Republicans remain afraid of accidentally handing the Democrats the 2024 election with a badly managed impeachment probe – but they shouldn\u2019t be, because their case is incredibly strong, journalist Ted Rall said.
US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) announced on Tuesday the\u00a0launching of an impeachment inquiry\u00a0into US President Joe Biden. The leading Republican said there were \u201cserious and credible allegations\u201d about Biden\u2019s conduct and the alleged \u201cculture of corruption\u201d surrounding the Biden family\u2019s foreign business dealings.
At the center of the issue is the president\u2019s son, Hunter Biden, long the subject of journalist investigations and Republican denunciations, and questions about Joe Biden\u2019s relationship to Hunter\u2019s business dealings, especially during Joe\u2019s time as US vice president and since he became president in 2021.
Republicans have for years promised to launch such an inquiry once they won a majority in the US House of Representatives again, but that majority was reached in early January following the November 2022 midterm elections. McCarthy became House speaker at that time after hammering out a nebulous set of promises with a pro-Trump faction of the House GOP Caucus – a faction that is increasingly upset with his performance.
Democrats have accused Republicans of giving in to the agenda of former US President Donald Trump, who was impeached in 2019 on accusations he abused his power by pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to reopen a probe into the Bidens, including claims that in 2016, then-VPOTUS Biden forced Kiev\u2019s prosecutor-general into closing a previous investigation of Hunter\u2019s business dealings in Ukraine.
Ted Rall, a syndicated editorial cartoonist, opinion columnist, graphic novelist, author, and co-host of\u00a0The Final Countdown,\u00a0told\u00a0Radio Sputnik\u2019s Political Misfits on Tuesday that while some elder GOP lawmakers are hesitant for the moment over fears they might accidentally help Biden\u2019s reputation ahead of the 2024 election, \u201cRepublicans will soon see that this is going to be to their advantage.\u201d
\u201cI think a lot of Republicans are suffering from Clinton Hangover Impeachment Syndrome. This didn’t go well for the Republicans in 1998, [former US President] Bill Clinton left office wildly popular, and they\u2019re worried that something similar could happen. The only thing is: it\u2019s not 1998, it\u2019s a different world now,\u201d he said, noting that when it came to Clinton\u2019s impeachment, the facts were clear.
\u201cHere, most liberal Democrats and many moderates – or, for that matter, everyone who\u2019s not a news junkie – doesn\u2019t really know or has been following the story of this Hunter Biden laptop, which has been carefully siloed as a new \u2018Benghazi malarkey\u2019 as Biden would say. But that\u2019s not true,\u201d Rall said.
\u201cBeyond what McCarthy may or may not want, as the inquiry proceeds, it\u2019s going to be impossible not to move forward with hearings simply because there are too many actionable facts.\u201d
\u201cThe call for impeachment, under the most basic definition of the term in the Constitution, which specifically references bribery – I think they\u2019re going to have to impeach him,\u201d Rall asserted. \u201cI think even the Republican senators are going to warm up to it and I think if all the facts are ultimately heard, President Biden\u2019s either going to have to cut a deal and promise not to run again, or perhaps resign, but we are at the beginning of this process,\u201d which he said \u201chas no place to go but \u2018down\u2019 for President Biden.\u201d
Rall noted there was \u201ca lot to get to the bottom\u201d of in the case.
\u201cIf my son sells me as a brand, then collects money by doing that, are you effectively bribing me? Especially if I\u2019m 80 years old and I care deeply about my son\u2019s finances and his ability to carry on after I\u2019m gone? That\u2019s a question I think hasn\u2019t been answered and I think we need to answer,\u201d he explained.
\u201cTransparency is good. We know money popped up in Joe\u2019s account that has never been explained, in terms of the origin. He declared it, he paid taxes on it, that\u2019s not an issue, but he never explained the origin of that money.\u201d
\u201cI\u2019m a little amused, frankly, as someone who is not sympathetic to Republicans and has never voted for a Republican, I absolutely cannot understand why they\u2019re such scaredy-cats about this. If I were them, I\u2019d be all over it,\u201d Rall said.
Rall noted that while he is \u201cpretty good\u201d at prognostication, it was \u201cimpossible to say\u201d how McCarthy\u2019s decision on impeachment would affect his political fate.
\u201cLook, he\u2019s one vote away from being removed as speaker by any member, so if it\u2019s not this it\u2019ll be something else. He was a \u2018dead man walking\u2019 the second he was sworn in as speaker, so in a way, does it really matter? Someone\u2019s going to be the speaker and whoever is the next speaker is going to have the same exact problem as he does. That\u2019s what\u2019s protecting him: he\u2019s got a job no one else wants because they all know if they get it, they\u2019ll get jacked up, too.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n