The U.S. Senate is getting ready to find President Trump innocent of the charges against him in the House articles of impeachment and all I can think of is a certain former governor of Massachusetts.
What will Mitt Romney, now a U.S. Senator from Utah, do when they call his name in the Senate roll call on impeachment this Wednesday?
I can't help but think that Mitt is giving some thought to the "White Horse Prophecy," which holds that one day the U.S. Constitution will be hanging by a thread and a member (or members) of The Church of Latter-day Saints (the "Saints") will save the nation.
The Saints officially keep the White Horse Prophecy at arms length. But I put stock in the recollection of one of Romney's distant relatives and fellow Saints, Judith Freeman, who pointed out that the prophecy "is something every child growing up in a Mormon household in the 1950s had drilled into their heads." [OPINION: Will Mitt Romney fulfill a Mormon 'prophecy' and save the Constitution?, Los Angeles Times, 10-19-2019.]
Switching gears, let's consider what one of Romney's Republican colleagues, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, said when explaining his vote with the Senate majority against calling witnesses and seeking additional evidence for Trump's Senate trial:
"The Senate reflects the country, and the country is as divided as it has been for a long time. For the Senate to tear up the ballots in this election and say President Trump couldn't be on it, the country probably wouldn't accept that. It would just pour gasoline on cultural fires that are burning out there.
"I think he (Trump) did something that was clearly inappropriate...it is inappropriate for the president to ask the leader of a foreign nation to investigate a leading political rival, which the president says he did. I think it is inappropriate at least in part to withhold aid to encourage that investigation. But that is not treason, that is not bribery, that is not a high crime and misdemeanor." [Alexander Says Convicting Trump Would 'Pour Gasoline on Cultural Fires,' New York Times, 1-31-20.]
That same article had this comment from Senator Ben Sasse, R-Nebraska: "Lamar (Alexander) speaks for lots and lots of us."
I don't see deep enough or far enough to know whether our Constitution is hanging by a thread but it sure seems like that sacred document, the rule-of-law foundation on which rests everything that is truly great about our country, is taking a beating.
On Wednesday, I hope that Romney (and other senators) will be as concerned about the vitality of our Constitution as Alexander claims to be about the state of our culture.
Wouldn't it be something if Romney climbed aboard that white horse and voted to convict the president of abuse of power and obstructing the Congress?
Back to Alexander...
No matter how judicious, deliberative and statesmanlike Alexander seems, I am skeptical. In the above-cited Times piece, he made it known, perhaps unintentionally, how large the specter of our state's senior U.S. senator looms in his mind.
"Whatever you think of his (Trump's) behavior," Alexander said, "with the terrific economy, with conservative judges, with fewer regulations, you add in there an inappropriate call with the president of Ukraine, and you decide if you prefer him or Elizabeth Warren."
NEWS FLASH: Washington, D.C., 2:00 PM, Feb. 5. Mitt Romney just announced that he will vote guilty later today on the first of two impeachment charges against the president. He said, "I believe that attempting to corrupt an election to maintain power is about as egregious an assault on the Constitution as can be made. And for that reason, it is a high crime and misdemeanor, and I have no choice under the oath that I took but to express that conclusion."
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