By Charlie Johnston

Contemplating this article, there were several marvelous titles that came to mind.

It could have been the Seinfeld Impeachment. As you remember, Seinfeld was famously called a show about nothing – sort of like this impeachment, where the only actual fact witness the Democrats could come up with said that Trump said he wanted nothing from Ukraine.

It could have been the Emily Litella Impeachment. Litella was an easily confused, hard of hearing character played by the late Gilda Radner on Saturday Night Live in the late 70’s and early 80’s when the show was routinely good. She would constantly go off on a rant about something she misunderstood – and when gently corrected, say, “Never mind” – kind of like Nancy Pelosi after her Democrats passed impeachment articles. Radner was much more entertaining, though.

My favorite potential title was the Flying Monkeys Impeachment. Alas, the site, The Conservative Treehouse beat me to it. I have long suspected that if someone tossed a glass of water on Nancy Pelosi, she would start melting. I sadly dropped the title but kept the accompanying picture atop this article.

I just went with The Pyrrhic Impeachment, for this is the latest of a series of events led by Democrats, the legacy media, and deep state bureaucrats these last few years that could culminate in their utter destruction.

Since September, I have been doing a bit of a deep dive into various election results across the country since (and including) the 2018 mid-terms. We are going through some volcanic shifts in allegiances right now. Much of the material is counter-intuitive and can seem contradictory until you dive very deep.

The suburbs have collapsed for Republicans (or at least what was once a GOP stronghold now tilts firmly Democrat). Everyone has their pet theory on it, but I have seen precious little hard data or focus groups that really explain it. Some had thought the shift was due to people fleeing blue states for red ones and then voting for the same things that had despoiled the states they fled. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has polling that shows that contrary to this trope, those who have moved to his state from a liberal one are actually even more conservative than Texans – that they know very well what tanked their state and are, in effect, conservative refugees like the old diaspora from Communist countries who are more conservative and American than native American citizens.

When I first saw election night results in 2018, I immediately thought of fraud – because they were almost a complete flip-flop from what they had traditionally been in the Texas suburbs I was most closely monitoring. That would happen if Democrat votes were counted as Republican and vice-versa. I quickly dropped that line of thought when I saw that it had happened in all suburban jurisdictions. Each county does an independent count – and it would take a massive conspiracy to create such a reversal in so many different jurisdictions. As I saw over the next week that the phenomenon was nationwide, I dismissed it entirely. Lazy operatives love to claim they were robbed, so I am not much given to that in the absence of hard, compelling evidence. I am re-thinking that now. Russ Ramsland, a voter fraud and election specialist, commissioned a detailed forensic investigation into cyber fraud in voting machines. He found that in many machines, security protections were intentionally disabled and source codes and passwords were widely distributed. If the results hold up to examination, this is staggering news. This is a way where, across the entire country, the suburbs could seem to be flipped without them having actually voted differently than usual. I remain dubious of this explanation, but I pray a serious investigation is done by the Dept. of Justice – and that these problems are fixed. It certainly is not unprecedented. The late Milton Rakove described, in his books, how Chicago voting machines in many precincts in the 60’s were set to record four out every five Republican votes cast as Democrat votes. All my life, I have been an advocate for paper ballots for, though the counting is slower, fraud is made much harder. Disabling security protections and widely distributing source codes would allow a few hackers to reverse vote counts nationally. The only restraining factor would be, to do it in real time without easy detection, they would have to carefully choose which areas to set automatic reversals: choosing a traditionally Democrat area would make it appear to have spontaneously changed to Republican. That being said, I have to rely on law enforcement and political parties to act on this, while I just work with the system and data we have. If I were a Republican State Party Chairman, I would be rallying my colleagues into a cry to the Atty. Gen.’s office to take this seriously and confirm or refute it – and call for a moratorium on any but paper ballots in my state until the issue is resolved.

I have my own theories about the suburban collapse. Like everyone else, though, so far they are only theories. It needs to be taken very seriously, for complacency could cause it to become a long-term reality.

Meantime, minorities are moving strongly away from Democrats. I don’t base this just on polling – but on results of elections since the 2018 General Election. In several districts I surveyed, Republicans were saved NOT by the suburbs that had once been strongholds, but by unexpectedly strong showings in counties (and a few cases, townships) that were heavily minority. That shift is real, as well. Meantime, I am getting the first whiffs that American Jews are starting to shift away from the party that hates them and Israel. So far, that is entirely from polling, supplemented by intense anecdotal cries. So I can’t reliably say whether it is real or wishful thinking yet, but I am paying attention now.

While there were significant (though not overwhelming) Republican losses last year, when you drill down, you find that almost all of those losses came from either left-wing or timid Republicans. This could be because most were in the suburbs (though the falloff even there was not nearly so bad for full-throated, unapologetic conservatives.) In deep-red Louisiana, a relatively conservative Democratic Governor who has led as a genuine centrist was able to hold on to his seat despite a solid Republican challenge. Though you would never know it to listen to the idiot media, conservative Kentucky got significantly redder this last election – even as its erratic Republican governor, Matt Bevin, was turned out by a razor-thin margin. (Bevin was the singular most unpopular governor in the country). As the legislative seats in Kentucky got redder, the media acted as if his loss reflected the base Republican vote in the state. If it weren’t for deceptive, superficial analysis, the legacy media could provide no analysis at all.

