Too Big To Fail

Posted: January 18, 2020 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

It occurred to me as I watched the Impeachment Trial of Donald John Trump officially begin last Thursday, that like several banks and corporations during the Great Recession of the 2000’s, the amount of lying, conniving, lawbreaking, personal greed and damage to the dignity of the Office of the President of the United States is so much, that it becomes too big for him to fail.  Or in this case, to be convicted.  Republicans in the House and Senate, along with key Cabinet positions in his Administration, have bought into the Trump Cult to such a degree that they cannot afford for him to fail lest they expose their own weaknesses, misconduct, phoniness, fraudulent actions and other misdeeds.

As things now stand, the trial that begins in earnest next Tuesday will be a sham.  The new developments coming out almost daily continue to show the depth and breadth of Mr. Trump’s efforts to rig the 2020 election.  Those efforts are matched by the depth and breadth of involvement by members of his Administration and his supporters in Congress.

You want a good example?  How about the fact the we are learning from written documents, including phone calls and text messages, that Representative Devin Nunes (R-CA) and his chief aide, Mr. Derek Harvey were in close contact with Mr. Lev Parnas, the chief “associate” (read thug) working with Mr. Rudy Giuliani.  These are the guys on the ground involved in the Ukraine caper trying to find manufactured dirt on Mr. Trump’s probable election opponent Mr. Joe Biden.  Mr. Nunes and Mr. Harvey were aiding and abetting the operation.  This is the same Devin Nunes that is the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee that investigated Mr. Trump’s activities.  He is one of those guys who shouted (literally) throughout the hearings that it was all made up, a hoax and a sham.  Even as he was in on it.  And even as he was supposed to help supervise the proceedings.

It is sometimes difficult to keep track of all the names and institutions that are normally outside the course of daily events.  Sometimes I think that, like at the ball park, “you can’t tell the players without a score card!”  But it is important to see what is going on in plain sight as well as behind closed doors.

One of those institutions is the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) (although Mr. Trump tweets it as GOA).  This is the non-partisan group tasked by law to monitor government activities and to report its findings to Congress. The GAO determined last week that the president’s withholding of appropriated funds for Ukraine broke the law.  Specifically, it broke the 1974 Impoundment Control Act (ICA) which was enacted in response to President Richard Nixon’s efforts to withhold appropriated funds to distract from his own Impeachment proceedings.  Several emails among government officials had already surfaced that in the months that the funds were withheld, conscientious government officials cited the law as they sought to determine why the funds were not sent.  It is not an obscure or non-relevant provision as some in the administration would like you to believe.

In the past week, Mr. Lev Parnas has been dropping some real bomb shells. While his testimony should not be taken as the absolute truth on its own merits, it does provide insight into the thinking going on and provides a road map for further investigation.  While many impugn his character, keep in mind that criminals commit crimes and they often turn on their fellow criminals for purposes of their own.  It does not mean that they aren’t factual.  But don’t take him at his word.  Look at the documents that he and his lawyers continue to turn over to Congress.  People lie.  Documents tend to lead to the truth.

In this busy week, revelations surfaced that the former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch (the ambassador Mr. Giuliani wanted fired for interfering with his extortion scheme) may have been under physical surveillance by Americans and in danger from Americans.  Not a peep from the Secretary of State defending his career Foreign Service Officers until cornered at a press conference yesterday.  He announced no action to conduct an investigation.  Days earlier, Ukraine began an investigation.  On their own.  As of today, Ukrainian officials asked the U.S. FBI to help them, but still no investigation initiated by any U.S. agency to protect our diplomats.  Is it because this administration does not care about U.S. citizens and diplomats overseas or is it because they do not want to know the answer?

More news this week as Mr. Giuliani, Mr. Parnas and the third thug in the ring, Mr. Igor Furman were reportedly being paid by a Russian oligarch (under indictment in the US) with close ties to Vladimir Putin.  (Why is it that all of Mr. Trump’s roads lead to Putin?)

As the evidence mounts, it is clear that this extortion scheme went far deeper than “just” a phone call between two presidents.  To date, no Republican has seriously contested any of the evidence produced around the Impeachment.  They have attacked witnesses, sources of information, process and other things that have nothing to do with the facts.  The facts are not in dispute.  For that matter, Mr. Trump himself admits to them.

As part of their scheme to white wash the Impeachment Trial, the Senate Republicans are setting up false equivalencies.  This is especially true with respect to witnesses and additional  evidence not available when the House did its investigation.  The president continues to block key information and to prevent witnesses from testifying (in my view this just reinforces that they have no exculpatory evidence).  The Republicans will claim that since they did not get, say, Mr. Hunter Biden to testify, then not having Mr. John Bolton testify means that it is “even” — no one got what they wanted, and thus that it is fair.  Baloney.  Hunter Biden has no material testimony as to what Mr. Trump did.  Mr. Bolton has significant first hand knowledge.  There are a multitude of similar arguments being put forward to prevent the truth from coming out.  This sets up their ultimate defense.

The Republican defense argument is likely to be “so what?”  “Yes, he did it.  What’s it to ya?”  Reasonable people may dispute whether the punishment, removal from office, fits the crime, extorting a foreign power to get them to interfere in a US election, but the facts remain.  Indeed, the vast scope of the whole scheme is becoming clearer and clearer.  It was a classic mob action.  It also indicates a pattern of behavior by the president.  It is clear that he will continue to act this way.  It is his nature and, we now know, the way he operates in every aspect of his life, past and present.  It is time to hold him accountable.  His behavior is not going to get better, and without accountability it can get a lot worse.

It seems to me that Mr. Trump now has sufficient accomplices in his administration, and in the Congress, that he feels he can get away with anything.  They do not think that anything is off limits to them in the pursuit of their self-interests and their own power, including criminal activity.  Nothing.  And that is not hyperbole as we continue to see for ourselves.

I have also come to understand that we will never know the real truth behind, or the extent of the corruption.  The system is not geared for fraud and criminal activity on such a scale, especially when it is coordinated by the President of the United States.  And most especially when the Attorney General of the United States does everything in or out of his power to protect the actions of the president. It’s just “too big.” Sadly, this includes whatever it is Vladimir Putin has on him.  (My view is that has to do with money laundering and other illegal financial ties.)

