Steve Castor knocked it out of the park again today. Trump is lucky to have Castor working on his behalf. #SteveCastor
He is a great lawyer based on his ability to reframe things and introduce doubt. He is doing his best as a lawyer during an otherwise solid and ironclad impeachment inquiry. Jordan has been the most embarrassing character.
WSJ Editorial Board tonight: https://www.wsj.com/articles/sondlands-unimpeachable-offenses-11574294949?mod=hp_opin_pos_1 Sondland’s Unimpeachable Offenses Witnesses are providing more detail about what we already know. By The Editorial Board Nov. 20, 2019 7:09 pm ET The House impeachment hearings roll on, but the most important news is how little new we are learning about President Trump and Ukraine. The witnesses from the diplomatic and national-security bureaucracy are filling in some details—many of which are unflattering about how policy is made in this Administration—but none change the fundamental narrative or suggest crimes or other impeachable offenses. *** That includes Wednesday’s testimony by Gordon Sondland, the U.S. Ambassador to the European Union who described what he saw and heard from May through September. His account essentially confirms that Mr. Trump had a negative view of Ukraine, was reluctant to keep supplying U.S. aid, and asked Mr. Sondland and others to work with Rudy Giuliani to press Ukraine’s new President Volodymyr Zelensky to announce that he was opening an anti-corruption probe. “The suggestion that we were engaged in some irregular or rogue diplomacy is absolutely false,” Mr. Sondland said. In other words, the President was directing policy, as he has the right to do, and nearly everyone in security positions seemed to know about it. As we’ve known since Mr. Trump released the transcript of his July 25 phone call with Mr. Zelensky, this may have been the least secret foreign-policy fiasco in memory. We’re almost embarrassed as journalists that we didn’t know about it. The impeachment press is hyperventilating that Mr. Sondland finally nailed down the elusive quid pro quo with Ukraine, but that is far from clear. “Was there a ‘quid pro quo?’” Mr. Sondland said in his opening statement. “With regard to the requested White House call and White House meeting [between Mr. Trump and Mr. Zelensky], the answer is yes.” But note that Mr. Sondland says nothing about aid to Ukraine being part of the quid, and under questioning later he said he merely “presumed” there were preconditions for a Trump-Zelensky meeting. He never heard that directly from Mr. Trump, and on one call with Mr. Sondland the President flatly rejected the idea. We also know that on three separate occasions, including the July 25 phone call, Mr. Trump invited Mr. Zelensky to the White House without preconditions. Mr. Sondland also said, under questioning by Democratic counsel Daniel Goldman, that he wasn’t even sure if Mr. Giuliani cared about the result of any Ukraine investigation—only that Mr. Zelensky publicly declare that one had been opened. “I never heard, Mr. Goldman, anyone say that the investigations had to start or be completed,” Mr. Sondland said. “The only thing I heard from Mr. Giuliani or otherwise was that they had to be announced in some form.” This isn’t a quid pro quo that comes close to meeting the definition of bribery. It’s another case of Mr. Trump’s volatile policy-making based on personal impulse or prejudice, but it’s not an impeachable offense. On that score, readers who have lives to lead can save time by reading Senator Ron Johnson’s account. The Wisconsin Republican has taken a personal interest in Ukraine since he joined the Senate in 2011, and in a Nov. 18 letter to House Intelligence Members he explains what he saw and heard at the White House and on visits to Ukraine. Mr. Johnson relates how he returned from Mr. Zelensky’s inaugural to brief Mr. Trump and discovered how hostile the President was to Ukraine. Mr. Johnson supported military aid and thought Mr. Zelensky, as a newly elected President, could do much to reduce corruption. The Senator spent the next months working with others, inside and outside the Administration, to change the President’s mind. Eventually he prevailed, and the aid was released on Sept. 11. Mr. Johnson says Mr. Trump called him on Aug. 31 and told him, “Ron, I understand your position. We’re reviewing it now, and you’ll probably like my final decision.” This matters because Democrats claim Mr. Trump released the aid only because they were on the impeachment trail. “To my knowledge, most members of the administration and Congress dealing with the issues involving Ukraine disagreed with President Trump’s attitude and approach toward Ukraine,” Mr. Johnson writes. “Many who had the opportunity and ability to influence the president attempted to change his mind. I see nothing wrong with U.S. officials working with Ukrainian officials to demonstrate Ukraine’s commitment to reform in order to change President Trump’s attitude and gain his support.” But Mr. Johnson adds that officials cannot substitute their policy for the President’s and that impeachment is doing “a great deal of damage to our democracy”—not least by making presidential phone calls with foreign leaders open to public disclosure. This is a political grownup talking. Like so many others since this idiosyncratic President was elected, Mr. Johnson has tried to steer Mr. Trump from his worst policy instincts. Thank goodness they have, and certainly this Trumpian behavior is ripe for debate and voter judgment in 2020. Democrats might have advanced that cause with hearings and a censure resolution. Instead, they have unleashed the dogs of impeachment without impeachable offenses.
