Impeachment

The impeachment inquiry

by Dave

CNN has done an excellent job exposing the false statements made against Joe Biden at the impeachment inquiry hearing today. It is important to remember that Hunter Biden and business associates are not on trial. See link to their article.

In fact, the Chairman of the Oversight committee, Rep James Comer, began with a highly misleading statement. Republican Rep. James Comer, in his opening statement how “the Bidens and their associates created over 20 shell companies” and “raked in over $20 million between 2014 and 2019.” The phrase “the Bidens and their associates” obscures the fact that there is no public evidence to date that President Joe Biden himself received any of this money. And it’s worth noting that a large chunk of the money went to the “associates” – Hunter Biden’s business partners – not even Biden’s family itself.

Nancy Mace made the allegation of that as a known fact, Joe Biden received a bribe from Burisma. Per CNN: The claim about a bribe from Burisma is a completely unproven allegation. The FBI informant who relayed the claim to the FBI in 2020 was merely reporting something he said he had been told by Burisma’s chief executive.

The rest of the false or misleading statements are discussed in the CNN link. I think on this first day of hearings, the Chairman and others have destroyed their credibility with a series of false statements. Representatives Jim Jordan, Nancy Mace, Tim Burchett and Byron Donalds are noted as making highly misleading or false statements.

Representative Byron Donalds tried to show collusion between Joe Biden and his sons, through statements in an email, which were taken totally out of context.

CNN Link: Fact check: Republicans make false, misleading claims at first Biden impeachment inquiry hearing

I am still waiting for some real evidence of wrong doing by Joe Biden.

Stay tuned,

Dave

Mitt Romney’s Speech during the Senate

by Dave

Some quotes:

Corrupting an election to keep oneself in office is perhaps the most abusive and destructive violation of one’s oath of office that I can imagine.

The results of this Senate court will, in fact, be appealed to a higher court, the judgment of the American people. Voters will make the final decision, just as the president’s lawyers have implored.

I will only be one name among many, no more, no less, to future generations of Americans who look at the record of this trial. They will note merely that I was among the senators who determined that what the president did was wrong, grievously wrong. We are all footnotes at best in the annals of history, but in the most powerful nation on Earth, the nation conceived in liberty and justice, that distinction is enough for any citizen.

I have included biographical summary of Mitt Romney from Wikipedia at the end of this blog.

 

SENATOR MITT ROMNEY, Republican of Utah:

 

The Constitution is at the foundation of our Republic’s success, and we each strive not to lose sight of our promise to defend it. The Constitution established the vehicle of impeachment that has occupied both houses of our Congress these many days. We have labored to faithfully execute our responsibilities to it. We have arrived at different judgments, but I hope we respect each other’s good faith.

The allegations made in the articles of impeachment are very serious. As a senator-juror, I swore an oath before God to exercise impartial justice. I am profoundly religious. My faith is at the heart of who I am. I take an oath before God as enormously consequential. I knew from the outset that being tasked with judging the president, the leader of my own party, would be the most difficult decision I have ever faced. I was not wrong.

The House managers presented evidence supporting their case, and the White House counsel disputed that case. In addition, the president’s team presented three defenses, first that there could be no impeachment without a statutory crime, second that the Bidens’ conduct justified the president’s actions, and third, that the judgment of the president’s actions should be left to the voters. Let me first address those three defenses.

The historic meaning of the words “high crimes and misdemeanors,” the writings of the founders and my own reasoned judgment convince me that a president can indeed commit acts against the public trust that are so egregious that while they’re not statutory crimes, they would demand removal from office. To maintain that the lack of a codified and comprehensive list of all the outrageous acts that a president might conceivably commit renders Congress powerless to remove such a president defies reason.

The president’s counsel also notes that Vice President Biden appeared to have a conflict of interest when he undertook an effort to remove the Ukrainian prosecutor general. If he knew of the exorbitant compensation his son was receiving from a company actually under investigation, the vice president should have recused himself. While ignoring a conflict of interest is not a crime, it is surely very wrong. With regards to Hunter Biden, taking excessive advantage of his father’s name is unsavory, but also not a crime. Given that in neither the case of the father nor the son was any evidence presented by the president’s counsel that a crime had been committed, the president’s insistence that they be investigated by the Ukrainians is hard to explain other than as a political pursuit. There’s no question in my mind that were their names not Biden, the president would never have done what he did.

The defense argues that the Senate should leave the impeachment decision to the voters. While that logic is appealing to our democratic instincts, it is inconsistent with the Constitution’s requirement that the Senate, not the voters, try the president.

Hamilton explained that the founders’ decision to invest senators with this obligation rather than leave it to the voters was intended to minimize, to the extent possible, the partisan sentiments of the public at large. So the verdict is ours to render under our Constitution. The people will judge us for how well and faithfully we fulfill our duty. The grave question the Constitution tasked senators to answer is whether the president committed an act so extreme and egregious that it rises to the level of a high crime and misdemeanor. Yes, he did.

The president asked a foreign government to investigate his political rival. The president withheld vital military funds from that government to press it to do so. The president delayed funds for an American ally at war with Russian invaders. The president’s purpose was personal and political. Accordingly, the president is guilty of an appalling abuse of public trust.

What he did was not perfect. No, it was a flagrant assault on our electoral rights, our national security and our fundamental values. Corrupting an election to keep oneself in office is perhaps the most abusive and destructive violation of one’s oath of office that I can imagine.

In the last several weeks, I’ve received numerous calls and texts. Many demanded, in their words, that I “stand with the team.” I can assure you that that thought has been very much on my mind: You see, I support a great deal of what the president has done. I voted with him 80 percent of the time.

But my promise before God to apply impartial justice required that I put my personal feelings and political biases aside. Were I to ignore the evidence that has been presented and disregard what I believe my oath and the Constitution demands of me for the sake of a partisan end, it would, I fear, expose my character to history’s rebuke and the censure of my own conscience.

I’m aware that there are people in my party and in my state who will strenuously disapprove of my decision, and in some quarters I will be vehemently denounced. I’m sure to hear abuse from the president and his supporters. Does anyone seriously believe that I would consent to these consequences other than from an inescapable conviction that my oath before God demanded it of me?

