You, Sir, Are Such a Dire Threat to the Republic That You Shouldn’t Be Permitted to Run for Reelection, but Please Come Address Us at a Joint Session of Congress Next Tuesday

It’s my belief that there are all sorts of ways to hold a president accountable and signal congressional displeasure short of removal from office. One would be not inviting him to give his State of the Union address in the traditional setting in the U.S. Capitol with all its pomp and circumstance, but let him go do it someplace else. This would seem to be a relatively mild step, given it’s largely symbolic. Yet it is another sign of a lack of seriousness in the impeachment effort that Democrats invited Trump to take advantage of this majestic setting for what’s basically a campaign speech at the same time they were saying he had to be removed from office, or the republic and Constitution would fall. This makes no sense.