The Commentariat -- February 1, 2020
With no real witnesses, the Senate will be moving into Alice in Wonderland territory. Following the trial of the Knave of Hearts, the Queen of Hearts pronounced 'sentence first, verdict after.' In the Senate, with no witnesses, this sequence will change. It will be 'verdict first, trial never.' -- Stephen Gillers, NYU Law professor, in a Just Security op-ed, January 27
Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: As I understand it, the next Senate impeachment proceeding will be debate beginning Monday @11 am ET, without the CJ. Debate will continue into Tuesday, but Tuesday night everyone moseys over to the House for the SOTU extended boast. Then the Senate will vote to acquit the SOB, with the CJ presiding, beginning @4 pm ET Wednesday. Here's a CNN story by Jeremy Herb & others on how that schedule came to be. However, when McConnell asked for & got the adjournment Friday, I don't think he had the schedule nailed down, as the story suggests.
Michael Shear & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "The Senate brought President Trump to the brink of acquittal on Friday of charges that he abused his power and obstructed Congress, as Republicans voted to block consideration of new witnesses and documents in his impeachment trial.... The Democrats' push for more witnesses and documents failed 49 to 51, with only two Republicans, Mitt Romney of Utah and Susan Collins of Maine, joining Democrats in favor. A vote on the verdict is planned for Wednesday.... Senators recessed the trial for the weekend and will return Monday for closing arguments, with a vote on the verdict on Wednesday. The timetable will rob Mr. Trump of the opportunity to use his State of the Union address scheduled for Tuesday night [Mrs. McC: and a Super Bowl Sunday interview] to boast about his acquittal.... Instead, he will become the second president to deliver the speech during his own impeachment trial....
"The president has insisted that he did nothing wrong, calling a July telephone conversation in which he asked the president of Ukraine to investigate his political rivals 'perfect' and the impeachment inquiry a 'sham.' For months, he has demanded that his allies deliver nothing less than an absolute defense of his actions. But while they were poised to acquit him, several Republicans offered words of criticism, instead. Senator Rob Portman, Republican of Ohio, said that 'some of the president's actions in this case -- including asking a foreign country to investigate a potential political opponent and the delay of aid to Ukraine -- were wrong and inappropriate.' Senator Marco Rubio of Florida [said]..., 'Just because actions meet a standard of impeachment does not mean it is in the best interest of the country to remove a president from office,' he said."
Shorter Marco: "He did it, it's impeachable, don't count on me." -- Mrs. Bea McCrabbie
Addy Baird, et al., of BuzzFeed News: "After days of arguments and questioning in ... Donald Trump's impeachment trial, many Republican senators have come to the same conclusion: The president did it, and they don't care."
The New York Times' live updates of Friday's impeachment proceedings are here. "Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the majority leader, called a recess after the vote, but gave no indication how long it would last."
"... Adam B. Schiff ... rose one final time on Friday to appeal to a Senate that had already essentially made up its mind against him. Vote for additional witnesses and documents, he implored them, or risk 'long lasting and harmful consequences long after this impeachment trial is over.' Mr. Schiff's warning to senators was threefold: First, he said, it would set a dangerous precedent for every future impeachment trial that witnesses and evidence were not necessary; second, the facts about Mr. Trump's pressure campaign on Ukraine will come out regardless; and third, Americans will see that for the president, there is a double standard of justice." ~~~
~~~ "Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, said Friday she would vote against including new witnesses and documents in President Trump's impeachment trial.... In a statement released just as the House managers began pleading their case for witnesses, Ms. Murkowski called their impeachment articles too 'rushed and flawed' to warrant prolonging the trial. But she also said she had become convinced that the Senate would be unable to deliver a fair trial...." ~~~
"John F. Kelly, President Trump's former chief of staff and secretary of homeland security, said on Friday that the Senate would be known forever as a body that 'shirks its responsibilities' if it wraps up the trial of his former boss without hearing witnesses." (Also linked yesterday.)