I sought to hear testimony from John Bolton, not only because I believed he could add context to the charges, but also because I hoped that what he might say could raise reasonable doubt and thus remove from me the awful obligation to vote for impeachment.

Like each member of this deliberative body, I love our country. I believe that our Constitution was inspired by Providence. I’m convinced that freedom itself is dependent on the strength and vitality of our national character. As it is with each senator, my vote is an act of conviction. We’ve come to different conclusions fellow senators, but I trust we have all followed the dictates of our conscience.

I acknowledge that my verdict will not remove the president from office. The results of this Senate court will, in fact, be appealed to a higher court, the judgment of the American people. Voters will make the final decision, just as the president’s lawyers have implored. My vote will likely be in the minority in the Senate, but irrespective of these things, with my vote, I will tell my children and their children that I did my duty to the best of my ability believing that my country expected it of me.

I will only be one name among many, no more, no less, to future generations of Americans who look at the record of this trial. They will note merely that I was among the senators who determined that what the president did was wrong, grievously wrong. We are all footnotes at best in the annals of history, but in the most powerful nation on Earth, the nation conceived in liberty and justice, that distinction is enough for any citizen.

Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

 Commentary 

I think this is a speech that should go down in history, as the choice between being loyal to a party verses loyal to the Constitution and obligations of a senator-juror.  Mitt Romney voted for the article of Abuse of Power and against the second article on obstructing the investigation.

Trump’s most recent attacks on his “perfect” phone call have been on House Representative Nancy Pelosi and  Mitt Romney.

Trump hit Romney at Prayer Breakfast

Note: Mitt Romney has been a deeply religious person his whole life, serving in the LDS Church. In the speech Romney declared, “I believe in my Mormon faith and endeavor to live by it. My faith is the faith of my fathers. I will be true to them and to my beliefs.”[14] Romney added that he should neither be elected nor rejected based upon his religion,[247] and echoed Senator John F. Kennedy‘s famous speech during his 1960 presidential campaign in saying, “I will put no doctrine of any church above the plain duties of the office and the sovereign authority of the law.”[246]    With Kennedy,  some voters were concerned that because he was Catholic,  he would be under the commands of the Pope.

Wikipedia:  Biography of Mitt Romney

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

 

Bolton’s Book “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir”

by Dave

Former National Security Advisor John Bolton has written his third book, entitled, “The Room Where It Happened” which according to  Amazon.com will be published in hard copy and on Kindle on March 17, 2020.   Amazon is accepting pre-publication orders.  I bought a copy from Amazon.     It isn’t my normal reading.  I disagree with his basic philosophy of using the threat of  military power in every way possible to promote US interests.   In one editorial in the New York Times,  he was aptly described as the least diplomatic diplomat.   I have posted his biography from Wikipedia under links.

Thanks to the impeachment hearings, John Bolton has now gotten heaps of criticism from the party he has always supported – the Republicans.   It has guaranteed that his hawkish views will be heard – either in his book or on social media. He appeared very often on Fox News during the Obama era.   It seemed he was critical of almost every initiative undertook by Obama with respect to international policy and cooperation.   At every turn, he would fall back to the idea that America would be better off going it alone.

But, I bought the book, because I am certain he will corroborate the testimony of others in the impeachment trial.  I’m sure Bolton feels a sense of betrayal from Trump, who could not separate his role as president, setting incredibly important policy decisions  from that of a candidate for re-election.

The current controversy is whether the manuscript can be published without changes.    A restraining order, preventing Simon and Schuster from publishing the book is possible, but likely to be ineffective, as I am certain  excepts will appear in the press.   A restraining order will only make the book more popular.

The Supreme Court case, “The New York Times v.  United States” was decided 38 years ago (I remember it, wow am I that old!) in favor of the New York Times publishing excerpts from the Pentagon Papers, a leaked government document reviewing the history of the Vietnam War, as prepared by the Department of Defense.   Three conservative judges (Burger, Harlan and Blackmun) dissented.  See links.

The lead story in today’s New York Times is: “Attacking Bolton, Republicans Push to Swiftly Acquit. Confident they can block witnesses.   The White House and Senate Republicans worked aggressively on Wednesday to discount damaging revelations from John R, Bolton and line up the votes to block new witnesses from testifying in President Trump’s impeachment trial, in a push to bring the proceeding to a swift close.”  A vote on witnesses may occur tomorrow, Friday January 31.  Without witnesses, the trial could end next week, before the State of the Union address.

Stay tuned,

Dave

Links:

Amazon, The Room Where it Happened: A White House Memoir, accepting pre-publication orders, available March 17, 2020

Wikipedia:  John Bolton

Wikipedia:  New York Times v.  United States (1971)

(yes- I know the actual case name is a bit longer and includes the case against the Washington Post.   The case was part of the C-Span series on Landmark Supreme Court cases. See

C-Span Landmark Supreme Court Decisions:  New York Times v United States

At issue was whether our First Amendment rights of a free speech could be limited by the government’s claim of harming to national security, because it relied on confidential information.  I believe after publication, it became clear that Pentagon Papers were an excellent historical account of events leading to our involvement in the Vietnam war.

 

 

 

A tie vote on witnesses? Republican witnesses? A few Q+A.

by Dave

If the Senate votes are a 50-50 split on witnesses,  Chief Justice Roberts could decide.  I agree with commentators who say he will simply rule that with neither party having a majority, the motion to call witnesses fails.  So it takes 4 Republicans to jump the fence.

Ok, who would testify for the Republicans? It’s a good question.  In a real courtroom trial, the defense does not have to call witnesses.   The defense can simply rest its case, saying the prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond “a reasonable doubt” or a “shadow of a doubt”  depending on the crime.

Calling House Manager Adam Schiff,  Hunter Biden or  Joe Biden would be a disaster for Republicans.   I will explain why:

Adam Schiff 

Adam Schiff will be asked about his comment that there was no contact between the whistle blower and his committee, when in fact there was contact.   He has already explained this many times,   When the whistle blower decided there was sufficient reason to reveal inappropriate demands on the Ukraine as a condition for military assistance, this individual did not know how to go about an official complaint.   A staff member on Schiff’s committee recommended to him to get a lawyer and the lawyer would explain to him the proper means of filing a complaint.  The complaint would not be immediately turned over to the House Intelligence Committee, but had to be first reviewed by the National Security Council,  to be deemed sufficiently urgent and important for the Committee to examine.

