No one can trust the outcome of the next presidential election. Now is the time for impeachment.

Many Democratic Party leaders continue to say they would prefer to wait for the next election, to let the voters oust President Donald Trump in 2020.

OPINION

Why would anyone believe that Trump would allow himself to be fired by American voters? What evidence is there over the past three years, or the course of his professional career, that suggests he would play by the rules?

Why would anyone who has read the Mueller report, or Trump’s tweets, or listened to the president’s former personal lawyer and co-workers, believe he would voluntarily step aside following an election to face possible criminal prosecution in federal and state courts?

How can anyone state without misgivings that Trump would not subvert the election process to protect his son, daughter and son-in-law?

Democrats, like much of America, seem to minimize the impact of Russian interference in the U.S. presidential election in 2016. But the evidence is abundant that it was a substantial effort and that the Russians are poised once again to interfere in the 2020 U.S. election campaign.

Having seen the impact of Russia’s espionage effort, China and North Korea are likely to engage in similar tactics.

Trump, while declaring there is a national emergency on the southern border, has done almost nothing to focus this country’s attention on foreign interference in our elections.

Yet, every one of our intelligence agencies has indicated that these attacks on our election system are an imminent threat. They have certainly undermined confidence in the election process.

Our president, of course, has said that the intelligence agencies cannot be trusted and may be involved in a conspiracy to undermine his administration.

That is why now is the time for Congress to address all of these issues in public hearings, to explain to the American people why this president is dangerous and begin the impeachment process.

There is evidence that Trump obstructed justice. Congress alone was given the power to stop an outlaw president from co-opting government for financial and personal gain.

That was not and is not the job of a special prosecutor or even the Department of Justice.

Yet, instead of accepting their responsibility, instead of heeding their oath of office to uphold the Constitution, many Democratic Party leaders would like to avoid a confrontation. They suggest impeachment is simply bad politics. It could cost them their seats in Congress.

They hide behind members of the Republican Party, who decided long ago that their allegiance is to the president and not their country. If the Senate Republicans are not going to vote for impeachment, say the Democrats, we shouldn’t take the risk of doing what we know is right.

There is such a putrid smell surrounding our nation’s capital, such a rank odor, that it should come as no shock the stench is emanating from the rotting corpse of American democracy.

Perhaps, this was inevitable. Never in human history has so much power, so much responsibility, been invested in the peasants.

The U.S. House of Representatives was created to be their house, their check on any president who thought himself above the law.

This is the sort of crisis our Founding Fathers envisioned. Trump is the sort of egomaniac they feared. He is the kind of president who would urge his subordinates to violate the law so as to carry out his orders.

Congress must act now. This president has already invented a national crisis for political gain, lied repeatedly to the American people, and appointed an attorney general whose sole loyalty is to the White House. And Trump has warned his supporters many times that the election process is rigged against Republicans and cannot be trusted.

Take the man at his word. He has no respect for tradition. He does not believe in a United States. He would invent a crisis to win re-election.

Waiting for the 2020 election is dangerous. It might even prove fatal.

Email: philkadner@gmail.com

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