Senate Trump Trial

[screen glare]

General Accounting Office. Non-partisan.

Its ruling? Yes - Trump has broken the law.

Crime. Dreamed up and committed by Trump.

The mentally ill President of The United States of America. The self-aggrandizing dangerous dope. Putin’s puppet. Five-time draft dodger. Jeffrey Epstein’s blackmailed customer and vicarious executioner. The embarrassment and pariah among all true leaders of the free world. The blatant conman. A GD liar. Lethal abuser of innocent kids. And - the most gullible voter’s choice to turn the DC swamp into a larger scofflaw sewer.

[Bryce]

General Accounting Office. Non-partisan.

Its ruling? Yes - Obama has broken the law.

SEVEN TIMES

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General Accounting Office. Non-partisan.

Its ruling? Yes - Obama has broken the law.

SEVEN TIMES

Sadly for Trump his came with bad timing... he screwed up...

[Lester The Nightfly]

I had to laugh at this CNN headline:

"Senate Republicans need to end this trial before Donald Trump confesses"

(before y'all flip out, it's simply a joke. Lighten up. Although truth be told I could see the old git doing just that. He'd still be acquitted. Shot on 5th Ave. and all...)

[screen glare]

Trump is a functioning mental patient who has frightened enablers and yes men to agree, zero ability to feel guilt, empathy, or shame - and is currently institutionalized in the white house.

But that’s better than being out on the streets. Shooting people 5th Ave. and all.

[audiophile]

Democrat's claim of personal gain is weak when Trump donates his salary away:

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-mete ... no-salary/

This trial is boring. No one cares, even nightly news barely even covers it.

[bmw]

This trial is boring. No one cares

That's because watching this trial is like re-watching a football game you already watched and know the outcome to.

And remember, the goal here is not convict Trump, but rather to ensure that Trump has that *asterisk* next to his name in the history books. Revenge for beating Hillary.

[Bryce]

Here's a question I would like to see a reporter, any reporter, ask one of the main players on the Democratic side. If your case for impeachment needs to be bolstered by further testimony from other witnesses and isn't strong enough to stand and convict as it is, how can you justify the vote to impeach in the first place?

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Here's a question I would like to see a reporter, any reporter, ask one of the main players on the Democratic side. If your case for impeachment needs to be bolstered by further testimony from other witnesses and isn't strong enough to stand and convict as it is, how can you justify the vote to impeach in the first place?

Did you just copy and paste the GOP talking points for that? It all seems verbatim familiar...

The house was stonewalled at every turn... Trump and company refused to cooperate or turn over any documents... getting the Democrats to go through the courts in a months long or longer fight was their goal which might have pushed this past the election while taking the steam out of it. That’s why they moved ahead with it without the testimony. So it’s not that the case is so flimsy that it needs to be bolstered, it’s that the administration wouldn’t play ball with the house and a Senate trial can do a much better job compelling testimony quickly. That the senators wouldn’t want to hear the testimony despite it being a normal thing in an impeachment trial speaks volumes. Hearing from witnesses in an impeachment trial is NORMAL.

Bolton initially refused to testify and wanted to drag this out in the courts as did Charles Kupperman. The house elected not to play that game and moved forward. They know a stalling tactic when they see one. I would also point out that Bolton now wants to testify and that the GAO report about the law that was broken withholding the aid has come out SINCE the impeachment vote. That still isn’t changing the GOP’s lockstep on witnesses except for Susan Collins who is a “likely” on witnesses...

Cory Gardner of Colorado
Lisa Murkowski of Alaska
Bob Corker of Tennessee
Mitt Romney of Utah

These are all folks to watch when the witness question finally comes up.

[bmw]

Here's a question I would like to see a reporter, any reporter, ask one of the main players on the Democratic side. If your case for impeachment needs to be bolstered by further testimony from other witnesses and isn't strong enough to stand and convict as it is, how can you justify the vote to impeach in the first place?

Yeah, right. Reporters asking questions critical of the process? Are you kidding me? The vast majority of them SUPPORT the impeachment (and even a conviction). They sure as hell aren't going to ask questions counter-to their own personal beliefs.

They were stonewalled at every turn... Trump and company refused to cooperate or turn over any documents... getting the Democrats to go through the courts in a months long or longer fight was their goal which might have pushed this past the election while taking the steam out of it.

The fact that a court battle would have been lengthy is no excuse. And if they thought they would have won on those points in court, they would have pursued it. I think they stayed out of court not because of the time (though that may have been a secondary factor), but because they knew they ultimately would lose and look like fools if they voted to impeach anyways.

Bottom line is there's no need for the Senate to hear from witnesses because the articles themselves are so weak. And the House has nobody but themselves to blame for this. And now they're acting like a bunch of power-hungry crybabies trying to get the Senate to do what they knowingly and intentionally refused to do themselves.

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Here's a question I would like to see a reporter, any reporter, ask one of the main players on the Democratic side. If your case for impeachment needs to be bolstered by further testimony from other witnesses and isn't strong enough to stand and convict as it is, how can you justify the vote to impeach in the first place?