Despite Trump’s tweets that Schiff probably wrote the whistle blower’s complaint,  the bottom line is that the Intelligence Committee acted properly in telling the whistle blower to get a lawyer.

If Adam Schiff is asked to divulge the name of the whistle blower, he would simply respond that the identity of the whistle blower is protected by law.

Hunter Biden + Joe Biden

Democrats would immediately object to calling Hunter Biden on the basis of foundation and relevance.   There has been zero evidence introduced to support the  allegation that Hunter Biden did anything wrong by serving on the board of Burisma.  However, Trump has pushed a false allegation that Joe Biden was involved in a scheme to benefit his son  as follows: Vice President Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to dismiss their General Prosecutor Shokin  so that the corrupt practices of Burisma could continue, hence his son could continue his lucrative position on the Board.

Just the opposite is true and the facts are all on Joe Biden’s side.  The firing of Shokin made it more likely that Burisma’s investigation would continue.    It is part of the testimony record of witnesses that the Shokin was not reforming the corrupt system in the Ukraine and numerous organizations including the International Monetary Fund  and the leaders of the  European Union wanted him out.  Any claims of wrongdoing  by Joe Biden are really limited to a barrage of tweets and Fox News commentary.

Calling Hunter Biden to testify would backfire.    No one is sure of the exact payments he received, and any revelation would be immediately objected to as irrelevant.    It is very common for a corporation to bring in individuals from outside the company  who can help the company establish its image and reputation.  President Ford was on dozens of corporate boards, making a lot of money in director fees.  He did nothing wrong and neither did Hunter Biden.

Republicans, I think, like more of talking about Hunter Biden than actually calling him to testify.   His past drug problems and infidelity are irrelevant to the Senate hearing, but great for the tabloids.

So,  I’ve yet to hear of a witness that Republicans seriously could call to testify.

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

Zeroing in on John Bolton

by Dave

Chuck Schumer has no real say in the impeachment trial.  Same goes with Adam Schiff.  Senate rules according to the majority.   The Senate has 53 Republicans and 47 Democrats.

The trial is actually just beginning.  However, everyone  knows exactly how this trial will end – 53 for acquital, and 47 for guilty. There is no chance in hell to convict the president.  It is not a matter of the evidence not being strong enough; it is a matter that the Republicans control the Senate and it takes a two-thirds majority to convict a President.  Never been done in our history, and this will be the third time impeachment has ended in acquittal.

It takes 4 Republican Senators to leap over the fence and join Democrats in calling for witnesses.   There’s a ton of speculation out there, and personally I don’t think it will happen.   I can see very well why Democrats are pushing for witnesses.  Adam Schiff provided a history of impeachment trials against federal judges and two presidents (Clinton and Andrew Johnson), and every trial had witnesses.  I think the average was around 20 witnesses.  I think Schumer recognized  he had to cut back his list so Mulvaney, Blair and Duffey (see last post)  no longer seem front and center.  If called to testify, Mulvaney would have to walk back his  press conference comment admitting to a quid pro quo when asked, making it even worse with “We do it all the time.”  Mulvaney is Trump’s right hand man,  getting Michael Duffey to alert the Defense Department of the hold on Ukrainian aid and for them to keep the hold secret  immediately following Trump’s call.

Bolton’s testimony will be a lot more straight forward.   Every conversation that Bolton had with Trump and his staff including Fiona Hill, Tim Morrison,  Marie Yovanavitch, David Holmes, Bill Taylor  and Ambassador Sondland would be collaborated.   His testimony would  further corroborates Rudy Giuliani involvement.   Both Mulvaney and Bolton were in the room with Trump, but only John Bolton appears to willingly testify.   The hold was orchestrated by Mulvaney despite being  opposed by John Bolton.

Schumer and Schiff are using cable TV broadcasts to argue for the necessity of witnesses, most notably CNN and MSNBC.   Meanwhile,  Republicans Senators and the White House Legal Counsel generally goes on Fox News and OAN (One American News) to blast Democrats on this issue.   One argument is that the Democrats failed in the House to get all witnesses, so now they are trying to get them in the Senate.  Of course, they tried to have many more witnesses in the House, but the invited witnesses, such as Bolton,  declined the invitation or subpoenas.

Schumer is under pressure also to conclude the trial because Sanders, Klobuchar and Warren must attend the trial and cannot campaign in Iowa.   I believe this is the real motivation right now to zero in on getting  Bolton to testify in one short explosive session.  Four hours of Bolton beats 12 hours of Schiff on cable TV.

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

Who are Schumer’s four witnesses?

by Dave

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has referred to the Senate hearings as a sham trial, as McConnell in the initial rules, rejected calling witnesses or issuing subpoenas for documents.  Yet, after the Bolton’s unpublished manuscript was leaked to the New York Times, the pressure to call him was definitely on.

There are two names I think everyone recognizes:  Mick Mulvaney, Director of the Office of Management and Budget and the White House’s Chief of Staff and John Bolton, former National Security Adviser.  Then there are two lesser known officials :  Robert Blair and Michael Duffey, both working for Mulvaney in different capacities.     I think if Schumer has his way, he would start with Blair and Duffey.  It would put pressure on Mick Mulvaney to tell the truth.   Just working up the food chain, of course.

Robert Blair: An assistant to the President, appointed by Mick Mulvaney as Trump’s Chief of Staff 

Blair, who was associate director for national security programs in the Office of Management and Budget, followed Mulvaney in January to the White House when Mulvaney became acting chief of staff. Mulvaney made Blair an assistant to the President. Blair serves as Mulvaney’s senior adviser for national security issues.  Blair’s hiring allowed Mulvaney to have a hand in national security issues without having to go through former White House national security adviser John Bolton. After Bolton was fired, one administration official said that Blair could be a favorite to replace Bolton because of his support from Mulvaney.