Washington Post Editors: "REPUBLICAN SENATORS who voted Friday to suppress known but unexamined evidence of President Trump'’s wrongdoing at his Senate trial must have calculated that the wrath of a vindictive president is more dangerous than the sensible judgment of the American people, who, polls showed, overwhelmingly favored the summoning of witnesses. That's almost the only way to understand how the Republicans could have chosen to deny themselves and the public the firsthand account of former national security adviser John Bolton, and perhaps others, on how Mr. Trump sought to extort political favors from Ukraine. The public explanations the senators offered were so weak and contradictory as to reveal themselves as pretexts.... We can hope only that voters who wanted that evidence to be heard in the trial will respond by showing incumbent senators they are a force to be reckoned with, as much as the bully in the White House." ~~~
~~~ New York Times Editors: "... no one ever lost money betting on the cynicism of today's congressional Republicans. The move [against calling for witnesses & documents] can only embolden the president to cheat in the 2020 election. [See George Soros' NYT op-ed linked under "Presidential Race" below.] The vote also brings the nation face to face with the reality that the Senate has become nothing more than an arena for the most base and brutal -- and stupid -- power politics. Faced with credible evidence that a president was abusing his powers, it would not muster the institutional self-respect to even investigate.... Every impeachment trial in American history had included witnesses.... It's not Congress as an institution that has failed [as Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska)]; it's Senate Republicans. They didn't refuse to hold a fair trial so much as they refused to hold any trial at all.... The Senate may acquit Mr. Trump, but it will not, it cannot, exonerate him. Mr. Trump is the most corrupt president in modern times...."
** Maggie Haberman & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "More than two months before he asked Ukraine's president to investigate his political opponents, President Trump directed John R. Bolton, then his national security adviser, to help with his pressure campaign to extract damaging information on Democrats from Ukrainian officials, according to an unpublished manuscript by Mr. Bolton. Mr. Trump gave the instruction, Mr. Bolton wrote, during an Oval Office conversation in early May that included the acting White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, the president's personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani and the White House counsel, Pat A. Cipollone, who is now leading the president's impeachment defense. Mr. Trump told Mr. Bolton to call Volodymyr Zelensky, who had recently won election as president of Ukraine, to ensure Mr. Zelensky would meet with Mr. Giuliani, who was planning a trip to Ukraine to discuss the investigations that the president sought, in Mr. Bolton's account. Mr. Bolton never made the call, he wrote. The previously undisclosed directive that Mr. Bolton describes would be the earliest known instance of Mr. Trump seeking to harness the power of the United States government to advance his pressure campaign against Ukraine, as he later did on the July call with Mr. Zelensky...." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Brett Samuels of the Hill has a summary report on the NYT story: "Cipollone's involvement in meetings about the pressure campaign on Ukraine would place additional scrutiny on the White House counsel. While leading Trump's defense in the impeachment trial, Cipollone has insisted there is no evidence of wrongdoing by the president and argued that the Senate does not need to hear from Bolton." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ According to this Yahoo! news story by David Knowles, either Bolton is lying or everyone else is. Trump said the meeting "never happened," Rudy tweeted, "The meeting the Times describes is a lie," and Mulvaney has claimed he always stepped out of a room when Rudy & Trump were in it to avoid compromising Trump & Rudy's client-lawyer confidentiality. Not sure what Cipollone has said during the course of the trial & elsewhere that would suggest the meeting "never happened." Knowles notes that "Records unearthed by House investigators, however, show that Giuliani's months-long pressure campaign on Ukraine overlapped with the May meeting alleged in Bolton's book." Mrs. McC: So who ya gonna believe, the POTUS*, his chief-of-staff, and two lawyers or one guy hawking a book?... Oh, the bookseller. ~~~
~~~ Paul Waldman & Greg Sargent of the Washington Post: "Stephen Gillers, a professor at the New York University School of Law, told us that this raises serious questions about the propriety of [Pat] Cipollone's role as Trump's chief counsel. As Gillers wrote in a recent piece, Cipollone had an obligation, at a minimum, to disclose all his own knowledge of the facts surrounding the case. As Gillers wrote, a legal ethics rule known as the 'advocate-witness rule' says that 'when a lawyer should be a witness at trial, she cannot also be an advocate in the courtroom.' Now [John] Bolton has placed Cipollone right in the room with Trump as he ordered Bolton to pressure the Ukrainian president to work with Trump's personal lawyer to set up a shadow operation that would subvert our foreign policy and national interest to Trump's corrupt political ends.... The new Bolton revelations show that the trial has been even more corrupted by Trump and his team than we thought in another important way.' ~~~
