[Rancid]

I wonder how corrupt @Hindsite and @blackjack21 would be if they held public office positions.

[Istanbuller]

If I were Ukrainian president, I wouldn't be sided with Biden and Democrats. These are the same people who bribed Ukraine to fight against Russia and later left it alone with Russia.

Trump is more peaceful than warmonger Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden and likes of them.

[jimjam]

I wonder how corrupt @Hindsite and @blackjack21 would be if they held public office positions.

I think that Hindsite would be squeaky clean because God is on his side. blackjack21? I'm afraid he may be available to the highest bidder via "campaign contributions" and/or over paying software contracts.

and here come the whistleblowers . I hear there may also be a whistle blowing over at the I.R.S. .

A second whistleblower with direct knowledge of an alleged plot by Donald Trump to extort Ukraine into producing dirt on his Democratic 2020 election rival Joe Biden has stepped forward, according to Mark Zaid, a lawyer for the first whistleblower in the case.

I'm starting to feel bad for Obese Donald. At this rate he may not be able to put together an intelligible sentence by week's end.

[blackjack21]

blackjack21? I'm afraid he may be available to the highest bidder via "campaign contributions" and/or over paying software contracts.

Heh. I work in open source software. The software is free. It's ruthlessly competitive.

I could be relied upon to collapse the higher education industry, leaving diploma mills churning out "women's studies" degrees and so forth virtually bankrupt. However, I could also be counted on to increase funding to STEM disciplines and basic research. However, I would also have initiatives to prosecute scientific fraud, increase research productivity, and to reward definitive success. I could be relied upon to crush environmentalists and government-employee labor unions, but pay bonuses per mile of roads repaved and bridges rebuilt. The problem with the establishment's corruption is that they do not deliver for the masses, so it doesn't translate into sure votes. They got away with it for a long time, because they just had two sides of the same coin running--Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton. That gig is over.

I hear there may also be a whistle blowing over at the I.R.S. .

Yeah. Apparently, they think a Treasury official who oversees the IRS is out of line if they ask how an audit is going. They already have a second and rather pointless whistleblower for Ukrainegate who has "firsthand" knowledge that is now irrelevant anyway since the transcript of the call was released.

A second whistleblower with direct knowledge of an alleged plot by Donald Trump to extort Ukraine into producing dirt on his Democratic 2020 election rival Joe Biden has stepped forward, according to Mark Zaid, a lawyer for the first whistleblower in the case.

Yep. They are using the same attorney. The whistle blower law is so you don't have to use attorneys with ties to the Democratic Chair of the Intelligence Committee. It's amazing how thick these guys can be.

[jimjam]

rather pointless whistleblower

[blackjack21]

Trump has already foiled them, and they don't seem to know it. Sadly, you likely won't get it either, because the commentators who are spot on about this are on your banned list. In this case, Rush Limbaugh.

By Releasing the Transcript, Trump Turned the Tables on Pencil Neck
The whistle blowers for Ukrainegate are irrelevant now, because the transcript is public domain now. Most of the foregoing article is a caustic ad hominem attack on Schiff that I agree with and you disagree with, so you can spare yourself reading it. However, Limbaugh makes several salient points, which I'll quote to spare you the surrounding vitriol:

1. Schiff's Credibility:

He has almost, it seems, taken it upon himself to get rid of Trump. He was the champion of the Trump-Russia collusion theory in the House, and he has openly lied so many times about having documented and documentable proof of Trump collusion with Russia.

He has yet to produce it. He doesn’t have it because it doesn’t exist.
...
Now, two years ago Adam Schiff lied to the American people. He said he had “absolute proof beyond circumstantial” that Trump had colluded with the Russians, and he repeated that lie for two solid years every chance he got. ... He repeated the lie from his ranking committee chair on the House Intelligence Committee.

