Having watched a good part of the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment hearings, I begin to wonder just how stupid some of these politicians really think the American public is. I refer to those members of the Committee who also happen to be members of the Clintonian Stooge Party (yes, Virginia, I mean the Democrats). Nearly every argument I have seen made by the Democratic members of the Committee (and the obviously liberal lawyers who presented Clinton’s so-called Defense) was fallacious, patently untrue, or had the obvious purpose of misleading those of the public who might be watching and couldn’t follow all the finer points. Or, possibly, it was the old saw about telling a lie long enough and so many times that it becomes the truth. Sorry, Ms. Waters. Too bad, Jerrold Nadler, you corpulent, obnoxious, lying buffoon. You’ll have to find something else to get red in the face about, Mr. Wexler. No matter what blue-sky concept you try to throw at the rest of the Committee, the articles of impeachment have been passed (three at the time of this writing, and probably the fourth and final article will be approved tomorrow morning). You couldn’t mislead those of the Committee who realize the gravity of the situation and treat it as more than a schoolyard dispute.

I have heard that the president’s obvious lies and other activities (so obvious, in fact, that even most of the Democratic members of the Committee had made statements that they believed the president was lying at the time of the release of the Starr Report and repeatedly conceded that fact in the impeachment hearings) do not rise to the level of impeachable offenses; that the damage to the country caused by the impeachment proceedings would be far more extensive than if the President were to continue in office; that we need to be forgiving of a penitent man. Too bad he's not penitent. I have heard that the charges need to be made specific and limited in the House hearing, before there is any sort of trial (which, no matter how much the screaming Democrats want to proclaim it, is not a Constitutional requirement of the hearing in the House), that polls say that a majority of Americans don’t want Clinton removed from office (which is immaterial; the approval of the American public has nothing to do with a man being impeached for crimes against the state), and that lying under oath in a civil proceeding and/or grand jury is not perjury. And black is white, and pigs fly, and I’ve got this wonderful swampland in Florida I’d love to sell you if you buy that last argument.

I have heard cases and precedents cited, and then watched them promptly defeated by Republicans on the Committee. I have seen impassioned arguments in defense of the president, all adding up to nothing. I have seen Abbe Lowell make an absolute ass of himself on national televison, saying (on MS-NBC, I believe), and I quote: "Impeachment is not about the President’s conduct; it’s about Congress’ conduct." Funny, but every one of my government and political science professors taught me that impeachment is all about the President’s conduct. That fact should be self-evident, but there are times, especially when your mind is being numbed by a never-ending onslaught of ridiculous and misleading claims, when things like this must be made clear.

And, once again, there is only one group on the House Judiciary Committee which is interested in the defense of the Constitution, and that is the Republicans. The only thing any one of those Democrats is interested in is preserving what’s left of the Democratic Party’s dignity, at any cost, while simultaneously trying to drag down the Republican side with cries of partisanship. More schoolyard antics, yet Democrats don’t seem to realize that in order for there to be partisanship there need to be two sides. So who’s being partisan now? Democrats would never stoop to such depths, would they (except while they’re breathing)?

By the way, partisanship as self-defense doesn’t work as an excuse, either. Members of the House of Representatives took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. It seems that Democrats are far more interested in preserving the president than the Constitution. To complete the sin, they wrap themselves in the Constitution and say that to impeach the president would cause grave damage to the American system of government and to the Constitution itself. Yet they completely ignore the much more far-reaching damage that would be caused by letting Clinton get away with censure or some other namby-pamby, slap-on-the-wrist punishment, including a proposed fine to be paid, not by Clinton, but from the coffers of the Democratic National Committee.

The country will heal from an impeachment. That has been proven in the relatively recent past. It won’t recover from a tacit approval of continuous and meticulously planned attempts to lie, obstruct justice, warp and otherwise undermine the justice system, and use the power of the office of President of the United States in morally, ethically, and legally inappropriate ways. And it won’t heal from the message to our children that adultery and lying, or parsing of words to make a lie seem to be the truth, even under oath, are accepted.

Well, folks, if that’s his defense, it’s time to lock him up and throw away the key. Smoke and mirrors and legalistic-sounding solipsisms don’t cut it. Hairsplitting and applying inaccurate or inappropriate legal definitions aren’t going to make the grade. Clinton’s defense lawyers had better have something a lot more substantive than this at his trial in the Senate, because if they don’t, Senators will have no choice but to vote for his impeachment, or compromise their oaths, whatever their political affiliation. And make no mistake; there will be a trial unless Clinton resigns.

The Watcher (Democrats? The fairness cops? Ahahahahahahahahaha...)