Trump puts impeachment behind him

There are several ways of summing up the end of the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. The man himself says it was a victory not just for him but for the whole country. Ok, that's one end of the spectrum. The BBC this morning put it another way. Its news reader said the impeachment of Trump "had failed". That's a very BBC way of saying the president had not been impeached but without actually saying he had been acquitted. It's a bit like saying in a criminal court case when it comes to an end with an acquittal that the prosecution had failed to persuade the jury to return a guilty verdict. See the difference? It's subtle but there's an implied nuance in the words chosen, as if there is a certain disbelief that the alleged offender in the dock had not been sentenced to prison when everyone thought he was guilty as hell. Republicans say the president was acquitted full stop. In other words totally not guilty of the two alleged crimes the Democrats had thought up. But whatever the interpretation of the same result, the fact is the impeachment drama is over. Trump will claim it was a victory for the people all the way to November 3, election day, while the Democrats will presumably try to get it across to the voters that their president was actually guilty of abuse of power and high crimes and misdemeanours and only got off the two charges because he had scared Republican senators into aqcuitting him. It was after all a purely political trial in the end because the judge and jury were already signed up to side with the defence and ridicule the prosecution. It was a done deal even before Nancy Pelosi made her big decision to go for impeachment. Does she now regret it? I don't think so. Will the Democratic Party as a whole regret it, especially the leading candidates for the presidential nomination? We don't know yet but if Trumps bangs on relentlessly about his victory, then they might well regret the whole saga. But will the voters have a change of mind about Trump, Republicans or Democrats, when they come to decide who to elect in November? Will the stain of impeachment linger in their minds even though Trump was saved by Republican senators from an ignominious end to his presidency? I think it might do. Not the do-or-die Trumpers but the more moderate-minded Republicans. Could they possibly think, "Can we risk having this man as our president for another four years? Could there be another impeachment in his second term of office?" I believe it is just posssible. But if the Democratic alternative is Pete Buttigieg or Bernie Sanders, I suspect they will say to themselves, "Oh hell, let's risk another four years of Trump and hope for the best."