Tag Archives: impeachment

national news

Don’t expect GOP heroes to emerge in public impeachment hearing

I feel the need to offer a sad scenario.

It is this: Do not hold your breath waiting for any Republican members of Congress to emerge as heroes during the public questioning of witnesses in the impeachment inquiry into Donald J. Trump.

Previous impeachment proceedings have produced congressmen and women who have crossed the aisle. I do not expect that event will occur at least in this phase of the impeachment inquiry.

Trump will get impeached by the House. That’s almost a lead-pipe cinch. The public hearings that commence on Wednesday will become a circus. How do we know that? Consider that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has installed Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio on the House Intelligence Committee. Jordan has emerged as arguably the most vocal Trump sycophant in the House and I believe he will do all he can do to divert this probe away from the issue at hand.

And it is: whether Donald Trump abused the immense power of his office for personal political gain by seeking a favor from Ukraine in exchange for weaponry that Ukrainians want to use against their Russia-back insurgents.

Will any Republicans on the Intelligence panel step forward the way, say, they did during the Watergate hearings of 1973 and 1974? Nope.

Remember it was GOP Sen. Howard Baker of Tennessee who asked back then, “What did the president know and when did he know it?”

Then came the million-dollar question from fellow Tennessean, Fred Thompson, who was GOP legal counsel on the Senate select committee investigating Watergate: “Are you aware,” Thompson asked White House aide Alexander Butterfield, “of any listening devices in the White House?” Thompson, being the good lawyer he was, knew the answer would be “yes,” that Butterfield was aware of such devices.

It was effectively game over at that point.

If only there could be some political heroism emerge today.

national news

Past the point of no return with this POTUS

I have a declaration to make regarding the president of the United States. It doesn’t give me any joy to say this, but I must say it nonetheless.

It now appears highly unlikely that I ever will be able to put the word “President” in front of “Trump” for as long as this man occupies the nation’s highest office.

A few critics of this blog have called me on this policy I have invoked since Trump became president. They dislike my references to Trump without attaching his elected title in front of his last name.

Too bad.

Truly, though, I had hoped for a turnaround in the president’s conduct of his office. I had wanted to be able to respect the man enough to refer to him the way others have done. The media have done their part in bestowing the title in front of the president’s name. That’s their call. I am making my own call on my own blog. Why? Because I can.

Trump’s behavior since the day he announced his candidacy for president has been abysmal, deplorable, reprehensible, disgusting, disgraceful … stop me now! The list of pejoratives is endless.

He’s going to be impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives. The Senate will put him on trial for high crimes and misdemeanors. He stands a good chance of surviving a Senate trial only because there do not appear to be enough Senate Republicans who will muster the courage to stand for the rule of law and vote to convict him of the charges the House impeachment articles will bring.

The backdrop for all of this is unique. Trump will be the first president to be impeached who is facing a re-election campaign. No one can predict with any certainty how the election will turn out when the votes are counted on Nov. 3, 2020.

As much as I wanted it to be different, I must declare that Donald John Trump Sr. has crossed a proverbial line of demarcation. I just do not see an instance that in the foreseeable future that will allow me to speak of this man the way I have spoken about other presidents with whom I have disagreed.

Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush 41 and 43 all conducted themselves with dignity and class — even while they have endured extreme controversy and, yes, scandal.

The current president has not. He won’t change his ways. Given all that has transpired since he rode down that escalator in Trump Tower to announce his entry into political life, I cannot imagine a scenario that would allow me to use the words “President” and “Trump” consecutively.

national news

Sen. Graham … let the House do its job and then do your own

U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham keeps yammering out of both sides of his mouth.

The South Carolina Republican once declared that Donald Trump was unfit for the presidency, then he said if allegations about a quid pro quo with Ukraine were trouble that it would be “very troubling.” Now he says without knowing the identity of the whistleblower whose memo triggered the impeachment inquiry into Trump isn’t known, then an impeachment of Trump is “dead on arrival” in the Senate.

