AT LEAST ONE GOP SENATOR HAS A CONSCIENCE

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-alaska, thinks the pending Senate trial of impeached President Donald Trump should be a serious, sober affair in which senators acting as jurors consider evidence with an open mind. Imagine that. She told an Anchorage TV station she refused to be a partisan “rubber stamp.”

Murkowski said she was “disturbed” to learn that Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell, R-kentucky, told Fox News host Sean Hannity that he planned “total coordination” with Trump’s attorneys during the trial. Alas, she appears to be the only Republican lawmaker willing to say this aloud.

It’s a sad commentary on the polarization of U.S. politics since 1974, when Republican President Richard Nixon faced impeachment over his attempts to impede an investigation into a break-in by operatives of his re-election campaign at the Democratic National Committee’s office at the Watergate building in Washington. Sen. Howard Baker, Rtennessee, led congressional attempts to get to the bottom of the serious allegations against Nixon.

No similar Democrat emerged in 1998 and 1999, when Democratic President Bill Clinton was impeached by the House but cleared by the Senate for lying about having a sexual relationship with an intern. But at least Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-connecticut, blasted Clinton, saying, “Such behavior is not just inappropriate. It is immoral and it is harmful.”

Murkowski’s comments lack such moral clarity. But at least one GOP senator has a conscience.