Impeach Trump Y/N

Indeed it is. Man, Giuliani is so fucked!

Giuliani is small potatoes. Trump is the epicenter of the disaster.

Old Lunch, there are also people who understand the question fine, and further know that it's asking "is orange man bad?" And they know their answer needs to be "fuck you, media."

The genuinely interesting poll is probably not possible today, because people know their answers are tribal signifiers. They will answer tribally.

In idle fantasy-land, if I had a time machine, it would be neat to go to 2014 and ask people "Is it bad for a President to enlist foreign help in discrediting his political rivals?"

Even the real-world sport of saying to Trumpites: "if this were a Democrat..." is pointless, because I know the answer: it doesn't matter. Tribals gonna tribe.

I saw this on Melania's plagiarized speech. "Well, when Michelle said it it was false, and when Melania said it it was true." I saw this on the topic of the Taliban Camp David meeting. What if a Democrat President had done this, etc. etc. The Trumper line was, "the comparison is invalid because Obama would have given away the store; Trump would have art-of-the-dealed their turbaned asses into the stone age, etc. etc."

sorry for long excerpt, but this is a fun, handy list of suggestions of who the house impeachment inquiry should talk to, from the nyt editorial board:

But here are a few notable figures — in addition, of course, to the whistle-blower himself — who could prove particularly useful to House investigators.

Rudy Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s personal attorney/fixer. As the point person on the push to get Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Mr. Giuliani likely knows more about the origins, scope and details of the effort than almost anyone. Some of the more targeted mysteries he could shed light on include: When and from whom did the president first get the idea to pressure Ukraine? How did Mr. Giuliani first become involved? Was he being paid for his work, and if so, by whom?

Mr. Giuliani loudly insists that he was working at the behest of the State Department. In that case, when did he first make contact with department officials? Which officials did he work with and in what capacity? How many people knew about his freelance project for Mr. Trump?

Bill Barr, attorney general. Mr. Barr is neck-deep in this mess. He features prominently not only in the whistle-blower’s complaint but also in the readout of the July 25 call, in which Mr. Trump told Mr. Zelensky that Mr. Barr, like Mr. Giuliani, would be contacting him about the investigation into Mr. Biden. The Justice Department has denied that Mr. Barr knew anything about this promise. But Mr. Barr should be pressed on why Mr. Trump thought it was proper to offer the services of the American attorney general to help a foreign government investigate his own political opponent.

When the whistle-blower complaint citing him by name was referred to the Justice Department, Mr. Barr should have formally recused himself from any involvement with it. Why didn’t he?

Mick Mulvaney, acting White House chief of staff. In July, Mr. Trump directed Mr. Mulvaney to arrange for Ukraine’s military aid to be put on hold. What explanation did he give Mr. Mulvaney? Whom did Mr. Mulvaney contact at the Departments of Defense and State to make that happen? What explanations did he offer them?

Mike Pompeo, secretary of state. Robert Menendez, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has already issued a raft of questions that he’d like Mr. Pompeo to address, including: Was Mr. Pompeo concerned that America’s Ukraine policy had been partially outsourced to the president’s personal lawyer? When did Mr. Pompeo first learn of Mr. Giuliani’s work? Did he approve it, and was he aware that State Department officials were involved with it? What explanation was he given for the withholding of aid to Ukraine?

Kurt Volker, former part-time special envoy to Ukraine, and Gordon Sondland, ambassador to the European Union. Both men consulted with Mr. Giuliani about his Ukraine project. On July 26, one day after Mr. Trump’s call with Mr. Zelensky, Mr. Volker and Mr. Sondland met with Ukrainian officials and reportedly offered advice on how to “navigate” Mr. Trump’s requests. Did they, as the whistle-blower claims, at some point become concerned about Mr. Giuliani’s work and seek to “contain the damage”? Mr. Volker resigned his post on Friday. Why?

Mike Pence, vice president. In his conversations with Ukrainian officials, including his Sept. 1 meeting with Mr. Zelensky, was there any mention of Mr. Biden or of the delayed military funding package? When asked at a news conference on Sept. 2 if he could assure Ukraine that the two issues were not linked, Mr. Pence ducked the question. Mr. Pence should also explain why Mr. Trump directed him to cancel his plans to attend Mr. Zelensky’s inauguration in May.

Mr. Trump himself has suggested looking into Mr. Pence’s interactions with Ukrainian officials. “And I think you should ask for VP Pence’s conversation, because he had a couple conversations also,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

John Bolton, former national security adviser. Mr. Bolton was forced out of the White House in September. What did he know about Mr. Trump’s pressure campaign? Mr. Bolton is said to have pushed for the withheld military aid to be released. What explanation did he receive for it being withheld?