Sen. Graham needs to be made to understand that the whistleblower’s ID is protected under the whistleblower statute, even though some media outlets have reported the name of someone purported to be the individual who’s ratted out misbehavior in the White House.

House committees hearing the inquiry aren’t going to call the whistleblower to testify. The Democratic chair of the Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, says it would be redundant and unnecessary. He also worries that it would create a distraction and divert attention away from the subject of the inquiry, which happens to be Graham’s newest BFF, Donald Trump.

The issue is clear cut: Did the president demand a quid pro quo from Ukraine … political dirt on Joe Biden in exchange for weapons to use against Russia-backed rebels? The House has heard from plenty of witnesses who say that Trump did that very thing. The nation will get to hear them say it out loud and in public this week.

The House is doing its job legally.

Let the House proceed, Sen. Graham.

International news

May Day celebration … in Russia, Mr. POTUS? Really?

Vladimir Putin has extended an invitation to Donald Trump. The Russian president wants the U.S. president to attend a May 9, 2020 event commemorating the 75th year since the end of World War II fighting in Europe.

Trump is considering whether to attend. He calls the anniversary of the Allied victory a “very big deal.” He also noted the event occurs in the middle of a presidential campaign, in which he will be a principal participant.

Oh, the quandary.

Normally I would suggest the president go to Russia to help our World War II allies celebrate the end of European combat during that terrible conflict.

Except, consider this:

  • The president is likely to be impeached because he sought a political favor from Ukraine in exchange for weapons that are slated to go to Ukraine, which is battling rebels backed by Russia. He held up the weapons that would be used against an aggressor sponsored by Russians.
  •  Russia attacked our electoral system in 2016 and is doing so in advance of the 2020 election. That’s the view of our nation’s intelligence network, which Trump has dismissed and disparaged.
  •  Russians are involved in the fighting in Syria. Trump has pulled out our forces from that region, putting our Kurdish allies in jeopardy, exposing them to potential harm by Russian-backed Syrian forces.

So, with all of that as a backdrop, Donald Trump might travel to Moscow to help the Russians cheer their role in defeating the Nazis. He’ll watch the Russians display their military hardware, which is one of the usual features of their May Day ceremony.

Yes, the Russians will show off equipment similar to what they are deploying in their fight with Ukraine, which has become entangled in a U.S. political fight that is likely to result in a presidential impeachment.

Oh, and the Russians are in the midst of launching yet another attack on our electoral system.

Let me think: Should the president go to Russia to applaud the Russians’ May Day celebration? Umm. No. He shouldn’t.

economic news

Jobless rate is great … but it doesn’t negate misbehavior by POTUS

One of the dodges employed by Donald Trump’s apologists who are fighting against the impeachment tide that is splashing against the president is the strength of the national economy.

Indeed, so does the president speak to that issue.

Unemployment is at a 50-year low, Trump and The Gang tell us. They ask: “Why impeach a president who is doing such a great job on the economy?”

Here’s my answer: Because the issues relating to the president’s probable impeachment by the U.S. House of Representatives have nothing to do with his performance as president, or the strength of the national economy.

The issues of grave concern center on whether the president has violated his oath of office or, as has been alleged, broken federal law.

It is the very same separation of these matters that drove Republicans to march toward impeaching President Clinton in 1998. They didn’t give a rat’s rear end about the nation’s economic health two decades ago. Did it matter to them that the federal budget was balanced on President Clinton’s watch? No. They said, with some justification, that the president perjured himself before a grand jury; he broke the law, they said and, therefore, had committed an impeachable offense.

I thought then that the impeachment was a waste of time, given that Clinton’s lie had to do with a relationship he was having with a woman who was not his wife. That relationship didn’t have a thing to do with the duties of his office.

The issues driving the pending impeachment of Donald Trump have everything to do with his conduct as president of the United States. They also have nothing to do with the jobless rate, or the growth rate of private-sector employment, or trade policy, or immigration policy or anything else on the president’s list of issues with which he must grapple.

