Trump's Non-Defence Defence

The Trial is ON!

The acquittal is almost guaranteed. Trump's defence is that he cannot be impeached as he has not been found to have broken any laws. WTF?

The standard for impeachment is that the President of the United States is as follows..

"The President, Vice President and all Civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."

When the Framers of the United States' Constitution crafted this section, the only precedent they had to look to was British Common Law.  According to Common Law "...other high Crimes and Misdemeanors." related to, other than actual crimes, misdeeds in office sufficiently corrupt and disreputable to warrant removal from office.  This has been the law in both British Common Law jurisdictions and in the United States literally for centuries.

This impeachment trial may change this, and rewrite this incredibly important section of the United States Constitution.  This is because if Trump is acquitted because he did not commit an actual crime, this defence will effectively become the new standard for impeachment.  This would be a much higher bar to hit for impeachment than the Framers intended, and this change would move the impeachment section from being extremely difficult to implement to being essentially irrelevant, as securing a criminal conviction through this process may be impossible.

There is one other insidious problem with Trump's defence. 

By saying he can only be impeached if a crime has been proven, he is essentially conceding the point about the possible quid pro quo. In other words, if he had a defence to the charge that he tried to use his office to gain an advantage over a political opponent, surely he would reveal that defence now.... 

...but he didn't reveal that mystery defence for the simple reason that he doesn't have one.

By trying to rewrite constitutional law by way of his defence, and by essentially admitting that he abused his office in offering this non-defence defence, Trump is telling one and all what we already know - the man is unfit for office, and he always has been. 

But he cannot do this alone.  His Republican allies make his continued dismemberment of America's traditions and legal framework possible every single day. 

Every great nation may be fated to die a thousand deaths at the hands of its own citizens long before these nations are ever diminished by outside competitors and enemies.  

The USA that emerges from the Trump years will be unrecognizable to those of us who grew up admiring that great nation.

KAG KAG KAG!!