Yes, Trump was directing the policy, but the article was wrong to suggest that he was directing it in a way that he has a right to do it. The President directed policy in a way that is illegal and impeachable. The rest of the article is the same crap about people acting like because they didn't hear the words "I am using bribery" then it wasn't actually bribery. That is patently false. The comic bit of someone saying 'You don't want to let me in? Maybe Ben Franklin can change your mind' as the character waves money in the guard/bouncer/Maitre D' s face wouldn't be a bribe either. Except it is a bribe and everyone who sees that knows that it is. The offer was communicated. The same is true of the trope using the reluctant transient who was a witness complaining about his memory while rubbing his thumb and fingers together while holding out his hand. Neither instance are they using the words but in both instances, they are absolutely bribery. We have numerous witnesses who have all corroborated each other's stories, the meaning, the intent, and that Trump was the one directing it, as the opinion article from WSJ states.
-Mueller Investigation made money by seizing Manaforts assets and resulted in numerous indictments. There is no way to to consider it anything other than a monumental success. -Recent depositions have exposed extensive corruption. - The house has put hundreds of bills on McConell's desk, none of which have been acted on. Mojo being Mojo.
Fiona Hill is good at answering questions that don't allow Republicans to lead her with questions that are begging for soundbites to take out of context.
I'm not an idiot, nor am I that smart in my opinion lol. I am hopefully going to have a masters degree in an something that is actually worth obtaining fairly soon though. In saying that I will never ever eva eva be as articulate as her.
I feel you. Honestly it re-instates some confidence I have that not all of our best and brightest have been bullied out by this current administration. It also shows me that when our best and brightest are allowed to do their jobs like focus on foreign policy, we have really good people representing us there. I didn't and still fully don't know or understand the importance of Ukraine as a territorial region until Fiona Hill mentioned it's basically a choke point for energy and trade routes that Russia has coveted for some time, and weakening them, strengthens Russia's aim in taking it over. Having our U.S. President propagate Russia talking points that go against a European ally, while withholding foreign aid and at the same time trying to create a tabloid by starting a faux investigation against a future political rival is just way too much smoke. It baffles me how those in defense (Senators and everyday supporters) of Trump can really in good conscience make a case in defense of him. I like a good trolling as much as the next internet @sshole, but this is our nation we're talking about.
Yeah and I feel you on this post. lol But really it should not be surprising because of the simple fact that our political system resulted in the two candidates H Clinton, and D Trump. As I have stated on here is that both are horrible. For some of the same reasons, and some very different reasons. People on here trying to justify his actions over these last few years is dumbfounding. The only thing to hang your hat on are some of the metrics of the economy. And I suppose if you swing that way are the federal judges that have been appointed (which could have been accomplished I assume with most any Republican) Which are all in line and in continuation of the metrics starting in the 2nd year of Obama's presidency. Regardless this country can and will do better than Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. If the US does not things could get really bad in this country and even the rest of the world.
Hillary was gonna be a mediocre to bad President which would still be miles better than what Trump has been. And again, she actually has passed legislation that's benefited U.S. citizens by being a big contributor to starting CHIP which has helped tens of millions of children with chronic illnesses that come from low income families for the past 20 years and counting. And it was done in a bipartisan fashion. That lone accomplishments from back in the 90s as First Lady is greater than anything Trump has done as President. ****, if CHIP didn't exist and Trump passed it right now, that would be a major talking point he'd never shut up about that might be the type of heartwarming legislation that would even ease tension towards impeachment inquiries. "Trump helps over 9 million kids from low income families receive the necessary healthcare to provide a good quality of life despite coming from poor upbringings." That **** would sell so hard to all the Evangelicals and red state supporters living in poverty. It would even be legislation that shows he actually gives a **** about his constituents. But that's Hillary's thing. To think, even some Trump supporter mom that has a child with chronic illnesses in Arkansas is getting more help from Hillary now from some policy she helped get passed in the 90s than Trump. What a useless President even to his own voting constituency.
I don't know, seemed pretty off-topic to me. I drifted in and out of consciousness there for a while, wasn't really paying attention
