r/politics • u/RB_Reich Robert Reich • Sep 26 '19

Let’s talk about impeachment! I'm Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor, author, professor, and co-founder of Inequality Media. AMA. AMA-Finished

I'm Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor for President Clinton and Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. I also co-founded Inequality Media in 2014.

Earlier this year, we made a video on the impeachment process: The Impeachment Process Explained

Please have a look and subscribe to our channel for weekly videos. (My colleagues are telling me I should say, “Smash that subscribe button,” but that sounds rather violent to me.)

Let’s talk about impeachment, the primaries, or anything else you want to discuss.

Proof: https://i.imgur.com/tiGP0tL.jpg

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u/BernieThrowaway_ Sep 26 '19

How do you think news of Trump's looming impeachment will affect the Democratic Primaries? Will Democrats who were more solidly in favor of impeachment get a boost, as if their messanging is being vindicated, or will it help those who were previously anti-impeachment, due to them getting the opportunity to change messaging? Also, do you think Democrats who previously didn't support it will come out of the woodwork strongly in favor of it, causing a feeding frenzy of sorts? How will this affect proceedings?

Thanks for the AMA, really excited to see the coming months. Thank you for your efforts in regards to pushing for this as well.

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u/RB_Reich Robert Reich Sep 26 '19

At this point, hard to tell, but my guess is that it helps Democrats because so many activists and likely voters say to themselves "finally, the Dems are standing up to this tyrant."

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u/dreamedifice Sep 26 '19

My thoughts too! Every time people talk about how impeachment may energize the GOP base, they forget how much a lack of impeachment de -energizes the Dem base.

About half the Democrats I know have been furious at the party at least since Helsinki that the Dems haven’t begun impeachment.

This outrage taints the whole party, down ballot too. Many people I know have given up on the party, and consider them meek, devoid of principle, useless, etc.

This move will help the Democratic base much more than it helps the GOP base.

The GOP will use a lack of conviction by the Senate as proof of innocence. But they also used a lack of impeachment attempt as proof of innocence (even more so).

All I think is that it’s time to do what is right, and not worry about the politics or the outcome. Hell, the GOP tried to repeal the ACA 60-some times. Doomed, but their base demanded it. Would their base have tolerated them not doing it? It’s time that Democrats did something for Democrats and stopped worrying about the hypothetical swing voters. This is not the Clinton impeachment. There is very troubling criminal behavior. Give people some credit, the public may side with the impeachment.

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u/Pylgrim Sep 27 '19

Every time people talk about how impeachment may energize the GOP base, they forget how much a lack of impeachment de -energizes the Dem base.

Thank you so much for putting it so succinctly.