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Author Topic: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠  (Read 16807 times)

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AGelbert

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Re: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠
« Reply #15 on: September 27, 2019, 12:09:31 am »
Donald Trump just got really bad news about his impeachment
Bill Palmer | 5:05 pm EDT September 26, 2019
Palmer Report » Analysis

All along, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said that she wasn’t going to impeach Donald Trump unless and until things were such that it had a chance to work. After all, if she had brought articles of impeachment three months or six months ago, not only would it have failed, it would have made it a lot harder for her to successfully impeach him now. So she knew what she was doing. The thing is, the numbers now say that she’s nailed the timing perfectly.

Donald Trump’s Ukraine whistleblower scandal is so horrifying, so easy for the average American to understand, and it so thoroughly has Trump’s own fingerprints on the wrongdoing, it’s the perfect scandal to drive his impeachment. If you want confirmation, just look at the latest numbers.

The new YouGov poll says that 55% of Americans “strongly” or “somewhat” support Trump’s impeachment if it’s proven he threatened to withhold military aid to push Ukraine into going after Joe Biden. The new Morning Consult poll, which simply asks if Trump should be impeached, period, only shows 43% of Americans in favor of impeachment – but that’s up six points over the past few days. In addition, seven percent of Americans have now dropped their opposition to impeachment, which suggests that this scandal is changing the minds of some people who had been standing by him.


As more evidence surfaces in the Ukraine whistleblower scandal, and as more people hear about this evidence, the pro-impeachment numbers should keep rising by the day. This will place pressure on the Republican Senators, because they’ll have to fear that the voters will punish them in 2020 if they try to protect Donald Trump in this scandal.

https://www.palmerreport.com/analysis/impeachment-really-bad-news-donald-trump-got-just/21158/
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Surly1

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The Director of National Intelligence Was Between the Jaws of a Nutcracker
Joseph Maguire never had a chance, and the Trump administration* made sure of it. You buy a ticket to Bedlam, you get the whole tour.




WASHINGTON — On Thursday, in a congressional hearing room, we saw a man caught in a nutcracker. It is true that he volunteered to walk into the nutcracker after two other people left it. It is also true that he twisted and turned, and fudged fantabulously (as Rep. Jim Hines put it) trying to survive between the jaws of the nutcracker. But, at the end of it, the nutcracker broke him as it has broken so many other people who decided to bathe in this poisoned spring of a presidency*. Joseph Maguire, former Navy SEAL, career Navy man from a family full of them, and now the Director of National Intelligence, found his previous life and career in tiny chunks all around his feet.

"I felt bad for the guy," said an interested observer of the House Intelligence Committee. "I felt like saying, you know, 'Hey, man. It's gonna be all right.'" But, hey, you buy a ticket to Bedlam and you get the full tour.

Maguire never had a chance. Shortly before the hearing, the committee released both the official complaint filed by the mysterious whistleblower regarding the administration*'s attempt to blackjack the embattled government of Ukraine into helping ratfck the president* a second term. These two documents so fundamentally demolished the threadbare remnants of the administration*'s shabby alibis as to be self-evident. Maguire's choices were either to ignore the obvious criminality that he knows about as well as anyone in government outside of the administration*, or to play dumb and couch his responses in various forms of privilege, not all of which actually exist. To nobody's surprise, Maguire did both. He said he trusted in the good faith of both the whistleblower and the Intelligence Community's inspector general, Michael Atkinson. He also refused even to say whether or not he had ever spoken to the president* on this matter, citing executive privilege—which, one supposes, is a backdoor way of saying that he had.

US-INTELLIGENCE-espionage-Congress
Maguire never had a chance.
ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDSGetty Images

"It seems clear that there was an effort from the Department of Justice, and Attorney General Barr, and the president, of course, to keep these facts from coming to light," said Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, Democrat of New York, and a member of the Intelligence Committee. "And if the box they put the Director of National Intelligence in was not opened up by the inspector general, we would not have known any of this.