As Timothy Egan put it more eloquently than I in a New York Times essay, evil attracts evil.  In the absence of good people acting, evil triumphs.  There is evil in the White House and it is spreading throughout our government.

Where Does It End?

Posted: December 17, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

The last few weeks produced a year’s worth of newsworthy events.  Among other things was the Commander-in-Chief interfering with the effective application of good order and discipline in the military under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ).  The president pardoned three men convicted or accused (and awaiting trial) for war crimes — two Army officers and one Navy Chief Petty Officer.  In doing so he further demonstrated a total lack of understanding of the military by tweeting (of course) that he did so because “we train our boys to be killing machines and then prosecute them when they kill!”  Such statements totally ignore the fact that what separates our military from most others is that in training to fight for our country, our military also learns to do so with discipline, under a code of conduct that prohibits indiscriminate killing, especially of civilians and works to protect the honor and dignity of our nation’s morals, espoused in a speech by General Douglas MacArthur, as “duty, honor, country.”  Note that all three men were brought up on charges of crimes under the UCMJ by their own soldiers and Sailors, not by higher ranking officers trying to make some politically correct example of them, as the president implies.

Hanging over everything of course, is the impending impeachment of the President of the United States.  In the course of events, three particularly troubling things are happening that in my opinion fundamentally threaten the nature of our democracy.

Very troubling is the conscious use of Russian propaganda on the part of Republican U.S. Senators to try and defend the president’s shakedown scheme against Ukraine to help his own reelection in 2020 using taxpayer money.  Otherwise knowledgeable and intelligent Republican Senators such as John Neely Kennedy (LA) and Ted Cruz (TX) and others publicly say that we do not know whether the Russians meddled in the 2016 election, rather it was the Ukrainians.  Such garbage could have been written by the former KGB officer Vladimir Putin himself.  A unanimous intelligence community agrees it was the Russians. Period.  They agree it was not Ukraine, a fact FBI Director Christopher Wray reiterated just last week.  The alleged Ukrainian “meddling” is most often a reference to a single op-ed piece written by the Ukrainian Ambassador to the United States criticizing then candidate Trump for saying that Crimea (stolen from Ukraine by force by Russia) “belongs” to Russia.  Since Ukraine and Russia continue in a hot war, it might not be too far of a stretch to say that there were some hard feelings towards Mr. Trump saying, essentially, that Ukraine should be a part of Russia again.  Another statement straight out of Putin’s talking points.

It is shameful that Republican Representatives and Senators perpetuate such lies on the citizens of the greatest nation on Earth.

But it get worse.

The long anticipated Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General (IG) report on the origins of the investigation into meddling in the 2016 election came out.  This report, according to Mr. Trump and his supporters, would unmask the “deep state” and clearly show that the FBI and DOJ were out to keep Mr. Trump from becoming president through a vast “liberal” conspiracy.  It did none of those things.  None.  On the contrary, while the IG’s report found some troubling procedural problems that need to be corrected or changed, it explicitly says that the basis of the investigation was solid, within DOJ guidelines, had no bias behind any of the decisions made and was fully appropriate.

The president’s reaction?  He lashed out as usual.  Among other things he referred to the people in the FBI as “scum.”  Perhaps we as a country have come to expect that from a President of the United States, but I have not. But, I am no longer surprised.  What deeply troubles me is that Attorney General William Barr, the DOJ and FBI boss, echoed the president’s remarks.  Instead of supporting the FBI or the work of the independent IG, in an interview with NBC News he said about the report and investigation:

“I think our nation was turned on its head for three years based on a completely bogus narrative that was largely fanned and hyped by a completely irresponsible press.  I think there were gross abuses and inexplicable behavior that is intolerable in the FBI.”

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal he said of the investigation “It was a travesty, and there were many abuses.”  So much for the credibility of an independent IG and so much for the Attorney General working for the people of the United States rather than being the president’s personal shill, I mean attorney.

Deeply troubling.  But it gets worse yet.

The president is about to be impeached (appropriately in my opinion, but that’s a post for another day).  The Senate will then conduct a trial on the two Articles of Impeachment to either remove Mr. Trump from office, or acquit him.

All 100 of the sitting Senators act as jurors and take an oath.  It is not the oath of office, but an oath as a juror.  According to Rule XXV of the Senate Rules On Impeachment Trials the oath is:

“I solemnly swear (or affirm) that in all things appertaining to the trial of ___, now pending, I will do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws, so help me God.”

And yet.

The Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) went on TV and declared that he is “in total coordination with the White House counsel” on the rules and parameters of the trial — such as calling witnesses or not —  and opined that the president would be acquitted and that all Republicans would so vote.  Senator McConnell gets to set the rules of this trial and is also a juror.  Fair and impartial?  It is like the jury foreman in a case getting together with the defense attorney before the trial to determine how they will acquit the defendant.

Other Republican Senators have expressed similar opinions, most notably Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC).  On Sunday’s Face the Nation he said that he was going to vote to acquit the president and that “I don’t need any witnesses.  I am ready to vote on the underlying articles.”  Earlier last week he said that he did not even intend to review any of the facts raised before the House of Representatives during the investigation leading to the Articles of Impeachment.  So much for following one’s oath.

Impeachment is a serious and sobering step.  The Senate deserves to treat it as such.  Instead we continue to hear Republicans moan and groan about “hoaxes” “witch hunts” “undermining the 2016 election” and other whiny defenses of the president.  Please note that not one of them disputes the facts as presented in the House.

Our democracy is in trouble as the president continues to argue that he is above the law.  He claims that he cannot be investigated by law enforcement or by the Congress.  Nobody or no entity or no organization can do so.  His lawyers have even argued in court that if the president actually did shoot someone on Fifth Avenue in New York (as he famously said during his campaign) that he could not be prosecuted.

In recent days, Mr. Trump’s “personal lawyer” Rudy Guiliani, just back from a “fact finding” trip to Ukraine, is bragging to anyone that will listen that he “forced out” U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanavitch because she was getting in the way of his schemes.

The president is being impeached for Obstruction of Congress and Abuse of Power.  It is clear that he did not just abuse power, rather that he continues abusing power today.  Events are unfolding that impact our elections.  Not the one in 2016, but the upcoming 2020 elections.  We already know that Mr. Trump thinks his position is so weak that he must cheat to win.  He took advantage of Russian meddling and he has often publicly stated that he will take help again from other nations if it will help him win.