~~~ Jonathan Chait: "Giuliani's role is the deepest, darkest cesspool in the Ukraine scandal. Probably for that reason, Trump and his lawyers have consistently denied knowledge of Giuliani's activities. Last November, in an interview with Bill O'Reilly, Trump repeatedly denied having directed Giuliani's work in Ukraine.... Earlier this month, Trump was asked about a signed letter by Giuliani to Zelensky, stating that he was representing Trump as a personal lawyer, with Trump's knowledge and permission. Trump again dissembled.... Meanwhile, Trump and his legal team maintain that this whole agenda was being driven in service of Trump's alleged desire to clean up corruption in Ukraine. As pathetic as Trump's defense may be, no element is as incriminating on its face as Giuliani's work. Even conceding it existed is to admit guilt. But Bolton apparently has the receipts." ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Another "murky" Rudy deal was his advocacy for "Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, for whom Giuliani has said he did consulting work, [who] was on the verge of being fired by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky from a separate post as the appointed head of the city administration, a move that would greatly reduce his power," according to Rosalind Helderman & others of the Washington Post. However, Rudy asked top Zelensky aide Andriy Yermak to keep Klitschoko in the administration. As Ronen Bergman & others of the New York Times put it, "But despite the fact that Mr. Zelensky's cabinet approved Mr. Klitschko's removal, he remains there today, leaving his adversaries in the murky and lucrative world of Ukrainian municipal politics to wonder whether Mr. Trump's personal attorney may have tipped the scales in his favor."
Steve Benen of MSNBC: "The lawyer for Lev Parnas ... reached out to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) this afternoon, sending him a letter signaling what Parnas would say if he's allowed to testify in the trial as a witness under oath. From the letter (pdf): 'If Lev Parnas was called as a witness, he would provide testimony based upon personal knowledge, corroborated by physical evidence..., which is directly relevant to the president's impeachment inquiry.... Mr. Parnas would testify to the efforts he and a handful of Republican operatives engaged in over a period of months, to remove Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and gather 'dirt' on Joe and Hunter Biden. Mr. Parnas would testify that those holding various roles in this plot included GOP super PAC America First, President Trump, Vice President Pence, former Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Attorney General Bill Barr, Sen. Lindsey Graham, Congressman Devin Nunes, Nunes' Staffer Derrick Harvey, Journalist John Soloman, Attorneys Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing, [Rudy] Giuliani, and others. He is prepared to review and explain relevant phone records, text messages, and other evidence in connection with these activities.'" (Also linked yesterday.) Here's an NBC News story by Josh Lederman & Lisa Ferri.
Abilgail Williams & Phil Helsel of NBC News: "Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, a central figure in the impeachment investigation..., retired from the State Department on Friday after three decades in the foreign service...."
Mrs. McCrabbie: To me, the worst part of this corrupt scheme was not Trump & Giuliani's going after the Bidens or even after Marie Yovanovitch (tho that was horrible). It was the repeated, relentless attempts to corrupt & compromise a new Ukrainian government, one the U.S. needed to promote "our" values in the region & stand up to Russia's aggression & anti-democratic mores. And no Republican -- that includes you, Lisa Murkowski -- is off the hook for aiding & abetting this gross abuse of U.S. power. Every American who has a Republican representative in Congress should ask him what he stands for, bearing in mind that the true answer is, "Myself." Throw the bums out. The vote to acquit (or in the case of House members, against impeachment) should be a badge of shame tattooed on their foreheads. It should, and sometimes will, be the first line of their obituaries.
** Michael Biesecker of the AP: "Charity watchdogs for years have raised concerns about the blurred lines between for-profit businesses tied to [Trump "lawyer" Jay] Sekulow and the complex web of non-profit entities he and his family control. The Associated Press reviewed 10 years of tax returns for the ACLJ [American Center for Law and Justice, a non-profit Christian legal advocacy group] and other charities tied to Sekulow.... The records from 2008 to 2017, the most recent year available, show that more than $65 million in charitable funds were paid to Sekulow [and his family].... All six of the [ACLJ] charity's paid board members share the last name Sekulow, including Jay's wife, Pam, and their sons, Jordon and Logan." --safari: A deep dive into Sekulow's life of scams. ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Applicable maxim: If you work for Trump, you're a fool or a crook. Corollary: Seculow is not a fool. Ergo ....
