Tag Archives: impeachment

national news

Watch out, Mr. ‘Current’ POTUS

If Donald J. Trump is going to refer to Christopher Wray as the “current” director of the FBI, I am going to take it upon myself — through High Plains Blogger — to hereby refer to Trump as the “current” president of the United States.

Fair is fair, right?

I mean, to imply that Wray’s status as head of the world’s pre-eminent investigative agency might be in peril gives many of us license to infer the same thing about the man who appointed him.

Donald Trump’s status as the “current” president well might imply the same thing, if not through impeachment and removal in a Senate trial, then via the next presidential election.

Donald Trump

We’re perplexed, too, Mitch

Wow! I gotta tell ya, Mitch. A lot of us out here today, at this moment, are “completely and utterly perplexed” as well.

We are perplexed by the view of those who insist that abuse of power and obstruction of Congress “are not high crimes and misdemeanors.”

You, Mr. Senate Majority Leader, are among those who continue to deny what is patently obvious to many of us out here in the hinterland.

Donald Trump has violated his formerly sacred oath of office. He needs to go.

national news

How is McConnell able to serve as a Senate ‘juror’?

I am baffled. The U.S. Senate majority leader is seeking to grease a pending Senate trial in favor of the president of the United States.

And this will occur after he takes an oath administered by the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court to be an impartial juror.

How does that work?

Mitch McConnell is working with the White House to ensure a favorable outcome for Donald Trump, who’s about to be impeached by the House of Representatives. The Senate will get the matter and will conduct a trial to determine whether Trump should be convicted of two high crimes and misdemeanors: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

All 100 senators will serve as jurors in a trial presided over by Chief Justice John Roberts. But how in the name of impartial juris prudence can Majority Leader McConnell perform the duties he will swear he will do if he’s attempting to rig the outcome in favor of the president?

This isn’t how you’re supposed to do it.

I get that the trial isn’t strictly a judicial affair, that it’s tinged with politics through and through. However, there is supposed to be a certain level of judicial decorum involved when the jurors take an oath to judge the evidence fairly and with an open mind.

For the leader of the Senate to work against that very oath is a serious violation of the duties he is supposed to perform.

national news

Rep. Van Drew finds a way to make big news

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U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey toiled in obscurity as a back-bench member of Congress.

Then he thrust himself onto the front pages simply by declining to endorse his party’s effort to impeach Donald Trump. He said he would vote “no” on impeachment articles when the issue reaches the full House of Representatives.

So now he is switching from the Democratic to Republican Party.

Are you surprised? Neither am I. Are you disappointed? Me, neither on that one, too.

Van Drew is likely to be among a handful of House Democrats who will vote “no” on whether to impeach the president. That’s their call. There’s no need to argue the point here. My feelings on the president’s conduct are known to those who read this blog.

I suppose my major takeaway from Van Drew’s pending decision is that he has found a way to make a name for himself well beyond his congressional district.

national news

Sen. McConnell seeks to ‘rig’ Senate trial

(Photo by Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

So this is how you play the game. You’re in charge of a body that is about to launch a trial and you rig it so it rules favorably against a defendant?

Spoiler alert: I said I was considering a temporary end to impeachment commentary, but I am going to weigh in briefly here.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his 99 U.S. Senate colleagues are about to put Donald Trump on trial for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The House will impeach Trump in due course.

McConnell now says he will work to ensure smooth cooperation between the Senate and the White House, meaning he is going to orchestrate a not guilty verdict for the president when the time comes to take the roll among the 100 Senate “jurors.”

Isn’t that called tampering with the jury? Or some form of unseemly manipulation of the jury pool? If this matter isn’t supposed to be about politics, but about doing what’s right … what is so “right” about what McConnell is seeking to do?

 

media news

Impeachment fatigue is setting in

I am considering whether I want to take a break on this blog from commenting on the impeachment of Donald John Trump.

I am running out of ways to express what already is known: that I believe Trump is unfit for the presidency; he deserves to be impeached; congressional Republicans are all wet in their defense of this guy.

The world out there is huge. It is full of issues, crises, good news, tragedy and other matters that deserve High Plains Blogger’s attention.

I cannot promise that’s what will happen. I am just suffering what can be described only as impeachment fatigue.

Your blogger will have plenty to say when the Senate trial commences. There might be a comment or two coming from this venue before then.

I am just worn out.

national news

Praising a system that allows bloggers to rant

I want to say a word of high praise to the greatest political system ever created. Yes, it’s a mess at times, but as Winston Churchill noted, it is far better than any other system ever conceived.

The United States is in the midst of an impeachment battle. The House of Representatives is going to impeach Donald John Trump Sr. It will be sloppy and messy, perhaps bloody in a political sense.

Through it all, this system of government of ours allows folks like me to continue to rant over the performance of the president, who I believe should be impeached. The House will do as I wish, albeit my journey to this point took me some time to get here.

