LOL Hat tip to Cold Fury - http://coldfury.com/

Impeachment Strategy (UPDATE: Letter)

quote:

Why would President Trump do this? Simple. He knows that the Democrats have been after him since he announced his candidacy; they pre-conjured a reason for his impeachment, for Heaven’s sake. Therefore, he is forcing an impeachment at the time of his choosing rather than theirs.

I don’t think the Democrats wanted to begin the procedure this long before the 2020 presidential election. Remember that Nancy Pelosi didn’t want this to happen right now; she comprehends strategy even if it’s a dim vestige of comprehension. But her caucus isn’t even that bright. They want Trump gone NOW and Pelosi had to do what they wanted.

And President Trump knew that this is how it would probably go.

So, voila! The impeachment inquiry was conjured, appeasing Pelosi’s idiot caucus, without messing up the intended timeline. She wants to file formal articles of impeachment months from now, hoping that the procedure will last until the time of the election, causing the president to lose. Therefore, it is in Donald Trump’s best interest to have them do it as soon as possible.

I think Pelosi wanted to start impeachment a few months before the 2020 election.

President Trump is wicked smart and a good planner, he and his staff seem to see things beyond the horizon. This is one of the things Harry Reid was warning his commie compatriots about.

Fun to watch.

Bonus question, How long has President Trump been watching politics in Washington DC? He and his staff appear to have been studying the swamp for a couple of decades at least.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
What about the safety of the woman once the melee began? The correct course of action in that crowd was to get her out of there.

Time and place

There will be a reckoning

As it stand, there are good images of this gutter trash. Let the police investigate. They may come up empty, or we may end up being be pleasantly surprised.

Sorry, Parabellum, in Minnesota being a criminal allows you to run for public office. I doubt if there will be any investigations of what went on.
The mayor and the citizenry feel that all the bad things that happened are the President's fault.

I've read before that John Bolton could possibly the whistle blower or at least involved in the process. I've always liked and admired John Bolton. He knew foreign policy and hated the Democrats version of it and always seemed to know what was best for the country.
now there's this. Very sad indeed.

The Revenge of John Bolton

quote:

Former White House Russia expert Fiona Hill testified Monday that John Bolton likened Rudolph W. Giuliani to a “hand grenade.” Giuliani responded overnight by likening Bolton to an “atomic bomb.”

.@RudyGiuliani on Bolton calling him a “hand grenade.” RG: “I’m very disappointed that his bitterness drives him to attack a friend falsely...It’s really ironic that John Bolton is calling anyone else a hand grenade. When John is described by many as an atomic bomb . “

— Kristen Welker (@kwelkernbc) October 15, 2019
As evidence builds in House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry, signs keep pointing to Bolton, who has not yet been scheduled to testify. But in Bolton, House Democrats have a potential witness with a trifecta of utility: (1) Proximity to the alleged scandal, (2) motivation to tell his story and, perhaps as important as anything, (3) a true-believer mentality.

Hill testified Monday that Bolton was “furious” over Trump aides’ Ukraine maneuvering, and she indicated that he was one of the people involved in national security officials lodging their concerns with a White House lawyer (as previously reported by The Washington Post):

Bolton and [European Union Ambassador Gordon] Sondland met in early July with then-special envoy for Ukraine Kurt Volker, Hill and Energy Secretary Rick Perry. During the meeting, Sondland’s agenda for Ukraine began to become clear, when he blurted out to the other officials present that there were “investigations that were dropped that need to be started up again,” according to a U.S. official familiar with the matter. The officials understood him to be referring to Burisma, the energy company, and Biden — something that made Bolton go “ballistic” after the meeting, the official said.Hill told lawmakers that after the meeting, Bolton instructed her to go raise their concerns about the shadow Ukraine operations with White House lawyers. Bolton said he didn’t want to be part of any “drug deal” that was being cooked up on Ukraine, one person familiar with Hill’s testimony said.
To this point, we’ve known that Bolton wasn’t happy about his acrimonious White House exit, given his public back-and-forth with Trump over it. What we didn’t know was how much his disenchantment might have extended to the Ukraine story. There are plenty of indications, after all, that Bolton was frozen out of White House processes toward the end of his tenure, as his rift with Trump grew. And reporting indicates that the Ukraine policy often went around the National Security Council, which Bolton led and Hill served on.

But Hill paints a picture of a Bolton who was in the room for at least some key Ukraine events, which would matter in any testimony he would offer.

