New Year Dissolution

It’s the dawning of a new year. So let me respectfully and warmly send you my best regards. I wish you lean muscles New Year Resolutionin your body and fatty pork in your bank account. For the younger readers, I wish you guidance in your winding path toward a successful life, and all the cutting edge gadgets you need to get there. If you’ve made new year resolutions, I hope you fulfill them before Year 2018 discards them for you.

As for myself, I am dreaming a new year … dissolution — the dissolution of the Trump presidency. What, do I have bats in my belfry? Probably. But the word of operation is “dream.” So indulge me in this reverie.

According to Section 4 of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, there is a way to get rid of a president who proves himself unbecoming of one:

Section 4. Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

Would the new vice president do that? The leaders of both Houses of Congress, department heads too? Chances are close to zero, of course. But, Mr. Dunno Trump, be forewarned, you can be evicted from that big white house if you tick off too many American citizens, and too many of your own cronies. The mechanism is clearly laid out in the supreme law of the land. I know this is unchartered territory. The United States has never proactively “fired” a president. In recent history, the closest scenario was the resignation of Richard Nixon, but technically he was not “terminated.”

I don’t expect this writing to reach anybody who’s politically important. Neither do I expect it to catch the media’s attention. Had my face been pretty like Megyn’s, and my last name Kelly, Trump might take notice and tweet me back at 3 in the morning, but I’m not her.

What I hope would happen is this. Roughly half of my readers (who presumably voted for Trump) would not like what I just said. That’s OK. I welcome your comments as long as the English does not have a locker room accent to it. I promise I’ll reprint it. Let us agree to disagree.

*** The End ***

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