After the impeachment

Trump finally gets hit by the asteroid he deserves

You know it’s wrong to smile. But there’s satisfaction seeing the schoolyard bully get his teeth knocked in.

Donald Trump has never lived the life he deserved. In the 1970s, the Justice Department sued him for refusing to rent apartments to African Americans. Still, he became a billionaire real estate developer. He bragged about sexually assaulting women, reduced presidential politics to name-calling and invited a foreign adversary to hack his 2016 rival’s emails. Still, he was elected president. He stocked his administration with crooks and cronies, used the presidency to further his financial interests, bribed a foreign ally for personal gain and hired a morally bankrupt attorney general. Still, he has good odds of winning reelection.

Then came testimony that exposed a brazen bribery scheme. Trump withheld nearly $400 million in military aid to squeeze Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to fabricate dirt on Democrat Joe Biden, and demanded that Ukraine take the fall for Russia’s interference in our 2016 election. “If what we’re talking about is not impeachable, then nothing is impeachable,” said University of North Carolina law professor Michael Gerhardt.

Trump is now one of only three presidents to be impeached, and the only one impeached in his first term.

Republicans have frequently accused Democrats of wanting Trump impeached since the day he took office. They’re right. As Chief Justice John Roberts read him the oath, my thoughts were of impeachment. Not because I’m a Democrat; I never contemplated impeachment during the Bush years.

Why Trump? On Inauguration Day, he had already confessed to grabbing women’s genitalia, stoked bigotry against Mexicans and Muslims, encouraged fans to “knock the crap” out of protesters, bilked Americans with his fraudulent “Trump University,” mocked a disabled reporter and lied in a way that appeared pathological.

Congressional testimony did not teach me Trump was unfit; it confirmed what evidence already established. Yes, from Day One I wanted Trump impeached. I’m not contrite. I’m elated.

To the members of Congress who persisted despite ignored subpoenas, “witch hunt” invective and the GOP’s blowhard virulence; to the news media that ignored the “enemy of the people” attacks and kept uncovering corruption; and to those who voted in a Democratic House majority that did what history called on it to do: job well done.

While I was dreaming of impeachment, Senate Republicans were dropping their spines and integrity at the 2016 inaugural coat check. When they vote to acquit the president of all he has done, it will be a sad day. But for now, revel in the knowledge that our democracy still exists and still works.