Michael Atkinson, the inspector general of the intelligence community. Mr. Atkinson reviewed the whistle-blower complaint, deemed it both “urgent” and “credible,” and forwarded it to Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence. After Mr. Maguire declined to pass the complaint along to Congress, as indicated by federal law, Mr. Atkinson chose to alert lawmakers to its existence himself. What explanation did Mr. Maguire give for not forwarding the complaint? How did he respond when Mr. Atkinson informed him that he would be alerting Congress?

Lawmakers will also need to hear from whoever was charged with moving the transcript of Mr. Trump’s July 25 call from the usual computer system to the special server, maintained by the National Security Council, reserved for “classified information of an especially sensitive nature.” Who directed this action? (On Friday, a White House official told CNN that N.S.C. attorneys did so.) Who else knew about it? Did anyone object at the time? Have other such conversations been improperly stashed in the system, as the whistle-blower alleged? (It has been reported that reconstructed transcripts of phone calls Mr. Trump had with the Saudi royal family and with Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, were stored on the server as well.) It’s worth remembering that one of the biggest bombshells of the Watergate hearings came from Alexander Butterfield, a relatively obscure administration staffer, who shared what he knew about the White House taping system.

Then there are the “multiple U.S. government officials” whom the whistle-blower cites as his sources — the ones whom Mr. Trump has compared to spies and has implied deserve to be executed for treason.

meanwhile, election season starts to heat up. this year is going to the most insane, unpredictable season of must-see real life yet

Why are so many of the usual suspects in Italy right now? Barr, Pence, Pompeo, iirc Bannon ...

I hear Italy is often rather pleasant in early autumn.

just a fun weekend in italy with the boys

Trump’s been filling his diaper extra hard on Twitter the last half hour or so

ok, wtf is with him calling the phone call "perfect" over and over? this has gone on for days now

now openly accusing schiff with "Fraud and Treason" as well. wow, the state-sponsored executions for all this are going to be wild

Trump genuinely doesn't seem to get how bad that transcript is for him, which I guess explains why it was released in the first place. I almost think he may not have bothered to read it himself and has no idea what he said.

he didn't bother to read the whistleblower complaint, either. he keeps fixating on "the person" who provided the whistleblower with information, calling them a "spy". but the first page of the complaint cites "more than half a dozen U.S. officials" who provided the whistleblower with info. if trump would have actually read that you know he'd be making up a nickname for this group of officials.

i mean... nixon reacted pretty much the exact same way to the smoking gun tape.

I have no doubt he hasn't read the complaint, but would've thought he'd have some idea about what the transcript he released and keeps praising actually says.

Tbh, I don't know enough about the history of Watergate to be able to compare.

The diapers are all full, the president is in full on shitting on a paper towel mode

wtf is with him calling the phone call "perfect" over and over?

he probably fucks those calls up all the time, and half the call logs hidden on the codeword server are just embarrassing, so he is just genuinely indignant at having his real accomplishment for once be doubted

Tbh, I don't know enough about the history of Watergate to be able to compare.

― Mario Meatwagon (Moodles)

well this isn't actually 1974 but it's similar enough that it's fascinating to see the parallels. nixon, as far as "the final days" has it, was absolutely convinced that the smoking gun tape exonerated him. now i'm sure nixon was a hell of a lot more intelligent than our current president, but i'm not sure intelligence factors into it, just the unrestricted ability for self-delusion... which nixon unquestionably had.

lol

Mr. President, don't do this. It looks like an attempt to obstruct justice, which is itself impeachable.

Alternatively, it makes you look small and weak. People will laugh at you. Don't go there, @realDonaldTrump.

— Sam Wang (@SamWangPhD) September 29, 2019

tweet thread eerily echoing the trial of tim heidecker again

lol he thinks his right is to meet his accuser

Grab 'Em By The Whistle!

ok, wtf is with him calling the phone call "perfect" over and over? this has gone on for days now

He has an extremely limited vocabulary, and does not have any ability to actually determine what is good or bad in any situation.

Like his murmuring “classy” over and over in the 1980s to convince idiots that his repugnantly tacky taste in decor was a mark of quality. He inherently believed that because it came from him, the grotesque obviousness of the tackiness indeed was classy, but ALSO believed that by repeating it over and over, people he thought were dumber than him would be persuaded of this. Here, he said all the words he intended to say, and another person gave him specific praise that he had asked to hear as an affirmation, therefore the call was perfect.

His greatest frustration as President is that everyone he comes in contact with no longer pretends to be dumber than him, so his repetition becomes more frenzied. He knows no other way of making his desires manifest, and has always thrown tantrums when they don’t.

Whistleblower under federal protection, reportedly. Which means ... Barr. Who did so well with Epstein.

well he/she is a spy, and we know how they used to handle spies in the good old days

I almost think he may not have bothered to read it himself and has no idea what he said.