The past is past.  We need to protect our future.

How Low Will They Go?

Posted: November 9, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

As more and more information becomes available through the release of sworn testimony concerning the shakedown of Ukraine perpetrated by the President of the United States and his minions, the Republicans in Congress have become increasingly desperate in their defense of his actions.

They have used arguments ranging from the ridiculous to the downright dishonest.  Recently, three Senators that I thought were relatively straight shooters, even if I didn’t usually agree with their ideas, grovelled in front of Mr. Trump in public.  At campaign rallies, Rand Paul (KY) and John Kennedy (LA) made speeches demeaning others in terms that would get any fourth grader in trouble as Mr. Trump stood behind them grinning his “look what I’ve made them do” grin.  Lindsey Graham (S.C.) increasingly is getting desperate in his attempts to be Mr. Trump’s bestie.  When asked about the most recent incriminating testimony from witnesses in the House of Representatives, he stated that he refused to read the transcripts.  In other words, a future juror in the president’s trial (should he be impeached which I think he deserves to be) refuses to even look at the evidence, much less give it due consideration.  Appalling.

Next week the public hearings in the impeachment inquiry begin.  After weeks of complaining that it was a secret “Soviet style” proceeding, the president and his underlings now claim that the hearings should not be public.  Because they know that unequivocal evidence exists that an orchestrated shakedown occurred?  Perhaps they fear that the public will continue the trend towards supporting impeachment if they hear the truth?

According to several reports, House Republicans are now contemplating claiming that the president did not know what his flunkeys, specifically Mr. Rudy Giuliani, Mr. Mick Mulvaney, and Ambassador Gordon Sondland, were doing.  They went “rogue.”  Nice try.  Mr. Trump himself released a Memorandum for the Record (MFR) that captures in his own words the  shakedown of the President of Ukraine.  Numerous individuals with direct knowledge, including listening to the phone call, have testified that there was a months long effort to make it clear to the Ukrainian government that to get what they so desperately needed to fend off Russian aggression was a public statement by the Ukrainian president.  According to the sworn testimony of Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent that statement must include three words.  “Investigation.” “Biden.” “Clinton.”  No statement, no reward.  A shakedown at the direction of Mr. Trump.  Also known in legal circles as extortion.

In the Senate, it appears that their defense of Mr. Trump will boil down to a three pronged response. “He did it.”  “So what?”  “Get over it.”

Nice.

The evidence will continue to show that the president abused the power of his office.  He probably is used to doing business this way in all of his endeavors.  Additionally, there was a concerted effort, as outlined in sworn testimony, to cover it up.  We all know enough about Mr. Trump that if he gets away with this abrogation of the public trust he will do it again.

The story is not very complicated.  In the coming weeks we will hear it for ourselves.  All Americans believe that no one is above the law.  That is now being put to the test.  Impeachment and removal from office is a sobering responsibility given to the Congress through the Constitution.  It should be approached with the utmost care and with a full understanding of the consequences of such an action.  Trivializing the process with playground epithets and unserious rationalizations should not be a part of the process.  One would expect both Democrats and Republicans to understand the stakes and to live up to their oaths of office.  Undertake due diligence.  Review the evidence.  Treat career diplomats and military officers testifying under oath with respect.  And yes, search their souls for the strength to do what they think is in keeping with our national values and laws.  We should expect nothing less from our elected officials.  Unfortunately, one party is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Trump, Inc.

He did it so get over it is not a defense.  It is a desperate short-term effort to retain power that is unworthy of American values and our faith in the rule of law.  Politicians should rise to the occasion and reflect our better selves.  Unfortunately, I expect that the road ahead will only get lower and muddier.

 

A Sad Day For America

Posted: November 1, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Yesterday the House of Representatives voted to authorize the rules to continue an impeachment inquiry into the actions of the President of the United States with respect to Ukraine.  It is a sober moment for our nation and it should be a reason for each of us to pause and to think about the ramifications of this action.

Contrary to what some have publicly stated, this was not a vote to impeach.  The vote pertained to the conduct of the public fact gathering portion of the proceeding.  Should the House decide that the president did in fact conduct himself in a manner contrary to the Constitution, they will draft Articles of Impeachment.  The entire House then votes to approve or disapprove each of the Articles.  Should one or more Article pass, the Senate then holds a trial, presided over by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and votes to convict or acquit the president on each Article.

So far, the majority of Republicans in the House have made a mockery of the proceedings.  At the direction of the president, they are spreading lies and misinformation about the investigation.  This included storming a classified conference room to “expose” the “secret” proceedings.  Not mentioned is that over 40 Republican Congressmen already had access to those proceedings and indeed participated in them to the fullest extent.  Yesterday, they went to the House floor to decry the inquiry as akin to secret trials held in the Soviet Union.  It is shameful and dishonest behavior on their part.

Now reports indicate that Mr. Trump will monetarily support the election campaigns of Senators that promise to vote against any Articles of Impeachment.  He will withhold supporting funds from those that do not.  We used to call this bribery.

The Impeachment Inquiry rules incorporate everything that the Republicans asked for with public hearings.  Everything.  And the rules approved yesterday afford the president more leeway and ability to participate than either set of hearings involving President Nixon or President Clinton.

The process should be fair and open.  But here’s the deal.  We all already know the basics of what happened.  The president, his Acting Chief of Staff, and his personal attorney have all been on television telling us exactly what happened.  A long parade of career diplomats and military officers followed with contextual information that indicates just how wide-spread and long-planned the effort to extort the Ukrainian government actually was.  It was an old-fashioned shake down.  The president wanted “dirt” on his main political rival and to have the Ukrainian government fuel a conspiracy theory that the Russians did not really interfere in the 2016 election.  Rather, it was a set up by the Democrats to undermine Mr. Trump’s campaign run from, wait for it, Ukraine.  Both conspiracy theories have been long ago debunked by our entire intelligence service and by several of Mr. Trump’s own political appointees.

