Here’s a thread.
Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Another Day of Ugliness
The projection. And the abject fear. https://t.co/UOoLn5tLjt
— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) December 4, 2019
I’m still like 40% convinced that if Pelosi held a press conference to announce her view that Trump is too stupid to have demanded that Ukraine investigate Biden in exchange for aid, he’d just blurt out a confession.
— Josh Chafetz (@joshchafetz) December 2, 2019
Schiff says “it’s deeply concerning” that there may have been members of Congress “complicit” in Trump seeking dirt on political foes – responding to phone logs uncovered Nunes interactions
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) December 3, 2019
For those who've questioned impeaching now while evidence is still unfolding, Schiff has a response: "This repeated & pervasive threat to our democratic electoral process added urgency to our work." Trump is cheating to win in 2020. Schiff felt the country couldn't afford to wait
— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) December 3, 2019
As Democrats prepare to draft articles of impeachment, "you could wind up with 3 or 4 articles," sources tell NBC News:
•One to two on abuse of power
•One on broader contempt/obstruction of Congress
•One related to the Mueller report and obstructionhttps://t.co/S86Qqnw2qo— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) December 3, 2019
I haven’t been able to watch all the way through this, but from what I have it’s a good, if crowded, recap:
My friend Jack Bryan with @ActMeasuresDoc has done a great service and condensed the impeachment hearings so far into an easy to digest 60 minutes. https://t.co/V6mzfyTHon
— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) December 1, 2019
Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Another Day of UglinessPost + Comments (137)
House Intelligence Impeachment report is out
The House Intelligence Committee impeachment report just dropped with 300 pages of details:
The impeachment inquiry into Donald J. Trump, the 45th President of the United States, uncovered a months-long effort by President Trump to use the powers of his office to solicit foreign interference on his behalf in the 2020 election. As described in this executive summary and the report that follows, President Trump’s scheme subverted U.S. foreign policy toward Ukraine and undermined our national security in favor of two politically motivated investigations that would help his presidential reelection campaign. The President demanded that the newly elected Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, publicly announce investigations into a political rival that he apparently feared the most, former Vice President Joe Biden, and into a discredited theory that it was Ukraine, not Russia, that interfered in the 2016 presidential election. To compel the Ukrainian President to do his political bidding, President Trump conditioned two official acts on the public announcement of the investigations: a coveted White House visit and critical U.S. military assistance Ukraine needed to fight its Russian adversary.
That is the language of bribery.
House Intelligence Impeachment report is outPost + Comments (93)
Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Winter Is Here
Current status, but with *two* little dogs:
UK Weather Update:
"fuck THAT"
??: Reddit user Superbaker123 pic.twitter.com/HNjgZtkKj9
— Paul Bronks (@SlenderSherbet) November 19, 2019
(Normally papillons are snow dogs, but our rescues are now 15 and 13, so they can’t run as fast as they once did. And the latest ‘band’ of this prolonged nor’easter is wet enough that the falling slush balls up in their coats. I’m not looking forward to shoveling the predicted additional 8″ or so once it finally ends this afternoon, myself.)
Hoyer makes it official: The House will be in session during the week of December 16th. (The calendar previously had the House on recess that week for the Christmas break.) Expect House Dems to use at least some of that time for the impeachment inquiry.
— Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) December 2, 2019
The question is not whether Trump has committed impeachable crimes. He has.
The question is whether Republicans in Congress will affirm that an American president is not above the law.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) November 22, 2019
Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Winter Is HerePost + Comments (80)
Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Will the WH Have the Courtesy to Schedule the Weekend News Dump Today?
As we head into Thanksgiving, a serenity prayer:
You cannot create a marriage of true minds with relatives divorced from reason.
— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) November 26, 2019
House Democrats accelerate impeachment inquiry, give Trump Sunday deadline to participate, by @ericawerner and @feliciasonmez https://t.co/TTCTt8c8gI
— Damian Paletta (@damianpaletta) November 26, 2019
Support for impeachment ticking up again. There goes the lazy narratives. pic.twitter.com/eYMwrVikkJ
— Schooley (@Rschooley) November 26, 2019
American men have way too much tolerance for the president’s boot on their throat https://t.co/4dfqu39peN
— Virginia Heffernan (@page88) November 26, 2019
A bunch think they own the same brand of boots.
— Galactic Fleet Cmdr (@NSAtookmyID) November 26, 2019
You want to torture your relatives? Talk about reality TV all night. Make them anticipate it. Oh, he's talking about Big Brother, now comes the part about Obama's surveillance. But it doesn't come. They'll just be waiting, wondering when they can break out the rehearsed nod.
— Iowa Campaign Choreographer (@agraybee) November 27, 2019
Tuesday Evening Open Thread: The Neverending Shower
I asked Pelosi specifically about this Thursday. Her response was blunt: “absolutely not.” Waiting for courts means July or later for all this testimony. They’ll instead push impeachment next 2 months & continue these investigations/hearings next year. https://t.co/mxEoINQEQd
— Paul Kane (@pkcapitol) November 26, 2019
New CNN poll:
By 50-43, Americans say Trump should be impeached *and removed*
53% say Trump used the presidency improperly
56% say Trump's pressure on Ukraine was about benefiting himself politically
Only 36% say Trump cared about fighting corruptionhttps://t.co/iXoVeU49qv
— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) November 26, 2019
Interesting little nugget from the Morning Consult poll: Slightly more respondents support removing Trump from office (50%) than support the impeachment inquiry itself (48%).
