Even before President Trump’s inauguration last January, pundits, reporters, and news anchors had begun speculating as to how and when he might be impeached. The guesswork has only increased since, and there is much less talk about if there will be an impeachment. It has now become almost a foregone conclusion, and even more so since the appointment of Bob Mueller as special counsel. It is becoming more likely that Trump, much like Nixon, will eventually be faced with the choice between impeachment and resignation. There has never been an occupant of the White House so manifestly unfit for the office he holds.
But the hard truth is that impeachment will not be enough. Impeachment will not save us because Trump is not the problem. We are.
Trump is the most obvious symptom
Trump is a symptom, albeit the worst and most visible, but a symptom nevertheless. He certainly did not create the blatant racism that he deals in, nor even the blunt and divisive rhetoric cleverly disguised as simply “telling it like it is.” Trump has never existed in a vacuum. He and his operatives during the campaign chose to exploit the deep resentment that has been simmering under the surface of society for years. While it is very likely true that Trump is not the sharpest tool in the shed when it comes to governing, he certainly does know a thing or two about manipulating people, supporters and detractors alike, through rhetoric, dog whistles, and tweets.
More than anything else, his Twitter account is a liability to both international peace and domestic tranquility.
I could write at length about the president’s propensity for division, his shocking statements, un-American behavior, and undignified actions. These are all elements of his unfitness for the highest and most powerful office in not only the United States, but the world.
We were aware of most of his personal qualities well before last November, and yet more than 60 million Americans chose to ignore all of these warning signs. The "Access Hollywood" tape would have been the final nail in the coffin for any other presidential candidate. Mitt Romney was done in by that mere 47% quote that now seems so innocent and trivial.
But Trump’s racist statements, sexist behavior, and un-presidential comportment were all on display for anyone to see, and millions of us not only weren’t bothered by any of it, some of us liked it. Somehow the country that chose to elect a talented yet unlikely politician named Barack Obama was also able to vote a well-documented conman named Donald Trump into the very same office.
The blame game, but we are at fault
Blame has been put in various places as to why Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College: the Comey letter a week before the election, Russian interference, faulty polling, a failure to campaign in the Rust Belt states that proved so pivotal to the election, and so on.
It is likely that they all played a part to some degree. But the real truth of the situation now is that we, the American people (whether we individually voted for him or not), have introduced an absolute disgrace to the office of president. Impeachment can remove him, but it cannot erase what he has deliberately uncovered. Whether the president is removed via impeachment, resignation, the 25th Amendment, or merely losing the 2020 election, we have a long road ahead of us and a deep hole to climb out of. There is far more division throughout the United States than I think anyone had ever before realized. We are perhaps less influenced by the better angels of our nature than we had hoped.
