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Friday, June 23, 2017

Impeachment Steve Update

So far, the record is as follows:
  1. I plan to research Brazil's civil-military relations in April 2016, but impeachment happens so I can't talk to folks there.
  2. I do go to Brazil in May 2017 and as I finish research in Brasilia, the President is accused of bribing people who voted in last year's impeachment process (and it is on tape). Protests ensue.
  3. I plan to research South Korea's civil-military relations in June 2017, but go to Japan instead since South Korea is a mess after its impeachment process plays out.
  4. While in Japan, legislation is passed to allow the Emperor to abdicate.  Not impeachment but a change in the symbolic executive.

So, of course, my friends ask me to spend time in the US to, you know, facilitate Trump's impeachment.  Since I have visited the US on a regular basis, we can come to two possible conclusions:
  • My impact has been impressive, as we are only 150 or so days in, and we have had heaps and heaps of impeachment talk. See what progress we have made, with my visits to drop off/pick up my daughter at college and flying through on the way to other places and so forth!
or
  • The process only works if I do research in the US.  I have not done so yet as one of my collaborators on this project has written books on Congress and national security, so it makes little sense for me to do any of that case study. Still, Dave has agreed that the greater good means I should do some of the work, so maybe I will.  Probably not until 2018-19 since: 
  

Anyhow, don't be so impatient.  Spreading impeachment fairy dust takes time.

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