PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE: This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus use an image from my favorite sport, golf. Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and a private sector lobbyist. This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

There is a lot of talk in Washington, D.C. about prospects for impeaching President Donald Trump.

In fact, for Democrats, soon to be in charge of the U.S. House, it may be more than just talk. For Republicans, who knows, but it is important to add that Republicans in the U.S. Senate would have to vote to convict if the House chooses to indict. [See below for more on the impeachment process.]

Quickly, impeachment is a word not well understood these days. The bottom line is that it is essentially a synonym for indict. If the U.S. House of Representatives votes to move ahead on impeachment, it is to bring an indictment.

There will be some arguments against heading toward impeachment, especially with an uncertain outcome, not to mention the toll on the country. But, at the same time, some House members who will be in charge of the impeachment process, if there is one, appear to believe Trump’s alleged crimes are serious enough to warrant moving forward.

In a column in the Washington Post, Michael Gerson, one of the best writers going today, put it this way:

“As Mueller time approaches (a reference to the coming repot by special counsel Robert Mueller), it is likely that President Trump’s defense will consist of two phrases: ‘But that is not illegal’ and ‘But that is not impeachable.’

“It is a strategy that prevails by the lowering of standards. Because Trump did not plot election fraud directly with Russian President Vladimir Putin by Skype, and because Trump’s various crimes and misdemeanors do not constitute high crimes and misdemeanors, we should consider the president vindicated. Unable to make the case for his own virtues, Trump must aver that his vices are commonplace and inconsequential.”

Gerson continues using telling words:

“…When all this evidence is stitched together in a narrative — as Mueller’s report will certainly do — the sum will be greater than the sleaze of its parts. Russian intelligence officials invested in an innovative strategy to support the election of a corrupt U.S. businessman with suspicious ties to Russian oligarchs. The candidate and his campaign welcomed that intervention in public and private. And the whole scheme seems to have paid off for both sides.

“For the rest of us, the deal hasn’t worked out so well. A deeply compromised American administration has been unable to effectively counter a direct attack on our democratic institutions by a hostile foreign government — responding to a digital Pearl Harbor with a wink and a nod. ‘This is an existential constitutional crisis,’ says historian Jon Meacham, ‘because it’s quite possible that the president of the United States right now is a witting or at least partially witting agent of a foreign power.’

“Some of us are still too shocked to process this. The United States seems to have gone from zero to banana republic in no seconds flat. But whether this transformation has been illegal, it must be impeachable — or else impeachment has no meaning.”

Consider me shocked with many others in America – not newly shocked, but continuing to be shocked by the over-the-top conduct of the nation’s president.

And, to borrow Gerson’s excellent phrase, “the sum (of what Mueller reports) will be greater than the sleaze of its parts.”

Still, it is important to understand the ins and outs of the impeachment process, even though many of us observed the process when President Bill Clinton was impeached, but not convicted.

To gain some answers to questions, I reviewed a New York Times article that was written in mid-2017, but remains largely on point today.

What is impeachment? The Constitution permits Congress to remove presidents before their term is up if enough lawmakers vote to say that they committed “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Only three presidents have been subjected to impeachment proceedings. Two were impeached but acquitted and stayed in office: Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1998 and 1999. A third, Richard M. Nixon in 1974, resigned to avoid being impeached.

What is the process? First, the House of Representatives votes on one or more articles of impeachment. If at least one gets a majority vote, the president is impeached — which essentially means being indicted.

Next, the proceedings move to the Senate, which holds a trial overseen by the chief justice of the Supreme Court.

A team of lawmakers from the House, known as managers, play the role of prosecutors. The president has defense lawyers, and the Senate serves as the jury.

If at least two-thirds of the senators find the president guilty, he is removed, and the vice president takes over as president.

What are the rules? There are no standard rules. Rather, the Senate passes a resolution first laying out trial procedures.

“When the Senate decided what the rules were going to be for our trial, they really made them up as they went along,” avers Greg Craig, who helped defend Clinton in his impeachment proceeding and later served as White House counsel to President Barack Obama.

For example, Craig said, the initial rules in that case gave four days to the Republican managers to make a case for conviction, followed by four days for the president’s legal team to defend him — essentially opening statements. The Senate then decided whether to hear witnesses, and if so, whether it would be live or on videotape. Eventually, the Senate permitted each side to depose several witnesses by videotape.

What are the standards? The Constitution allows for the impeachment and removal of a president for “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” But no controlling authority serves as a check on how lawmakers choose to interpret that standard, which makes it as much a question of political will as of legal analysis.

In the case of Clinton’s trial, for example, Robert Byrd, a Democrat senator from West Virginia at the time, told his colleagues that he thought Clinton was clearly guilty of perjury, but that removing him from office was a bad idea.

“To drop the sword of Damocles now, given the bitter political partisanship surrounding this entire matter, would only serve to further undermine a public trust that is too much damaged already,” he said. “Therefore, I will reluctantly vote to acquit.”

What about the 25th Amendment? Adopted in 1967, the 25th Amendment provides another mechanism for removing a president. It is geared toward dealing with a president who becomes too disabled to carry out the duties of the office, as opposed to presidential law breaking.

Under its procedures, if the vice president and a majority of the cabinet tell Congress that the president is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office,” the vice president immediately becomes the acting president. If the president contests that finding, but two-thirds of both chambers of Congress side with the vice president, the vice president remains the acting president for the rest of the term.

After all this, my view is that Trump deserves to be impeached in the U.S. House and convicted in the U.S. Senate. With Michael Gerson, I say “the sum of what Trump has done will be greater than the sleaze of its parts.”  So, reasonable citizens — I include myself under that label — deserve to see impeachment and conviction.