Based on what he's done in the past, I think knows pretty exactly what he said, but he truly believes that the fact he did not literally spell out the quid-pro-quo, but instead merely hinted at it, insinuated it, and implied it, and had his surrogates like Giuliani repeatedly do the same song and dance to Zelinsky for months on end, means that he's covered his ass and can't be held legally liable for what he did. He somehow thinks that preserving that tiny fig leaf means he can claim 'perfect' innocence and everyone has to take him at his word.

i've been hearing the call was perfect

I was doing some reading on Joe McCarthy and noticed that his reign of demagoguery and disinformation lasted exactly 4 years, 4 months—from 1950 speech about communists at State to “have you no sense of decency?” It‘s been 4 years, 3 1/2 months since Trump’s announcement speech.

— Ryan Lizza (@RyanLizza) September 30, 2019

rly makes u think

At least that would be a step in the right direction for the internet.

exhuming mccarthy

New Quinnipiac poll: Do you think President Trump should be impeached and removed from office?

NOW
Yes 47%
No 47%

LAST WEEK
Yes 37%
No 57%

— Steve Kornacki (@SteveKornacki) September 30, 2019

that's a very encouraging trend, but those numbers aren't yet decisive enough to strike dread into the hearts of republican senators. still, good news.

lmao this is convincing

Dems have already made up their mind that Trump is guilty, so they should just hold the impeachment vote now and get it over with. Spare us the sham hearings, the “investigations,” and the ridiculous grandstanding that will surely accompany them. @FDRLST https://t.co/GbHENeOJJA

— John Daniel Davidson (@johnddavidson) September 30, 2019

John Daniel Davidson has already made up his mind that Trump is innocent, so we should spare him the need to examine any new facts uncovered during any future investigations. He will only resort to ridiculous hand waving to dismiss them anyway.

WaPo quotes a retired teacher who “expressed nervousness” about impeachment. 27 years ago, she appeared in a Post piece about her husband, who was waging a legal battle to clear the name of his dad, a convicted Nazi collaborator pic.twitter.com/0diCXTFLgZ

— b r a d (@bshoup) September 30, 2019

uh oh, more breaking crimes

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/30/us/politics/trump-australia-barr-mueller.html

WASHINGTON — President Trump pushed the Australian prime minister during a recent telephone call to help Attorney General William P. Barr gather information for a Justice Department inquiry that Mr. Trump hopes will discredit the Mueller investigation, according to two American officials with knowledge of the call.

The White House restricted access to the call’s transcript to a small group of the president’s aides, one of the officials said, an unusual decision that is similar to the handling of a July call with the Ukrainian president that is at the heart of House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry into Mr. Trump. Like that call, the discussion with Prime Minister Scott Morrison of Australia shows the extent to which Mr. Trump sees the attorney general as a critical partner in his goal to show that the Mueller investigation had corrupt and partisan origins, and the extent that Mr. Trump sees the Justice Department inquiry as a potential way to gain leverage over America’s closest allies.

And like the call with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, the discussion with Mr. Morrison shows the president using high-level diplomacy to advance his personal political interests.

in previous eras, the main actors would have the dignity and self-awareness to resign in shame. it is amazing that bill barr hasn't stepped down already. in this era, you go down kicking and screaming and then start your own tv network which says you're always right

i'm guessing that call will be rated... near perfect?

starting to think that Mueller might have been incompetent

i hope that whoever reads the transcript in congress does so in an aussie accent

vol 2 of the mueller report is just one long list of things trump did and is doing that are clearly misdemeanors and high crimes. no one read the fucking report. even the people on the news will offhandedly say that this new ukraine scandal kicks ass because the primary document sources are so short, compared to the unreadable, war and peace on steroids, completely incomprehensible, impossible mueller report

Btw if anyone’s been seeing the latest messaging from the Federalist et al regarding supposed recent changes in whistleblower policy you will be shocked to learn it’s all bullshit https://www.thedailybeast.com/gop-shows-russian-trolls-how-its-done-with-trump-inspector-general-whistleblower-smear

Just to back up: So it looks like the President, the Attorney General, and the Secretary of State are all implicated in a criminal conspiracy?

— Clara Jeffery (@ClaraJeffery) September 30, 2019

been out of touch a bit , what's going on now ?

more of the usual or something new ?

oh Australian PM doesn't want to be left out i see

Barr should resign, but I wish he would recuse first, just to see Trump's reaction.

oh more cool stuff

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo took part in the Trump phone call with Ukraine's leader, a senior State Department official said https://t.co/twUmCMapOu

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) September 30, 2019

interesting Monday! this is a great start to infrastructureimpeachment week .

and where are the tax returns?