Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) made it clear this week that the route the Senate takes to reach its conclusion on impeachment is trivial when the outcome’s predetermined.
Cheating worked before. Cheat harder now.
Giuliani said it would be “horrible” if the Senate decided to host a trial.
Stopped clock. Blind squirrel. Right, but for all the wrong reasons.
It’s all going to depend on public opinion and outrage. They can’t get away with it if the voters think the process is legitimate and that Moscow Mitch and the Rs are trying to short circuit the process to protect an obviously guilty Trump. That’s why having the open hearings and piling up the evidence in the House is so important.
Agree, this is all just noise.
Republicans will make a huge error not having a proper trial…it will go over great with their base, but the American people will expect a proper trial. And, if they don’t have a trial, then Trump won’t have an opportunity to refute what is likely to be a devastating case against him, except through public propaganda. Americans watch trial TV all the time, both real and fictional, they will understand what it means for the Republicans in the Senate to put on a sham trial or not have one at all: they are afraid to hold an honest trial with evidence presented for and against Trump.
They may think this will save the Senate for them, as Republican senators won’t have to vote and risk alienating anyone. Tying themselves to a lawless process to clear Trump will be far worse for their electoral chances though, as the Trump base won’t save the ones in danger if the rest of the nation is enraged over a sham trial process.
Can’t we just burn out the swamp with a flame thrower or pour sand in it?
The alt-right social media troll brigades are going to meme this one until every Republican is aware that it’s becoming the official crazy position. In their hermetic world, it just might work.
This! No trial is a Democrat’s dream, imo.
I’m no John Roberts fanboi, but he does care about the Supreme Court as an institution and about not being perceived as partisan. I really don’t believe he would agree to be part of a sham impeachment trial.
Big, strong, beautiful, perfect McConnell - pushed around by the big Conservative talkers. It’s a sad day when the Speaker of the House has so little power./s
ETA: Not the Speaker but the Senate Majority Leader - Thx Cervantes and news247.
ETA: /s
We all know what Limbaugh and Ingraham and their ilk are going to say, just as we know it doesn’t matter what these people say, because they are simply entertainers.
A cogent analysis would point out that the upcoming live, public testimony is going happen first, before any real thinking can be done about what will happen in the Senate. How that goes will set the stage, making observations, particularly those by Limbaugh an Ingraham, completely irrelevant.
Now here’s an idea: Tell trump he can get his own Netflix gig with Mark Burnett and it will be the bestest! Better than Obama’s! All he has to do is resign. Just keep telling him how great it will be and how it will stick it to Obama and own the Libs while handing him resignation paperwork and a sharpie.
Then lock his traitor ass up.
Senate Majority Leader?
I think you’re absolutely right. If they shortcircuit it too obviously, it’ll cost them.
Not a perfect analogy, but when Governor Northam in Virginia brought the GOP legislature back to consider gun control legislation and it immediately adjourned, a lot of people saw that as mockery of the process, and decided the only solution was to fire them.
“Mum’s the word on what direction McConnell plans to take.”
Wattle he do, wattle he do…?
You mean Senate Majority Leader.
“The Turtle said, ‘Hey, if we do it, there’s gotta be a trial.’ There’s nobody in official Republican strata that’s trying to refute this! They’re all dealing with it as though it’s a fait accompli. It’s not a fait accompli. But, see, there’s a whole different mentality about this stuff when you live in the Beltway,” he said on his show last month.
k
???
Since when?