Bill Clinton admitted his affair

[Arthur_Phuxache]

So, yeah, I suppose he does "get away with it", in the sense that you can get away with murder if you just make sure you never kill someone in the first place.

Admittedly, this policy has always worked for me, so far.

 

[lerk]

The impact of this would be pretty interesting. I wonder how many people nowadays would know what impeachment was if the last time it happened was 150 years ago. Ever since then, we have been seeing people go "Impeach Bush!" "Impeach Obama!" "Impeach Trump!". Since impeachment wouldn't really have been as big of a part of the American political life without Clinton's I wonder what their demand would be then. Then again I imagine that a good amount of people would be aware of impeachment being floated during Watergate and Iran-Contra so I can't imagine that impeachment would be too obscure.

 

[Makemakean]

The impact of this would be pretty interesting. I wonder how many people nowadays would know what impeachment was if the last time it happened was 150 years ago. Ever since then, we have been seeing people go "Impeach Bush!" "Impeach Obama!" "Impeach Trump!". Since impeachment wouldn't really have been as big of a part of the American political life without Clinton's I wonder what their demand would be then. Then again I imagine that a good amount of people would be aware of impeachment being floated during Watergate and Iran-Contra so I can't imagine that impeachment would be too obscure.

Well, Watergate is still fresh on everyone's mind, and I think that more than anything else is the reason that impeachment today is something that is seen as eminently possible, because Nixon would in all likelihood have been both impeached and convicted had he not resigned when he did. It is worth noting that between Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama, all Presidents faced attempts at impeachments by some members of Congress at some point, though only in the case of Clinton did it actually make it out of the Judiciary Committee.

Still, it is quite remarkable how the whole attitude towards impeachment has changed in the popular mood. The mythology that emerged from the Senate failing to convict Andrew Johnson wasn't that Andrew Johnson was in fact a good President, or that Stevens and the Radical Republicans who fought against him were bad, but that taking the step of impeachment was so serious, so decisive, so far-reaching, that even though Andrew Johnson was one of the worst Presidents that America had ever had, since the charges levied against him were not completely and totally ironclad, not thoroughly (no pun intended) unimpeacheable, and you could make the case that Congress had deliberately tried to trap him in a situation where they would have an excuse to get rid of him, it would have been a stain on the Constitution, on the Presidency, on Congress to carry it out, and the Senate was right in failing to convict him.

It truly was the Nuclear Option, it was opening Pandora's Box.

Now I'm far from convinced that that was a particularly good mythology to develop.

Actually, I'm pretty convinced that it was fundamentally a very bad mythology to develop, since it kind of normalized the idea that the President can get away with an awful lot of shady things because to remove him would still be the greater sin.

But it was a mythology that was there, and that we're still trying to recover from.

 

[Geordie]

Of course, impeachment has gone from the nuclear option to just a thing that happens. In another 150 years, it'll just be routine. Like our silliness with Black Rod.

Hushed voice: "The Electoral College results have been ratified, so now the Speaker motions the Senate Minority Leader to the podium, so they can read out the articles of impeachment. Once these are struck down in the ceremonial vote, the President-Elect is confirmed."