In exchange for made-up information fabricated by Mr. Trump and his henchmen, the president would release nearly $400 million in aid that Ukraine needed to fight off Russian backed separatists.  While Mr. Trump ran his crazy mob scam, Ukrainians were dying on the battlefield.  Mr. Trump undermined Ukrainian security and our own national security for his personal domestic political goals.  He used taxpayer money to extort another country to interfere in our domestic elections for his benefit.  This was not a government effort to eliminate corruption generally.  There is no such effort or policy in this administration unless the only country in the world that is corrupt is Ukraine and the only people in Ukraine that were corrupt was the Bidens.

It was not just one “perfect” phone call either.  The parade of witnesses deposed by the House committees (there were three committees involved) described a long-term, many pronged, concerted effort to run the scam.  The phone call was the result of months of heavy pressure outside of normal diplomatic channels to get Ukraine to fabricate lies to help the political fortunes of Mr. Trump.

There is also the little matter of the president standing on the White House lawn and encouraging China to interfere in the 2020 election, just as he publicly asked Russia to interfere in the 2016 election.

We already know all this.  (Although, I suspect that it is only the tip of the ice berg.)

The House of Representatives is focused only on his egregious behavior regarding Ukraine.  They are not considering impeachment based on his status as an unindicted co-conspirator for money laundering and campaign violations regarding payments to a porn star and a Playboy model.  They are not trying to impeach him for the 110 known contacts between his campaign and Russians during the 2016 election.  They are not drawing up Articles for the 10 clear cut unlawful efforts to obstruct justice during the Mueller Investigation.  They are not contemplating impeaching him for the over 13,500 documented lies to the American people.

Equally important, we all know that a president cannot be impeached because we disagree with his policies.  We cannot impeach a president because of an obnoxious personality.  We can impeach a president when our national security is put at risk through an abuse of power.

In my opinion the facts surrounding the Ukraine shakedown are not in dispute.  Please note that the Republicans are not defending Mr. Trump by disputing the facts or by providing an explanation of his actions.  They are only attacking the process, and now that process is of their own design.  If they had a factual basis to defend the president, they would use it.  They have no facts on their side.

If the facts are not in dispute then the only remaining question is whether they meet the standard of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”  I think that they do, in the context of presidential abuse of power — the major concern of the Founding Fathers — and obstruction of justice by refusing to turn over documents and witnesses lawfully subpoenaed by Congress.

Some argue that with elections about a year away the president should not be impeached but rather the people should decide Mr. Trump’s fate through the ballot box.  I think that argument is illogical.  Mr. Trump was trying to interfere with the 2020 election after we already know that there was interference in the 2016 election.  He knows better.  More to the point, how can we be sure that the 2020 election is legitimate if we already know that Mr. Trump is trying to stack the deck in his own favor?  He is already trying to steal the 2020 election.  We know this.  Why allow it to happen?

Likewise those that argue that this is just the Democrats trying to undo the 2016 election should take another look.  The inquiry is not about the 2016 election.  It is about what is happening now to influence the 2020 election.  It is not about the past, it’s about the future.

For those that argue that Mr. Trump was out of line to extort the Ukrainians, but that his actions did not rise to the level of an impeachable offense I merely ask, where is that line?  How much can a president put national security at risk before we say that it is too much?  How far can a president abuse the power of the office before we say that it was abused too much?  Whether or not the Senate convicts Mr. Trump on any charges — and I believe that inevitably there will be Articles of Impeachment approved in the House — it is important to put a Constitutional marker down that such behavior is not acceptable and that there are consequences to ignoring the law.

It is a sober day when an impeachment proceeding is necessary.  No one should take joy in the process.  It is also a sad day when an entire political party turns into a cult of personality and publicly attacks a Constitutional process while many of those same politicians privately agree that the leader of the cult abused his power.

There is no telling how events will unfold between now and the end of the year.  I only know that it will be a tough time for our country.

A Sober Assessment

Posted: September 29, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

With Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) decision to open an impeachment inquiry into the actions of the president, a new chapter of American history is about to be written.  This is serious business and it should be approached soberly by all of us.

Recognizing that I have used this space before to call for an impeachment inquiry into Mr. Trump’s activities, I still caution everyone, Democrat, Republican, Independent or Undecided to pay attention to events as they unfold and not to jump to any conclusions until all of the facts are known and fully understood.  Such an inquiry should not be taken lightly and the full consequences for our democracy should be fully understood and everyone must conduct themselves appropriately.

Please keep in mind, as well, that the inquiry is only the first step of many as the Congress moves forward.  An inquiry determines if the House of Representatives considers there to be sufficient evidence to formulate Articles of Impeachment.  If they so decide that the evidence exists, then through the Judiciary Committee they formulate the Articles and the entire House votes on each Article as to whether it should be referred to the Senate.  The vote is on a simple majority.  Should Articles be approved, the matter is referred to the Senate for a trial.  It takes a two-thirds majority in the Senate to convict on any particular Article.  Think of the House as a grand jury.  They investigate and if they find sufficient evidence they refer it to trial in the Senate.  The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court presides at the trial, although the Majority Leader of the Senate can formulate the process by which the trial proceeds.

In my view, the inquiry is fully appropriate.  Forget for the moment (if such is possible) the results of the Mueller Report, the misappropriation of funds, the declarations of National Emergencies where none exist, the violation of campaign laws and the rest of it.  The information that became available in the course of last week concerning Mr. Trump’s interactions with the president of Ukraine is sufficient, in and of itself, to warrant investigation.

If you remember nothing else, note that the Russian interference involved the 2016 election.  Mr. Trump was working to solicit interference in the 2020 election.  After all we learned about the past, Mr. Trump intended to move ahead with a bigger and better plan to throw the next election.  Note that his now famous phone call took place the day after Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller testified before Congress.  In the phone call Mr. Trump is quoted as saying, “As you saw yesterday, that whole performance ended with a poor performance by a man named Robert Mueller, an incompetent performance, but they say a lot of it started with Ukraine.”  In Mr. Trump’s mind there was no consequence to his actions in 2016 so he decided to do it again.

The information in the public domain was released by the Trump Administration itself.  The memorandum for the record of the 25 July conversation (read it here) and the unclassified version of the whistle-blower’s complaint (read it here) were not “leaked” or otherwise released by nefarious means.  Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Trump have themselves validated that the events occurred as depicted in those documents.  And more.

It is the “and more” that adds context to the matter and illustrates the depth of the alleged abuse of office.  The problem is way more concerning than one phone call, although in itself it is quite serious.

