Why Impeachment is a Bad Political Move. Lanhee Chen talks to Armstrong & Getty

He's also something behind Sean's head director of Domestic Policy Studies and Lecture in the Public Policy Program at Stanford. Thank you for moving Sean, Lonie. How are you, sir? Hey, I'm doing fine. Guys, how are you good? It's always great to talk. So we're just playing a clip, playing a clip of Nancy and AOC not sounding like they were, you know, loaded for bear for impeachment. Certainly, while I'm sure it's certainly still on the table, they're not. We're

not going there yet. But what I want to ask you about is I keep hearing about the conventional wisdom that uh, impeaching Clinton hurt the Republicans and so it would be a bad idea for the Democrats, dude for Trump, and I just feel like there's no conventional wisdom that matters anymore. I mean, everything's gotten thrown out the window in the last several years with the conventional wisdom. Do you still hold to the the idea that would obviously

be a bad political move for the House to impeach Trump. Yeah, you know, I think the reason why it is a bad political move is not because of the conventional wisdom, but if because of who Trump is and what Trump is able to do with the platforms he has. All Right, It's not so much that impeachment and of itself would be of great benefit to the Democrats, would be a great benefits to the Republicans. It's just Trump would find

a way to take all of that energy and redirect it. Um. You know, He's like one of those forces in the universe that absorbs that energy and then spews it out in an opposite direction. And I just and I see that this would be a very predictably bad outcome to the Democrats, which is why, by the way, I think Matthew Pelosi is the only thing holding that that team together right now. There weren't for her and sort of

the way that she's thinking about this. They would they would have been well down the road on impeachment already, and I think politically it would harm them going into the next election side. Well, to your point, Lonnie, about taking energy and redirecting it, it is undeniable at this point. I don't care who you are and how you vote.

That the narrative Number one of why Trump is illegitimate or should not be president was the whole Russian collusion thing Lett turned out to be baseless, and so the president could easily say, all right, here's another effort to overturn the election, exactly exactly, and and you know it just it fits into the narrative that President Trump is out there and in part trying to uh to continue, which is that his opponents are willing to oppose him

at all costs, even if that means overturning the will of the people, the will of the people who supported him. And I do think that the other piece of this is that when some of these Democrats start to talk about impeachment, they get this look in their eyes, this sort of crazed look almost and and and it doesn't serve their party. Well, I don't think that's what the

American people want as an alternative. I don't think they want fire breathing opponents of the president who are willing to go to the match op post him at all costs. I think there will they want someone who's willing to point out when he's wrong or point out areas where he's not doing things well, but I don't think they

want someone who opposes him at every turn. Well for the crowd in the Democratic Party that does want impeachment, though, what is their thinking since they know they don't have the votes in the Senate, do they think they would change public opinion with the impeachment hearing somehow or well, I don't even understand what their strategy is. Well, there's

two measures of thinking I've heard about. One is exactly your point, which is this would be a saga played out on television that surely something negative would come out of impeachment proceedings that would hurt the president. It would be a spectacle that would finally allow them to be at the same bandwidth as the President in terms of the getting of information out there and the propagation of information.

So that that's one theory. The other theory goes to energy for the Democratic base that because there are many in the Democratic Party primary base, the sort of died in the world Democratic Party activists who want this to happen. If the Democratic Party in Congress does not do this, they're going to suck the lights out of the base and suck the energy out of the base and make them less motivated how to turn out to vote. I don't subscribe to that theory because I think the base, frankly,

the Democratic base hates Trump so much. I don't care what the Democrat in Congress do or don't do. They're gonna come out and vote against him. But but there is this theory about political mobilization which goes to the necessity of firing up your base, which, by the way, is why Trump continues talk about immigration and the issues that the Republican base cares about. I think in the same way that Democratic politicians are saying, Look, we know

our base cares about impeachment. That's we're going to keep talking about it. Lan he Chen as host of the podcast Crossing Lines with Lan heat Chen. Yeah, I see your point, although I think there still is some danger for the Democratic base in the same way that prior to Trump coming along the energy and the Republican Party I think was really on the decline, partly because the Republicans up and down the roster showed no interest in fiscal responsibility, which is one of the great causes of

the Republican base. And so yeah, I guess you have to keep throwing the breadcrumbs. But it's just it seems idiotic to me, the idea of uh impeaching him, especially now it's mid en We've got an election in the like an hour and a half. Yeah, exactly. Well, you know, the point about fiscal responsibility is really interesting because I think you're absolutely right that for many years that was a hallmark signature issue amongst Republicans and the Republican base.