Schiff harmed his credibility by claiming to have evidence of Trump-Russia collusion. He's on tape being punked by Russian comedians purporting to be Russian intelligence guys offering him dirt on Donald Trump, and Schiff was lapping it up. An accuser can't claim it's illegal for Trump to do what he's doing himself. It rings false.

2. Schiff is a Fact Witness: Schiff was involved with the whistle blowers and their attorney before this stuff went public AND lied about it to the public. Again, he's harmed his own credibility. However, he has also made himself a fact witness, which makes it a conflict of interest for him to proceed against Trump--the same problem that destroyed Rod Rosenstein's credibility.

Well, I’m gonna turn the table on him. He is now a fact witness in this so-called whistleblower scandal. He was involved in creating the whistleblower’s complaint — and in an abject lie that he himself had to blow his own cover because it was gonna get blown eventually.

As such, this whistleblower will never testify because it was then learned that he didn’t know anything firsthand! He was told these things. Then he prepared his report, his whistleblower report for the inspector general. Well, guess what? None of that’s true, either. Because what was revealed yesterday in the New York Times was that the whistleblower first contacted Adam Schiff, not the inspector general, and that Adam Schiff helped him write whistleblower complaint.

It's another failed coup attempt. It's obviously political. Whistle blowers don't talk to members of congress, secure legal counsel and then file whistle blower complaints. The entire point of whistle blower complaints is to remain anonymous to prevent your chain of command from firing you for reporting on your chain of command. The whole point is not making it public.

3. Schiff is coordinating with the CIA:

Well, they goofed up, because by telling us the source was the CIA, they told us where to look for the other conspirators at the same time! Everybody was wonder, “Well, well, well, well, who told the whistleblower? If the whistleblower does not have firsthand knowledge of it, then who told him?” A-ha! Now we know. So thank you, New York Times, for outing your operative as a CIA agent. That tells us where to look for the other conspirators in this sordid tale.

Conclusion:

And people are wondering, “Why would the New York Times do this? Why would the New York Times run a piece undermining Pencil Neck and undermining impeachment?” But if you read the story as I did, you find out that the revelation came directly from Schiff’s spokesman, a guy named Patrick Boland.

The New York Times even says so. Yet everybody seems to have missed that, which makes me think that once Trump unexpectedly, surprisingly released the transcript, Schiff realized all of this was gonna come out. He realized it. Trump releasing that transcript smoked these people. I cannot he hasn’t {sic} this enough. Releasing that transcript blue{sic} up every plan they had made, and it was already implemented. They were lying about what Trump said in the phone call.

They all [thought]{sic}Trump would never release it to protect presidential privacy, that they could then make up what Trump said — and then at the same time get a twofer: Accuse Trump of a cover-up, stonewalling, obstruction. Oh, it was all laid out! It was ready to happen! And Trump blows everything to smithereens by releasing the transcript. So now Schiff and his office know all of this is gonna come cascading out. They had to get in front of it.

Even AOC has moved on already.

Trump Won’t Make the Same Legal Mistake This Time

The AP makes an observation. They say that during the Mueller investigation that cooperation was the wrong way to go because cooperating made them appear to be losing.
...
The AP story is kind of sour grapes because they say the White House has now learned from that mistake, because when they stopped cooperating with Mueller is when they started winning. That’s when they appeared to be going on offense is when they stopped cooperating. So the AP story is (summarized), “This is why the White House is being so obstinate! This is why the White House is treating Pelosi this way, is ’cause they learned during Mueller that it didn’t help them at all to cooperate,” and it didn’t.
...
Sean Davis writes that they just got a copy of Kurt Volker’s testimony before the House yesterday. It directly contradicts the Democrat impeachment narrative. It completely blows it out of the water
...
They’re saying that he confirmed that Trump broke the law, that Trump was asking for corruption to happen and all this — and it’s the exact opposite. His testimony blows every narrative out of the water on impeachment.

Ergo, Biden is getting the shaft BECAUSE of the impeachment push and Trump is now much more skilled at dealing with these investigations and foiling his political adversaries.