Without going into every twist and turn, the big picture indicates that Mr. Giuliani began working with the Ukrainian government to dig up dirt on former Vice President Biden and his son Hunter in late 2018, as soon as it became apparent the Mr. Biden would run for president and be a serious threat to Mr. Trump’s re-election.  He worked with discredited and then current Ukrainian prosecutors of the government of President Poroshenko.  In January, February, and March of this year he continued to pressure them to investigate the Bidens and to promote disproved conspiracy theories concerning the Democratic National Committee emails and servers and the then Ambassador from the U.S. to Ukraine, claiming that they worked to interfere in the 2016 election (not the Russians).

All was going well from Mr. Giuliani’s stand point until on 21 April Volodymyr Zelensky beat all predictions by defeating Mr. Poroshenko in the presidential election.  Mr. Zelensky ran on a platform of eliminating corruption in the Ukrainian government and nearly all new prosecutors were appointed.  Much of Mr. Giuliani’s work went to waste and they needed to start over in trying to co-opt the Ukrainians.  That process began with a congratulatory phone call to the winner.

In May the president permanently recalled U.S. Ambassador Masha Yovanonitch, a career State Department employee, because she was trying to counter Mr. Giuliani’s attempts at co-opting the new government.  She was, in essence, fired for working to protect the national security interests of the United States.

Later in May, Mr. Trump cancelled Vice President Mike Pence’s trip to the Ukrainian president’s inauguration, an embarrassing blow to the new president.  In the whistle-blower’s complaint the reason was to withhold favors for Mr. Zelensky until they could determine if he would “play ball” with Mr. Trump through Mr. Giuliani — presumably meaning that they would work to discredit the Bidens and to support conspiracy theories about former Secretary Hillary Clinton’s emails.

In July of this year, the Office of Management and Budget, on the direction of the president himself, according to the whistle-blower, withheld much needed military and other aid for Ukraine.  When State Department and Pentagon officials tried to find out the reason, they were stonewalled. On 25 July the president made his phone call and on the 26th, envoys of the U.S. met with President Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials to help them “navigate the demands the president had made” the previous day.

Other outrageous details of improper behavior can be found in the complaint that the Intelligence Community (IC) Inspector General (IG) and the Acting Director of National Intelligence (DNI) both testified was “credible.”  Both individuals were appointed by Mr. Trump.

It might also be noted quickly that Ukraine is in a fighting war with Russia.  13,000 Ukrainians have died in the fight and the Russians helped to shoot down Malaysian Air Flight 17 with the loss of all 298 people onboard.  Any delay or cancellation of arms to Ukraine helps Russia in its efforts.

In the grand tradition of Washington DC, a cover-up occurred.  As a minimum, the details of the phone call and other activities were over-classified and stored on a computer designed to be used for only the highest classified compartmented information.  This was a decision designed to protect Mr. Trump from embarrassing domestic political activity.  We do not know how many other conversations or documents are improperly classified in order to protect the president from his own actions and words by hiding them from the public and government officials that might object to such activity.

These are serious allegations that cannot be brushed away.  They certainly deserve a full investigation.  One can than decide for oneself whether or not the facts as they are uncovered deserve impeachment or not.

In that discussion, remember that a lot of smoke is going to be blown to try and hide the real transgressions.  Some will take a narrow legal approach that no U.S. laws were actually broken.  Others will argue that a president has the Constitutional right to conduct foreign policy in any manner that they choose.  Some will argue it was “just a phone call” to a country that no one cares about.  Others will argue that we as citizens are naive if we don’t think that this is how it is always done.  Some will simply argue that there is nothing to see here, please move along.

We have a national security interest in Ukraine because if Russia gets away with its aggression, Russia has ambitions concerning other “traditional” Russian areas such as the Baltic states.  As members of NATO, any attack on the Baltic states is an attack on all members of NATO, including the U.S.

I simply say that the President of the United States, by his own admission and corroborated by Mr. Giuliani and others, used his office to involve a foreign government in our national elections in an attempt to personally benefit from another nation’s activities at the expense of our own national security.

To ignore it is to condone it.

A Line In The Sand

Posted: September 24, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Enough!

For those that take even the most cursory notice of events on the daily news, you have no doubt heard that the president once again broke the norms of presidential behavior by, again, using his office for personal gain.  He will stop at nothing if it serves his personal interests.  He has yet to see any consequences to his actions and is increasingly emboldened to do whatever the heck he wants to do — legal or not.

He already moved beyond the boundaries of ethical and moral behavior.  Now that he sees no consequences from the Mueller Report and has an Attorney General that has decreed the president is above the law — any law — while in office, he sees nothing that can slow him down, much less stop him, from pursuing whatever he wants to do.

The only possible way to put a check on his actions is to impeach him, and the Democrats are dithering and wringing their hands in an ineffective effort to provide oversight of Mr. Trump’s presidency.  So far they’ve brought a butter knife to a grenade fight.  Mr. Trump has refused to provide any documents or to allow any testimony from anyone that he deems a possible threat to his reign.  Across the board.  Including hum-drum, every day just-trying-to-do-business subjects.  Total non-cooperation.

That may be about to change.

The latest insult to the office, to our country and to all of us as citizens involves the president’s efforts, aided and abetted by his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani (who has no role in the government or the administration, a fact that will become significant) to get a foreign power to interfere in the 2020 election.  Sound familiar?

As briefly as possible, the entire situation came to light when the president instructed his Acting Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to break the law.  Also known as obstruction of justice.  (Note that Mr. Trump fired the DNI and the Deputy DNI last month.) That came about because an intelligence official turned in a complaint to the Inspector General (IG) of the Intelligence Community — who, by the way, was appointed by Mr. Trump — stating that the president interacted with the head of a foreign government in a way that was detrimental to the interests of the United States.  The specifics of the claim are classified.  The law requires that if the IG finds the complaint credible and urgent that it must (“shall be”) be turned over to the Intelligence Committees of the House and Senate.  The Acting DNI refused based on directions from the Executive Branch.  The IG went to Congress and explained what happened and stood by his initial determination that it should go to Congress.  The Acting DNI continues to refuse to turn it over.