I watched a clip of a young Illinois state senator speaking to the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Barack Obama saluted a system of government that allowed dissent “without a sudden knock on our door.” Amen to that. The young senator would be elected to the U.S. Senate and then, four years later, would become the nation’s 44th president of the United States.

Donald Trump calls the press the “enemy of the people.” He couldn’t possibly be any more wrong. The Constitution protects the press against government coercion and interference. Yet the president sees the press only through the eyes of someone who lusts for positive coverage of his words and deeds, no matter what! It does not work that way, Mr. President. If this man had any understanding of what the nation’s founders intended when they established the First Amendment to the Constitution, he might comprehend the press’s role in ensuring the freedoms we all enjoy.

Accordingly, that role extends to folks like me. I no longer work full time for a formal media organization. I’m out here in Flyover Country sharing my views with the world through this blog. High Plains Blogger is my therapy, my release and my vehicle to vent my frustration with government. I also offer praise now and then.

As I continue to write critically of Congress, the president and even the courts, I do so with the knowledge that I can speak my mind freely without concern for the knock on the door that will not come.

Trump wants to “make American great again”? Hah! Our system of government crafted by those wise men at the founding of this nation ensured our ongoing greatness. It will last for as long as there is a United States of America.

national news

Pelosi: It’s time to impeach Donald Trump

Well, there you have it. U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has declared that the time has come to impeach the president of the United States.

She said this morning that she makes that assertion with sadness in her heart. Pelosi said Donald Trump has brought this moment onto himself.

Pelosi resisted the idea of impeaching the president for a good bit of time. Then came that infamous phone call and the request he made of a foreign government for personal political help. That did it.

The speaker has directed the Judiciary Committee to begin drafting articles of impeachment. So, the committee will proceed I presume with all deliberate speed.

I am going to take her at her word that she doesn’t “hate” Donald Trump. She fielded a reporter’s question today about whether she and here fellow Democrats hate the president and that their visceral feelings toward him are driving their push for impeachment. Pelosi fired back, telling the reporter to “don’t mess with me” by accusing her hating anyone. She said her Catholic upbringing taught her to “pray” for the president, which she said she does every day.

The impeachment process is now moving ahead. There will be no more delay. That suits me just fine.

The Intelligence and Judiciary committees have compiled enough evidence to lay out those articles of impeachment.

I am one patriotic American taxpayer who is ready to see this drama play out toward its conclusion.

national news

Professor Karlan learns a tough lesson

“Pamela Karlan, you should be ashamed of your very angry and obviously biased public pandering, and using a child to do it.”

So said first lady Melania Trump via Twitter in response to a university professor’s unfortunate invoking of Mrs. Trump’s son, Barron, during testimony today before the House Judiciary Committee.

Professor Karlan said that while it is all right for the president to name his son “Barron,” he couldn’t “make him a baron.”

That drew the expected criticism.

Frankly, she deserved to take the hit for the remark, for which she apologized.

Now, this likely won’t quell the critics. It should, but they’ll continue to yammer at her. We have learned in this political climate that apologies often never go far enough to absolve someone from the transgression they commit.

In this instance, Pamela Karlan’s mistake was clearly defined. Politicians’ children should be off limits … always! She crossed a line that was equally defined.

I am heartened to have listened to her apology as she made it. I am guessing Karlan might have known of the consequence of that mistake the moment she uttered it.

The heated debate in Washington is only going to get even hotter as this impeachment matter progresses toward a full vote in the House of Representatives. The president and his key aides have provided all by themselves the world with plenty of grist for which they can be criticized.

The president’s young son is way off limits.

International news

Trump makes a hash of another NATO gathering

Well now, that didn’t go too well.

Donald Trump was one of several heads of state and government attending a meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Then he decided he had enough of the treatment he was getting from his fellow world leaders gathered in London. So he left early, canceling an anticipated press conference.

Oh, my.

He started out by having a testy press availability with French President Emanuel Macron, who snapped back at Trump’s assertion that many Islamic State fighters come from France.

He called Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “two-faced.”

Trump said France needs NATO more than the United States and chided the French for not paying more for their defense against potential enemies in Europe.

Other world leaders were heard on a “hot microphone” poking fun at the U.S. president … which I guess was too much for Trump to handle.

He left the meeting early and headed for home.

Goodness, gracious.

Is this how the president of the United States represents us on the world stage? Must we tolerate this kind of petulance? Must this nation be held up as an international laughingstock only because its president doesn’t know how to behave and act like the head of state of the world’s most indispensable nation?

He talks about impeachment constantly during his press sessions. He blasts House Speaker Nancy Pelosi openly while he’s overseas. Trump ridicules the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, hurling a variety of epithets at the man who is performing his constitutionally prescribed duties.

So, another foreign visit has gone badly.

Get to work, Mr. President, on whatever it is you do.