You know, it’s interesting that the list of ‘witnesses’ the Republicans want to hear from does not include a single person from the administration who has refused to appear or comply with a subpoena to give a deposition - not the Secretary of State, Acting Chief of Staff, or National Security Advisor at the time, nor others. I wonder why Nunes and his fellow committee members don’t want to hear from those actual Trump administration witnesses. What could they possibly know that, if testified about truthfully, the president and Republican lackeys don’t want to hear? What could they possibly say to make it seem like things were not so perfect?
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exactly. It makes no sense at all from a normal/logical perspective. You have to put yourself in an alternate reality framework – as in
“what if I was already a raging narcissist, and found myself in the most powerful position on the planet, surrounded by nothing but sycophants? What would I be thinking?” 
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It’s also difficult to conduct cross-examination when the ranking cross-examiner (mooooo) has a habit of skipping the hearings.
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someone should explain the difference between “first witness” and “chief complaining witness.”
For instance, if I see a hit and run, and I call the cops, I’m not the chief complaining witness. The complaining witness is the victim, I’m just the guy who called the cops. And I don’t have to identify myself for the cops to show up.
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Obama was not impeached. That is going to drive him crazy.
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I don’t know. He could be proud that he has something Obama does not.
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Give them time.
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Nikki Haley is such an opportunistic ass-kisser (and backstabber) with her recent remarks making Trump out to be a boy scout who maybe took a cookie too many. I doubt it’s because anyone has dirt on her so much as her ambition to be VP or prez one day and she’s getting in good with the leader of her party and his rabid base that demand total loyalty and boot-licking. She’s setting the standard for how Repubs are going to be expected to talk about all this.
Today she suggested that it’s absurd to impeach a president for merely asking a foreign leader for a favor, as if bribery, extortion and soliciting an illegal campaign contribution was the same thing as asking for Zelensky’s family recipe for Chicken Kiev (btw is that even a think in Ukraine or a US/Western Europe thing?). But this is going to be a big talking point from here on: Not only wasn’t this “request for a favor” impeachable, it wasn’t even inappropriate. Not even close.
The base will of course eat it up, but the rest of the country? I predict not so much, just with varying degrees of disapproval. The real question is HOW upset most Americans will be with Trump’s actions.
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Lt. Col. Alexander Semyon Vindman hails from those parts. Can we expect ethnic slurs in tweets next week?
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I wish there was a way to not only impeach but annul a presidency, like it never happened or was a mistake and is officially erased from day one, including all resulting actions that can still be reversed, like judicial appointments, bills signed, treaties revoked, etc. Alas, no dice.
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I am surprised she weighed in on this at all. Not a smart move for someone hoping to pick up the reigns of the tattered GOP after this is over. She is probably angling for VP but it is not a smart move to put yourself in this sewer just as the toilet is flushed.
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She has an angle her, I’m sure. Perhaps not a smart one, but there’s a reason for it. My guess is that she wants to position herself as a loyal Repub so that even if Trump goes down she’ll retain the support of his base as one of the natural leaders of the post-Trump GOP. Perhaps she fears that even in defeat Trump will continue to lead the party and that no one will stand in his way given his loyal band of batshit idiot adorers, and she wants to be on the right side of that. They really do fear him in the GOP. God knows what kind of ritual humiliation and abuse they’ve gotten behind closed doors from that sadist.
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The truly amazing thing is that Republicans seem to have taken no lesson from their recent losses in PA, VA and KY. They all seem to be buried inside the bubble. And I do mean buried.
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Here is the secret of Trump’s Power.
He is the best I have ever seen in projecting to his followers (both voters and Congress) absolute strength.
Some of this I attribute to RW Propaganda
Some of this I attribute to help from enablers
Some of this I attribute to Roy Cohn
Some of this I attribute, quite frankly, to his mental illness and MobBoss life
And it leads to an observation I made some days ago:
[Donald Trump will act in a manner in which his behavior six months from his removal will be astonishingly similar to his behavior six hours from his removal]
This has lessons for us…and quite reasonably explains why our gloominess is more pronounced than it should be
(1) On the cusp of Impeachment
(2) After a Magnificent week at the Voting Booth
And why it will always be more than it should be.
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She must not believe it’s going to be flushed. I guess from her point of view his takeover of the Republican party was so complete that she doesn’t believe anyone can take him down. Not a leader among the bunch, is there?
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No one will reap the total lunatic support of his cult but Trump. Especially not a woman. Haley has miscalculated this one. She is now all in so when he goes down she goes with him.
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Well, up until the very end, Hitler projected a maniacal kind of ferociousness. And, like Trump, much if not most of it was massive mental illness. I’ve seen this up close in people I know. It’s scary and clearly due to mental illness, a way of defending the self against one’s deep self-loathing and lack of a sense of self by projecting the exact opposite to the world, and thus, hopefully, to oneself. Such people are nuts and IMO beyond the possibility of help given their profound fear of admitting their deepest fears about themselves to themselves. Momentum and ferocious energy keep their fragile selves from imploding.
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Not saying that it’ll work, but I suspect that it’s the thinking. While cunning and calculating she doesn’t strike me as especially bright. Few Repubs are. It’s actually a liability. Only a sociopath could survive being genuinely smart in today’s GOP, as only they could channel it properly.
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Next week will be one of those “what side are you on?” moments in our history. Are you with us or against us?
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I have, obviously, a slew of regrets in the Age of Trump. I have not catalogued them. But I grieve for decent people unnecessarily saddened from Trump’s presence in our lives.
I do reserve a special disdain for people who are using this man for their own purposes. Selfish, self-enriching purposes.
I am a Dialectical thinker with the Trump Era. I believe that his presence will also spur a great deal of reactive good.
If Trump’s Evil can lead to Planet-saving work, post-High-School programs for youth bored out of their skulls due to OUR lack of guidance, increased interest in Journalism, etc. I will cheer all of these for the Rest of My Days.
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