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Democratic Decision | September 20, 1998
It is now fairly mainstream opinion that President Clinton should leave office. Over 125 newspapers, including The Atlanta Constitution, The Chicago Tribune and The San Jose Mercury News, have called for his resignation. Other papers, including The Boston Globe, have suggested he do so if his effectiveness is any further impaired.
These editorial views are echoed by religious leaders across the country, many of whom believe that Clinton's resignation is a moral imperative. Clinton's friends in the clergy are especially upset. The Revered Robert Schuller captured their sense of betrayal when he recounted how Clinton lied to him earlier this year: "He did it
with such passion and with his eyes locked on me...He's the third public man to do that - Nixon and Agnew lied to me, and now Clinton."
The fact remains, however, that the only people who can make Clinton resign are his fellow Democrats. Republicans, even if they were so inclined (which they are not), can impeach Clinton if they can convince enough Democrats to join them in so doing. But impeachment is a long process for which there is little public appetite. Why roll the rock up the hill if there's a possibility it might just roll back down and crush you? Why not just enjoy the present tactical advantage? A dead duck President Clinton is far more useful and appealing
to Republican strategists than a fresh start President Gore.
Only the Democratic Party can force Clinton to resign. They have ample reason to do just that. Their once realistic prospects for recapturing control of the House of Representatives have evaporated in the heat generated by Clinton's scandalous misconduct. Most experts now believe Democrats will lose 15-25 Congressional seats this November. Democrats may well lose five seats in the U.S. Senate on election day,
which would give the GOP a 60-40 "filibuster free" majority. Democrats may even see their gubernatorial numbers diminish, an almost impossible feat given that four years ago they lost virtually every gubernatorial contest that mattered.
Most menacingly, Democrats may lose up to 250 state legislative seats this fall, which when combined with the more than 400 seats lost in previous elections during Clinton's regime, would result in Republican
domination of the redistricting process that begins in the year 2001. If the Republicans hold onto the governor's office in California and seize control of both houses of the California legislature, then they will gain 5-6 Congressional seats from California redistricting alone. The country's best political analysts believe the GOP could gain as many as 20 seats from redistricting in the year 2002, if they hold their gubernatorial gains and continue their Sherman-like march through state legislative campaigns.
These facts are known to the Democratic leadership, but for some reason, the dam does not break.
The political question of the moment is: Why not? Why do all these Democrats - knowing to a virtual certainty what the cost will be - continue to support by their silence a president who is leading them to electoral disaster.
They don't need any more evidence of the president's misconduct. They know, in their heart of hearts, that the president perjured himself in both a federal civil case and a federal criminal investigation. They know, in their heart of hearts, that Filegate and Travelgate and Webb Hubbell and Whitewater and the campaign finance scandals are not the work of some "vast right-wing conspiracy" or a crazy special prosecutor, but the underhanded dealings of a dishonest man.
And yet they maintain radio silence, in the hope that the whole thing will somehow blow over. It is true that public opinion, as measured by telephone polls, is opposed to impeachment and resignation. But it is also true that almost 80 percent of white people in America, according to a New York Times survey, think the president's moral and ethical compass is dysfunctional. That number renders what remains of Clinton's presidency meaningless.
Congressional Democrats at least have the out that they must "weigh all the evidence" and "let the process work." Key Democratic constituencies have no such excuse. Feminists, whose hard work in the face of much derision made possible a whole new world of opportunities for women, now find themselves in the incredible position of defending behavior that they spent their adult lives decrying. Liberals, whose courageous work in the cause of civil rights changed the face of a great nation, now find themselves thinking up ever more elaborate
arguments in defense of a moral degenerate.
If Clinton is not forced to resign in the next few weeks, the 1998 mid-term elections will be nationalized and the question on the ballot (disguised in the form of candidate choices) will be: Is Clinton's behavior acceptable in a civil society? Republicans and conservative independents, energized by their disgust, will flood the polling
booths to answer in the negative. Democrats and more liberal independents, discouraged by recent developments, will be less likely to vote. An electoral blood bath looms if the Democratic Party remains
complicit in the crisis of the Clinton regime.
This column originally appeared in The Boston Globe
John Ellis Columnist, Fox News Online |