"Common sense would lead to that conclusion [that Maguire had had some contact with the White House]. But it sure seemed that way. He seemed pained by the position he was put in. But, obviously, that's a question for the president. You have an incredible whistleblower complaint—that contains a credible allegation of the president pressuring a foreign leader to meddle in an American election. The Director of National Intelligence said it was credible. He did not quibble about that.

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"And the only reason he didn't send it to Congress was that he was put in a box by the White House and the attorney general, who were both implicated in the complaint. My God, that sounds like a terrible conflict of interest, and I think it speaks volumes about what's going on at the highest levels of this administration. You've got the effort to pressure the foreign leader to get involved in the 2020 election. That's a solicitation by the president for a foreign leader to interfere with out election, and then there's the effort to cover it up. If that doesn't support further inquiry, I don't know what does."

US-INTELLIGENCE-espionage-Congress
Devin Nunes, left, made a predictable impression.

BRENDAN SMIALOWSKIGetty Images

The Republicans on the committee didn't quite know what to do with Maguire, either. They wavered between praising him for his service, taking potshots at committee chairman Adam Schiff, and weaving their Sean Hannity Starter Kit conspiracies throughout the official record. (Congressman Devin Nunes, the former White House lawn ornament now d/b/a the ranking minority member of the committee, accused Democrats of seeking out **** pictures of the president*, which was a new one on a lot of people, most of whom felt their stomachs turn at the very concept.) Eventually, the Republicans simply gave up questioning and left the room entirely, although Nunes came back at the end to belch some talking points because what the hell else does he have to do these days...besides suing internet cows, of course.

For all Maguire's agonized testimony, however, the real witnesses before the committee on Thursday were the whistleblower, through his or her complaint, and Michael Atkinson, through his report about the complaint. (Atkinson, it should be noted, was testifying in closed session before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday.) Everything said by actual humans in the committee room was mere filigree.

"He was put in a box by the White House and the attorney general, who were both implicated in the complaint. My God, that sounds like a terrible conflict of interest."

"As [Maguire] said, this process was unusual," said Rep. Joaquin Castro, Democrat of Texas. "It's different from anything that's happened in the past. It was extraordinary that the inspector general's determination of 'Urgent Request' was overruled. If you look at the complaint, it says that a lot of people in the White House actually knew about the president's abuse of power, and there were people who tried to cover it up by putting this phone conversation into a different system, so that's very unusual. We also need to know if there were other things that were covered up besides this phone conversation. What about conversations with other foreign leaders, like Vladimir Putin?"

Meanwhile, up in New York, at a meeting of the U.S. staff at the United Nations, the President* of the United States said this. From The New York Times:

“I want to know who’s the person who gave the whistle-blower the information because that’s close to a spy. You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart with spies and treason, right? We used to handle it a little differently than we do now.”

Get the net, for the love of the living god.

Respond to this post on the Esquire Politics Facebook Page here.


AGelbert

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Re: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠
« Reply #17 on: September 27, 2019, 02:21:51 pm »
Joseph Maguire never had a chance, and the Trump administration* made sure of it. You buy a ticket to Bedlam, you get the whole tour.

Yep. The following was written March 6, 2016. It is prophetic because it is even more true now than then:

Quote
Congratulation, Republicans. After decades of sowing the wind, you’re now reaping the whirlwind. Your ability to exert anything resembling influence and/or control seems negligible at best and nonexistent at worst. You chose to lie down with dogs…and you’ve awakened with fleas. Worst of all, you have only yourselves to blame.


