THE REPUBLICANS DEFEND TRUMP WITH RUSSIAN DISINFORMATION

As the impeachment Investigation is not a court of law the fact that it has been proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Donald J. Trump  attempted to bribe President Zelensky of Ukraine by withholding tax payer money until he smeared 2020 political opponent Joe Biden, is irrelevant. The House Republican jurors are not remotely interested in the law.  More tragically they don’t care that the President of the United States of America has trashed every value that America has stood for and in the process betrayed his oath. 
Nowhere was that more starkly illustrated when three Republican Impeachment hearing members passed on their question time to Dr. Fiona Hill of the National Security Council to prevent her from crushing their dangerous repetition of Putin’s talking points. Hill, politely but firmly lectured the elected representatives of the American Congress on their own foreign policy legislation on Russia/Ukraine. She literally threw a hand grenade into the hearing chamber shattering any semblance of respectability of any defense of President Trump. 

The Republicans’ cynical central defense of Trump thus became a repetition of Russian disinformation which has been debunked by American intelligence. In effect the Republicans have handed over their party to Trump and his Russian collaborators. Their mantra is as it is in all totalitarian states, “My leader right or wrong”.

However, as Jay H. Ell has stated ad nauseam this is only the beginning of a long drawn out process and who knows how the cookie will crumble.  The world around Trump is disintegrating rapidly, even Fox News is beginning to deviate from slavish adherence. Who would have believed two weeks ago that there would be such a clear cut consensus on the facts of the Trump abuse of power?

THE HOUSE REPUBLICANS HANG IN WITH TRUMP

The Republican House lawmakers remained solidly behind the POTUS as they believe that will ensure their political survival. They fear if they don’t he will support an opponent in their Primaries. This they do while offering no counter to the damning evidence of the Impeachment Investigation. To date they can take Job’s comfort from the Trump poll numbers that are steady at forty percent. While this still holds they can fantasize that the results of the 2018 midterms and the off year elections in 2019 are an aberration. 

So in spite of incontrovertible testimony that Trump abused his power by committing bribery, extortion and obstruction of justice, the Republicans support him by creating an alternate worldview. This in spite of the stark warning by Dr. Hill of the danger that by so doing they are aiding Putin in dividing American Society. Furthermore she argued that by their failure to censure the Russian President they are giving hime the green light to repeat the exercise in the 2020 election. She also disabused them of any thought it was Putin’s love affair with Trump that had occasioned his involvement. Rather the Russian Premier would be highly satisfied at Trump's impeachment because it is as a result of his intervention that there is political chaos in a weakened America.

There is no doubt that to use Dr. Hill’s phraseology the Republicans are electing to turn their party’s policy into carrying out the POTUS’S political errands rather than serving their country.

FOX NEWS, TRUMP’S MAIN ECHO CHAMBER WAVERING, SLIGHTLY

The President’s main mouth piece, Fox News, is really in a bit of an ambivalent tiz. They, having helped create an alternate reality, made some moves which can be interpreted as inching away from blind support of the President. This included being more even handed in the day time coverage of the impeachment proceedings. Their commentator Chris Wallace criticized Trump mercilessly. On the other hand they felt forced to dispense with their long time legal analyst Judge Napolitano who way back stated that Trump had committed impeachable offenses and in his place injected none other than Kenneth Starr. The latter is Plato’s original hypocrite, who literally scraped the bottom of the barrel to recommend the removal of Bill Clinton after having entrapped him into lying about a sexual relationship. Starr had steadfastly maintained till well into impeachment hearings that Trump had done nothing impeachable. However on the penultimate day after Ambassador Sondland had laid out in detail why there was a quid pro quo, he commented that the Republican Senators might have to make a trip to the WhiteHouse. He was alluding to the Republican delegation lead by Senators Goldwater and Scott forcing Nixon to resign. 

Fox News accepted an advert from the anti Trump group,“Republicans For The Rule Of Law”, where there are cut outs from the impeachment hearings illustrating the quid pro quo. These excerpts were followed by Lindsey Graham Republican Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee stating that if he could be shown a quid pro quo “that would be very disturbing”.

The morning after the final scheduled testimony Trump took advantage of his standing invitation to phone into “Fox and Friends” dominating the whole hour with his free flowing consciousness including repeating the canard that Ukraine not Russia intervened in the 2016 elections. Not even the uninformed watcher would have missed that the Fox trio kept gently challenging his dissembling inane incoherent conspiracy theories and obvious lies.

