Now That Trump's President... (not any more!)

As far as comedy goes, I hope The Onion's 'Trump Boys' gags never stop: https://www.theonion.com/tag/trump-boys

I know this is 2 weeks old, but I don't think it was posted yet

here's your sunday morning deniro trump rant. good one this week

Makes a good point about our democracy being tested but then supports Bloomberg.

just look at that mullet... sorta like hay colored tentacles clawing at his collar. still sometimes hard to believe that this fucking guy became president

Is that photo manipulated to make his head look flat? He must be missing half a brain up there.

shitshow

 | 

\/

“I don’t know how you can impeach someone who’s done a great job" - Trump, Aug. 2018

Nunes is unwatchable. 

Strong performances from Kent and Taylor. The facts are damning. The GOP are weak, but it will be difficult to win removal. These bastards stand to cash in the biggest pay day of their lives in order to shield Trumpo. The dark-money channels are in place, the signals are out, and the motivation is as big as big oil because corrupt oil powers have been propping up Trump and the GOP in order to delay progress on carbon emissions. 

  On 11/13/2019 at 8:08 PM, very honest said:

The dark-money channels are in place, the signals are out, and the motivation is as big as big oil because corrupt oil powers have been propping up Trump and the GOP in order to delay progress on carbon emissions. 

Where are your opinions coming from, friend? Keep watch

!

https://www.newsweek.com/ann-coulter-vows-not-watch-impeachment-hearings-later-admits-she-backslid-calls-first-witness-1471665

The hearing yesterday ended up being less of a shit show, actually. The usual Republican attack dogs, Ratcliffe, Jordan, and Nunes, looked fearful. GOP members were "yielding back" extra time to the committee instead of yielding extra time to their minority chair. Jordan had been added to the House Intel Committee only last week, which was a curious news item. Now it makes more sense, the GOP is feeling weak so they added an attack dog to the committee doing hearings. 

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent, who testified alongside Ambassador Taylor, is apparently the man. Kent and Taylor gave dramatic testimony and gave push-back to GOP reps.

George Kent's opening statements provided good background regarding the Ukraine US relationship. Taylor's opening statement went on for 40 minutes (and was good).

The Democrats have been learning how to do these hearings. The Corey Lewandowski hearing, which was actually a significant impeachment hearing about an obstruction of justice offense in the Mueller report, was hampered by Lewandowski being in full Trump-defense PR mode, and the Congressional member cross-examinations coming before the extended staff lawyer examination. After hours of grueling rhetoric from politicians trying to get reelected and a Trump stooge, with the waters muddied, late in the afternoon, the staff lawyer spends 30 minutes dragging the damning details out of Lewandowski all at once, confirming a fact pattern detailing an obstruction of justice crime.

Now the Democrats have learned and they did the staff examinations before the member examinations. After opening statements, both parties had a lawyer-type interview the witnesses for up to 45 mins each. This allowed a longer exploration of the drama of a nation at war with a powerful neighbor, and their ally the US trying to strong-arm the new anti-corruption president to engage in corrupt behavior, and how the publicly weakened Ukraine/US relationship severely impacted Ukraine's negotiating position in peace talks with Russia. The GOP staff examiner seemed meek, slinked back, and was corrected by Taylor at times. He actually wrapped early (they had 45 minutes and he used about 30).

The Taylor/Jordan exchange was a spectacle. Right when Jordan starts, you can see Taylor watching intently for the attack. Taylor engages courteously but struggles to tolerate Jordan. Taylor starts glaring tauntingly at Jordan. He points out that Jordan is omitting inconvenient facts that he knows, which had been stated earlier in the hearing. Taylor was top of his class at West Point and is a decorated Vietnam vet. Ukrainian soldiers were wounded and killed on the frontline on a day that he visited, while they were being denied defense aid. Jim Jordan got a JD degree but never took the bar exam, and was an assistant wrestling coach at a college for 8 years.

Himes was good. Nice to see Dems calling out GOP when appropriate.

The Taylor/Kent hearing is one brick in the case but it came out about as good as it could have. Vindman, Yanakovich, Morrison, Sondland, their private deposition transcripts have been released and the testimony is damning. Yanakovich is tomorrow, Sondland is next week, and Vindman will be a good one, not scheduled yet though. Yanakovich is a badass, Sondland is a squirming Trump stooge forced to correct perjury in order to avoid prison, and Vindman is a decorated Colonel who was on the call and noticed patterns of cover-up behavior in the administration. Quid pro quo aka extortion aka bribery, withholding defense aid in order to extract political investigations from a vulnerable nation that needed our help in their active war with Russia, it's substantiated with an abundance of quality evidence.

It will be amazing if the GOP Senate equits Trump, and it will be amazing if they don't. How does the right-wing media machine change course? Fox News has been trying but that ship turns slowly. 

  On 11/14/2019 at 4:31 PM, very honest said:

it's substantiated with an abundance of quality evidence

what is the evidence? 