Only While Christians Need Apply. Maria Sacchetti, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump added six countries to his administration's travel ban Friday -- including Nigeria, Africa's most populous country -- in a widely anticipated expansion that Democrats blasted as 'clearly discriminatory' against people from predominantly black and Muslim nations. Citing national security concerns, officials at the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department said Trump's proclamation would bar most citizens of Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar and Kyrgyzstan from coming to work and live in the United States. Two nations, Tanzania and Sudan, would be banned from applying for the visa lottery, which issues up to 50,000 visas a year worldwide to countries with historically low migration to the United States. The new ban takes effect Feb. 22; travelers who have received visas or are in transit at that time will not be affected."
Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: The only "experience" Trump brought to the top job was his "professional" career building tall things. Let's see how well his sole area of "expertise" has worked out: ~~~
~~~ Bienvenido a los Estados Unitos. Nick Miroff of the Washington Post: "President Trump's border wall probably will require the installation of hundreds of storm gates to prevent flash floods from undermining or knocking it over, gates that must be left open for months every summer during 'monsoon season' in the desert, according to U.S. border officials, agents and engineers familiar with the plans. The open, unmanned gates in remote areas already have allowed for the easy entry of smugglers and migrants into the United States." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Thursday, we learned from Matt Stieb of New York that "... on Wednesday, Customs and Border Protection confirmed to CNN that newly-installed wall panels in Calexico, California were knocked down by wind gusts of up to 37-miles-per-hour, causing the metal slats to timber into Mexican territory[.]... The wall has faced a few setbacks that contradict Trump's claims of near-impenetrability, like in November when the Washington Post reported that smugglers were using reciprocating saws -- available for less than $100 -- to cut through sections of the steel-bollard barrier in minutes. And though the president has claimed that no one would be able to climb the wall, smugglers have found a simple summiting method, using rebar ladders to hoist up one side, and rope ladders to scale down the other."
Kayla Tausche of CNBC: "In November 2017 ... Trump was on a 12-day tour through Asia, his second major international trip since taking office.... What wasn't on the White House or State Department agendas: a meeting with private equity investors convened by Jared Kushner ... and U.S. Ambassador Terry Branstad.... At the time of the meeting, the Kushner family was under fire for its pursuit of overseas investors.... The meeting and its guest list ... was arranged by Wendi Deng Murdoch, a longtime friend of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump.... CNBC filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act with the State Department [about the meeting].... The State Department acknowledged the request on Dec. 11, 2017, but suggested getting the information would take a long time.... Last October, the department finally provided a date: July 23, 2021 -- 3½ years after the original filing. Put another way: 1,323 days. During the first two years of the Trump presidency, the State Department processed 83% of 'complex' requests in less than 400 days, according to analysis of public data available on FOIA.gov." --s ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Not surprisingly, the most corrupt administration ever is also the least transparent.
Joe Heim of the Washington Post: "The Library of Congress abandoned plans last year to showcase a mural-size photograph of demonstrators at the 2017 Women's March in Washington because of concerns it would be perceived as critical of President Trump, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post. The massive 14-by-10-foot print of the photograph -- showing tens of thousands of demonstrators filling Pennsylvania Avenue NW for the Women's March on Jan. 21, 2017 -- was envisioned by the library as one of the dominant displays of the 'Shall Not Be Denied: Women Fight for the Vote' exhibit celebrating the centennial of women's right to vote. Instead, the exhibit opened June 4 with that photograph replaced by an image of eight people taking part in a Women's March in Houston. The change was made so late in the process -- just five days before the exhibit opened -- that the photographer who captured the original image, Kevin Carroll, is credited in the exhibit's brochure and the photographer of the replacement image is not.... The National Archives said two weeks ago it made a mistake when it blurred out anti-Trump signs from a large photograph, also of the 2017 Women's March but by a different photographer...." ~~~
~~~ OR, we could just pretend anti-Trump protests never happened at all. Thanks to Ken W. for the link.