Blair was one of just a small group of officials on the line during Trump’s controversial phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Mulvaney was not.  During the July 25 call, Trump asked Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden — despite there being no evidence of wrongdoing by either Joe Biden or his son, Hunter, in Ukraine. The phone call was part of a whistleblower’s complaint that alleged Trump sought “to solicit interference” from Ukraine in the upcoming 2020 election, and that the White House took steps to cover it up. Trump has denied doing anything improper.

Before joining the Trump administration, Blair worked for the past 14 years as a staffer for several committees in the House of Representatives. His last position was staff director on the House Subcommittee on Defense Appropriations. He previously worked as a regional adviser for Africa at the US State Department of State from 2001-2003.  According to his LinkedIn profile, he received a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and two master’s degrees from Tufts University. He served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Africa during the mid-1990s.

Michael Duffey, OMB, associated director of national security programs  

Michael Duffey, a politically appointed Office of Management and Budget official, was given authority by the White House to keep aid to Ukraine on hold after career budget staff members questioned the legality of delaying the funds.  Duffey previously served as executive director of the Republican Party of Wisconsin.  “While career civil servants put an initial hold on the aid, Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs in OMB, was given the authority for continuing to keep the aid on hold after the career staff began raising their concerns to political officials at OMB, according to people familiar with the matter,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

Duffey also began overseeing the process for approving and releasing funds for other foreign aid and defense accounts, according to the report.  Trump’s order to withhold nearly $400 million in aid to Ukraine in July is at the heart of House Democrats’ move to launch an impeachment inquiry into allegations that Trump used U.S. foreign policy powers to benefit himself politically.  Duffey, 41, left Wisconsin’s Republican Party in December 2016 when he was named to then-President-elect Donald Trump’s national security team at the Pentagon. He joined the administration when another prominent Wisconsin politician, Reince Priebus, was Trump’s chief of staff. Priebus held that post until July 2017.

What makes Michael Duffey’s testimony so important, is an email he wrote about 90 minutes  following   Trump’s  phone  call  to  Zelensky,   notifying  the  Department of  Defense,  that  a hold had  been  put  on  the  Ukraine military  aid,  and  given  the  sensitive  nature  of  this  hold,  this  information  limited to those with a need to know.  It further confirms the testimony of Sondland and others,  that it was a “dollars for dirt” deal.

This memo was released in December 2010 as part of a FIOA requestl

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

Excellent Presentations in Senate Impeachment Trial

by Dave

“Dollars for Dirt” – Congressman Jason Crow nailed it.  So did Adam Schiff.   What Trump’s people were up to and why, became so clear yesterday.   Through one phone call, Trump put himself as the director of the dirty and illegal scheme of using his authority to corrupt the 2020 election.   Trump was circumventing his own administration. “Talk to Rudy” was a way of keeping the “investigation announcements”  out of the way of normal channels – including the National Security Council,  FBI,  CIA, and Foreign Service.  It did not go unnoticed.

It was Trump’s scheme to  demand that Ukraine’s  President Zelensky help Trump to smear Joe Biden and the Democrat Party in return for desperately needed military assistance.

Trump wanted to cheat in the elections, even before a Democratic candidate was nominated at the convention.

I believe now “Drain the Swamp”  must be replaced with “Dirt for Dollars.”

The acquittal of Trump is almost certain, but I so hope he loses in his second trial, in November 2020, where the American electorate can vote him out.

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

Impeachment

by Dave

Comments and responses

Alice Steward: Democrats need to realize they had their chance to make an overwhelming and bipartisan case for impeachment — and they failed.

My Response:  House Manager Adam Schiff  made it clear months ago, that to win in an impeachment trial is a very difficult, even if all the facts are solid and in your favor.  I and others believe Adam Schiff used his time very effectively to lay out the case against President Trump based just on evidence given at the hearing.   I fully expect an acquittal, because Trump is the Republican candidate for re-election and the voting will be along party lines.  The Republicans and Donald Trump will champion the acquittal as some kind of victory for justice and fairness.  I think most Americans will see through this as a trial absent of witnesses will likely be perceived as a coverup.    Americans are more likely to be aware  of the dishonesty and disrespect of the electoral process by soliciting the help of the Ukrainian President to support false accusations against his rivals – even if the Senate acquits Trump.

 Alice Steward: But then Rep. Adam Schiff, lead impeachment manager, touting crushing evidence to support the two articles of impeachment — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — said additional testimony and documents are needed. If House Democrats had met their constitutional threshold for a conviction, they would not need additional information. They realize the only potential for an impeachment game-changer is additional evidence — and, ideally, witnesses.

My Response:  I don’t see the contradiction.  Yes – the House Managers stated there was already clear and convincing evidence and they wanted more collaborating testimony from 4 – 5 witnesses.  Anyone who has ever served in jury duty understands there isn’t a threshold of proof based on written law, but it is in the minds of the jurists, in this case, 100 senators with 53 of them Republicans, whose threshold for violations of the constitution is sky high.  Democrats wanted a new series of high level witnesses such as Mick Mulvaney to  come forward and firmly collaborate in detail the plan to delay badly needed military aid to Ukraine solely improve Donald Trump’s re-election in 2020 to show how tightly all their evidence fit together.   If this failed to convince the 53 Republican Senators, then there would be an appeal in the form of an election in 2020.

Anyone who sat in a jury, knows that if a prosecutor shows DNA evidence, fingerprint evidence, and even video recordings (obviously clear and convincing evidence), they still present eye witnesses.  Mulvaney and Trump were in the meetings with Trump and they are the best eye witnesses of what happened.

Alice Steward: Here’s the thing, though, House members could have subpoenaed Bolton already. They did not, and they should not expect the Senate to do the job they failed to do.

My Response:  I agree.  The House should have subpoenaed Bolton to appear.  But they could see a lengthy court process as Bolton’s assistants were fighting the subpoenas.  It seemed that Bolton was complying with the President’s order not to testify.   Mick  Mulvaney was subpoenaed.

Alice Stewart is a CNN political commentator, Resident Fellow at the Institute of Politics at Harvard University and former Communications Director for Ted Cruz for President.