Support for Trump impeachment and removal up three points since last week's hearings to 50%.
— Josh Kraushaar (@HotlineJosh) November 26, 2019
He appears to be committing impeachable crimes in the middle of an impeachment. I understand the Democratic desire to keep this thing narrow, but he’s making it pretty close to impossible.
— Brian Schatz (@brianschatz) November 25, 2019
Adam Schiff said in a letter today that his committee is preparing a report on its investigation into Trump and Ukraine, which will be transmitted to the House Judiciary Committee shortly after Thanksgiving. https://t.co/DXIQPxEPZE
— Axios (@axios) November 26, 2019
Tuesday Evening Open Thread: The Neverending ShowerPost + Comments (202)
Why Do The Investigations Seem To End Too Early?
Something has bothered me since Robert Mueller’s investigation.
Let’s look at the letter appointing him special counsel:
- Robert S. Mueller III is appointed to serve as Special Counsel…
Not Special Prosecutor, as he is often titled. Special Counsel.
- any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump…
Based on these words, I expected a very different report from Mueller.
Mueller acted more as a prosecutor than an investigator. Perhaps I am getting this wrong; in internet parlance, IANAL, I am not a lawyer.
Mueller prosecuted cases against Paul Manafort and the the Internet Research Agency of St. Petersburg. His investigations supported Michael Cohen’s conviction and Michael Flynn’s guilty plea to lying to the FBI about his contacts with the Russian ambassador. There are probably others, but that is not my point. His investigation seems to have been for the purpose of finding prosecutable crimes.
I expected that “any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump” would have included a great deal more than what was in the report.
There were a great many contacts between Russians and the Trump campaign, or near misses like Maria Butina, who got cozy with the NRA, which supported Trump. The Russians used hacked files from the Democratic National Committee to help Republicans beyond Trump.
The Republican platform was changed to weaken support for Ukraine; the Mueller report mentions this, but notes that Trump seems to have been unaware of the change. The person who seems to have been responsible for it, J. D. Gordon, also is connected to Carter Page, who has his own Russian connections. And then there is George Papadopoulos, also with Russian connections.
Perhaps some of these Russian connections, like Butina, can be said not to have been connected with the Trump campaign. The hacked files used against other candidates, again not related to the Trump campaign. Although the platform change may not have involved Trump, his campaign certainly was involved with it, and with those other folks with hinky Russian connections. But these were investigated cursorily, if at all.
I don’t understand how Mueller interpreted the charge and why. I would like to know more about that.
It seems to be difficult to report on connections to Russia without being accused of paranoia. Additionally, some popular voices have greatly exaggerated connections to Russia on the basis of inadequate information.
I do not believe Putin is minutely directing a campaign to destroy the United States. He does not work like that. He remains a KGB colonel with access to the power of a state. He is a tactician rather than a strategist. He wants Russia to be recognized as a great power. Russia is in a strange position internationally. Its nuclear arsenal is equivalent to that of the United States, but its economy is about the size of Texas’s, based primarily on extractive industries. A nuclear great power, but not much else.
The way for Russia to be a great power is to lessen the influence of other great powers. Hence a campaign to divide Americans and Europeans, internally and from each other.
The campaign is loosely run – more a matter of “Who will rid me of these turbulent adversaries?” than of detailed planning and late nights in the Kremlin. Thus, multiple Russian actors, backed by multiple oligarchs, show up in the Mueller Report and in other ways.
Trump always has something bad to say about America’s allies, but never about Vladimir Putin and other autocrats. The connections across the Republican Party to Russia are many, as far as we know now, largely through donations. The Dallas Morning News has had major articles on this means of influence (August 2017, December 2017, two in May 2018) . Why haven’t other news outlets joined the investigation? Why isn’t this mentioned as common knowledge when Tucker Carlson sides with Russia over Ukraine?
There are so many stories that need more investigation.
Trump’s history with Russia. 1987 seems to be a turning point. And, of course, the noteless meetings with Vladimir Putin, particularly in Helsinki in July 2018.
Devin Nunes’s midnight run to the White House
Kevin McCarthy’s comment about Putin paying Trump and Dana Rohrabacher. McCarthy received a campaign contribution from Rudy Giuliani’s associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, which he is returning. He is not the only one to receive money from them.
Parnas and Fruman are currently a focus of media attention. Parnas would like to testify to Congress, but there is little reason to believe anything he says until we understand better his connections to Giuliani and Trump and to people like Dmytro Firtash.
Eight Republican members of Congress spent the Fourth of July, 2018, in Moscow. They met with senior Russian officials. They are Richard Shelby (AL), Ron Johnson (WI), John Neely Kennedy (LA), Jerry Moran (KS), Steve Daines (MT), John Hoeven (ND), John Thune (SD) and Rep. Kay Granger (TX). Johnson and Kennedy have been extremely vocal lately in spreading the Russian propaganda meme that Ukraine, not Russia, hacked the campaigns in 2016.
And, oh yes, the US Intelligence Community report of January 2017 said that the Republican campaign was hacked too. We haven’t seen any more about that.
That’s the list I come up with over a day or two of thought. I’ll bet there’s more.
There is a throughline to all this: Russian interference in American politics. It’s a big story, to be sure, but one that we need to hear. Most of it was not covered in the Mueller investigation. The House Intelligence Committee hearings have been on a very small part of it. News organizations are working on parts of it. We need more.
Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner
Why Do The Investigations Seem To End Too Early?Post + Comments (81)