Remember when four Americans were killed in Syria in January, shortly after Trump announced a pull-out from the country.
The news has disappeared into the ether.
Like so many other things, let’s imagine if something like this happened when Obama was Presi -----—
Wait.
We don’t have to imagine it. We saw it back in 2012. It was called Benghazi.
Benghazi
Republicans immediately went after the Obama administration for every possible imagined scenario: A “stand-down” order delaying help; cuts in security; desertion by the embassy staff — all bogus. Eventually all the serious accusations were shot down and the only thing left was what Susan Rice said on TV after the attacks: The entire “scandal” was whether she incorrectly said the attack resulted from an anti-Muslim video instead of terrorism. Supposedly, the Obama administration said it was the video because admitting it was terrorism would make the administration appear to be weak on terror before the election. That's it. That’s the entire Benghazi “scandal.” And this served as the basis for 10 Congressional investigations.
But the mission was accomplished. Benghazi helped decide the 2016 election:
1. It led to discovery of HRC’s private email server and the media’s obsession with it, culminating in the devastating Comey Memo.
2. The Russian/GOP release of hacked emails muddied the difference between that and the private server issue. Many voters just knew Hillary = emails = bad.
3. Repetition of Benghazi! Benghazi! caused millions of voters to believe HRC had done something wrong concerning something called Benghazi — another layer to the false narrative that included emails and the Clinton Foundation. So it became Hillary=Benghazi!=Emails=Foundation=Very Bad.
Syria
Now let’s return to the Syrian deaths. Is there any doubt that if there was a Democratic President there would still be non-stop Fox News coverage consisting of imagined intentional and negligent screw-ups? Is there any doubt there would be multiple investigations in Congress?
Is there any doubt we’d be hearing Jeanine Pirro screeching: “By saying we were pulling out of Syria, this Democratic President left four Americans to die in a hellhole.”? Any doubt four committees would already be set up to investigate everything for months, whether or not there was anything to investigate?
Democrats will investigate what happened in Syria if it’s warranted. But they haven’t immediately amped up the scandals and accusations to 12, like the Republicans do for every Benghazi.
Should the Democrats have made Syria into Benghazi?
Definitely not. We don’t exploit the deaths of Americans solely for political gain.
And that’s the problem.
Asymmetric Politics
Republican willingness to lie, exaggerate and exploit without conscience creates Asymmetric Politics.
This is a corollary to “Both-sides” coverage, where every Republican excess must be balanced by something Democrats did, no matter how disproportionate or non-existent. And the further corollary is the right’s ability to spread false and misleading narratives into the mainstream through the “Wurlitzer” of Fox, Limbaugh et al. and social media.
This brings us to:
Impeachment
Speaker Pelosi has been widely praised for “taking impeachment off the table,” at least for the moment. The Morning Joe crew could not contain its enthusiasm for the Speaker’s “savvy” move. (You’ve got to question anything getting so much praise from that crowd of CW yes-people)
Others, like Greg Sargent, wrote, Nancy Pelosi just blew it on impeachment. Here's how to get it right.
I can see both points of view. But I am sure of one thing. If the parties were reversed, a Democrat would have been impeached at least a year ago. We know that because they impeached Bill Clinton less than a year after the fateful blow-job emerged. We’re pretty sure Hillary would have been impeached over emails within months.
Republicans don’t agonize over whether it would be bipartisan, or whether it would cause a backlash — In fact in 1999, they impeached Bill Clinton even after the likelihood of impeachment already caused a backlash in the 1998 midterms. And it may have helped put W Bush within Supreme Court-stealing-distance of the Presidency.
Of course there are pragmatic questions like:
- What happens after impeachment in the House?
- Can McConnell simply sit on it?
- If it goes forward, what’s the form — a trial with witnesses, or the 1999 model of statements from both sides? Will Mueller testify?
- Will an acquittal in the Senate vindicate Trump and help re-elect him?
- Or will it highlight his crimes and elect the Democrat?
But Republicans would not agonize over these questions, so whether to impeach is another example of asymmetric politics. And seeing it through that lens might make you come down on the pro-impeach side.
Unlike making Syria into Benghazi, impeachment is completely justified. Every day Trump remains President is an affront to decency, morality, and intelligence. He is acting at the direction of a Russian autocrat, endangering all of us by, e.g., abrogating the INF Treaty. Right now, he’s allowing Americans to fly in planes banned by half the world, while hobnobbing with the CEO of the plane’s maker.
Republicans invent “scandals.” Democrats don’t have to, but need to press the real ones as hard as they can.
They break the rules, but we must use the rules when they’re on our side.