quote:

Mitt Romney is doing something nearly unheard of these days: He’s putting his country above his party. He’s voting his conscience when doing so comes at a cost. He’s not rationalizing weakness and timidity by prettying them up as virtues. He will vote to convict President Donald Trump, in an act of extraordinary political courage.

This decision would have negative ramifications for Romney in any era, but he faces particularly harsh consequences in this one, when political tribalism has never been more acute, when hating those who see things in politics differently than you do is fashionable, and when invective against perceived enemies is more emotionally powerful (and satisfying) then is affection for those you believe to be on your side.

We are living in the Era of Rage.

quote:

Mitt Romney didn’t want to go through with it.

“This has been the most difficult decision I have ever had to make in my life,” he told me yesterday afternoon in his Senate office. Roughly 24 hours later, Romney would deliver a speech announcing that he was voting to convict President Donald Trump on the first article of impeachment—abuse of power. For weeks, the senator from Utah had sat silently in the impeachment trial alongside his 99 colleagues, reviewing the evidence at night and praying for guidance. The gravity of the moment weighed on him, as did the pressure from members of his own party to acquit their leader. As his conscience tugged at him, he said, the exercise took on a spiritual dimension.

Romney, a devout member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, described to me the power of taking an oath before God: “It’s something which I take very seriously.” Throughout the trial, he said, he was guided by his father’s favorite verse of Mormon scripture: Search diligently, pray always, and be believing, and all things shall work together for your good. “I have gone through a process of very thorough analysis and searching, and I have prayed through this process,” he told me. “But I don’t pretend that God told me what to do.”

In the end, the evidence was inescapable. “The president did in fact pressure a foreign government to corrupt our election process,” Romney said. “And really, corrupting an election process in a democratic republic is about as abusive and egregious an act against the Constitution—and one's oath—that I can imagine. It's what autocrats do.”

According to Romney’s interpretation of Alexander Hamilton’s treatise on impeachment in “Federalist No. 65”—which he says he’s read “multiple, multiple times”—Trump’s attempts to enlist the Ukrainian president in interfering with the 2020 election clearly rose to the level of “high crimes and misdemeanors.” (He told me he would not vote to convict on the second article of impeachment, obstruction of Congress.)

quote:

Originally posted by Mikhailoh:
Clear minded meaning of course he agrees with you.

I have no issue with his vote and wish we could get back to those ethics. But he was the sole person I saw in this whole covfefe who was adhering to that.

quote:

Originally posted by Nina:

quote:

Originally posted by Mikhailoh:
Clear minded meaning of course he agrees with you.

I have no issue with his vote and wish we could get back to those ethics. But he was the sole person I saw in this whole covfefe who was adhering to that.

But wait--I thought you felt the impeachment hearings in the Senate were a farce, because Trump didn't do anything that was impeachable? If so, how can you praise him for adherence to ethical standards? Maybe I have you mistaken for someone else.

quote:

Originally posted by Mikhailoh:
Clear minded meaning of course he agrees with you.

quote:

Originally posted by wtg:
Romney's speech.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc7iHMUt8Y4

Text:

https://time.com/5778603/mitt-...speech-donald-trump/

quote:

Originally posted by CHAS:
A writer for the Atlantic used "then" for "than".
The world is going to hell for sure.

quote:

Originally posted by Mary Anna:

quote:

Originally posted by CHAS:
A writer for the Atlantic used "then" for "than".
The world is going to hell for sure.

It's worse than that. A writer for The Atlantic used "then" for "than" and an editor for The Atlantic then let it happen.

quote:

Originally posted by Mikhailoh:

quote:

Originally posted by Nina:

quote:

Originally posted by Mikhailoh:
Clear minded meaning of course he agrees with you.

I have no issue with his vote and wish we could get back to those ethics. But he was the sole person I saw in this whole covfefe who was adhering to that.

But wait--I thought you felt the impeachment hearings in the Senate were a farce, because Trump didn't do anything that was impeachable? If so, how can you praise him for adherence to ethical standards? Maybe I have you mistaken for someone else.

It's really very simple. This is what he believes. That it differs from what I believe is meaningless. He believes it and he took a very tough action that may cost him dearly in today’s sleazy political environment. That I respect him voting his conscience has nothing to do with agreeing with him. He might well be the only senator who did.