This week we will see the House Judiciary Committee complete its show trial. The vote on impeachment in this committee has been preordained from the minute it was taken up. Even though the American people, by an overwhelming margin, do not want this move taken, the rightwing ideologues on this committee are itching for blood and have the weapons to get some.

One of the problems is that this process has a momentum all its own. Once you start down the impeachment road, you can't turn back, there are no side trips, you have to vote on it. There are Republicans who would love to stop short of impeaching the President, but they don't know how.

Despite calls for censure as an alternative, there is very little enthusiasm for it on either side. The Republicans version would place the President in the stocks, condemning him as a lying, cheating, philanderer, a felon who demeans his office and the country by being in it. The Democrats are willing to agree to rapping him across the knuckles with a ruler and saying "Bad President, bad, bad President" -- the number of "bads" is open to negotiation.

Instead, the charade continues. First, Henry Hyde gets to chair this nonsense, which the media babblers hail as a wonderful thing, since he is fair and "moderate." There has never been anything fair or moderate about this man, as the Hyde Amendment, his legacy up until now, clearly demonstrates. The mean-spiritedness of that piece of legislation, combined by his nastiness during the debate, should have forever branded him for the extremist he is. Commentators like him though, because he's good for a quote and is always a gentleman to them, which is the key. Unfortunately, quotability, white hair, and a big gut don't really make you a statesman. His performance in these hearings has been ghastly, right to today's statement that the President's defense has to "prove he's innocent of the charges". This is a new view of American legal theory, but not inconsistent with the entire thrust of this nonsense. The committee vote is inevitable.

There are two curious things that trouble me as we proceed. Okay, there are more than two, but for now, let's look at two. First, the repeated fantasy that the President is the "chief law enforcement officer of the United States." Hyde even included that question in his 81 questions. Clinton's exceedingly polite dodging of that question is referred to as one of the "insults" which has the House Republicans so upset. All I want to know is where this title exists in the Constitution. When I was in school, the Attorney General had the law enforcement responsibilities. The Republicans ignore the specific language of the Constitution whenever it suits them. They interpret the "Commander-in-chief" clause in ways which have nothing to with its actual meaning, all the while blathering about "original intent" of the framers.

Which brings us to my second problem. Does anyone really believe the Founding Fathers intended for the serious act of impeachment to be carried out by a lame duck Congress? Sitting in judgement of the President will be not only retirees, but people whose viewpoint had already been rejected by their constituents. The Republicans are in a rush to get this vote taken by the House because in the next Congress, the one that takes office in a month, which will have the responsibility to actually try the President, they will have fewer votes. I question the constitutionality of this action. Of course, this rush to judgement has nothing to do with fairness, nor morality. It is designed to overturn the last two Presidential elections, no more, no less. Contemptuous of the will of the people, they will have their way. There may not be enough votes in the Senate to remove Bill Clinton, but they will embarrass him, come hell or high water. To make sure there is no challenge to this unconstitutional coup, Trent Lott will start the trial in the Senate before the session ends, ignoring the fact that two separate Senates will be hearing the evidence. Fairness is not their problem. They believe, as their mouthpiece, Rush Limbaugh has proclaimed since Clinton's victory in 1992, that America is being "held hostage." So they have dispensed with the concept of individual responsibility and decision. Tom "The Hammer" DeLay, Republican Whip, has rounded up the wandering cattle, the stampede is ready.

The prattling press will proclaim that Bill Clinton will forever be tainted by the disgrace of impeachment, whatever the result of the subsequent trial. When I was in school, Andrew Johnson's impeachment was considered a badge of honor, referred to as partisan act, its ultimate success prevented by one lone "profile in courage." Unless such men of independent thought arise in the House and prevent the circus, I suspect that posterity will view Clinton's impeachment the same way.

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