It couldn’t be more obvious that the White House is using the threat of impeachment as a way to galvanize the Obama faithful to come out to the polls in November. With nothing positive to run on, Democrats have to rely on pathetic wedge issues like their #GOPWarOnWomen nonsense and the impeachment gambit which casts the first African American president in the role of victim in need of protection.
Over at NRO, Rich Lowry suggests Obama’s daring Republicans to impeach him with his ever increasing lawless behavior.
The White House may consider the unilateral amnesty a winning move on several different levels: it gets its policy goal; it satisfies an important part of its base; and if there is any serious move toward impeachment, it rallies the entirety of the Democratic base in a way we haven’t seen since 2008 and — assuming the politics of impeachment are bad for Republicans — drives the middle away from the GOP.
Because aside from Sarah Palin, no one’s been talking more about impeaching Obama than the Obama White House and Obama’s allies in Congress and the pro-Obama media.
And the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee raised $2.1 million over the weekend. Not a bad haul for a political party that has nothing positive to run on.
The press, of course, has been more than complicit in pushing this White House-approved narrative, quizzing Republicans on the issue every chance they get. Few – if any – Republicans are taking the bait.
In an appearance on Fox News Sunday, newly selected House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) was asked if he would take the option of impeaching the president “off the table.”
“The White House wants to talk about impeachment and they’re trying to fundraise off that, too,” Scalise replied. “The White House will do anything they can to change the topic away from the president’s failed agenda.”
In this answer, Scalise refused to remove a tool from Congress’s limited toolbox when it comes to reining in executive authority, but he also acknowledged how politically problematic impeachment would be for Republicans. The headlines which followed this appearance all ran in some fashion with the revelation that Scalise had refused to take impeachment off the table. Impeachment is imminent!
Even Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX), a House Republican known with a penchant for excessive rhetoric, thinks that pursuing impeachment would be foolish. Stockman told a conservative news site recently that Obama and his advisors are praying for the House to impeach the president “because his senior advisers believe that is the only chance the Democratic Party has to avoid a major electoral defeat.”
Surprisingly though, one of the talking heads at MSNBC managed to see through the ruse.
“Have you noticed this impeach Obama talk lately?” MSNBC’s Chris Hayes asked on Monday night. “Is it possible this is all a masterful stroke of Democrats running a false flag operation?”
Speaker Boehner did his best to answer that question with an unqualified “YES” on Tuesday.
“This whole talk about impeachment is coming from the president’s own staff,” Boehner said. “And coming from Democrats on Capitol Hill. Why? Because they are trying to rally their people to give money and to show up in this year’s election.”
“We have no plans to impeach the president,” Boehner added. “We have no future plans. Listen, it’s all a scam, started by Democrats at the White House.”
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