Yet Fox News is not going to abandon its ratings base easily as illustrated by their reportage in their normally fairly even handed daily newsletter. Last week it ignored the Impeachment hearings, after reporting the week earlier that Trump was toast.

Fox News is a crucial component of Trump’s support system. Without it he has no national mouthpiece as he has created a media consensus against his behavior and unconstitutional approach. He has publicly attacked Fox’s recent ambivalence. His anger, for whatever reason, makes them uncomfortable and one or other concession seems to follow his attacks. Their ultimate stance is one of the factors that could decide his fate. One telling observation is that Paul Ryan, the former Republican House Speaker who abandoned his post because of the Trump Presidency, is newly elected to the Fox board. He will hardly be advocating for full throttle support of Trump.

THE  STATE OF THE DEMOCRATS IN THE ERA OF THE TRUMP IMPEACHMENT

The Democrats appear to be able to successfully walk and chew gum at the same time in that  the House Intelligence Committee is conducting the devastating demolition of Trump and his talking points while the party are campaigning and winning  elections even in the reddest of states on the basis of domestic issues. Most importantly their long drawn out nomination process which is garnering much coverage, particularly their debates, have not focussed on Trump. Rather, to quote Peter Buttigieg they are preparing for a post Trump world. 

Nancy Pelosi the Speaker of the House and the de facto leader of the party continues to masterly orchestrate the objectives of the impeachment of Trump, articulate and pass legislation that meets the electorate’s priorities while keeping the many factions in her party in line. The party’s differing viewpoints are reflected in the stances of the many challengers for the Democratic Party Presidential nomination. While there are so many uncertainties in that process there are a number of facts that can be agreed upon. Chief among these is that the only conceivable path to a second Trump term is an unelectable Democratic candidate. 

The Democratic contenders can be categorized in several ways. The one that is front and centre is, "Who has the best chance to beat Trump?”. The general consensus has been that the natural challenger would be former Vice President, Joe Biden. So fearful is the POTUS of the appeal that Biden would have to the middle of the road and Mid West voters that he based his Ukrainian foreign policy on getting Biden smeared. Biden while still top of the national polls is not receiving enthusiastic support from the party followers. This is largely because he doesn’t shine in debates. (Jay H. Ell wonders why that should be so overwhelmingly important). In addition he is lagging behind in the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire. While he may gain steam his failure to be the obvious choice is giving the Democratic Party Establishment grey hairs.

Then the perception is that numbers two and three in the national Democratic polls, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, have reached their limit of support and would not have enough following to go over the top against Trump. This leaves the field wide open with the leader of the rest being Peter Buttingieg who has currently not much support amongst the African Americans and the Hispanics. There is still plenty of time for this to play out. There is no doubt both Governor Patrick Duval and Mayor Michael Bloomberg read this the same way - hence their late entries into the race.

THE REPUBLICAN SENATORS - “THE LAST REMAINING ADULTS IN THE ROOM”

EVERY ACTION AND STATEMENT MADE BY THE REPUBLICAN SENATORS HAS TO BE SEEN IN THE CONTEXT OF THE CONFIDENTIAL BRIEFING THEY RECEIVED FROM THE INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES WHO INFORMED THEM THAT THE ACCUSATION THAT UKRAINE INTERFERED IN THE 2016 ELECTION WAS RUSSIAN DISINFORMATION.

All focus is on the Senate who the Founders of the American constitution envisaged as the backstop to overreach by the other branches of the Government. They are the ultimate decision makers as to whether the President is removed from office. As matters stand thoughts of his removal are a real stretch as it would require twenty of the fifty -  three Republicans to turn on Trump. However there are several who for various reasons could vote aye in a vote to exit him from office. Currently the Senators generally are not available for comment but there is activity among them in various directions.

A number of Senators huddled with Trump to strategize about the termination proceedings. Trump would like the matter dismissed with no trial but even the enabling adults recognized that could not happen. McConnell who is seriously AWOL has already suggested a six week ordeal. It appears from the leaked sources the best Trump could hope for is a two week hearing. With Republicans such as Texas’s Ted Cruz opining that justice must be seen to be done Trump could have gained very little happiness from his meeting with them. 

Trump’s enabler in chief Lindsey Graham, who was originally the great straight shooter with his friend John McCain, has finally agreed to hold hearings on the Bidens and Ukraine's alleged intervention in the 2016 election. When the history of the Trump train wreck is written Graham may argue that he did all this to have influence on the POTUS. The counter narrative to that will be Dr. Hill’s informed opinion that this will be aiding Russia as their goal is that the US President, whoever he may be, be placed under a cloud.