Sarah Blaskey, et al., of the Miami Herald: "A Connecticut woman chastised for dancing on her car at a Palm Beach hotel late Friday morning ended up driving away and crashing her vehicle through two security barricades outside Mar-a-Lago..., drawing gunfire from law enforcement officers, before leading a police helicopter on a chase that ended in her arrest. Hannah Roemhild, 30, a trained opera singer, is now in the custody of the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office. 'This is not a terrorist thing,' Palm Beach Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said at a Friday afternoon news conference. 'This is somebody that obviously was impaired somehow.'"
Presidential Race
George Soros in a New York Times op-ed: "I believe that Mr. Trump and Facebook's chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, realize that their interests are aligned -- the president's in winning elections, Mr. Zuckerberg's in making money.... Mr. Zuckerberg met with Mr. Trump in the Oval Office on Sept. 19, 2019.... [In] an interview on the sidelines at the World Economic Forum on Jan. 22..., Mr. Zuckerberg [said that Trump] 'told me that I'm No. 1 in the world in Facebook.' Mr. Trump apparently had no problem with Facebook's decision not to fact-check political ads.... Facebook's decision not to require fact-checking for political candidates' advertising in 2020 has flung open the door for false, manipulated, extreme and incendiary statements. Such content is rewarded with prime placement and promotion if it meets Facebook-designed algorithmic standards for popularity and engagement. What's more, Facebook's design tends to obscure the sources of inflammatory and false content, and fails to adequately punish those who spread false information. Nor does the company effectively warn those who are exposed to lies." ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Democrats should run ads against Facebook: "If you saw it on Facebook, it's probably a lie." In the meantime, it is hard to see how the U.S. differs from Russia in the countries' systems of government of, by and for oligarchs. We are all Russians now. Alas, most of us are serfs, trodden & abused by our masters.
Nishita Jha of BuzzFeed News: "A former aspiring actor [Jessica Mann] testified Friday that Harvey Weinstein forced oral sex on her, raped her, and then manipulated her into a sexually humiliating relationship, which she said included him wanting to film her having sex, urinating on her, and asking if she liked his 'big Jewish dick.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Pilar Melendez of the Daily Beast: "'The first time I saw him fully naked, I thought he was deformed and intersex,' [Jessica Mann] said, as Weinstein put his head into his hand. 'He has extreme scarring that I didn't know if he was a burn victim but it didn't make sense. He does not have testicles and it appears that he has a vagina.'" (Also linked yesterday.)
Way Beyond the Beltway
Kevin Rawlinson of the Guardian (@18:00 ET in Friday's liveblog): "The United Kingdom has left the European Union. As the clock struck 11pm GMT, the nation officially enacted the biggest constitutional change in living memory and, in doing so, became the first member state ever to leave the EU." (Also linked yesterday.)
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Reader Comments (14)
The weather is bad, and I'm irritable, so naturally I have a rant about the New York Times:
This is about their ongoing coverage of the corona virus.
Why do they say "more than 250" are now dead? From the NYT print, I might guess 1083 have died, not the 259 that many other media are reporting. What's with this vagueness?
And what is that orangey oblong thing that's supposed to say something about how many people might/could maybe have clinical illness? or die? There seems to be nothing in the text about that, although there are orange outlined cartoons of people in a subway car with a red line meandering over them. Have I forgotten how to read?
Who else combines a logarithmic scale with a plain numeric scale? I couldn't figure it out, even without the orange blob. It's unreadable.
And why are people being quarantined for 14 days? what is the basis for this? standard practice based on evidence? of what?
And, not to get scary, but even in olden times (1918), when there were no long distance planes, the virus of that time spread like wildfire around the globe. Nothing stopped it, and this was at a time when nurses new how to quarantine people (a big part of how they conquered yellow fever). (I won't tell what the % mortality was: it will scare you).
And what is the mortality scale anyway? In the early reports, there were more numbers, so I could calculate the possible mortality rate: 5%. The times is now reporting the rate is 3%, but where are their numbers? It matters: 5% mortality rate is definitely scary; 3% is the kind of number where you turn your head left and right and say "okay so we're not gonna die." so accurate numbers - numerator and denominator - matter.
What is news for, except to inform in such a way that people know something specific?
And I'm sick and tired of all those flashing images and gifs that take the place of content!!! Am I a 10 year old????