If Trump was a CAT:


'By  Jack Cluth    09.27.19

“Enemies of the People”: A child’s guide to Republican politics in the Donald Trump era

Quote
Jeff Tiedrich
@itsJeffTiedrich
Trump: I eat babies
All rational people: WTF???
Deplorables: GET OVER IT, LIBTARDS
Trump: I never said I eat babies
Deplorables: TRUMP NEVER SAID HE ATE BABIES, LIBTARDS
New York Times: Baby-Eating a Political Minefield for Democrats

37.7K
12:56 PM - Jul 26, 2018
;
https://whatwouldjackdo.org/2019/09/27/enemies-of-the-people-a-childs-guide-to-republican-politics-in-the-donald-trump-era/

Long PITCHFORKS!
« Last Edit: December 07, 2019, 07:30:45 pm by AGelbert »
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠
« Reply #18 on: September 27, 2019, 04:03:10 pm »

“The interference includes…pressuring a foreign country to investigate one of the president’s main domestic political rivals”

By Jack Cluth    09.27.19

Over the next few days, I suspect we’re going to hear a battalion of Donald Trump’s enablers- in Congress and the Right-wing Echo Chamber- bemoaning that Democrats are still, after all this time, still trying to bring down Trump by any means necessary. They’ll keen shrilly about how the transcript of Trump’s phone conversation with the Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky exonerates him utterly and completely. If you read the whistleblower’s complaint and the transcript, you’ll know that nothing could be further from the truth.

Trump and his apologists are becoming increasingly desperate about protecting their fiefdom…and it’s beginning to appear as if their position and power may be in mortal peril. It’s clear that Trump used the phone call to pressure President Zelensky to find dirt on Joe and Hunter Biden…and that he used the promise of American military aid to squeeze Zelensky. Several things- (including egregious abuse of Presidential power)- are clear from the transcript, among them:

– Trump was “using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country” in order to bolster his prospects in the 2020 Presidential election…and the White House tried to cover it up.

– “The interference includes, among other things, pressuring a foreign country to investigate one of the president’s main domestic political rivals.” The complaint implicates Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney, as well as Attorney General William Barr.

– The White House moved to “lock down” the transcript of the phone call by putting it on a more secure computer system normally reserved for sensitive national security information, NOT politically sensitive information.

– According to the whistleblower, this was not the first time phone transcripts were moved “into this codeword-level system solely for the purpose of protecting politically sensitive — rather than national security sensitive — information.”

Trump’s actions posed significant risks to U.S. national security and constituted a “serious or flagrant problem, abuse, or violation of law or Executive Order.

– Several U.S. officials believed the call was predicated on Zelensky’s willingness to “play ball” and cooperate with a scheme intended to enhance Trump’s political prospects.



– Officials were concerned that Giuliani’s efforts represented the “circumvention of national security decision-making processes to engage with Ukrainian officials and relay messages back and forth” between Ukraine’s leadership and Trump.

It seems clear that not only is there a tremendous amount of smoke, but several U.S. officials can almost certainly to the fact that there’s an actual fire burning. The whistleblower’s complaint is not merely the ranting of a disgruntled government employee; that would be easy to debunk. No, there are witnesses to the events in question (and probably a a paper or electronic trail), and those witnesses can speak to the truth of what Trump said.

Over the next few days and week, I’m firmly convinced we’ll find out even more about how Trump has been misusing the power of the Presidency for his own financial and political benefit. If that isn’t sufficient to impeach him, I can’t begin to imagine what might be.

https://whatwouldjackdo.org/2019/09/27/the-interference-includes-pressuring-a-foreign-country-to-investigate-one-of-the-presidents-main-domestic-political-rivals/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Anyone who believes what a liar says is a fool. Trump is an INVETERATE, CONFIRMED, CHRONIC LIAR.


Quote
INVETERATE, CONFIRMED, CHRONIC mean firmly established.