Yeah, right. Reporters asking questions critical of the process? Are you kidding me? The vast majority of them SUPPORT the impeachment (and even a conviction). They sure as hell aren't going to ask questions counter-to their own personal beliefs.

They were stonewalled at every turn... Trump and company refused to cooperate or turn over any documents... getting the Democrats to go through the courts in a months long or longer fight was their goal which might have pushed this past the election while taking the steam out of it.

The fact that a court battle would have been lengthy is no excuse. And if they thought they would have won on those points in court, they would have pursued it. I think they stayed out of court not because of the time (though that may have been a secondary factor), but because they knew they ultimately would lose and look like fools if they voted to impeach anyways.

Bottom line is there's no need for the Senate to hear from witnesses because the articles themselves are so weak. And the House has nobody but themselves to blame for this. And now they're acting like a bunch of power-hungry crybabies trying to get the Senate to do what they knowingly and intentionally refused to do themselves.

One of Trumps typical tactics is to tie things up in the courts for years with appeals... would this really have any power at all if it were started in September 2019 and finished in March 2021? People wouldn’t be paying any attention to it by then.

I think the real rub is that these arguments are getting aired on both sides, the bases are getting fired up and money is being raised. Both sides know that the outcome is baked in but they are staking their positions ahead of 2020 at this point. Anything the Democrats do and say in the trial now is geared towards the 4 or 5 senators I mentioned above voting for witnesses.

[bmw]

In the end, this only helps Trump as I think it only amplifies the effects of a booming economy. If things weren't going so well on the home front, I think it would possibly amplify that the other way. But the bottom line is no matter how the Democrats try to spin it, the economy is doing well. The stock market still keeps hitting daily highs (thus impacting not only rich people who invest, but also anybody with a 401(k)). Unemployment is at rock-bottom. Wages are rising. GDP is moderately strong. And on the international front, we're in relatively peaceful times.

So when you try to throw a President out of office who presides during good times (and do so based on such petty accusations), and on top of that 2 of your 3 top candidates are promoting RADICAL change to our current economic structure, all of that combines to be good news for Trump.

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In the end, this only helps Trump as I think it only amplifies the effects of a booming economy. If things weren't going so well on the home front, I think it would possibly amplify that the other way. But the bottom line is no matter how the Democrats try to spin it, the economy is doing well. The stock market still keeps hitting daily highs (thus impacting not only rich people who invest, but also anybody with a 401(k)). Unemployment is at rock-bottom. Wages are rising. GDP is moderately strong. And on the international front, we're in relatively peaceful times.

So when you try to throw a President out of office who presides during good times (and do so based on such petty accusations), and on top of that 2 of your 3 top candidates are promoting RADICAL change to our current economic structure, all of that combines to be good news for Trump.

But for much of Obama’s 2 terms GDP was about this strong... it was decried by the right (including Trump) as unacceptably low and a result of a man who supposedly didn’t believe in the greatness of America. Now that it’s Trump with the same 2% or so growth it’s suddenly “moderately strong”? I’ve said it before but it bares repeating that we haven’t exactly taken leaps and bounds to get here from where were the day he took office... unemployment is down about a percent or so, wages are up a bit, the stock market is certainly higher (though it had gone from 6,300 at its low point in March 2009 up to 23 or 24,000 under Obama) and job creation has remained steady. There WAS a sugar high from the tax cuts but that’s gone. It’s actually one reason the Republicans were talking about yet another tax cut as stimulus. Meanwhile the deficit has exploded as a result of the tax cut. It did blow the hole in the budget that was warned about when they did the cut.

Then we look electorally. If he loses Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania he’s toast. If he loses one of those plus Florida he’s toast. He won by the absolute barest of margins and would essentially have to perform exactly the same feat in exactly the same way in order to win. Those odds are not exceedingly good and he’s not gonna flip any Clinton states to make up for any state he loses. I would be pretty nervous — maybe optimistic — but still nervous if I was a Republican.

Fun fact: Excluding Rasmussen (which has a notorious Republican House effect) he has never hit 50% approval in his time in office.

His solid support ceiling seems to be about 45% which won’t be enough to get it done. The challenge for the Democrats is not to lose focus on the goal of winning the election by reliving 2016 and having half the people stay home pissed that their guy (gal?) isn’t up there...

[MasterB]

I'd rather watch paint dry than the Impeachment trial which is a joke since Adam doesn't know jack about the law or abuse of power either what Adam has said is pure BS and spin with no truth whatsoever and why no one is watching this dog and pony show it's a train wreck of a show. Adam is a do-nothing congressmen and is part of the problem in DC.

[Rate This]

I'd rather watch paint dry than the Impeachment trial which is a joke since Adam doesn't know jack about the law or abuse of power either what Adam has said is pure BS and spin with no truth whatsoever and why no one is watching this dog and pony show it's a train wreck of a show. Adam is a do-nothing congressmen and is part of the problem in DC.

Don’t hold back, tell us how you really feel.