One thing that has become appallingly clear is that without constitutional revisions, and I am not proposing any particular amendments at this time, there will never be a president of the United States removed from office by impeachment.

Three U.S. Presidents have been impeached, Johnson during Reconstruction, Clinton, and Trump. Nixon resigned and avoided his impeachment. This week Senator and former Presidential candidate Mitt Romney made history by becoming the first and only Senator to vote in the guilt phase of an impeachment for the removal of a president of his own party. It didn’t happen for Johnson and it did not happen for Clinton.

Johnson’s impeachment was a purely political affair and from a historical time that does not reflect modern political processes.

Clinton was impeached for committing perjury while under oath, an obstruction of justice. Granted he was set-up, granted the investigation that had started was about a real estate investment and allegation, ultimately unfounded, of fraud and not about his sexual activities, but when asked directly under oath he had a duty, and a legal and moral obligation to be truthful. A citizen was seeking justice and he obstr5ucted it. I was torn over that impeachment because he was guilty but it was also a political vendetta.

Trump quite clearly, quite blatantly, used the vast powers of the Presidency, endangering lives and the interests of the nations, for his own selfish gain. It was an abuse of power, of his office, and of the public trust. Trump’s actions are the very reason what the impeachment clause exists and yet only a single GOP Senator could find the courage to vote ‘guilty.’

The political pressure, prices, and incentives are now simply too powerful to expect senator to vote contrary to the interests of their party.

The greatest political failing of this nation’s founding father was the naïve assumption that the system would function would forming political parties. (Their greatest moral failing is of course slavery, an absolute evil.) The system is designed for power and ambition to check power and ambition, but it assumes that the combatants would be the branches, congress vs executive and not the organizations occupying those branches. The system was not designed for this and increased incentives and penalties of today’s radically polarized politics renders the federal government ungovernable.