Bolton’s motivation is also important here. In addition to his dissatisfaction with the circumstances of his departure, he has already spoken out against some of the policies of the administration he left behind — more gently in public and in a more unvarnished manner privately.

Trump supporters’ will cast him as a disgruntled former aide if he testifies against the White House, but it’s also true that aides with more loyalty might bend their version of events in a more favorable light. Bolton appears to have no great motivation to do that, based on how he views this episode and how he exited the White House. And whatever he says, if he testifies, will be under oath.

And last is a related point. Not only is Bolton a potentially motivated witness with little loyalty to Trump, he actually has something pulling him in the opposite direction: An almost-religious view of foreign policy. Bolton has often been criticized as strident and overly militaristic, but regardless of the substance of his foreign policy, the point here is that he has strong beliefs that appear to outrank other concerns.

That’s important, especially in this moment, because Trump’s foreign policy has veered significantly away from Bolton’s vision — most recently with his decision to withdraw from northern Syria, which is a decision many hawkish Republicans speak about in dire terms. They speak of Trump having left the United States’ Kurdish allies for “slaughter” at the hands of Turkey, as well as a possible resurgence of the Islamic State. And if those Republicans are speaking out against Trump like never before, just imagine what Bolton must be thinking right now.

One of the great ironies here is that Bolton is perhaps the last person you would expect to be a key witness for Democrats in their impeachment inquiry, given that they have derided him for so long. And the thing that could give him extra motivation to speak out is a shift away from Republican Party orthodoxy on foreign policy.

Much remains to play out, and Bolton still has not even been called to give a deposition. But Giuliani seems genuinely concerned that Bolton viewed his and the Trump team’s Ukraine actions in such a light. And the table seems to be set for Bolton to figure prominently in whatever comes next.

https://outline.com/zSvaHm

Pussies are afraid of bringing anything into the public, wonder why? Also interesting they are breaking precedent that has occured for past impeachment proceedings? You'd think as strong of a case they claim to have it'd would be on the floor by now...

Pelosi announces House won't vote now on whether to begin impeachment inquiry

Fox News

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced after meeting with the House Democratic caucus on Tuesday that there will be no vote -- at least for now -- on the launch of formal impeachment proceedings against President Trump.

"There's no requirement that we have a vote, and so at this time we will not be having a vote," Pelosi said. "We're not here to call bluffs -- we're here to find the truth, to uphold the Constitution of the United States. This is not a game for us. This is deadly serious."

The move was seemingly a boon for moderate Democrats in swing districts, who have been reluctant to have a formal vote in favor of the proceedings as the 2020 elections approach -- even as they also have sought to appease liberal constituents by vocally backing the ongoing inquiry.

A congressional aide familiar with House Democrats' discussions told Fox News that many House Democrats did not want to be seen as letting the White House dictate how the House conducted itself. Last week, the White House sent a fiery letter to House Democrats announcing that it would not cooperate with their inquiry, for several reasons -- including that, contrary to past precedent, no formal vote had been held on whether to begin impeachment proceedings.

Pelosi ripped those arguments: "They have no substance. They can't defend the president, so they're going to process," she said.

Pelosi last month unilaterally held a news conference announcing that such proceedings were in progress. House rules do not require a vote to begin an impeachment inquiry, but it remains unclear whether the courts will agree that an impeachment inquiry has begun without such a vote. If courts do not find that a formal inquiry is in progress, they could curtail Democrats' evidence-gathering efforts.

But Pelosi, on Tuesday, heralded a series of recent court victories by Democrats, including a key win in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals that reaffirmed congressional authority to subpoena several years of Trump's financial records from his accounting firm, Mazars.

"The rulings that we won last week -- three of them were against the president's hateful public charge rule from taking effect," Pelosi said, referring to the administration's immigration policy. "A ruling against the president's sham national emergency declaration to build his wasteful border wall. A ruling in the Mazars case led by [House Oversight Committee] Chairman [Elijah] Cummings. ... so again, five victories on Friday, one today, in terms of Emoluments."

Separately at the press conference on Tuesday, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., accused the White House of "stonewalling" despite those rulings.

"Were it not for the fact that at least some witnesses have given us documents, we would not know there is a paper record of efforts to condition this meeting, and perhaps condition military support itself, on these political investigations Donald Trump wanted," Schiff said, referring to Trump's fateful July call with Ukraine's leader. "Those documents would have been completely bottled up by the State Department. ... The evidence of obstruction of Congress continues to mount."

Schiff said the Office of Management and Budget has refused to provide evidence concerning whether the Trump administration withheld aid to Ukraine, contingent on the country conducting an investigation of Joe and Hunter Biden's business dealings there.