INVETERATE applies to a habit, attitude, or feeling of such long existence as to be practically ineradicable or unalterable. - an inveterate smoker

CONFIRMED implies a growing stronger and firmer with time so as to resist change or reform.  a confirmed bachelor

CHRONIC suggests something that is persistent or endlessly recurrent and troublesome.  a chronic complainer https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/inveterate



He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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GREAT VIDEO: Whistleblower claims of White House coverup
« Reply #20 on: September 27, 2019, 08:27:40 pm »
Whistleblower alleges White House coverup | Trump impeachment inquiry
39,370 views•Sep 26, 2019


Channel 4 News
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Seeking to interfere in the 2020 election, and what's more - attempting to cover it up.Those are the allegations facing President Donald Trump tonight. (Subscribe: https://bit.ly/C4_News_Subscribe)
 
Democrats say they are gathering even more ammunition in their impeachment inquiry against him, with the public release of the whistleblower complaint at the centre of their investigation.
 
#Trump #Impeachment
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He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠
« Reply #21 on: September 27, 2019, 08:40:37 pm »
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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🦀 Trump unleashes fury over impeachment inquiry
« Reply #22 on: September 27, 2019, 08:51:37 pm »
Donald Trump unleashes fury over impeachment inquiry
17,140 views•Sep 27, 2019


Channel 4 News
861K subscribers

President Trump has unleashed another diatribe on Twitter, accusing Democrats of making up the contents of his phone call with the Ukrainian leader to make it “sound horrible”. (Subscribe: https://bit.ly/C4_News_Subscribe)

A formal impeachment inquiry is now investigating whether Donald Trump abused his powers by pressuring Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate his Democratic rival Joe Biden.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the President was putting national security at risk.

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He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠
« Reply #23 on: September 27, 2019, 09:01:13 pm »
Donald 🦀 Trump, to Fight Impeachment - Will he Win or Lose?
2,735 views•Sep 26, 2019


Thom Hartmann Program
181K subscribers

Why is Donald Trump opening an impeachment defense task force?

➡️Please Subscribe to Our Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/thomhart...
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Will Trump Go After Whistle Blower for Revealing Treason?
« Reply #24 on: September 27, 2019, 09:06:35 pm »
Will Trump 🦍 Go After Whistle Blower for Revealing Treason?
736 views•Sep 27, 2019


Thom Hartmann Program
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Donald Trump in glorifying the harsh past may have put the whistle blower in danger and that could be exactly what the President wanted to do! 


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Pence is up to his EYEBALLS in Ukraine TREASON!
« Reply #25 on: September 27, 2019, 09:20:23 pm »
What Are 🦕 Mike Pence's Real Motives As Impeachment Continues?
1,010 views•Sep 27, 2019


Thom Hartmann Program
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Who is Mike Pence Really?

Thom Hartmann is joined by Tom LoBianco DC based reporter & political analyst and author of Piety & Power: Mike Pence and the Taking of the White House.

 
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Re: 🌟 IMPEACHMENT SCORE 🌠
« Reply #26 on: September 27, 2019, 10:07:51 pm »

Details emerge of the White House's efforts to lock down records of a Presidential phone call.


Al Jazeera English
3.92M subscribers

Leveraging the office of the U.S. President, to interfere in the 2020 election.
That's the accusation facing Donald Trump in a whistleblower complaint that's set him on course for an impeachment investigation.
Donald Trump has been accused of trying to persuade the Ukranian leader to dig up dirt on his rival, Joe Biden.
So, will the impeachment effort against Donald Trump intensify?
Or will it back fire on the President's opponents?

Presenter: Sami Zeidan

Guests
Greg Swenson, Spokesman for Republicans Abroad UK
Rina Shah,  Republican Strategist
Arshad Hasan,  Democratic Political Strategist.

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#AlJazeeraEnglish #TrumpImpeachment #USPolitics

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Impeachment Is 🌟 Good For Our Political Future'
« Reply #27 on: September 27, 2019, 10:50:55 pm »
'Impeachment Is 🌟 Good For Our Political Future'
1,240 views•Sep 27, 2019


The Real News Network
354K subscribers

The Nation's national correspondent John Nichols says that history shows impeachment has changed the political future, and thinks it is part of a struggle we should not shy away from.