Ukrainegate is not at all going the way the Democrats had hoped.

[Istanbuller]

Lindsey Graham says he will make whistleblowers testify publicly. Of course if there is real one. Fake news Democrats are panicking now.

[Hindsite]

The rules have changed, making the vote superflous.

The rules where changed by Pelosi and the Democrats on the committees to be unfair to the President and leave the President and the Republicans at a big disadvantage. They were not changed by a full vote of Congress.

His constant refusal to cooperate with Congress is itself an impeachable offense.

Let's see what happens.

[late]

There is nothing in the constitution requiring the president to cooperate with them. On the contrary, defendants have the right to remain silent and are presumed innocent.

Dorothy Parker would come in handy right about now.

Congress has the power to impeach, which means it also has the power to compel. You can't investigate what you can't see..

Love the kaleidoscope of crap, but seriously...

[Stormsmith]

No he did not. No quid pro quo was clear, even Ukraine agreed that there was no quid pro quo. It was about investigating corruption, not to affect the election. Trump could beat Biden in the election like a drum anyway.

Do you know what a quid pro quo is? And Mr. Trump looks exhausted, sounds mentally deranged, and behaves like a worried man, tweetwise, you know, quilty. If you don't know a QPQ when you see it, consider the other evidence
PS: On your ongoing use of the "i'm rubber, you're glue" defence, it's a refreshing change to see you reverse it with the honourable Mr Biden's drum thingee

[Hindsite]

Do you know what a quid pro quo is? And Mr. Trump looks exhausted, sounds mentally deranged, and behaves like a worried man, tweetwise, you know, quilty. If you don't know a QPQ when you see it, consider the other evidence
PS: On your ongoing use of the "i'm rubber, you're glue" defence, it's a refreshing change to see you reverse it with the honourable Mr Biden's drum thingee

It would not be honorable for President Trump to overlook a possible crime and not request it at least be investigated. It is clear to me that President Trump was not holding back aid money to obtain something for himself. President Trump did not even mention aid money of any kind. President Trump mentioned "Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution," which looks like corruption.

Yeah. Apparently, they think a Treasury official who oversees the IRS is out of line if they ask how an audit is going. They already have a second and rather pointless whistleblower for Ukrainegate who has "firsthand" knowledge that is now irrelevant anyway since the transcript of the call was released.

Yep. They are using the same attorney. The whistle blower law is so you don't have to use attorneys with ties to the Democratic Chair of the Intelligence Committee. It's amazing how thick these guys can be.

Don't you think it looks something like what they did to Brett Kavanaugh?

[jimjam]

Rush Limbaugh

Now, this fellow Limbaugh …… he's non partisan and totally impartial? ( )

[blackjack21]

Don't you think it looks something like what they did to Brett Kavanaugh?

Yes. It's as if they think that if there are more witnesses to something that wasn't a crime, then the additional witnesses somehow makes it a crime. So that's sort of what it looks like--and with Kavanaugh, everyone knew it they were going to pull something. So that's how it appears with Trump. I think with Trump there is also another objective--to obstruct justice. They probably know that the IG report and the Durham investigation are going to turn up bad news for the deep state.

Pelosi has also said that if Trump is re-elected, he will do irreparable damage to the country. I take that to mean that the deep state will have collapsed and the left will have lost the courts for a generation.

[Hong Wu]

Not 100% on topic but I'll be impressed, in a bad way, if Biden still wins the nomination after this. Bernie is tenuous after his heart attack and Warren is surging. This could have been a pretty run of the mill scandal -- $50,000 a year to your son is just not a lot of money in this league we're talking about. Yet they have blown this story up, clearly to try and protect Biden and to conflate it with related IG stuff. As we've observed in this thread, the best way to not totally demean yourself when arguing in favor of an un-voted anonymous hearsay impeachment "inquiry" is to throw Biden under the bus too. So if Biden wins at this point, I'm going to assume that they rigged their primary again.