"The Constitution is clear. ... the House will have the sole power of impeachment," Schiff said later, when asked why there would be no floor vote on an impeachment inquiry.

The White House has strongly suggested it will take the fight over the Democrats' subpoenas to the Supreme Court.

"In the history of our nation, the House of Representatives has never attempted to launch an impeachment inquiry against the president without a majority of the House taking political accountability for that decision by voting to authorize such a dramatic constitutional step," the White House letter to Pelosi and other top Democratic leaders stated.

It continued: "Without waiting to see what was actually said on the call, a press conference was held announcing an 'impeachment inquiry' based on falsehoods and misinformation about the call."

Despite Pelosi's claim that there was no “House precedent that the whole House vote before proceeding with an impeachment inquiry,” several previous impeachment inquiries have been launched only by a full vote of the House -- including the impeachment proceedings concerning former Presidents Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.

White House officials told Fox News the vote opening the proceedings was a small ask, considering the implications of potentially overturning a national election.

Responding to the letter, Pelosi accused Trump of "trying to make lawlessness a virtue" and added, "The American people have already heard the President’s own words – ‘do us a favor, though.’" (That line, from a transcript of Trump's call with Ukraine's leader, in reality referred to Trump's request for Ukraine to assist in an investigation into 2016 election interference, and did not relate to Biden.)

Pelosi continued: "This letter is manifestly wrong, and is simply another unlawful attempt to hide the facts of the Trump Administration’s brazen efforts to pressure foreign powers to intervene in the 2020 elections. ... The White House should be warned that continued efforts to hide the truth of the President’s abuse of power from the American people will be regarded as further evidence of obstruction. Mr. President, you are not above the law. You will be held accountable.”

Just before Pelosi took the microphone on Tuesday, a spokesperson for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy's office emphasized some of the White House's other objections to Democrats' inquiry.

Separately, the letter asserted multiple alleged violations of the president's due-process rights. It noted that under current impeachment inquiry proceedings, Democrats were not allowing presidential or State Department counsel to be present.

Among the GOP's complaints are that Democrats' procedures did not provide for the "disclosure of all evidence favorable to the president and all evidence bearing on the credibility of witnesses called to testify in the inquiry," according to the White House. And "the right to see all evidence, to present evidence, to call witnesses, to have counsel present at all hearings, to cross-examine all witnesses, to make objections relating to the examination of witnesses or the admissibility of testimony and evidence, and to respond to evidence and testimony" has also been obstructed.

The White House asserted that Democrats also have not permitted Republicans in the minority to issue subpoenas, contradicting the "standard, bipartisan practice in all recent resolutions authorizing presidential impeachment inquiries."

They ran out of hand lotion. Handjobs for everyone.

Next Trump Rally Thursday night in Dallas

In the meantime, Gaetz says it looks like the House Dems do not have the votes. At 0:57 in the video, listen to what he says about that.

Gaetz: "Keystone Cops"

Gaetz, unlike other House "leaders," is not from the weeny class who have before them a generational, constitutional issue yet find themselves watching from the impotent sidelines.

This is a time for Statesman to step forward.

It looks like Gaetz is gonna answer this generation's call.

Schiff argues that his actions are warranted because it's like a grand jury.

If so, who is the grand jury?

Is he thinking he's a prosecutor?

Is the grand jury, both sides of the House?

Is it both sides of the Intelligence committee?

Is it his secret squirrel insider club?

The model he asserts doesn't fit with what he's doing.

How are other members of the House even remotely tolerating this?

There is nothing whatever in the Constitution that allows a rump group to "investigate" in secret.

The WHOLE House has the power to determine probable cause (if, arguendo, Schiff can convince others that it's like a grand jury procedure) but the whole of Congress is being denied a full investigation of the facts. So, how can that be?

People in the House should raise cane because they are being denied what they need to make an informed decision.

quote:

People in the House should raise cane because they are being denied what they need to make an informed decision.

Just for information, the term is "raise Cain", referring to the son of Adam who slew his brother Abel, in the sense of conjuring up his spirit.

flashguy

Thank you. I know that. Oops.

Sometimes a phrase or some spelling or some punctuation is not up to snuff in posts.

I love seeing PA on the map remaining RED!

From Zero Hedge:

Moody’s Analytics has predicted that Donald Trump will easily win reelection in 2020, with three models showing that the President will secure at least 289 electoral votes and as many as 351.

Also shows VA as red. Unlikely.

quote:

Also shows VA as red. Unlikely.