I predict that the president will release a transcript of his conversation that will be spun to show he didn’t do what is alleged.  Firstly, we know we cannot trust Mr. Trump to be truthful, therefore how do we know it is the actual transcript?  Secondly, and more importantly, the transcript is not nearly as important as the original whistle blower complaint.  That document would give a fuller story and put the events in context.  The Administration has no intention of turning that over.  In itself, that to me is evidence that something serious occurred that Mr. Trump does not want us to know about.

In short, since then we have learned from Mr. Trump and Mr. Giuliani themselves, as well as from wide spread reporting in the Washington Post, New York Times and Wall Street Journal, that the complaint involves the President of Ukraine who Mr. Trump tried to bully (eight times according to reports) into finding “dirt” on former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.  We learned today that Mr. Trump withheld needed military funding and aid for Ukraine totaling nearly 400 million dollars.  The reporting alleges that Mr. Trump wanted the dirt before he would release the money.  Congress had authorized the money in two different bills early this year.  Over the summer inquiries began to build as to why the money had not been made available to the government of Ukraine, currently locked into a shooting war with Russia.  (Russia!  Again!)

In sum, Mr. Trump wanted the Ukrainian government to interfere in the 2020 election by supplying information (whether true or not, more on that in a minute) on Mr. Biden and his son that the Trump Campaign could use to slime the individual Mr. Trump most fears as his opponent in the election.  In exchange, he would release the money Congress appropriated (yet another presidential abuse of the power invested by the Constitution in the Congress) to help the Ukrainians defend themselves against Russia — who annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 and is trying to obtain more Ukrainian territory.

Mr. Trump and his allies are trying to make the focus of the story about Mr. Biden and corruption.  (Kind of hits close to home when the president’s children are trotting around the world doing business with their father’s permission and help, spending taxpayer’s money for Secret Service protection and other expenses.)

The thing is, the Ukrainians already investigated the allegations against the Bidens and guess what?  There is nothing to it.  No corruption.  No undue pressure.  Nothing.  And if you listen closely to Mr. Trump and his lackeys, they present no evidence that anything is amiss.  Just innuendo and questions as to why no one is looking into it.  (BECAUSE THEY ALREADY DID!)  And don’t forget that Mr. Trump is on the record with over 12,000 lies since taking office.

I do not give Mr. Trump or his campaign any slack regarding their involvement with Russia during the 2016 campaign.  (“Russia if you’re listening….”)  But maybe one could make a case that they did not know what they were doing.

That does not fly in this situation.

The President.  Of the United States.  Used the full authority and weight of his office — himself, in his own voice — to try and convince a foreign state to interfere in our election against a specific opponent in exchange for funds desperately needed for their protection.

This alone is an impeachable offense.  Abuse of power and obstruction of justice.

However, add it to the list of other impeachable offenses and one would think that the House of Representatives has to act.  The Mueller Report defines ten times Mr. Trump obstructed the investigation of his involvement with Russia in 2016.  Over one thousand former federal attorneys — Republicans and Democrats — publicly stated that they would have prosecuted any other citizen with that evidence.  The U.S. Attorney of the Southern District of New York lists him as an unindicted co-conspirator in election campaign fraud when he paid off two mistresses to keep them from speaking up before the election.  And on and on and on.

When do we put a stop to the madness?  The more he gets away with, the more emboldened he is to do more.  We are still over a year from the election.  Anyone that thinks Mr. Trump won’t try every illegal dirty trick in the book to stay in office is not paying attention.  At the risk of sounding like I am hyperventilating, I can envision our very democracy at stake.

The Republicans, led by Senator Mitch McConnell (Tr-KY), a.k,a. “Moscow Mitch” are now a wholly owned subsidiary of Trump, Inc.  Perhaps my biggest disappointment, even shock, is that not one Republican Senator, or Congressman, has said “enough”!  According to multitudes of reports, in private conversations many elected Republicans worry because they do not like the way Mr. Trump operates and see him as a threat to our country.  Yet, not a peep.  To stay silent is to be a co-conspirator.  They are aiding and abetting a president that is out of control.  Not a patriot among them.

As I get ready to publish this, it appears that later today the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) will announce a preliminary impeachment inquiry.

At last.

Mr. Trump may not realize he has crossed a line in the sand.  The American people will not stand for his shenanigans forever.

But if we do, God help us all.

 

The Fix Is In

Posted: May 5, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Several events last week disturbed me to my core as I realized the depths that Mr. Donald J. Trump and his administration will go to protect him from the rule of law and any sort of accountability.  One of the prominent warning signals came in the form of Attorney General William Barr’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.  In case you missed the live broadcast of his appearance, I will point out that it was not just what he said in response to questions but also how he said it.  He was clearly annoyed that any Senator would question his decisions or his power as the head of law enforcement in the United States.  Perhaps more chilling was his unadulterated and unabashed pro-Trump posture.  He is no longer the Attorney General of the United States, or even the attorney charged with protecting the presidency as an institution.  He clearly and forcefully defended Mr. Trump, the man, and not the president, the office.

Among many startling elements of A.G. Barr’s comments regarding the Mueller Report are what I see as the three most egregious points:

  • The most troubling and news worthy defense of Mr. Trump by A.G. Barr was his insistence that the president is above the law.  You read that correctly.  In response to a question on obstruction of justice — and the fact that if Mr. Trump was successful in carrying out the obstruction, then that could be the reason that no conspiracy to work with the Russians was proved — Mr. Barr stated that under the Constitution the president has the authority to oversee investigations (including those involving the president) and therefore has the authority to shut them down.  Thus, there can be no obstruction even if the president stops an investigation into himself because it is within his power.  He further argued that this is especially true if the president thought the investigation “was not well founded” or “groundless.”  The president has the ability to declare it so.  “The president does not have to sit there, constitutionally, and allow it to run its course.”  And there you have it.  All the president has to do is say that there is no reason to investigate him and then no one can investigate him.  (I assume a “hoax” is “not well founded.”)  The Attorney General believes the president is above the law.  (For info, Article I for the proposed impeachment of Richard Nixon was obstruction of justice.)
  • The second most troubling aspect of A.G. Barr’s testimony is that he waffled mightily in response to a question as to whether the president or any one else at the White House asked him to investigate others.  The context was a section of the Mueller Report that indicated Mr. Trump pressured the Department of Justice (DOJ) to re-open an investigation of Secretary Hillary Clinton and others of Mr. Trump’s political opponents after the election.  He finally answered “I don’t know.” Right.  (As Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) pointed out, that’s not something one might forget.) It used to be a bipartisan agreement that a president using his office to investigate a political opponent on purely political grounds was an abuse of power (Article II of those brought against Mr. Nixon).
  • The third most troubling comment was the confirmation by A.G. Barr that Special Counsel Mueller objected to the characterization of his report put forward by Mr. Barr on 24 March.  In his statement summarizing the results of the Report he claimed that Mr. Mueller found no criminal evidence of conspiracy or obstruction.  When the report was finally released, we found that was not true.  Mr. Mueller wrote to Mr. Barr three days after his March summary to object to the characterization of his work.  “The summary letter the Department sent to Congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of March 24 did not fully capture the context, nature and substance of this Office’s work and conclusions.”  Some Senators think that Mr. Barr lied in his previous testimony when he said that he had not heard any objections from Mr. Mueller when in fact he had already received and read the letter.