Rant over.
More news with political implications:
The NYT published "good news" that the expected life span of men had not decreased last year, whereas it had for the previous 3 years. Yay. Trump will of course take credit for this.
However, the change may simply be that the suicide rate has gone down in that age group, possibly a reflection that it is now almost impossible to get fentanyl and/or oxy's (lowering the OD rate). Last year calculated, there were "only" 1171 more suicides than the previous year: 48,344. Happy news: this is less than gun deaths. Scary news: the suicide rate has increased 35% in the last 10 years.
A glimmer of hope, sort of: suicides in adolescents may be about to decrease - not yet, mind you. It used to be that people were helpless in the face of youth suicide (10-18), because they simply didn't communicate their misery to adults. However, last year ER visits for suicidal thoughts (not action) in youth 10-18 increased 35% of girls and and amazing 62.3% for boys. Boys are talking about their feelings. Yay! Peer to peer interventions are now being studied and they seem to be effective in helping suicidal youth. But seeking out adult help is a positive change in this age group.
There's a lot to a number, especially if it's about something as amazing as a fall in mortality. Of course the NYT didn't get into this. Losers.
Another Marco translation:
'Just because actions meet a standard of impeachment does not mean it is in the best interest of the country--read: in my best interests-- to remove a president from office,' he said.
Which, when you think about it, is pretty much the same as the Pretender's standard of conduct, that is, no standard at all beyond the personal, how will it affect me, measure, which should have become evident to most of the nation now applies to the entire party of sniveling cowards.
My take on the two yes votes. Collins' yes vote is a political calculation all about her fate in November. Romney, I think, is a vulture capitalist who needs to "feel" virtuous. Call his yes akin to being loudly anti-abortion. Feels good, and it's no trouble at all.
No, Victoria, I surely didn't think you were ten.
No ten year old is capable of such accurate and elevated dudgeon. Serious subject I know, but you made me smile here on our own windy morning.
Good rant, Victoria and long overdue. To think we have this terrifying virus while we are dealing with a terrifying virus of another kind.
During the hearings we heard a lot about putting ourselves in another's shoes. When Marie says she feels more passionate about "...the repeated and relentless attempt to corrupt and compromise the new Ukrainian government" than all the other crimes, she is walking in someone else's shoes––it's called empathy in some circles. I, too, feel strongly about what Trump put Zelensky through––brand new, his mission was to cut through the corruption and keep those Russians at bay. It was an absolute travesty what Trump and his henchmen put him through.
The vote yesterday ––twas a coup d’état in slow motion. It is over. They won.
I registered this past summer to vote in New Hampshire. I registered as a Democrat (I think -- I'm not 100% sure I had the option to make a choice, but I'm about 80% sure I did). Democrats have been running for president in this state for more than a year. Some of them (that would be you, Elizabeth Warren) send me many, many, many emails asking for money.
The primary here is in a little more than a week away. Only ONE candidate's staff has phoned me -- in this case asking if I'd put up a yard sign. That candidate was Mike Bloomberg. No one has knocked on my door even tho I live in the kind of town where people vote Democratic (a capitol city bedroom community). Not a single candidate has invited me to a single campaign event even tho many campaign events have been held near my home.
In 2016, after Hillary had won, or was near winning, the nomination, I called her campaign and told them I owned two properties on a main highway and they could put up any sized sign they wanted. They said thanks, they didn't have any signs but they would call back. Nada.
I have a listed phone number & it's listed in the town where I'm registered to vote. Candidates should have been bothering me for a year. Yet only Bloomberg has called. Do you think maybe Democrats don't know WTF they're doing?
I keep hearing about various candidates' great ground-games in Iowa. From my POV, they have next to nothing here.
Note to a confused senator:
Dear Marco,
If a president (or president*)meets and, in this case, passes by several parsecs the standard for impeachment, it is one hundred percent the case that removal from office is in the best interest of the country. What the fuck have you been eating? Fox Treason Frosted Flakes?
Mrs McC: Wasn't it Will Rogers who once said; "I do not belong to an organized political party. I am a Democrat?"
The saddest and most true statement I've seen on the end of this sordid affair was a lede from NBC Newscom: "Trumps impeachment trial is being tuned out by America because no one thinks it matters."