Stay tuned,

Dave

Link: Schiff Brilliantly Crushes Trump’s Defenses

What’s next (from Vox’s news, their best guess):

A rough outline of the schedule is below: (managers and counsel may decide not to use all the time allocated.  It may be on Monday that Alan Dershowitz will make his presentation defending Trump because he did not break the law. No crime, no impeachable offense).

Wednesday:    House impeachment managers have roughly eight hours for opening arguments.
Thursday:        House impeachment managers have roughly eight hours for opening arguments.
Friday:            House impeachment managers have roughly eight hours for opening arguments.

Saturday: Trump’s defense counsel has roughly eight hours for opening arguments.
Next week: Defense counsel could continue to build their case on Monday and Tuesday. Senators will also have up to 16 hours to ask questions of both the impeachment managers and Trump’s counsel.
A vote on hearing more evidence isn’t expected until sometime next week, and then the pressure will be on a subset of moderate Republicans and Democrats yet again. That vote will ultimately determine if any additional witnesses will even be considered or if Republicans will be content wrapping up the trial without this testimony.

 

 

Delay in Impeachment

by Dave

House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi made a tactical decision not to immediately deliver the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate, in hopes of adding pressure on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to call witnesses.   Two key witnesses were former National Security Advisor John Bolton and Director of Office of Management and Budget, Mike Mulvaney.  I did not think either would actually appear if subpoenaed.

McConnell said on the floor: “Some House Democrats imply they are withholding the articles for some kind of ‘leverage’ so they can dictate the Senate process to senators. I admit, I’m not sure what ‘leverage’ there is in refraining from sending us something we do not want!”

Did Pelosi’s ploy fail?  Maybe not.  McConnell needs a majority of Senators to vote for the impeachment rules.  There are only 51 Republican senators.   So,  McConnell needs all Republicans to be in agreement on the rules.   He will be not be negotiating with Pelosi but members of his own party.   The Senate will re-convene on January 7, 2020 and there will intense pressure to get the impeachment done.   The outcome is a foregone conclusion.   The Republicans will claim victory, and the Democrats will claim a totally sham Senate trial.

Pelosi’s tactic may backfire, if this drags out.  Trump will not waste a minute in shifting attention to the Nancy Pelosi as the one who is obstructing justice.  As least his kind of justice.  It will be followed by a chorus of Republicans.

The evidence Trump is very strong.  But, this must be decided in November by voters.

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

 

 

Trump’s Approval

by Dave

Trump’s approval rating has  increased from 39% on October 1 -13 to 45% on Dec 2 – 15 and numerous commentators have mentioned this as a sign of Americans disapproval of impeachment.  This is really hard to say, because other polls show a high percentage of Americans support the impeachment.   Polls always contain noise and no commentator likes to say the polls are inconclusive, but that may be the truth.   A 6% change over 3 months, is not particularly significant and I look at graphs to identify trends.   Gallup tries to pick a random representative sample but surveys are always imperfect.   The links provided below are the best ones I could find.  Time will tell if there really is a trend as a result of the House actions yesterday.

The country is divided.   Except for brief periods of extreme events, it has been this way for the past two decades.  A breakdown of approval ratings, shows a rock solid support by Republicans (89%) and a similar lack of approval by Democrats (8%).  This recent small uptick in approval ratings seem to be coming from independents, who show a 10% increase in approval ratings over the last 3 months, to 43%. approval.

The really striking feature of Trump’s approval ratings, as compared to the past 12 presidents from Truman to Obama, is how flat  (little variability)  his approval ratings have been to date.   He never gets above 50% or below 35% in the polls.   So, the variability as measured by Trump’s high to low is around 15%.  Obama’s was 25%.  George W. Bush ratings ranged from 90% to 25%, or an incredible 65%.   Bush became extremely popular right after the 9/11 attack in 2001, and then his popularity began to slide as the US attacked Afghanistan and Iraq.

Without any extreme event,  approval ratings often hit their  high mark  in about the first 100 days following inauguration of the first term.   Obama had his  highest approval ratings (62 to 67%) from January to May, 2000 in the honeymoon period.   G. W. Bush had a similar honeymoon period of  57 to 62%, however this approval rating soared immediately after 9/11.   Neither Clinton nor George H.W. Bush had their highest ratings during the  honeymoon period of their first term,  but both Reagan and Carter did.  What sent George H.W. Bush’s ratings through the roof (89%) was the beginning of the Iraq war.

Nixon’s approval rating was generally quite high (above 50%) even though the perception is that he was an unpopular president due to the numerous anti-war rallies.  He was re-elected in Nov 1972 in a landslide election, and definitely enjoyed high approval of 67% in the first week of the honeymoon period.  The Watergate scandal galvanized public opinion in October 1973  with the battle for the tapes and the  firing of  the Special Prosecutor Cox, termed the “Saturday Night Massacre.”  Nixon’s approval ratings sank to below 30% in October  and never recovered in the next 10 months before his resignation.

Returning now to Trump’s flattish (trendless)  ratings and coming events,  In January,  the Senate will acquit Trump of the two articles of impeachment.  The headlines from the New York Times, Washington Post and all the print media that Trump hates so much , will have in big bold letters “The Senate Acquits Trump.”   This should help fuel his rallies.  Whether this translates into a boost in ratings, we shall see.

If Trump can sustain  approval ratings above “the line”  (50%) I will immediately concede that impeachment boosted his approval.   Likewise, if the Gallup approval  ratings fall in the usual range (35 to 45%), then the conclusion should be that impeachment had no discernible affect.   Sinking below 35% is rare, but it could happen, particularly if the Democrat campaign intensifies.

A couple caveats:  (1)  It takes time to do polling, so the period to watch is 4 to 8 weeks after the acquittal and  (2) I use Gallup polls for consistency.   I’ve included a link for the 538 website, which compares many surveys, and gives each of them a score.  Trump seems to do better by a couple of percentage points, when surveys include likely or registered voters.   I would think these surveys are better indicators of results of the 2020 election.

A final caveat is that surveys only ask if one approves of the president’s performance.  The 2020 election will give voters a chance to select which of presidential candidate they feel would best lead the country.   Obviously, the big unknown is the registered voters who do not vote. Also, to win an election, you have to be get a majority of votes in the swing states (PA, FL, MI, AZ, etc), not necessarily be the most popular in the country.

