The impeachment howitzer: The new normal

Lindsey Graham: Impeach Joe Biden

Salon writes on potential upcoming festivities in Washington in an article entitled, Joe Biden will be impeached — because Democrats have forgotten how to fight:

In 2015, I publicly warned that Donald Trump would win the 2016 presidential election. My prediction was dismissed as "crazy" and "hysterical."

We were again slurred as suffering from "Trump derangement syndrome" and exaggerating the dangers that Trump and his regime represented to American democracy and society, somehow for our own personal gain. The political class and the hope-peddlers kept on insisting that the "institutions" were "strong" and that the "rule of law" would shut down Trump and his fascist movement if they went too far.

Once again, our warnings were proven correct. If anything, those who repeatedly sounded the alarm about the existential danger that Donald Trump and his movement represent were too careful and restrained.

Pro-democracy voices and other patriots repeatedly warned that Trump would attempt a coup in order to remain in power. Again, the professional smart people and others invested in "normalcy" dismissed such warnings. In their collective mind, because America was a "democracy" that had always seen an orderly transfer of power between administrations, it would always remain so. On Jan. 6 of this year, they and the world learned that fictions and fables of American exceptionalism offer no real protection against the rising tide of neofascism. Some eight months later, the Trump movement's coup against democracy continues.

Democrats have been unable to marshal an adequate defense, and are at dire risk of being routed without even putting up a fight. Which leads to one more warning and prediction. The Trump-controlled Republican Party will in all likelihood impeach President Joe Biden if they win control of the House of Representatives in the 2022 midterm elections. They will not be able to convict Biden in the Senate and remove him from office — just as Democrats were unable to convict Trump — but that's largely beside the point. 

There are many conditional qualifiers to that prediction, but given the Republican Party's escalating embrace of fascism, Biden's impeachment is more likely than not.

What I possess, however, is a willingness to accept the evidence and what it reveals about the health of American democracy. I am also not hobbled by a faith in American exceptionalism or a belief that democracy is inherent to this country and will endure forever. I am also not so naïve as to believe that America's democratic experiment is destined to end positively — in reality, America's multiracial democracy is very much a work in progress.[1]

As evidence of the possibility of an impeachment, the author cites the fact that in the closed epistemology of far right internet blither and lies, it is already taken for granted that Biden will be impeached. Also cited is the argument that there won't be significant consequences if the fascist Republican Party (FRP) does take the House in the upcoming, likely rigged and fraudulent election of 2022 and then impeaches Biden. The FRP base will roar in approval! 

The author also points out that decades of FRP propaganda and disinformation have convinced most rank and file Republicans and other conservatives that the Democratic Party is illegitimate and does not reflect real American values. That rings true. The rhetoric from the right for at least the last 20 years has been mostly (~95% ?) rage and hate tinged with a lot of fear, horror and smug, self-righteous fundamentalist Christian moral judgment. Elitist radical right Christian nationalist moral judgments against Democrats comes across loud, clear and undeniable. It is driven by raw lust for revenge for imagined horrors such as the terrible, terrible persecution of Christians at the hands of evil, socialist, cannibal pedophile Democrats. 

According to current Christian nationalist mythology, humble, innocent Christians in America are now severely persecuted for merely wanting to worship their God as they are commanded by their morally righteous elites. That God demands revenge good and hard. Impeaching Biden would be a nice gesture on the long road to Christianizing America by imposing Christian Sharia and resetting the governmental, social and economic clock to ~1850 or thereabouts.

There probably will be an impeachment of Biden (~75% chance?) if the House flips back to FRP control after the rigged elections. Impeached for what? That doesn't matter. Just impeach him. Use the final withdrawal from Afghanistan as the excuse. Impeach him for criticizing the use of horse medicine to treat COVID. Just use whatever excuse that looks at least remotely plausible to the rabid FRP base.

Questions: Is it more likely than not that if the FRP gains control of the House, they will impeach Biden? Is Lyin' Donnie (the ex-president) really the leader of an American fascist movement as the author shockingly claims?

Footnote: 

1. The Salon article also includes these light-hearted thoughts for consideration:

Gregory Wallance writes at The Hill that "a remarkably broad range of Republicans," from Marjorie Taylor Greene to Lindsey Graham, "are turning the Constitution's impeachment clause into a negative branding howitzer aimed at the White House":

Under total war rules, it's irrelevant that Biden did not commit an impeachable offense, unlike Trump, who committed two, ....

Yes, under total war rules, neither truth nor democracy matters. Winning matters.