  On 11/14/2019 at 4:35 PM, Drum Up said:

what is the evidence? 

testimony from several credible witnesses, text messages, the jul 25 call notes, media statements by trump and giuliani. also trump's stonewalling of documents and testimony is itself damning evidence. why would they withhold evidence that would exonerate him?

in addition to the wealth of evidence that's already public, there are a lot of documents and witnesses that may come out during this process following court orders or other developments.

  On 11/14/2019 at 4:31 PM, very honest said:

How does the right-wing media machine change course? Fox News has been trying but that ship turns slowly. 

I don't think they ever will...they stay hitched to king donald and keep backing his delusions of witch hunt, fake news, etc. until he's dead. that's part of what is so maddening about donnie's sinking ship reality tv shit show...that no matter what happens to him, he's still going to maintain support from MAGA/fox news for years to come. history will look back at this period in time as the point when common sense disappeared from among roughly half of the american voting public...

  On 11/14/2019 at 5:27 PM, zero said:

I don't think they ever will...they stay hitched to king donald and keep backing his delusions of witch hunt, fake news, etc. until he's dead. that's part of what is so maddening about donnie's sinking ship reality tv shit show...that no matter what happens to him, he's still going to maintain support from MAGA/fox news for years to come. history will look back at this period in time as the point when common sense disappeared from among roughly half of the american voting public...

right wing media is weird. it's like fox realized they can report stories from fringe websites by using innuendo language to protect themselves, then politicians found the legitimized fake news helpful for getting away with things, and now the whole ecosystem has wound up in crazyland.

  On 11/14/2019 at 4:35 PM, Drum Up said:

what is the evidence? 

If you implicitly made the point I think you did, I actually agree!

I read a couple of interesting articles on the Guardian recently where they interviewed a number of people who voted for Trump in 2016 asking their thoughts on the impeachment thing. All of them basically said something like: we're not convinced, but if the dems have the evidence i'm interested and will use that knowledge in the coming 2020 election (read: it's up to the voters to decide about Trump. not congress!).

So a lot of people haven't been convinced up unto this point. And from what I've seen, I'm wondering whether the dems will be able to deliver the evidence needed to convince those people. 

Personally, I think the dems made a miscalculation about not going after the higher people like pompeo, mulvaney and giuliani. They need the people directly involved, instead of the worrying people lower down the chain of command (taylor, hill, sondland, ...). It seems to me the dems assumed those would give a strong enough case. Which to a certain degree it does. But I don't think it's enough to move the needle with respect to the people who are currently undecided. And my guess is, you'd need to have the mulvaneys, pompeos and giulianis in public hearings to get the undecided people to move.

In short: too bad sandwichspread. Although I'm not expecting a huge backlash either, btw. My guess is, the outcome of 2020 is already set. And the only thing able to move the needle, would be a proverbial meteorite.

  On 11/14/2019 at 7:11 PM, goDel said:

Personally, I think the dems made a miscalculation about not going after the higher people like pompeo, mulvaney and giuliani. They need the people directly involved, instead of the worrying people lower down the chain of command (taylor, hill, sondland, ...). 

they are subpoenaing witnesses on an ongoing basis, and they have to strategize around court rulings on compelling testimony. nadler said the mcgahn case is the precedent that will open the floodgates of testimony and documents. bolton said he will testify after the mcgahn ruling is finalized, which means the ukraine stuff won't be done until the mueller stuff is ready to go. i think the mcgahn case has now been through regular court and appeals court and all that's left is for the supreme court to say if they will review the appeals ruling (which said mcgahn has to testify). they don't want to subpoena people until they can enforce it.

once the supreme court says the McGahn case Appeals Court ruling stands, which is the expected result, get ready.

  On 11/14/2019 at 7:11 PM, goDel said:

My guess is, the outcome of 2020 is already set.

What do you think will happen? I'm still hoping that Trump is defeated, but I'm worried that this impeachment will backfire on the dems.

They're describing the House members in the words of the person potentially on trial.  Ass end up.

  On 11/14/2019 at 11:52 PM, Drum Up said:

What do you think will happen? I'm still hoping that Trump is defeated, but I'm worried that this impeachment will backfire on the dems.

I don't think it's going to backfire. Reason is that the people who are already done with Trump will be confirmed in their opinions during these hearings. I really don't see these hearings flipping people from an anti Trump stance to pro trump. Therefore, no backlash. And i also dont expect anti trumpers to stay home coming elections. Plenty energy to vote. Less so for Trump supporters, i feel. 

About 2020: the recent outcomes in Virginia, Kentucky and the blue wave in 2018 say plenty, imo. I expect similar results. Although on a national level theres still plenty support for trump and the big picture votes will still be close to 50/50. Just the other way around. And a dem win. Again though, still plenty votes going to trump.

Support for trump will not implode. I don't expect a nixon like scenario. If that would happen, it would have happened ten times by now. Remember, people consciously voted for the "grab em by the pussy" guy. 

  On 11/15/2019 at 2:11 AM, Rubin Farr said:

They're describing the House members in the words of the person potentially on trial.  Ass end up.

Expand