Let’s just try to keep these matters in some perspective, shall we? The economy is doing well under Donald Trump’s watch. It’s a big deal, to be sure. It’s a tiny, infinitesimal deal, however, when we ponder this matter of impeachment.

national news

‘I mean no disrespect … ‘

I learned a long time ago that when someone says they “mean no disrespect,” they usually do mean disrespect.

So it was this week when U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., stood before a Donald Trump rally crowd and bellowed that “I mean no disrespect, but it must suck to be that dumb.”

The object of his “mean no disrespect” setup? It wasn’t the guy standing next to him, which was the president of the United States.

Oh, no. It was U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who launched the impeachment inquiry into Trump’s conduct as president. The inquiry, of course, is intended to determine if the House will impeach Trump.

You and I know it will do precisely that.

Sen. Kennedy, though, wants to declare his fealty to the president. He does so by disparaging the intelligence of arguably the nation’s most adroit politician, who in my mind happens to be Speaker Pelosi.

Kennedy’s “mean no disrespect” comment, shall we say, was quite disrespectful. I am looking forward to seeing who among the nation’s leading politicians comes out of this mess with the more serious battle scars.

My hunch is that it won’t be Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

national news

Is it possible Trump would resign … a la Richard Nixon?

I feel like sharing with you a political fantasy that keeps creeping into the recesses of my noggin.

Right off the top: I cannot stop wondering if there’s a chance that Donald J. Trump would resign the presidency, the way Richard Nixon did on Aug. 9, 1974.

President Nixon’s resignation speech spoke of the distraction a prolonged impeachment hearing in the House and a Senate trial would become. He said resigning was “abhorrent” to him. The president added that he couldn’t in good conscience concentrate on keeping his job at the risk of letting more critical matters of governance go unattended.

So, he quit.

To be fair, the president didn’t mention in that televised speech that Senate Republicans had told him he was toast when the matter would go to trial.

Twenty-four years later, another president was impeached. Bill Clinton didn’t quit. He fought it, but was able to compartmentalize the impeachment apart from the task of governing.

Donald Trump isn’t wired that way. He is being consumed by the impeachment. He fires off a constant stream of Twitter messages blasting the House impeachment inquiry, and the patriots who have told House committee members that, by golly, the president did seek a quid pro quo, a personal political favor from a foreign government.

Resigning, of course, would belie what Trump has said all along, that he didn’t do anything wrong when he had that “perfect” phone call with the Ukrainian president.

Nor is Trump inclined to put country ahead of his personal political fortunes. I mean, he had no public service exposure prior to running for the presidency in 2016, so the idea of serving others is totally foreign to this guy.

Plus, I guess I should add that the prospect of the Senate convicting him of any crime against the nation is even more remote than it was in 1999 when it cleared President Clinton.

However, I cannot stop hoping that Donald Trump would find it within himself to simply walk away. Sure, that would mean we’d get Mike Pence as president. The vice president also might be tainted by the dirt that has been kicked up around the president, which I suppose is grist for yet another story at another time.

I am not sure I have the stomach for the impeachment that is racing closer to finality. If only the president of the United States was as queasy as many of the people he promised to serve … and could finally put the nation’s interest ahead of his own.

If only he’d just quit.

national news

Talkers are now suggesting Trump won’t run in 2020 … huh?

Neil Katyal is a serious guy, a former acting U.S. solicitor general who’s argued cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and, yes, I’ll stipulate that he was appointed to the solicitor general’s post by President Barack Obama.

So, when Katyal says that Donald Trump is unlikely to be the 2020 Republican presidential nominee, one ought to consider this a serious prediction.

I’ll declare here that I disagree with Katyal. I believe Trump will run for re-election next year and that the Republican National Convention will nominate him for another term as president.

Katyal believes the probable impeachment by the House of Representatives will drive Trump to the sidelines. I also need to note that Katyal has wanted Trump to be impeached. He believes the president has committed high crimes and misdemeanors and should be kicked out of office.