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Across a divided nation, skepticism about impeachment
« Reply #28 on: September 28, 2019, 09:22:18 am »
'Impeachment Is 🌟 Good For Our Political Future'
1,240 views•Sep 27, 2019

Don't kid yourself, AG. As much as people like us and those who still traffic in reality agree that a mentally ill POTUS must go, this country is still rotten with Trumpists, fascists, white nationalists and nazis who will not go quietly.

Across a divided nation, skepticism about impeachment





Clouds are seen over the White House after President Trump returned on the South Lawn on Sept 26. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
September 27, 2019 at 12:11 p.m. EDT

They don’t ordinarily agree with each other. They watch different channels, hear different versions of the news and view neighbors across a gaping, painful politicaldivide. But in swing districts across the country, the idea of impeaching the president has brought some Americans together: They’re wary of deploying the Constitution’s ultimate weapon — one that takes the decision about who is president out of voters’ hands.

Derek Tsao is a Republican in California who has grown tired of President Trump’s behavior. Curtis Johnson is a Democrat in Florida who could never quite fathom why his fellow Americans chose a man like Trump. Lisa Foulds is a lifelong Republican in suburban Virginia whose kids have pushed her toward the center, so much so that she voted for a Democrat for Congress last year.

They all say the president may have crossed a line when he pressed his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate one of Trump’s main political rivals. And despite their political differences, they say the Democrats’ move this week to start impeachment proceedings against Trump is the wrong tactic at the wrong time.

Polls have shown that public opinion has shifted slightly in favor of impeachment, but many still see it as “an exercise in futility,” as Johnson put it.

The retired steelworker from Indiana, now living in New Smyrna Beach, Fla., said he’s eager for Democrats to find a candidate who can beat Trump next year, but he fears that impeaching the president will make Trump’s reelection more likely. “There’s not enough time before the election and nothing will come of it,” said Johnson, 71. “This is going to hurt the Democrats because everyone’s going to say, ‘You’re putting all your energy into this?’ ”

Tsao, 27, who is studying to be a physical therapist, has followed this week’s news only glancingly, but he’s all for investigating any credible accusations.

“If a crime has been alleged, you should find out more about it,” he said. “I fear, though, that it’s just another anti-Trump move.”

Launching an investigation and potentially putting Trump on trial in the Senate strikes Foulds, a 50-year-old who still considers herself a Republican after voting for independent Gary Johnson in 2016, as “a waste of the taxpayers’ money.”

“For something as trivial as gaining dirt on somebody? It just seems petty,” she said. “I just think it has to be much more egregious.”

As events in Washington unfolded at a breakneck pace this week, many Democrats and Republicans interviewed in swing districts across seven states were united in their exhaustion — with politics, with polarization and, even among some of his supporters, with the president. Many said they chose not to follow every twist and turn in the Ukraine story because their views about Trump had long ago solidified, pro or con.

Voters across the partisan spectrum argued that next year’s election — not impeachment — is the best way to resolve the country’s struggle with a divisive, unpopular president who now stands accused of betraying the nation’s interests.

An NPR-“PBS NewsHour”-Marist poll conducted Wednesday found that 49 percent of Americans supported opening an impeachment inquiry while 46 percent were opposed. And in a Huffington Post-YouGov poll completed Thursday, 47 percent said that “Trump should be impeached and removed from office,” up slightly from 43 percent earlier this month. The increase was driven more by increased support among Democrats than among independents.

Polls taken earlier in the week, before details of the Ukraine call were known, showed somewhat less support for impeachment. In a Quinnipiac University survey completed on Monday, 37 percent of registered voters supported impeaching and removing the president; 57 percent were opposed, including nearly all Republicans, 58 percent of independents, and 21 percent of Democrats.