Stay tuned,

Dave

Links:

Gallup poll 

(you can select various presidents, and their support from Republicans, Democrats and Independents)

Wikipedia – Presidential Approval Ratings (historical) 

Wikipedia = Presidential Approval Rating (Trump)

538 Website

(shows about an even split on those for and against impeachment.

 

Truth Matters 2

by Dave

Wow. What a day!  Trump’s letter to Pelosi sent on Dec 17, 2019 repeats Politifact  “Lie of the Year” for 2019 and also the lie that I thought should have won (my personal favorite).  It adds some “golden oldies”  well known to be false.

Here’s the lie that got  Trump the 2019 award:

“…  so-called whistleblower who started this entire hoax with a false report of the phone call that bears no relationship to the actual phone call that was made.”

As so carefully analyzed by Politifact, the whistleblower’s report coincides very well with what the transcript says.

Trump’s lie is embedded in another misleading statement, that the White House was denied the right to call or  cross examine witnesses.  CNN reports:

Allowing the subject of an impeachment inquiry to call witnesses or present counter evidence is not required in either the Constitution or House rules. Furthermore, the House voted in late October to allow Mr. Trump’s lawyers to cross examine witnesses once the impeaching hearing moved to Judiciary Committee. But the White House declined to participate. If the House successfully votes to impeach a federal official, the Senate then holds trial. The impeachment rules in the upper chamber do offer the impeached person some rights.

But, this letter also contains my personal choice the lie of the year, as follows:

You know full well that Vice President Biden used his office and $1 billion dollars of U.S. aid money to coerce Ukraine into firing the prosecutor who was digging into the company paying his son millions of dollars.

That’s exactly the line Trump planned to use to gain the support of the Americans in 2020.  Except he would add,  “This is based on an ongoing investigation by the President Zelensky of Ukraine as announced in 2019” if the whistleblower hadn’t ruined his plans.  You know what – he’ll probably still use it.   He can say that this is based on an investigation by Rudy Giuliani or an  OANN investigation or Attorney Joe DiGenova research., passed on to the FBI.

Well, of course Rep. Pelosi knows this is  total rubbish, because the firing of Ukraine’s General Prosecutor Shokin was very well explained  in the House Judiciary Committee report as follows:

Similarly, there is no legitimate basis for President Trump to claim former Vice President Biden behaved improperly in calling for the removal of Ukrainian prosecutor general Viktor Shokin. When he called for Mr. Shokin’s removal, then-Vice President Biden acted in accordance with and in furtherance of an official United States policy and the broad consensus of various European countries and the International Monetary Fund.615 Indeed, in late 2015, the International Monetary Fund threatened Ukraine that it would not receive $40 billion in international assistance unless Mr. Shokin was removed.616 Vice President Biden was subsequently enlisted by the State Department to call for Mr. Shokin’s removal—and in late 2015 and early 2016, he announced that the United States would withhold $1 billion in loan guarantees unless Mr. Shokin was dismissed.617 Ultimately, in March 2016, Ukraine’s parliament voted to dismiss Mr. Shokin.618 Moreover, multiple witnesses confirmed that the removal of Mr. Shokin would have increased the likelihood that Burisma would be investigated for corruption, not the opposite, given that Mr. Shokin was widely considered to be both ineffective and corrupt.619 Any suggestion that former Vice President Biden called for Mr. Shokin’s removal in order to stop an investigation of Burisma, the company whose board Hunter Biden sat on, is inconsistent with these facts.620

I’ve left in the footnotes 615 to 620, which are references to documents in the report.

The letter is nasty, with numerous false or misleading statements, including:

Speaker Pelosi, you admitted just last week at a public forum that your party’s impeachment effort has been going on for two and a half years

Just the opposite is true.  The 2 1/2 years is the Mueller investigation, which was initiated by the Justice Department.  After the report was completed, the Speaker was reluctant to begin impeachment proceedings.  Yes, other Democrats felt the impeachment case was strong, but Pelosi held out.  The obstruction of Congress would have occurred in either the Russian or Ukraine case.  With the Ukraine scandal, Trump really handed Pelosi a much more straight forward violation of the constitution.

And Trump adds one of his all time favorite lies:

Congressman Adam Schiff cheated and lied all the way up to the present day, even going so far as to fraudulently make up, out of thin air, my conversation with President Zelensky of Ukraine and read this fantasy language to Congress as though it were said by me.

Fact checkers know this as the “short version” of the big lie.  The longer version of the lie, told at Trump rallies, is that Schiff first invents the conversation, then Trump reveals to the public the real transcript exposing Schiff as a liar.  Great at rallies, but twice as false as the shorter version.  I call the longer version, the comic book one, because it not only has a villian (Schiff) but a hero to boot (Trump).     From the New York Times critique of the letter:   In a congressional hearing in September, Mr. Schiff said he was conferring the “essence” of the conversation that was meant to be partially “parody.” His account veered from the transcript in chronology and details at points, but it generally tracked with the transcript’s version of what Mr. Trump said on the call.”  The longer version is absolutely wrong, because Schiff’s summary of the conversation was done after the transcript was released in September.

The tone of the letter is angry and inappropriate for anyone holding high office.   It is taking aim at elected representatives, who come to Congress to represent their constituents.  It attacks the FBI.    The critical information is the letter has been proven to be untrue.

The letter was characterized by Rep. Pelosi as “sick.”  The headlines in the New York Times,  “Trump’s 6-page Diatribe Belittles Impeachment as an “Attempted Coup,”  The polemics are disgraceful.  The lies are consistent with the last 3 years of Trump’s presidency.  See link for the letter.  There are dozens of analyses of the letter on the internet.

I would just say it is sad when we have a president with so little regard for the truth.

Please don’t count on Facebook postings, Twitter,  Fox and OANN commentators, Trump rallies  and other sources for factual news, particularly on impeachment.   These are sources of misleading and frequently false information.

I invoke the Daniel Moynihan admonition: “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.”   If we start to get straight the facts, our differences are likely to be less.