We all knew this was almost certainly a doomed effort from the start but like the Chinese man facing off a line of tanks, it had to be done.
As if the past few weeks haven't consisted of Mr. Schiff making no headway with intense intelligent discourse and everyone in the Senate cages yawning, sucking up and calculating how much trouble they might be in with their constituents and not caring, now we get to behold a SOTU "speech" and many many victory laps taken by the man none of us would pass in the street without spitting on-- Disgusting times we live in. I cannot even manage how we get past any of this, as the revelations will continue to provide irony and regrets, as the demented IMPOTUS crowns himself emperor and his power-mad supporters remain "people" with zero virtue and success with incomparible illegality. The only thing to look forward to is their demises, and the sure future that the Democratic party has of completely blowing any opportunity to get rid of these cretins. Sorry-- I don't see anything good today, tomorrow or infinitely. The rabble have won.
Bobby Lee,
Consider the source.
Read the same NBC piece yesterday and recognized it as a typical right wing talking point, an attempt to diminish the importance of something you don't like.
Don't know why these nitwits have the loud voice they have but they do. Here's the dope on this dope:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Lott
Apparently a religious nut who lives part-time just north of me in the part of WA the Pretender held a campaign rally in in 2016. I'm guessing this Lott guy was drooling at his side.
Bea: I got the Bloomberg robocall this morning, and was actually impressed. A pleasant-voiced young woman got right to the point: would I give permission for them to put a sign in my yard? There was no selling, just the question. And since my wife donated to Hillary in 16, of course we've been getting the mail, usually generic D stuff but this week one from Bloomberg.
We are not an early primary state, the state is blue and the county and congressional district are about as blue as can be. But Bloomberg wants to put a sign in our yard anyway. I guess his campaign wants to be sure to GOTV. Good for them.
In 2016 right after Labor Day I drove from the east coast to Whidbey Island (near Seattle) and from WVA onward on the northern route I saw lots of identical Trump-Pence signs, very few Hillary. The message I got was that T-P campaign knew how to locate billboards along intersates, Hillary folks did not . But I got a sort of queasy feeling about it.
Wouldn't call it a drip, drip. More of the oozing overflow from the septic Pretender swamp we can expect to continue in the months to come.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/01/politics/trump-ukraine-aid-emails-omb-justice-department/index.html
Patrick,
Had the same gut clenching feeling as I drove through parts of the trans-mountain West in the summer of 2016. Gave me the shivers that are still with me.
BTW, on your trip to Whidbey, you shoulda dropped by. We could have anticipatorily commiserated.
Well, I spoke too soon. Someone from Warren's campaign actually came to my house!
My family, on my father's side, has lived in Portsmouth NH since the late 1800s. (And in a nod to @ Victoria, my father's aunt, 18 at the time, died of the influenza in 1918. I understand it took her in about a day.) I have lived in NH since 1988, but visited often before then. And it was different going back the past several elections. Candidates used to be thick on the ground. I recall planning on meeting a friend for coffee prior to the 2008 primary, and she met me at the door of the cafe saying we couldn't get in, Michelle Obama was in there.
Four years ago, I never bothered to go hear Hillary speak, but I didn't get the impression she was around much. But then, the Republican candidates were taking up all the oxygen, one orange-hued one in particular. This year, my son and I decided we would go see all of the most likely candidates. Despite our best intentions, we saw only two. The candidates just weren't around. I'm sure this is partly because although NH still has the first primary, other states vote soon thereafter, and candidates can't spend too much time on us. But despite all the grousing about NH being so small and unrepresentative, its citizens have always shown up to meet and talk with the candidates when they're around. I regret if we will no longer have that chance.
As far as canvassers go, they have been coming to my door starting more than a month ago, and definitely more in the past two weeks. Not every candidate, but most of them.
Bill Maher, last night, best expressed my own - and so many others’ - state of mind and heart:
“Okay, I’m going to try not to cry during the show because we lost Democracy this week. I feel like I’m standing over a casket and thinking: ‘Hmm I should have been nicer when it was alive.’”
https://deadline.com/2020/01/bill-maher-mourns-democracy-i-feel-like-im-standing-over-a-casket-says-trump-lies-like-a-racoon-eats-trash-1202848551/