I'm not so sure anymore. You know, I don't know that Republican voters care nearly as much about the fiscal condition of the country and fiscal responsibility the issues you're gonna make, you know, you know, I've I've been I've been crying for for years about this one. I mean, it's it's the reality though, of of what federal spending does, is that federal spending eventually sort of lures people in. And I think we've seen that happen on on many

many issues, and certainly with Republican base. Um, what's to come clear with the polling over the years is that fifcal responsibility does not test nearly as well as it used to. And I have to because uh, you know, people just don't care and so there's no party. So there's no party for that anymore. There's no constituency for wow. So you don't think, though you're a political scientist, is there any way there's a soft landing from this profligate spending.

We're well over twenty two trillion dollars in debt now or will it be exorbitant taxes and a choked economy that the more doomsday issue scenarios that people like me, you're constantly so you're cuts the Proah, yeah, well you know, I I really hope it doesn't go the way of higher taxes and choking off economic growth. By the way, one interesting thing to think about is this the Social

Security program. When the Social Security Program trust fund runs out of money, which will happen here, you know, within the next few decades. When that happens, it's not just the wealthy who get their benefits cut. Every single beneficiary on Social Security will have to get their benefits cut by an equivalent amount. I don't care if you make twenty dollars a year or you make two million dollars a year. The reality is that entitlement cuts are coming,

whether we like it or not. And that's why dealing with it now is the right answer. In terms of what it's gonna take, it's gonna take transformational leadership. I don't think it's something where you know, we we can scare people into it, as we've tried that. I don't think it's something where we can say, well, taxes are coming, because you know, we all know that's probably gonna happen if a Democrat gets elected. I don't think people are

really phazed by that. It's got to take a leader who's willing to stand up president I think, and say, look, this is some some here's some medicine. You're gonna have to have it. It It doesn't taste great, but we need it to keep the country on track. And that's the only thing that I think is going to change this.

And unfortunately, see anybody out there who's willing to have that message, Well, Alan he if you're asking me to run I accept your call I have, but I would I would warn your oppo research guys, they're gonna see some stuff that will shot. We're gonna have to start spinning immediately. Well it got it got no news coverage that Mitch McConnell got a bipartisan deal in the Senate to raise the dead ceiling and that whole thing. No

fight on that whatsoever. Yeah, I mean, you know that the issue with the death ceiling is is it's become For a while, there was a real political hoppotade. Remember back in two thousand thousand eleven during the fiscal fiscal cliff and the fiscal crisis. Now, I think everybody has agreed that this is sort of mutually assured destruction if

we don't raise the death ceiling. So they've tried to be politicize this, but at least it was a point of levels for something, not like there's just nobody cares anymore, no, I know. And and think back to when we have every we had that Bowl Simpson Commission, which was put together to come up with ideas, and they're like, hey, here's some ideas that both sides are gonna hate. And I said, wow, that's great. That's actually exactly what we need.

We need ideas that both sides are gonna hate, because that's the only way we solve this problem. And unfortunately we've come really far from that. It's only been nine years, eight eight or nine years since we had that commission, and I gotta say we are we are as far away from fiscal responsibility today as we've ever been. Wow. Well, that's fabulous. That is something ancient Rome calling, ancient Rome calling. Uh. Lana he Chen is the host of the podcast Crossing

Lines with lanh Chan. He's a big brain to the Hoover Institution, director of Domestic Policy Studies, and lecturer at Stanford. Lan He always enlightening. We enjoy it very much. Thanks for the time. Hey, thank you guys. And we'll have a link to lan He's podcast. You can find it quickly. Listen. You're tiring me out. You're like some guy who wants to rescind Louisiana purchase year cause your issue is so old and dumb. Nobody cares. I was just thinking we

should stop talking about it. I mean, if nobody cares about it, talking about it is not good for you know, ratings or listenership either, nobody. We're We're the fat guy. The doctor told him, look, you keep eating like that, you're gonna die. Whatever. I'm just going, We're not that guy. We're the dietitian crying outside his window is he hammers down chocolate cake by the fisto. We're saying, please, we love you, Mr America. We don't want you to kill yourself.

Stop it, so you know, to drop my sarcasm for the moment. Uh, and probably only for a moment. I just I feel like we owe it to the kids. I mean, your kids are young. I don't want them to row up, and I'm going to drain the blood of the young and live forever. So this concerns me as well. They're gonna wait, grow up the way Brits did whatever, like seventy years ago, where you just have to realize, oh, we're not going to be a dominant

world power anymore. That's over. It's entirely possible, and and the cuts to the there are going to be you think, you know, you hear these sob stories now about America's poor food insecurity. They got cable TV and a jet ski. Well, it's gonna be real poor when all these benefits are cut. Oh yeah, everybody's gonna say what happened? I help him around to yell at you are strong and getty