I also like to recent comment Judge Amy Berman Jackson, ‘”If people don’t have the facts, democracy doesn’t work.”

Stay tuned,

Dave

Links:

There is a lot of good fact checking website as I list under the links.

Letter-From-President-Trump-Final

Politifact website

CNN Fact Checking

Factcheck.org

 

 

 

 

Truth Matters

by Dave

I believe in truth.  Lying from high officials can do great harm.  They use social media to rapidly spread lies.  Political parties use lies to increase their base.

Politifact 2019 lie of the year goes to Donald Trump.  He is now the four time award winner (2015, 2016, 2017, and 2019).  Yes, I was unhappy that he did not get the award in 2018,  but I suspect they wanted to draw attention how very harmful lies  from anonymous sources or obscure websites that go viral  on social media.   The headline for the 2018 lie was: “Online smear machine tries to take down Parkland students” and it relates to the protests movement after 17 students were gunned down at a high school in Florida.  “Claiming some of the students on TV after #Parkland are actors is the work of a disgusting group of idiots with no sense of decency,” wrote Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., on Twitter on Feb. 20.  Kudos to Rubio and others who quickly denounced this lie.  Politifact did  not attributed to any one person, but to obscure unnamed  websites.  Politifact names  OANN commentator Graham Ledger for broadcasting the theory that students were “crisis actors” and Donald Trump, Jr. liked a tweet stemming from the Ledger commentary.  It is the commentators on  OANN (Outside Any Normal News) that conspiracy theorists find an audience.  Anything for a rating, right!

Ok, back to 2019 Lie of the Year:  ” Donald Trump’s claim whistleblower got Ukraine call ‘almost completely wrong'” won the award.  There are a whole slew of lies, Trump has originated or re-tweeted,  on virtually every topic,

But this one seems to be one of his all time favorites.  According to Politifact:

Since the Sept. 26 release of the whistleblower complaint about his call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump has insisted more than 80 times that the whistleblower’s account is fake, fraudulent, incorrect, “total fiction,” “made up,” and “sooo wrong.” (sounds like Trump)

It was likely a tough choice, because Donald Trump  lies continuously.  I liked the 2017 lie of the year:   Russian election interference is a ‘made-up story’  or in 2016: Fake news.  Trump is not considered the source, but the enabler of this lie.    The 2015 award is for  campaign misstatements of Donald Trump.    President Obama also won an award for a lie in 2013: “If you like your health care plan, you can keep it”  but I think the real difference is, that he apologized for this lie.

My choice of the lie for 2019 would be: “Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire its prosecutor …. the prosecutor said he was forced out for leading a corruption probe into Hunter Biden’s company. … Democrats want to impeach President Trump for discussing this investigation with Ukraine’s President.”   which was part of an ad campaign for Trump’s re-election.   It is very clever, because the real lie is in the information not provided.  The prosecutor was corrupt and had sidelined the Burisma investigation,   The pressure to fire Prosecutor Shokin came from the US, IMF  and EU leaders.  See links below.

The Washingon Post calculated  Trump has lied 15,413 just in the last 3 years since becoming president.  It looks like the lying is going to get worse (hard to imagine).   See last link.

Wake up America, – We are much better than this.  (Elijah Cummings)

Stay tuned,

Dave

10 things Donald Trump got wrong about impeachment in 2019, fact-checked

The silence of the year: What did Hunter Biden do for Burisma?

Lie of the Year 2019: Donald Trump’s claim whistleblower got Ukraine call ‘almost completely wrong’

A look back at Lie of the Year, 2009 to 2018

President Trump has made 15,413 false or misleading claims over 1,055 days

 

Impeachment Trial in the Senate

by Dave

By the end of next week, the Articles of Impeachment will be approved and sent to the Senate.  The trial of impeachment in the Senate will likely be confined to two to three weeks  in January 2020.   It will be run by Republicans and made to help Donald Trump.   In fact, at times, it may seem an impeachment trial is  a honorable exercise, to undo the damage from the House of Representatives.   It is a foregone conclusion that Trump will be acquitted of two articles against the him.  The voting in the Senate will be nearly entirely along party lines – meaning Trump will be acquitted.   I am 100% certain of this.

After the acquittal vote, there will be a moment of party unity among  Republicans.   Their speeches will be similar,  using such phrases as “totally exonerated” and “proved to all that the charges were baseless.”   They will in the process vilify Rep. Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler and Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.    The Democrats acted deplorably and despicably.  The only reason for the impeachment was because they knew none of their candidates could beat him in November.   At least that will be the spiel – are we that naive?

There is intense discussion right now among Republicans on how to make the trial in the Senate one of “vindication and exoneration.”   Trump sees this as a time to glorify the achievements of the Republican party and vilify the Democrats.  It is as if you went to a ball game, and one team could pick the umpire.    This is free time on television, so why not?  I won’t watch much.

For me, it will be a sad day.  It will say to all future presidents that as long as you hold the majority in the Senate, then Article 2 of the Constitution doesn’t really apply.   I agree the bar for impeachment must be high.  The evidence must be solid.  The conduct of the president must clearly show he committed “high crimes and misdemeanors.”  Each of the Articles has been proven:  I.  Trump approved military aid for Ukraine conditional on announcements of two investigations to help him win elections and II.  He obstructed justice by refusing to let key witnesses testify at the impeachment inquiry.

Obviously, Trump has the authority to veto military assistance.   He also could have made an announcement, that he would attach conditions to the aid.    He did neither of these.  Instead, he had his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani and Ambassador Gordon Sondland to set up the “announcements” which would help support false accusations against Joe Biden.

It will be a sad day for the idea of elections free of outside interference.  It will be a sad day for the role of Congress to investigate wrong doing by the president, because the subpoenas now don’t mean much.  Trump and Republicans can celebrate his “exoneration” but he will forever be remembered in the history books, as the fourth president to be impeached by Congress.

