By Walt Zlotow
Some are calling for the Trump cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office for committing war crimes in Iran and lurching the world economy to ruin. Alas, the section of the 25th allowing the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet to declare the president incapacitated to involuntarily remove him under the Constitution, does not apply when that Cabinet and Republican Congress enabled his criminal war that now requires his removal.
What to do? Simple, channel Senator Barry Goldwater. On August 7, 1974 Sen. Goldwater, joined by Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott and House Minority Leader John Rhodes, requested and got a meeting with Watergate beleaguered President Richard Nixon. They told him he was going to be impeached, only had support of 10 to 15 Republican senators and would surely be removed from office. To whit… fall on your sword and resign. Next day Nixon resigned.
It took an esteemed conservative Republican and two GOP leaders to persuade Nixon to resign, something he publicly said was against every fibre of his being.
Goldwater’s successful gambit removing Nixon from office had no importance beyond the simple political need of Republicans to end the Watergate scandal and continue in power under squeaky clean Gerald Ford.
The stakes 52 years later are monumentally more critical. A clearly degraded President Trump unilaterally launched a criminal war of aggression on Iran. Within three days the war was lost for two reasons. First, instead of heeding Trump’s edict for Iranians to depose their government on behalf of the US and Israel, the Iranian people rallied to their government’s existential defense. Second, knowing the US and Israel would attack, Iran prepared a missile defense that is destroying US military assets in the region and destroying Israel itself.
Even worse for Trump and the world, Iran shut down the Strait of Hormuz, cutting off a fifth of the world’s oil supply. The unfolding economic decline worldwide will be enormous and unstoppable unless Trump ends his failed, criminal war and settles on Iran’s sensible terms.
Since Trump will never admit defeat to save thousands of lives and a worldwide economic meltdown, a select group from his Cabinet and GOP Congress must remove him from office. Since the 25th Amendment is technically unavailable, they must invoke the Goldwater option. Pay him a visit and request his voluntary resignation. When Trump as expected refuses, tell him they will go public with their demand. If he refuses again, they must employ the nuclear option, shut down the Cabinet and shut down Congress till he resigns.
Should Trump refuse a third time, the Cabinet will likely have enough deranged behavior to constitutionally invoke the 25 Amendment based on Trump’s mental incapacity – representing a clear and present danger to America, indeed the world.
The Cabinet and GOP Congress must not waste a single day invoking the Goldwater option to prevent further war crimes and worldwide economic calamity.
And if Goldwater were around today to observe the proceedings, he’d smile and say ‘Nice work, boys, glad I could show you the way.
Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition
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Donnie can’t and won’t step down because of his almost pathological fear of weakness, loss of strength and a diminution of him being a manly man strongman. Roy Cohn taught him well and helped bring out the crazed sociopath that was lurking in his mind:
https://ideas.bkconnection.com/the-five-lessons-roy-cohn-taught-donald-trump-that-guide-him-to-this-day
Much as I admire the sentiments expressed here I can’t see this scenario playing out. Trump will never resign, his ego won’t allow it. There are no republicans of sufficient stature willing to make such an approach. Even if such people could be identified they won’t do it because they know there are still enough deranged MAGA supporters that an insurrection would almost certainly ensue with the potential for those involved to be assassinated by MAGA lynch mobs. Even if the leaders of the rest of the world, excluding those who like what he’s doing, were to actually seriously call him out, he would ignore them. I believe the only hope is that Iran swats the US and Israel so hard there are genuine public uprisings, or Trump has a heart attack.
Sadly, the preferred ”voluntary resignation” is most unlikely while the suggested strategy of shutting down Cabinet & Congress would only play into his desire to become the King of the USA (Undemocratic States of Apartheid) introduced by Presidential edict under some constructed subterfuge.
Trump appears poxed, possibly tertiary syphilis saturated, is mad, rotten, evil, malicious, filthy and uncivilised. And “they” voted for this crock of shit, the USA right, dumb, under educated, simple supremacist blobs.
Sounds like a plan Walt!
Agree, it’s not going to happen as there is something wrong with ageing white US elites, not just hanging around too long, but propensity for Christian &/or conspiracy beliefs and servitude to authority….