Mitch McConnell says impeachment ‘ought to be rare’ and is ‘not good for the country’ as House GOP lurches toward Biden inquiry — I have an odd perspective here, so hear me out: Republicans need to let McConnell play this card. The country is tired of impeachment talk. People in general are tired of D.C. intrigue and use of government as the arbiter of political penalty. Sure, the GOP base welcomes a justified inquiry based upon facts into the well-documented and pretty damn legitimate suspicions on the Biden family influence trading. If the GOP base was enough to win elections then we wouldn’t need to worry about convincing anyone else. It’s the moderates and independents who need winning over, and you’re not going to do that by repeating Democrats’s bewildering rush into impeachment with zero criminal charges and no inquiry.
Republicans must not just look like the party that cares about the rule of law, they must legitimately care for it, and to that extent, the republic. They must contrast their careful adherence to the law with the reckless disregard shown to it by Democrats.
It reminds me of John Adams’s defense of the British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre. Adams was a young, but immensely respected attorney grieving the loss of a child when the redcoats opened fire on colonists on March 5th, 1770. Several hundred people had gathered outside the Boston Customs House to taunt a lone sentry who had hit a barber’s apprentice on the head with his musket during an argument. Other redcoats joined the sentry as the crowd grew in both numbers and fury, some carrying clubs. Among them, American hero Crispus Attucks, counted as the first fatality in the American War for Independence. At some point the crowd engaged with the British soldiers and shots were fired leaving five dead. Captain Thomas Preston was enraged that his redcoats had fired — but their argument during the trial was that they had reason to believe their lives were in danger and acted to defend themselves.
Adams, who staunchly supported the patriot cause, also knew that America could not be the republic the Founders envisioned if it couldn’t pass the first test: due process. The dream of self-governance would be forever ruined if the patriots couldn’t prosecute impartial trials. It was for this reason that he accepted the case.
Adams laser-focused on the facts alone, without involving the patriot cause. The verdict resulted in the acquittal of six soldiers and two manslaughter convictions for the remaining two. That colonists widely accepted the verdicts of the trials speaks volumes to Adams’s fact-focused defense. It laid the foundation for an American faith in the rule of law. Many years later Adams remarked that his defense of the redcoats was “one of the most gallant, generous, manly, and disinterested actions of my whole life, and one of the best pieces of service I ever rendered my country."
We needed both the fiery oratory skills and messaging machinations of Sam Adams — and we needed the skillful legal maneuvers and quiet operations of John Adams. A movement moves best with a balance between the two. Having said this, it would be obtuse to infer from this story that I’m comparing McConnell to Adams when I’m examining an approach. Comparison of approach is not a comparison of case, especially with one so clear cut as the Biden scandals. McConnell and others need to demonstrate adherence to the inquiry process because we as Americans need to see once again how our republic is supposed to function, having gone so long without seeing it. An inquiry as it’s supposed to proceed and actual criminal charges brought about by evidence — as opposed to a pyrrhic victory of an optic at the expense of faith in government — is lasting.