Protesters call to impeach President Trump in front of the White House on Sept. 24. House Speaker Nancy Pelos (D-Calif.)i announced a formal impeachment inquiry into Trump. (Carolyn Kaster/AP)
Protesters call to impeach President Trump in front of the White House on Sept. 24. House Speaker Nancy Pelos (D-Calif.)i announced a formal impeachment inquiry into Trump. (Carolyn Kaster/AP)

A lose-lose

Rosa Kee can’t stand Trump, but for a long time, she thought impeachment was the wrong idea: “I really wanted us to vote him out, because otherwise he’d say, ‘This isn’t what the people wanted.’ ”

But this week, Kee, a former telecom employee from Stone Mountain, Ga., changed her mind. Kee is now, grudgingly, okay with the Democrats pressing toward impeachment.

“This feels different to me,” said Kee, 73. “Back when he said to Putin, ‘Russia, if you’re listening, go after Hillary,’ I thought, ‘Okay, that’s just his ego talking.’ But what he did to this Ukrainian guy, now he’s using his position for his own interests.”

Kee still doesn’t like the idea of Congress removing Trump — a decision she thinks voters should make on their own — but she believes House Democrats are making a principled decision, even if she’s certain it won’t succeed.

“It will help the Democrats because they finally did something about him,” she said. “But I fear it will help Trump, too, because he’s always making himself out to be the victim, and that always works for him.”

Impeachment — Congress’s power to remove a president without a vote by the people — has never been popular. In the 1970s with Republican Richard Nixon and in the 1990s with Democrat Bill Clinton, a majority of Americans concluded that the president had behaved badly. But the country remained largely opposed to impeachment until shortly before Nixon resigned, and in Clinton’s case, all the way through his acquittal by the Senate.

In Washington, the Ukraine story sucked the air out of every other issue. In Iowa and other early primary states, Democratic presidential candidates watched as news coverage pivoted from the campaign to impeachment. Political consultants and pundits shifted into hyper-speculation mode, urgently searching for clues about how the impeachment probe might alter the country’s political path.

In swing districts, the Ukraine call and impeachment inquiry didn’t seem quite the watershed events they were in the capital, but some voters welcomed the move.

A woman views newspaper headlines announcing the acquittal of President Bill Clinton in February 1999 in Sacramento. Only three of President Trump’s predecessors underwent impeachment proceedings: Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton, who were acquitted after trials in the Senate, and Richard Nixon, who resigned to avoid being impeached in connection with the Watergate scandal. (Bob Galbraith/AP)
A woman views newspaper headlines announcing the acquittal of President Bill Clinton in February 1999 in Sacramento. Only three of President Trump’s predecessors underwent impeachment proceedings: Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton, who were acquitted after trials in the Senate, and Richard Nixon, who resigned to avoid being impeached in connection with the Watergate scandal. (Bob Galbraith/AP)

In the Yorba Linda, Calif., townhouse development where Frank Bryant lives, some neighbors no longer speak to each other because of their opposing views on Trump. “It’s way too personal,” so nobody talks politics anymore around the community pool, said Bryant, a professor of marketing at nearby Cal Poly Pomona.

He generally votes for Democrats, but he admires how Trump has managed the economy. Now, Bryant’s ready to go along with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s decision to switch gears and embrace impeachment.

“I think we have to go with the speaker right now,” Bryant said. “She’s been very careful, and so, if she sees something there now, I believe her.”

Voters on both sides echoed Pelosi’s concerns earlier this year that an impeachment drive could hurt Democrats. Trump supporters and opponents alike predicted that the move might strengthen Trump’s reelection bid.

The modern history of impeachment demonstrates that a sitting president can indeed turn the tables on his accusers, said Frank O. Bowman III, a professor at the University of Missouri School of Law and author of “High Crimes and Misdemeanors,” a history of impeachment. Bowman said that Clinton effectively pressed his case in the news media, portraying his Republican opponents as bad guys who wanted to use his extramarital sexual affair to remove him from office.

“Clinton managed to flip the public narrative from his own bad behavior to the behavior of those who attacked him,” the historian said. “Trump doesn’t need Clinton to teach him anything about fighting dirty. Any attempt to impeach Trump is going to invite the nastiest kinds of backlash, first of all against Joe Biden.”

