turnover (Germany’s SPD has already undergone one, and it may be continuing), Sternberg is operating under a false premise with most of his claim. Neither the US nor Great Britain have a center-left political party anymore.

The US has only the Progressive-Democratic Party, a far-left party given life by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and vigor by Pete Buttigieg, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and such (so far) lesser lights as Bill de Blasio and Gavin Newsom.

Great Britain has only its Labour Party, which has gone as far-left in the British political spectrum as has the Progressive-Democratic Party in ours. Labour has been enthusiastically taken there by the party’s continued and continuing leader, Jeremy Corbyn and the party’s own lesser light Sadiq Khan.

It would be good for both our nations did our two actually have center-left parties, but there’s nothing forming even in the wings for either of us.

Impeachment

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Now the House Progressive-Democrats have deigned deliver their Articles of Impeachment to the Senate, and the Senate’s trial will begin in earnest (the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court has been sworn in, and the Senators have been sworn in) tomorrow right after lunch Eastern Time.  There remains speculation about whether the Senate will call additional witnesses in the course of the trial or whether the Senate should simply dismiss the case.

The matter seems clear to my august self.

Under our Constitution, the House has the sole responsibility to conduct an impeachment investigation and to produce the resulting Articles of Impeachment. Further, only the House is allowed to conduct that investigation. Finally, that investigation is entire and complete with the writing of the Articles. Art I, Sect 2:

The House of Representatives…shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.

Under our Constitution, the Senate has the sole responsibility to try the House’s impeachment Articles. Further, that’s all the Senate is allowed to do vis-a-vis impeachment. In particular, it cannot conduct its own investigation. Art I, Sect 3:

The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.

The Senate should hear the cases presented by the House’s and President’s impeachment managers, evaluate the case as presented in the Articles, and then vote to acquit or convict. No further investigation, no witnesses, nothing else at all is required or legitimate.