People need to stop listening to their ideological talking heads on television and seriously look at the facts regarding what is happening with President Trump’s impeachment.

The Republican talking points — calling the process unconstitutional and a brazen attempt to overturn the results of the 2016 election — are already factually weak, but they are downright ludicrous because of one pesky issue: Bill Clinton’s impeachment in 1998. Clinton was impeached for lying under oath about an extramarital affair with his intern. Trump is being impeached for withholding monetary aid to an ally in need to benefit his own political campaign. It doesn’t take a constitutional scholar to determine which of these two charges is more geopolitically severe.

People can say what Trump did was not an impeachable offense, but because the precedent of a modern impeachment trial has already been set with the overreaching charges against Clinton, Trump’s trial essentially has to happen. Anyone who supported Clinton’s impeachment needs to think the same for Trump or they are a hypocrite, plain and simple.

Furthermore, the Democrats fully cooperated with the investigation in 1998. They allowed witnesses to speak in the trial and provided all the documentation they were asked for. The Republicans are not allowing any of that to happen and that doesn’t help the case for Trump’s innocence.

Ken Starr’s impeachment investigation in 1998 cost the taxpayers more than $39 million. Now he is in support of Mitch McConnell trying to prevent a fair trial by withholding evidence and witnesses.

Wake up, America.

Eric Rohrbach, New Gloucester

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