If Donald Trump has taught any of us any lesson at all it ought to be to never underestimate this guy’s staying power. He should never have been elected president in the first place; but he was elected. He shouldn’t have been nominated by the GOP in the summer of 2016, given all the candidacy-destroying instances that would have taken out “normal” candidates for public office; but he was nominated.

Trump has managed somehow to survive countless deal-breaking mistakes. He denigrated a Vietnam War hero, the late Sen. John McCain; he mocked a physically handicapped reporter for the New York Times; he admitted to grabbing women by their “pu***”; he disparaged a Gold Star family at the Democratic National Convention. You want more? Well, you get the idea.

He survived all of it.

Is the president inclined to bow out of the 2020 presidential campaign because the House has impeached him? I find that hard to believe.

I wish it were plausible. I am shuddering at the notion that Trump somehow is going to parlay this impeachment into a winning political strategy. How? I suppose by energizing that base of support that holds firm at around 40 percent, based on the RealClearPolitics polling average. Yeah, he needs more than that to win, but won the presidency in 2016 despite polling nearly 3 million fewer votes than his Democratic opponent.

This clown is maddening in the extreme. He doesn’t deserve to be re-elected. I hope Neil Katyal is right. However, I fear the worst, that Trump will run for re-election … and that he just might win!

national news

Isn’t this ‘obstruction of justice’?

I must be missing something, or perhaps I am slow on the uptake.

The U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee has subpoenaed acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to Capitol Hill to take his testimony behind closed doors; it’s part of the House impeachment inquiry into whether Donald Trump committed impeachable offenses.

Mulvaney was a no-show. He defied a lawful subpoena from the legislative branch of government.

Now, where I come from, that would be considered an obstruction of justice. Congress is doing its legally sanctioned duty to ask an executive branch staffer for information into a legally constituted inquiry into whether the president of the United States should be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors.

Republicans involved in this inquiry are giving the White House a pass on stiffing Congress. That’s hardly what they said in 1998 when the House was conducting an inquiry into whether to impeach President Clinton. Two decades ago GOP House members and their Senate colleagues said that subpoenas issued by Congress had the force of law and that anyone who gets a summons must appear before Congress.

What’s changed? How is this different?

Oh, wait! I got it! The president is a Republican. Therefore, he isn’t held to the same standard of accountability as his Democratic predecessor.

The House impeached Clinton on charges that included an obstruction count. Has the White House chief of staff delivered another evidentiary dirt ball that will land on Donald Trump?

national news

Letter to congressman seeking ‘no’ vote answer on its way

Well … I have done it.

I wrote a letter to my congressman and sent it to his district office in Plano. It says, in part:

I have to know: Why did you vote against the measure in the House to approve the formal impeachment inquiry pushed by Speaker Pelosi?

I fail to understand how members of Congress can demand more transparency in these impeachment proceedings, argue with those on the other side who kept the proceedings out of public view, and then vote against a measure that provides the transparency you demanded.

I would appreciate an explanation from you.

Look, I consider you to be an earnest and dedicated young man. I salute your service in the Marine Corps and your service overseas in a time of war. I hope you do a great job in Congress and I am confident you will.

Your “no” vote on the impeachment inquiry puzzles me. I cannot fathom the reasoning behind rejecting a measure that answers the very concern you and others on your side of the aisle had expressed.

Good luck to you. I look forward to hearing from you.

My congressman is Van Taylor, a Republican who has represented
the Third Congressional District of Texas for all of about 10 months. He succeeded longtime Rep. Sam Johnson, a legendary figure in North Texas politics, given his history as a Vietnam War prisoner who endured torture and many years of captivity in the hands of a brutal enemy.

Taylor has been a quiet congressional freshman. he has towed the GOP line since joining their congressional ranks at the start of the year.

My note explains the nature of my concern about the GOP’s stance regarding impeachment. They want it to be made public, then vote against the measure that creates the transparency they demand.

I don’t know if Rep. Taylor will answer my question. If he does, I will be glad to share his response here. I truly would hate to believe he doesn’t care enough to give one of his constituents an explanation of a vote he has cast ostensibly on our behalf.