A decade ago, the bulk of the Republican establishment mainly wanted to get the best seats at the surrender ceremony after Democrats slashed them. In the last three years, many Republicans have sought to sue for peace with the Democrats as the latter tore through like Atilla the Hun – and with all the same fair-mindedness. I thought the Kavanaugh hearings would send a wave of disgust through the electorate , benefitting Republicans last year. It probably did minimize the national losses, but it was not a turning point for voters. Some studies have shown that it is easier to get people to change their religious affiliation than it is to get them to change their political affiliation.

I think the Democrats have given Republicans a great gift with their antics of the last year IF Republicans press their case with vigor and fortitude. Fortunately, the Democrats take-no-prisoners insane behavior has persuaded more GOP officeholders than I have ever seen that there is no negotiating with this crowd. They can only be beaten or surrendered to. So perhaps for only the second time in my lifetime, Republican officials enter campaign season with the right mindset.

Voters, shaken by the intemperate radicalism of the left, just want some semblance of normalcy – of old-time traditional Americanism. Over in England, early this year, Boris Johnson won a very narrow majority in Parliament. It was so narrow he could not get Brexit (or much of anything else) done. It was not much different than the narrow divide in England for the last five years. The left thought that if it just doubled down on the screaming, it was sure to win the spot elections last week. Instead, voters shifted en masse in repulsion at the European left’s radicalism and condescending paternalism, giving Johnson one of the two biggest landslides recorded in England in the last century. Large numbers of the working class abandoned the leftis Labour Party and voted, for the first time in their lives, for the conservative Tories. We have an analogous situation going on here in America. All the Democratic presidential candidates indirectly support higher unemployment by insisting on a “green” economy. At the last Democratic debate, Joe Biden made it overt, promising he would go “green” even if it cost hundreds of thousands of middle-class workers their jobs.

I have come to think this otherwise senseless impeachment, with no crimes and no evidence, makes no sense except as a distraction and a laying of groundwork to argue that the shock and awe that will begin mid-January from Atty. Gen. William Barr and Federal Prosecutor John Durham is just political payback. The problem for the Dems is that their own voters have started regarding both them and their media toadies much more skeptically – and the investigation into corruption at the Intelligence Agencies, FBI, Justice Dept. and State Dept. has something impeachment never has had – a mountain of solid (you might say unimpeachable) evidence behind it. Meantime, watch for indictments of Planned Parenthood to drop in the first quarter of 2020 AND the surprise revelation of Grand Jury investigations into judicial corruption to drop in early summer.

I have been working on a comprehensive election approach for Republicans. Ideally, Republicans would nationalize the elections, as Newt Gingrich did successfully in 1994. Even if they don’t, the approach I have almost finished will work well for all who adopt it. I was going to give a detailed summary next week, but Christmas is not the time to do that. Instead, I will run a piece on the relationship between Jesus and Mary that a reader from New Jersey intriguingly suggested to me.

Basically, this is the “faith, family and freedom” election. Emphasize that Republicans support an opportunity society – a return to normalcy. Candidates need not scream – in fact, they should not (though a Jim Jordan-style boldness or a Matt Gaetz-style humorous but steady resolve is a plus). Republicans’ instinct is to play it safe, to back off of even their supposedly strongest principles if the radicals or the media screams at them. Most of those “play it safe” Republicans will get wiped out this time. Showing firmness under fire is the indispensable quality of the successful GOP candidate this time around. In fact, their strategy should be to state boldly and calmly things that were universal verities just a decade ago – and then not waver when the hair-triggered left starts screaming. Voters want neither screamers nor timid appeasers this time. A Republican who, like Justin Amash, (the former GOP Congressman who became an independent Never-Trumper), tries to cozy up to the New York Times, will lose his base, the Democrats will still hate him, and after saying enough nice things about him to keep him on the leash, The Times will drop him. The day after election, such candidates will have to make the walk of shame – and the Times will never call them back, having got what it wanted out of them.

In 1812, The French Emperor and General Napoleon marched into Russia with an army of half a million – then the largest ever seen in Europe. He sliced through the heart of Russia with little resistance, thinking he would make a triumphant entry into Moscow. Instead, Muscovites abandoned – and burned – the city, seeking to deprive the French Emperor of any supplies. Trapped by his own hubris and bereft of basic supplies, Napoleon began a humiliating retreat – with a Russian winter coming on quickly. The Russian Army which had heretofore retreated so meekly, suddenly became aggressive, filled with a terrible resolve. Only one out of every five French soldiers survived that terrifying, deadly and disastrous retreat.

The Democrats and the media have given Republicans an historic opportunity. If the GOP takes it, impeachment will be the left’s March on Moscow.