Stay tuned,

Dave

 

Articles of Impeachment

by Dave

The Articles of Impeachment as a pdf document can be open and saved in the link shown below.  It’s only 9 pages.   Many have commented on the narrow focus of the articles is likely  to keep them simple for the public to understand.  I agree but  I suspect there are other reasons.  Due to the Republican majority in the Senate, it is a foregone conclusion that  Senate will vote to acquit the President on all charges.   It’s just the way a political trial goes. If there had been more articles, there would have been more acquittals.  The Senate vote will be a sad day, as Donald Trump will be celebrating his victory over the “Dems”  as broadcasted over Fox News,  it will reinforce the idea that all this was one big “witch hunt.”  The vote will just political, as the evidence makes a powerful case for Trump to be found guilty.

The inquiry proceeded rapidly.  Adam Schiff made a good point, that to work through the courts to compel appearances by the witnesses and production of documents would likely have given Donald Trump an extra year to continue the abuse of power.    A second reason is political.  Democratic candidates such as Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders need to be free to campaign and not held captive to impeachment proceedings.   Donald Trump had started with big rallies in the swing states, such as Florida,  while Democrats are focused on the primary races.

Stay tuned,

Dave

Links:

articles of impeachment

Who is telling the truth in the impeachment hearings

by Dave

Politicians lie.  They all do it.  But they also get caught doing it.  That’s the purpose of fact checking organizations.  Trump supporters have a lot to explain, and their defense of Trump includes a lot that is just not true.  I encourage my followers to fact check what they read here, and it really isn’t hard. Also, “main stream media” such as CNN and the print media, including  the New York Times and Washington Post are very reliable sources of information.  The House Intelligence Committee puts an incredible amount of raw information,  i.e. transcripts of testimony and documents on their website.  It is hard to keep up with all of this, but it is out there.

It is very consistent for Trump to launch a counter offensive attack on impeachment, by supporting and often retweeting  statements by Republican senators, which are without foundation, when his actions are indefensible.

Here is a short list of statements  which are absolute rubbish:

Question 1: Did President Barack Obama immediately fire all Bush-appointed ambassadors “the day he was elected office”?

FALSE

As is the custom, Obama immediately replaced most — not all — of Bush’s politically appointed ambassadors. Obama did not remove any of the career appointees to ambassadorships.

Sources:  Factcheck.org and politifact.com

Question arises because Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was recalled after a smear campaign was launch against her by people close to Donald Trump, including Rudy Giuliani and Representative Pete Sessions.  There is a lot more to this story, but Trump got caught before he could put a political appointee into the Ambassador position.

Question 2:   Is it true that several news organizations reported that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 election. Senator Kennedy states, “It’s been well documented in the Financial Times, in Politico, in The Economist, in the Washington Examiner, even on CBS, that the prime minister of Ukraine, the interior minister, the Ukrainian ambassador to the United States, the head of the Ukrainian Anti-Corruption League, all meddled in the election on social media and otherwise,”

A:   From Politifact.com:

FALSE

We found that these articles paint a picture of Ukrainian leaders fearful of Russia and of Trump’s comments that took a more conciliatory stance on Russian aggression. The news coverage shows Ukrainians preferred Hillary Clinton because she was tough on Russia. However, the articles don’t show a vast, top-down approach ordered to boost Clinton.

Kennedy mentioned The Economist multiple times. The Economist’s U.S. editor John Prideaux told us: “We are a bit puzzled by Sen. Kennedy citing us to the effect that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 elections.”

Republicans frequently mention a 2017 Politico article, which focused on the work of a Democratic political contractor who tried to dig up dirt on Trump and his advisers. We vetted it and found that the GOP has used its findings selectively.

Question 3:  Is Sen. John Kennedy similar accusation true?  The Senator says former Ukraine President Petro Poroshenko “actively worked for Secretary Clinton.

FALSE

Answer by Politifact.com – see link.

His sources are  completely lacking.   It didn’t get the “Pants on Fire” designation, but it should.

Question 4:  What about the 2017 Politico story that shows the Sen. Kennedy statements are true?

FALSE

A:  “The article did not state that the Ukrainian government conspired with the Clinton campaign or the DNC,” said Melissa Cooke, a booking manager for Politico, in an email. “It also emphasized that the acts of Ukrainian officials to raise questions about Trump were not comparable to Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, and reported that the then-Ukrainian government was trying to make amends with then-President-elect Trump.”

Senator John Kennedy is a Republican from Louisiana.

Question 5: Is Trump’s statement true: “They never thought, Dan, that I was going to release that call, and I really had no choice because Adam Schiff made up a call,” Trump said Nov. 15. “He said the president said this, and then he made up a call.”

FALSE 

Trump has repeated this statement numerous times.  Schiff already had the released memo, and was just giving a “dramatized synopsis” of key points.  See link.

—-

I’m stopping at 5 false statements for now.  For more false statements,  please follow this link to politifact.org   (Fact-checking Impeachment Claims) .    One of the few true claims came surprisingly from Fox News, and their legal analyst who stated it is perfectly legal to have witnesses testify in private.  I’ve included this link at the end.

There will be an enormous number of false statements, coming from Rep. Jim Jordan,  Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Attorney diGenova and his wife, Victoria Toensing (see link below), Sen. John Kennedy from Louisiana, and of course, Donald Trump.  I encourage everyone to check out these links and dig in more to get the truth.  It doesn’t come from Facebook or Twitter, that’s for sure.

In the coming few weeks, the false statements will increase.   Republicans know when the impeachment goes to the Senate, they have the votes to acquit Trump.   It is highly likely they will not only acquit him, but cast the Democrats as the true villains,  is concocting false evidence against Trump, because they can’t  deal with their loss in 2016 or because they can’t  win the election

Stay tuned,

Dave

Links:

Sen.  Kennedy claims that Ukrainian President Poroshenko actively worked for Clinton is False

What we know about the Politico story at the heart of a Ukraine conspiracy theory

Did Obama Fire All Bush-Appointed Ambassadors?

Donald Trump gets Ukraine phone memo timeline backwards

Exclusive: Giuliani Ally Pete Sessions Was Eyed for Top Slot in Ukraine

Fox News analyst correct: Impeachment inquiry is following rules by questioning witnesses in private

Other Fact checking resources:

AP FACT CHECK: Trump and the people he forgets he knew

Politifact.com

Republicans Cherry-Pick Facts on Impeachment

Factcheck.org