In St. Clair Shores, a sharply split district in Detroit’s northern suburbs, Diana Rascano, 69, said she often votes for Democrats in local elections, where government “touches your life more than the feds.” But in presidential votes, she’s a consistent Republican because of her conservative views on abortion, immigration and taxes.

The transcript of the president’s call with his Ukrainian counterpart sounded like standard business talk to her, not unlike what she recalls from her days as an executive at the Detroit Edison utility company.

Rascano said Democrats, some Republicans and the news media are acting as “one big angry mob in . . . a constant barrage of trying to find a crime” committed by Trump. As a result, she said, she’s more supportive of the president in 2020 than she was in 2016.

Small-business owner Jason Scaggs, 36, touches up one of the many painted sentiments on his “Flag Barn” in Owings, Md., on Nov. 2, 2016. The barn, which dates to 1912, has signs that read: “Trump — Make America Great Again,” “Blue Lives Matter” and “Dedicated to Our Troops.” (Linda Davidson/The Washington Post)
Small-business owner Jason Scaggs, 36, touches up one of the many painted sentiments on his “Flag Barn” in Owings, Md., on Nov. 2, 2016. The barn, which dates to 1912, has signs that read: “Trump — Make America Great Again,” “Blue Lives Matter” and “Dedicated to Our Troops.” (Linda Davidson/The Washington Post)

Switching sides

In northwestern Pennsylvania, Trump in 2016 became the first Republican presidential candidate to carry Erie County in more than three decades. White working-class voters abandoned their historical ties to the Democratic Party after manufacturing plants downsized or closed along Lake Erie’s southern shore.

But last year, county voters shifted their loyalties back to Democrats as Gov. Tom Wolf and Sen. Robert P. Casey Jr. both carried the county by about 20 points.

In Harborcreek, a working-class town just east of Erie city, many residents said they weren’t paying much attention to the unfolding impeachment controversy in Washington.

Jim Cass, a 77-year-old retired bar owner who has been a Republican all his life, has never liked Trump and said the Ukraine matter has only validated his view.

“I think he is a liar and a cheat and I never trusted him with our foreign affairs,” Cass said, “and I don’t like anything about him. Period.”

He’s all for impeaching the president, but he isn’t sure Congress will be able to amass sufficient evidence to get the job done, and he worries that the debate will deepen the nation’s divisions.

He’s certain the debate will exacerbate divisions within his own family. He has a son and a son-in-law “who loves Trump,” but another son and a daughter-in-law who “don’t have any use for him, either.”

But Cass said the risk of more family fights is worth it if the result is removing from office the man he considers “mentally ill.”

To another Republican in Harborcreek, though, the move toward impeachment seems a recipe for a Trump victory in 2020. Randy Wienke, a 64-year-old truck driver, has been stuck in the house for several days recovering from back surgery — plenty of time to absorb details of the Ukraine story on Fox News.

He’s concluded that Democrats are just out to remove Trump over a phone call that he said most voters don’t care about. “They just don’t like him, and they don’t like him because he doesn’t play into their little clique politics game there,” Wienke said.

He’s convinced that the “real criminals” are Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who have been the target of Trump’s counterattack this week.

Even if Trump did do something wrong, Wienke said, he doesn’t understand why Democrats would rush to push him from office: “Who would take his place? Mike Pence? They still would not be getting rid of any of his conservative, Republican political views.”

The impeachment initiative has changed some minds — if not about Trump, then about the Democrats lining up against him.

Tom Shaw, 56, a fraud investigator in Henrico, Va., voted for Democrat Barack Obama in 2008, Republican Mitt Romney in 2012 and then Trump in the last election, in good part because he liked the idea of a businessperson managing the country.

“Business is tough and running this country is like a big business,” Shaw said. He’s been pleased to see Trump cut red tape, lower unemployment, reduce corporate tax rates and sign a criminal justice reform bill.

But Shaw switched gears last year to vote against his Republican congressman, Dave Brat, and choose Democrat Abigail Spanberger because she’d served as a CIA officer and promised to work with Republicans.