Yeah, the NoVa DC suburbs have turned that once great state blue. It's optimistic, at best.
But just look at that map!
The land mass of this country is overwhelmingly red. Illinois stands out like a sore thumb, almost like as much an island as Hawaii...

My Rep (a Dem for whom I did not vote) just sent out a poll, asking her constituents if they supported impeachment.

I've long considered sending her a communication saying I wish Democrats would get on with the business of actually legislating, as opposed to endless attempts to overturn the 2016 election.

Then again: Given the kinds of things Dems do when they legislate: Perhaps not. I've long suspected Trump is trolling these people to keep them distracted from doing harm--to anybody but themselves

^^^^
I hope you return her inquiry duly annotated.

quote:

Originally posted by HighZonie:
^^^^
I hope you return her inquiry duly annotated.

There was no opportunity to comment. It was a simple yes/no vote kind of a thing.

President Trump doesn't just deal with these kinds of questions, he also brings the fight right to these biased assholes. In the clip, he says essentially that his political instincts tell him that Americans don't want us over there, and I believe that he is correct. All this "Well, it's a very complicated situation" shit is code for "You people are too stupid to understand."
Any adult who over the years has paid attention to the conflicts in that region of the world knows that there is no chance that there will be peace there, ever. The only way that there could be peace is total, absolute nuclear annihilation in that region, and I do mean complete annihilation of every living person in that region. If there are even two people left alive, and even if they are from the same country, if they are from different factions, they will climb out of the rubble and try to kill each other.

Fuck that place, fuck those people and their incessant bullshit, their ancient vendettas. Just fuck 'em. We can't fix that place or those people.

Ever see Muhammad Ali box? If the referee had to break up the fighters, Ali would often throw a solid punch on the break. That's what you see at the end of this clip. Americans should thank God every day for what this man is doing for this nation.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: parabellum,

Schiff pressed Volker to say Ukraine felt pressure from Trump

https://www.washingtonexaminer...-pressure-from-trump


by Byron York
| October 16, 2019 04:00 PM

Print this article

In a secret interview, Rep. Adam Schiff, leader of the House Democratic effort to impeach President Trump, pressed former United States special representative to Ukraine Kurt Volker to testify that Ukrainian officials felt pressured to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden's son Hunter as a result of Trump withholding U.S. military aid to Ukraine.

Volker denied that was the case, noting that Ukrainian leaders did not even know the aid was being withheld and that they believed their relationship with the U.S. was moving along satisfactorily, without them having done anything Trump mentioned in his notorious July 25 phone conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

When Volker repeatedly declined to agree to Schiff's characterization of events, Schiff said, "Ambassador, you're making this much more complicated than it has to be."

The interview took place Oct. 3 in a secure room in the U.S. Capitol. While the session covered several topics, the issue of an alleged quid pro quo — U.S. military aid in exchange for a Ukrainian investigation of the Bidens and a public announcement that such an investigation was underway — was a significant part of the discussion.

"[The Ukrainians] didn't want to be drawn into investigating a Democratic candidate for president, which would mean only peril for Ukraine, is that fair to say?" Schiff asked Volker.

"That may be true," Volker said. "That may be true. They didn't express that to me, and, of course, I didn't know that was the context at the time." (Volker has said he did not know that Trump had mentioned the Bidens on the July 25 call with Zelensky until the rough transcript of the call was released on Sept. 25.)

"Part of the other context is vital military support is being withheld from the Ukraine during this period, right?" Schiff asked.

"That was not part of the context at the time," Volker said. "At least to my knowledge, they [Ukrainian leaders] were not aware of that."

Schiff asked whether Volker had discussed the withholding of aid with Ukrainian officials. Volker said he had not. The first time he talked with the Ukrainians about that was when a story appeared in the press, an article in Politico, "Trump holds up Ukraine military aid meant to confront Russia," on Aug. 28-29, well after the July 25 Trump-Zelensky phone call.

"The first conversation I had was when the diplomatic adviser to President Zelensky, Vadym Prystaiko, I believe it was, texted me a copy of the Politico article about the hold on assistance," Volker testified. "So I had had many conversations with him in the months prior to that, and this did not come up from him to me, which makes me believe that this was not on his radar until that time when he saw the article."

Volker said that he already knew about the suspension in aid, having learned on July 18, a week before the Trump-Zelensky call. Volker testified that he asked around about the suspension — why was it being done? — but was not able to find out what was going on.

Schiff began to push the quid pro quo allegation. He asked Volker whether he would agree that "no president of the United States should ever ask a foreign leader to help intervene in a U.S. election."