And this is where the Democrats are in terms of their coalition. A genuine far-leftist would not win the general. A genuine centrist would not win the primary. So we get something in-between: a disingenuous centrist that people can believe is lying when he talks about extreme environmentalism, open borders, capital gains etc. Just how long can the Democrats pull this off for? We can probably expect another rigged primary on behalf of the most insincere centrist they can find in 2024 too. Sooner or later though their own voters are going to tire of it.

[Hong Wu]

A second Ukraine whistleblower is claimed to exist. This one also claims to have "first hand knowledge." I'm putting it in quotes for a reason.

First, this whistleblower (and multiple others rumored to exist) are all represented by the same legal team, even though none of them have come forward publicly yet. This makes it clear that they're coordinating with each other behind the scenes.

Second, if they're coordinating with each other behind the scenes, why the heck would they start with the anonymous hearsay whistleblower instead of with the firsthand knowledge whistleblower?

Third, there's only two possible explanations. The first possible explanation is that the "firsthand knowledge" whistleblower possesses no such knowledge. The second possibility is that they really are this inept. Sad!

[Hindsite]

Yes. It's as if they think that if there are more witnesses to something that wasn't a crime, then the additional witnesses somehow makes it a crime. So that's sort of what it looks like--and with Kavanaugh, everyone knew it they were going to pull something. So that's how it appears with Trump. I think with Trump there is also another objective--to obstruct justice. They probably know that the IG report and the Durham investigation are going to turn up bad news for the deep state.

Pelosi has also said that if Trump is re-elected, he will do irreparable damage to the country. I take that to mean that the deep state will have collapsed and the left will have lost the courts for a generation.

Pelosi was holding back on this impeachment of Trump until the rumor of a whistleblower report with this Ukraine thing with Biden came out. Then all of a sudden, she is all in for a formal impeachment inquiry before the whistleblower report was even delivered to Congress. Pelosi and the Democrats must be panicking about something related to a possible investigation in Ukraine of Democrat's dirty deeds.

[late]

Pelosi was holding back on this impeachment of Trump until the rumor of a whistleblower report with this Ukraine thing with Biden came out. Then all of a sudden, she is all in for a formal impeachment inquiry before the whistleblower report was even delivered to Congress. Pelosi and the Democrats must be panicking about something related to a possible investigation in Ukraine of Democrat's dirty deeds.

Pelosi was reluctant because of what happened to Newt. She stopped resisting because Ukraine is a slam dunk.

They're all worried, but all the manic lying and tweeting and distracting suggest Trump is the one in a panic.

[BigSteve]

Pelosi was holding back on this impeachment of Trump until the rumor of a whistleblower report with this Ukraine thing with Biden came out. Then all of a sudden, she is all in for a formal impeachment inquiry before the whistleblower report was even delivered to Congress. Pelosi and the Democrats must be panicking about something related to a possible investigation in Ukraine of Democrat's dirty deeds.

If she was truly "all in" for an impeachment inquiry, she'd have put it to a vote.

That ragged bitch wants no part of that...

[Hindsite]

Pelosi was reluctant because of what happened to Newt. She stopped resisting because Ukraine is a slam dunk.

They're all worried, but all the manic lying and tweeting and distracting suggest Trump is the one in a panic.

You seem to be all in on the Democrat's corruption and Adam Schiff's lying about President Trump. This is just like the Russian collusion hoax all over again.

If she was truly "all in" for an impeachment inquiry, she'd have put it to a vote.

That ragged bitch wants no part of that...

There is good evidence she did not have the votes at that time. She was reported to be 5 votes short. She knows how to count votes and is waiting until she can get commitments from those members that are not sure they want to go on the record by their vote.

[BigSteve]

The single quickest way to guarantee a Trump victory in 2020 is to impeach him in 2019.

Pelosi and Schiff and Nadler have been running their fat fucking mouths for far too long. It's time for them to put up or shut up...