He won’t vote for her again, though, because of her strong advocacy for gun control — and because she announced her support for impeachment this week.

“I’d love to see her sit down and lay out the specific facts that are illegal involving Trump,” he said. “But we’ll see. Maybe something comes out in the hearings. If there’s evidence that Trump violated some law or did something unethical, I would vote to impeach him in a second.”

Portnoy reported from Chesterfield, Va.; Wilson from Yorba Linda, Calif.; Craig from Erie, Pa.; and Fisher from Washington. Anna Clark in Detroit; Jared Leone in Dunedin, Fla.; Eva Ruth Moravec in Georgetown, Tex.; and Scott Clement contributed to this report


AGelbert

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From 🦀 tweedledee to 🦕 teedledum ☠️
« Reply #29 on: September 28, 2019, 01:56:39 pm »




Published on Friday, August 09, 2019 by Common Dreams:

SNIPPET:

Many recent presidents have been awful, “But then there was Donald Trump, the only president in recent American history to openly despise the twin ideals—individual dignity and fundamental equality—upon which the contemporary United States is built. When you confront the reality of a president like Trump, the state of both sets of brakes—internal [constitutional] and external [public resistance]—become hugely important because Donald Trump’s political train runs on the most potent and dangerous fuel of all: a steady diet of fear, greed, loathing, lies, and envy. It’s a toxic mixture that has destroyed democracies before, and can do so again.

“Give Trump credit,” he continues. “He did his homework well and became the twenty-first-century master of divisive rhetoric. We’re used to thinking of Hitler’s Third Reich as the incomparably evil tyranny that it undoubtedly was. But Hitler didn’t take power by force. He used a set of rhetorical tropes codified in Trump’s bedside reading that persuaded enough Germans to welcome Hitler as a populist leader. The Nazis did not overthrow the Weimar Republic. It fell into their hands as the fruit of Hitler’s satanic ability to mesmerize enough Germans to trade their birthright for a pottage of scapegoating, short-term economic gain, xenophobia, and racism. It could happen here.”

Full article:







From 🦀 tweedledee to 🦕 teedledum:

President Pence: "That was just too bad about Trump..."

Agelbert NOTE: As strange as this may seem to anyone reading this, the systemic rot in American politics (and the judiciary) is much more widepread than meets the 'Trump fascist leadership' "eye".

Of course Trump and his entire retinue of murderous crooks and liars should be impeached as a matter of priniciple. But, while I am certain that Trump will be impeached in the House (and "acquitted" in the 🐘 Senate 👎), you know the Democrats do not have the ethical integrity to impeach both 🦀 Trump and 🦕 Pence, never mind 😈 Barr, Mulvaney, 👹 Moscow Mitch, etc., et al. The reason the Democrats have to "limit" the scope of their impeachment efforts is that they know the massively corrupt Republicans are quite aware of the massive corruption in the Democratic Party and will, like corned rats, go scorched earth to expose it. The Democrats do not want the lipstick removed from their "big tent" PIG.

After the Senate "acquits" Trump, the House impeachment stigma will pretty much ruin Trump's political future, unless Trump just declares elections cancelled due to a "national emergency" (SEE: in-our-faces Dictatorship).

I honestly do not think Trump can pull that off, even though I am certain he is seriously considering it. Trump had the gall to ask the Republican Leadership to vet his daughter Ivanka as his 2016 VP running mate until they had a polite discussion with him about the nepotism no-no in American politics.

At any rate, Trump will soon be history. But, the devastating fascist harm he has done to the USA will NOT have been reversed in any way, shape or form. 

So, the rot in both political parties will fester even more destructively, thereby continuing our downward spiral towards anarchy and revolution. Unless the majority of the American voting public demands, in no uncertain terms , ethical behavior NOW from BOTH the Democrats and the Republicans, we will soon all be toast.

No ethics equals NO SOLUTION.



He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

 

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