"I agree with that," said Volker.

"And that would be particularly egregious if it was done in the context of withholding foreign assistance?" Schiff continued.

Volker balked. "We're getting now into, you know, a conflation of these things that I didn't think was actually there."

Schiff wanted Volker to agree that "if it's inappropriate for a president to seek foreign help in a U.S. election, it would be doubly so if a president was doing that at a time when the United States was withholding military support from the country."

Again, Volker did not agree. "I can't really speak to that," he said. "My understanding of the security assistance issue is — "

Schiff interrupted. "Why can't you speak to that, ambassador? You're a career diplomat. You can understand the enormous leverage that a president would have while withholding military support from an ally at war with Russia. You can understand just how significant that would be, correct?"

Volker tried to go along without actually agreeing. "I can understand that that would be significant," he said.

Schiff persisted. "And when that suspension of aid became known to that country, to Ukraine, it would be all the more weighty to consider what the president had asked of them, wouldn't it?"

"So again, congressman, I don't believe — " Volker began.

"It's a pretty straightforward question," Schiff said.

"But I don't believe the Ukrainians were aware that the assistance was being held up — "

"They became aware of it," Schiff said.

"They became aware later, but I don't believe they were aware at the time, so there was no leverage implied," Volker said.

The two men continued to argue about the chronology of events. By the time the Ukrainians learned about the withheld aid in late August, Volker said, all sides had dropped the idea of making a statement announcing an investigation of the Bidens and events during the 2016 election. But Schiff kept pushing the notion that once the Ukrainians did learn about the withheld aid, then they would have felt tremendous pressure from Trump.

"At the point they [the Ukrainians] learned that, wouldn't that have given them added urgency to meet the president's request on the Bidens?" Schiff asked.

"I don't know the answer to that," Volker said.

Schiff pressed Volker to agree one more time. In response, Volker tried to explain that the Ukrainians did not seem to be feeling pressure from Trump and the U.S.

"Congressman, this is why I'm trying to say the context is different, because at the time they learned that, if we assume it's Aug. 29, they had just had a visit from the national security adviser, John Bolton. That's a high-level meeting already. He was recommending and working on scheduling the visit of President Zelensky to Washington. We were also working on a bilateral meeting to take place in Warsaw on the margins of a commemoration on the beginning of World War II. And in that context, I think the Ukrainians felt like things are going the right direction, and they had not done anything on — they had not done anything on an investigation, they had not done anything on a statement, and things were ramping up in terms of their engagement with the administration. So I think they were actually feeling pretty good then."

At that point, Schiff gave up. Why was Volker resisting? "Ambassador, I find it remarkable as a career diplomat that you have difficulty acknowledging that when Ukraine learned that their aid had been suspended for unknown reasons, that this wouldn't add additional urgency to a request by the president of the United States. I find that remarkable."

Later, Republican Rep. Scott Perry questioned Volker, returning to the colloquy with Schiff. Perry asked Volker whether he, Volker, had close relations with Ukrainian officials and whether, if those officials felt something was amiss, they would tell Volker.

"The folks that you dealt with in Ukraine at the very highest level, I don't know, but I'm going to ask, do you feel like they had a fair amount of trust in you?"

"Absolutely," said Volker.

"So they would confide things in you if they had a question?"

"They would confide things," Volker answered. "They would ask questions. They would ask for help. We had a very candid relationship ... "

"In your conversation with Rep. Schiff, he kind of implied and wanted you to intimate that there was an agreement based on that conversation that: If you do the investigation, then you can have a meeting [with Trump] and maybe we'll consider this military aid. If that were the case from the call, do you feel, because they had some trust in you, that they would have come to you and said, 'Hey how do we handle this? Is this what the President of the United States is asking?' Would they confide — would they ask you that?"

"Yes," said Volker. "They would have asked me exactly that, you know. How do we handle this?"

Much of the coverage of Volker's testimony focused on his opening statement, which made its way to the media. (Washington Post headline: "Volker defends Biden as 'man of integrity' in testimony to Congress.") But there was much more to the testimony than the opening statement. Among other things, it showed how Schiff, as a powerful chairman in charge of impeachment, pursues his theory of the case even when a witness gives testimony that does not support it.

Schiff has scheduled more interviews for this week and next.

Para,
Thanks for posting that awesome video. Seriously the RNC should just play that non-stop as a commercial between now and the election. Trump gave it to him with both barrels. Love our President!

At 0:14, you can see the reporter's balloon deflate.