There were more, but then you can read it for yourself.

Let’s put a few more developments from recent days out there to paint a picture.  Consider the following:

  • In an on-air discussion with Sean Hannity of Fox News Mr. Trump said of the Mueller Investigation, “This was a coup.  This was an attempted overthrow of the United States government.” Incredibly — although I don’t know why I continue to be surprised — Representative Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), the House Minority Leader, used the same word in response to a reporter’s question.
  • The Trump Administration asserted that it will fight or ignore any House subpoena. They are also going to court to stop subpoenas of other entities where Congress is seeking information about the president and possible financial ties to other governments or foreign entities.  “We’re fighting all the subpoenas.”  (Contempt of Congress — refusing subpoenas — was Article III of those against Mr. Nixon.)
  • Mr. Trump still does not acknowledge Russian interference in the 2016 election.  According to the Mueller Report there were 251 contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russian-connected operatives including 37 meetings in person or via Skype.  At least thirty-three campaign officials and advisers held the meetings or were aware of such meetings.  Recall that the Mueller Report concluded that “the Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion.”

On Friday, Mr. Trump and Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin held a nearly ninety minute phone call.  Mr. Trump did not confront Mr. Putin about the attacks.  President Obama may have been asleep at the switch and not done all that he could as his administration learned the breadth and depth of Russian intrusion, but he did talk directly to Mr. Putin to warn him against further meddling.  He also imposed sanctions against Russia (which are the ones that presidential adviser Michael Flynn got into trouble over for calling the Russian Ambassador and saying that Mr. Trump would lift them).  President Obama also expelled 35 Russian diplomats from the US and shut down two of their facilities in the US.  Yet in his ninety minute conversation with Mr. Putin, Mr. Trump did not even bring up the Russian actions except to say that he and Mr. Putin did not collude and Mr. Putin should know because he was the one who was supposed to have done it.  They then agreed that it was a hoax.  You can’t make this stuff up.

So what does all of this mean?

When taken in their totality it means that we have a president with no boundaries, no oversight, and no sense of what is right.  Mr. Trump still has not been held accountable for any of his outrageous actions and must surely think that the preponderance of evidence indicates that he never will be.  Most certainly not by the Republicans in the Senate and not by the Attorney General.  In fact, should someone, somehow initiate proceedings against the president, we already know that his A.G. says he can shut it down because, well, just because he can if he wants to.

It is also clear that Mr. Trump will not take Executive Action to stop Russian interference in the 2020 election.  Although various agencies are working to shore up our defenses, there is no national level coordination and planning under way to prevent further meddling.  Indeed, Mr. Trump and others in his administration implied that he would take their help again in 2020.(Russia if you’re listening…)

I think that the evidence above also indicates the Mr. Trump believes that the purpose of the federal government is to do his bidding and therefore he will not hesitate to use the full power and strength of the U.S. government to take down his political opponents.  Apparently he will do so with the willing acquiescence of the A.G. and Republicans in the House and Senate.

Talk of coups really scares me.  Do the president and the leader of the Republican Party in the House really think that the Mueller Investigation was an attempted coup? Stop and think about that for a moment.  Anyone that threatens this president’s sense of well-being is a direct threat to him.  Really?  A coup?  If they actually believe that then there is nothing he will stop at to prevent losing his power.  And who will stop him?  The House is being ignored (A.G. Barr won’t even show up to testify about the Mueller Report and his role in its release).  No oversight there.  The Senate trembles in its boots that one of their Republican colleagues will be the subject of a nasty Tweet. No oversight there.  The Attorney General is now the personal defense attorney for Mr. Trump.  No oversight there.  The fix is in.

How far will he go?  Declare martial law for some other self-created crisis?  Nullify a close election he loses?  Suspend the election because he Tweets out that the Democrats are attempting a coup?  I am not sure what he is capable of doing.

Do I sound like a wing nut conspiracy dealer with too much time on his hands?  I hope so.

And yet, the things I’ve mentioned above happened in only a matter of days.  In other administrations, Republican or Democrat, there would be a major reaction to such a clear threat to our norms and national well-being.  Sadly, most people just dismiss it as business as usual.

One theory floating around is that Mr. Trump and his advisers and supporters in Congress are pushing the Democrats in the House as hard as they can so that they are left with little recourse except for impeachment.  Improbably, the Republicans think that an impeachment proceeding against Mr. Trump will help his approval ratings and “guarantee” his re-election in 2020.  To them there is no down side as they know that the Senate would never convict him of the Articles of Impeachment.  If that is the plan, how much further will the administration overflow the banks of good government to create a flood of institutional indignities to force the issue?

I worry that we are in the midst of the creeping destruction of our Republic.  It is taking place in slow motion and in public so that most people who are rightly concerned with the day-to-day effort of just going to work, to school and of trying to keep food on the table don’t see it.  Like everything associated with this president, it is hiding in plain sight.

Shameful

Posted: April 29, 2019 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

“You don’t even have to be convicted of a crime to lose your job in this constitutional republic.  If this body determines that your conduct as a public official is clearly out of bounds… Impeachment is not about punishment, impeachment is about cleansing the office.  Impeachment is about restoring honor and integrity to the office.”  — Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)

“The president of the United States looked 270 million Americans in the eye, and lied, deliberately and methodically. He took an oath to faithfully execute the laws of this nation, and he violated that oath. He pledged to be the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, and he violated that pledge. He took an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and he willfully and repeatedly violated that oath.”  — Mitch McConnell (R-Ky)

“There is one standard of justice that applies equally to all, and to say or do otherwise will undermine the most sacred of all American ideals. [The] President has committed federal crimes, and there must be a reckoning, or no American shall ever again be prosecuted for those same crimes.”  — John Thune (R-S.D.)