The Senators that might turn against Trump especially if the train should continue to accelerate could be divided into the institutionalists and those who could well lose their 2020 elections if the voting patterns of 2018 are repeated. The latter include the five Senators from Maine, Iowa, Colorado, North Carolina and Arizona. There is even a fear that Texas and Kansas could be at risk. Another potential group of Trump nay sayers who might want to hold onto the traditions of the Senate and American democracy include Liza Murkowski, Lamar Alexander, Richard Burr, Mike Enzi and John Izakson. In addition the obvious leader of the movement to terminate Trump would be Mitt Romney a former Republican nominee for President and the last white hope to save what is left of the principles of the Republican Party. He has absolutely nothing to lose and he has regularly criticized Trump. Just by the by Speaker Paul Ryan, the new Fox News board member, was Romney’s running mate in the latter’s Presidential bid. 

So there is the potential for enough Republicans to vote to create a bipartisan majority to vote for Trump’s ouster but not reaching the two - thirds number to effect his removal.  Nevertheless  Republican defection would weaken the POTUS to the extent that he would have little to no hope of winning reelection. Also this whole scenario could explode necessitating what Kenneth Starr mused about - a forced Trump resignation.

WHAT IS HAPPENING NOW?

Trump has jeopardy on so many fronts directly and indirectly related to the termination proceedings. 

  What if early this week the courts finally rule that Don McGahn, former WhiteHouse Council has to testify before Congress? Even if there is an appeal this could open the floodgates to those who are looking for judicial cover to extricate themselves from legal jeopardy by telling all. This could include John Bolton, former Trump’s National Security Advisor, whose lawyer has informed the House Impeachment Chairman Schiff that he has as yet unrevealed information on the POTUS’S maneuverings in the Ukraine scandal. Bolton is becoming more and more public with his anger with the Trump WhiteHouse. 

  What if the Supreme Court refuses to hear the appeal to stop the release of Trump’s taxes? It boggles the mind as to what that might reveal as Trump has fought and lied so long to prevent this from happening?

  The release of batches of Trump Administration withheld documents by court order is on the cards. One batch has already been delivered from the State Department confirming that the the firing of Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch came right from the top with the cooperation of Secretary Pompeo.

Joseph Bondi. Lev Parnas’s lawyer has stated that Parnas has crucial evidence for the Impeachment enquiry. He alleges that Nunes in a visit to Ukraine attempted to get dirt on Biden from corrupt officials from the previous regime. 

In addition to wobbling Fox News the highly influential conservative “Drudge Report” abandoned Trump during the impeachment hearings. Trump has sent Jared Kuschner to find out why.

Trump is involved in a public altercation with the military brass. He wants to pardon those who have committed what have been labelled war crimes and in a rare conflagration the 
 brass have objected indicating that they set the standards of conduct. If this continues he will have declared war against everyone employed by the Federal Government.

Chairman Schiff has stated that his impeachment enquiry is not necessarily over. 

In all probability the House Judiciary Committee in framing impeachment articles will include a string of Trump’s obstruction of justice efforts, showing a pattern since way back.

AT THE END OF THE DAY

The House Republicans have committed themselves to a cheat who is now the personification of their party. He recently signed a statement that he had fraudulently used his own charitable foundation to pay for political activity and was fined two million dollars as well as forfeiting a similar amount that still remained in the fund. This follows his scam to create a University where he settled the litigation for twenty - five million dollars to those who he had swindled in the belief that they would obtain a valid degree. These are just two of his nearly five thousand law suits that he has been involved in.

Then the POTUS has been exposed as conducting American Foreign Policy for his own personal political objectives. Here his enablers could offer no defense other to deflect that there is a vast deep state conspiracy against him, that the Bidens were crooks in Ukraine and that Ukrainians were responsible for the 2016 election hack in favor of Hillary Clinton. To add to Republican shame Lindsey Graham is now investigating a canard that has been debunked by the intelligence agencies.

Maybe as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s involvement in the “political errand” of Donald Trump is becoming more and more public, Mitch McConnell will be less inclined to insist that he stand for the Senate in red Kansas which McConnell believes is at risk of switching to the Democrats. 

Whatever AG Barr is trying to cook up about the origins of the Mueller investigation the independent Department of Justice’s Watchdog probe has found that it was well founded and legitimate.

This is such a fast moving story with so many tentacles that it is really impossible to predict where the bones will fall next. One thing is for sure Trump will not come out of it whole. The fear is that he could still bring the whole house tumbling with him. The only hope is that the Republican adults in the Senate will stand up and be counted.