“As of April 27, including the president’s rally in Green Bay, Wis., the tally in our database stands at 10,111 (false or misleading) claims in 828 days.” — Washington Post

Have Republicans finally seen the light and figured out that Donald J. Trump is unfit for office given the clear-cut references to obstruction of justice in the Mueller Report?  Hardly.

The quotes above refer to the impeachment proceedings against President Bill Clinton in 1999 and the fact that our current president has lied over 10,000 times since taking office.  The hypocrisy speaks for itself.

And yet, the talk of impeachment — should Mr. Trump be impeached or not — focuses only on the disagreements within the Democrat Party.  Not a word on the Constitutional duty for oversight and the rule of law from any Republican.  The closest that any Republican now in office came was a statement from Senator Mitt Romney (R-Ut).  Mr. Romney did not speak of impeachment or make a case that Mr. Trump should resign.  He merely said that he was “sickened” and “appalled” by the actions of those in the Trump administration and campaign “including the president.”  No reference as to what the consequences should be, but at least it was something.  He was, of course, immediately attacked for his statement.  After that, crickets.

And it gets worse.

“And you look at what Russia did — you know, buying some Facebook ads and try to sow dissent and do it, and it’s a terrible thing but I think the investigations and all the speculation that has happened for the last two years has had a much harsher impact on democracy than a couple Facebook ads….I think they said they spent about $160,000. I spent $160,000 on Facebook every three hours during the campaign. So if you look at the magnitude of what they did and what they accomplished, I think the ensuing investigations have been way more harmful to our country.”  — Jared Kushner commenting on the Mueller Report

We have come to a place where a (the?) Senior Adviser to the President, downplays the fact that a foreign adversary interferes in our election and that he believes that the investigation of that fact was a bigger threat to our democracy.  Oh, by the way.  He got his facts wrong, and he failed to mention criminal activity hacking into the DNC data base and stealing damaging emails. But I suppose that is to be expected from this administration.

And it gets worse yet.

When the president’s personal lawyer was asked about the Mueller Report’s findings of Russian interference in the election during an interview on CNN he said, “There’s nothing wrong with taking information from Russians.”  When given a chance to clarify his statement he said, “There’s no crime.  We’re going to get into morality?  That isn’t what prosecutors look at, morality.”  So in the course of the Trump campaign we’ve gone from there was no contact with the Russians, to maybe there was contact but it was to talk about orphans, to if there was contact with the Russians there is nothing wrong with it, to we did contact the Russians but everybody would have done the same, to yes, of course we were in cahoots with the Russians, what’s wrong with that?

And it gets even worse.

According to the New York Times then Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Kirstjen Nielsen tried to bring up cyber security and Russian (and other foreign adversaries) interference in the 2020 election.  She was thwarted by Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney who told her not to bring it up in front of the president.  She was told that Mr. Trump equates any discussion of Russian interference in the 2016 election as questioning the legitimacy of his election.  As a result, there have been no Cabinet level meetings on the subject and no presidential level directives to prepare to defend the country against future attacks.  So much for the president upholding his oath of office.  Additionally, I will take a quick note to remind everyone that the DHS is not primarily focused on immigration.  At least it wasn’t until this administration.  It is involved in counter-intelligence work, cyber security and many other areas vital to our country to protect it from real threats to our security, not manufactured border crises.

Mr. Trump is the biggest threat to our democracy of any president in my lifetime, and possibly ever.  My lifetime includes the presidency of Richard M. Nixon.  He at least had certain standards that even he would not dismiss.  A scoundrel yes, but a scoundrel with at least some understanding of what our country stands for.  There were lines even he would not cross.  Mr. Trump knows no boundaries and now he is aided and abetted by Republicans in the House and Senate that apparently have no boundaries either.  Somehow they have made a pact with the devil that they will support and defend anything Mr. Trump does or says in order to get a tax cut and conservative judges on the federal courts.  It seems nothing else matters.

By their actions and words it is clear that the Republican Party no longer has any intellectual or moral underpinnings.  Their sole reason for being is to defend the president, no matter what.  The Republican Party in Washington ceased to exist.  Trumpism prevails.

To me this is not a matter of policy or a matter of Democrats just not liking the president.  Like has nothing to do with it.  Mr. Trump is destroying the moral fabric of society and deliberately stoking fear and loathing in order to achieve his own ends.

All presidents deserve thoughtful criticism and reasonable people can reasonably disagree on a given policy.  This is more than that.

Please tell me that you would hold Mr. Trump’s actions, words, and demeanor up to your children as an aspirational goal you would be proud to see them achieve.  If you cannot do that, then why do we tolerate it in our president?  What happened to our desire to see a person of great character as the leader of our country?

And please, spare me the “what abouts.”  Not all of our presidents or party leaders have been icons of virtue, but can you truly say that anyone of them in our lifetime was worse than Mr. Trump?  This is not a “it happens on both sides” issue.  It is not.

While the Democrats move to and fro tearing themselves apart contemplating their collective navel as they try to decide whether and how to hold Mr. Trump accountable under their duty as sworn to in an oath to protect and defend the Constitution, Republicans sit smugly on the sidelines appearing systematically to kiss Mr. Trump’s — well, you know.  Not a leader among them.

We get so caught up in the day-to-day travesty known as the Trump Administration that we lose sight of the forest for the trees.  Everyday brings a new outrage.  It is hard to keep up.  Step back sometime and think about the totality of his destructive work.  Taken as a whole, he is a one man wrecking crew with his advisers and apologists in Congress gleefully sifting through the wreckage.

We now know who Mr. Trump is and little about him surprises me any more.  He outrages me, yes, worries me, yes, but not much new in his spiel.  What worries me more is that so many people go merrily along with him hoping that some day it will make their lives better.  Where is the evidence for that?  Apparently, the motivation for Republicans in Congress and those working for him in the White House is power.  Pure unadulterated power.

I wonder how they manage to look at themselves in the mirror each morning.  Shameful.

 

 

 

Newer Entries →