Donald Trump

[SWP's back]

Every president does it though. He’s just “average”

 

[Mike D]

Take money in at Veterans fundraiser, disburse it to your campaign staff, then vow you'll never settle the suit the "sleazy" NY state AG files regarding your misappropriation, but settle it anyhow.

What a President.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/07/trump-ordered-to-pay-2-million-to-settle-trump-foundation-suit.html

This is akin to someone stealing a charity box for shop deplorable.

 

[andyhinch]

Someone from his inner circle was on the BBC news at 3:00 this morning, was getting a bit of grilling, his response, well no body’s perfect

 

[Gareth Barry Conlon]

Shitgibbon is considering a Government shutdown to halt any impeachment trial according to MSNBC.

This would backfire so badly. Thousands of government workers across the US would not get paid all because he wants to stop his trial. How long would he hold out with that and what would be the impression? An impeachment trial is all about momentum - how rapidly would he lose support, this would ramp it up even before it begins.

 

[Gareth Barry Conlon]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/powe...a14efa-0173-11ea-8bab-0fc209e065a8_story.html

Pay wall so here's the nuts of it.

House Republicans’ latest plan to shield President Trump from impeachment is to focus on at least three deputies — U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, Trump’s lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani, and possibly acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney — who they say could have acted on their own to influence Ukraine policy.

All three occupy a special place in the Ukraine narrative as the people in most direct contact with Trump. As Republicans argue that most of the testimony against Trump is based on faulty secondhand information, they are sowing doubts about whether Sondland, Giuliani and Mulvaney were actually representing the president or freelancing to pursue their own agendas.

If this is true then the key fact is they are not arguing there was not a serious unlawful act. A change in the narrative to date and no doubt the trial would come down to those three arguing Trump new and directed it and the Whitehouse arguing he was completely unaware. The key problem for the whitehouse is that Trumpo was the one on the phone pushing the dodgy deal. And people like Bolton who is currently part on the fence could climb off the fence and screw him.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/powe...a14efa-0173-11ea-8bab-0fc209e065a8_story.html

Pay wall so here's the nuts of it.



If this is true then the key fact is they are not arguing there was not a serious unlawful act. A change in the narrative to date and no doubt the trial would come down to those three arguing Trump new and directed it and the Whitehouse arguing he was completely unaware. The key problem for the whitehouse is that Trumpo was the one on the phone pushing the dodgy deal. And people like Bolton who is currently part on the fence could climb off the fence and screw him.

I got the feeling they would try and trawl this kind of defence out at some point. Like you say, if they go down this route, they are essentially saying that they concede that it was an unlawful act, and I'd be very surprised if Sondland, Giuliani and Mulvaney haven't got enough evidence in their back pocket's to prove that it was Trump who sanctioned the strategy of withholding the money to Ukraine for political/personal gain. Very risky strategy.

They're gonna need a bigger bus.

 

[Mike D]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/powe...a14efa-0173-11ea-8bab-0fc209e065a8_story.html

Pay wall so here's the nuts of it.



If this is true then the key fact is they are not arguing there was not a serious unlawful act. A change in the narrative to date and no doubt the trial would come down to those three arguing Trump new and directed it and the Whitehouse arguing he was completely unaware. The key problem for the whitehouse is that Trumpo was the one on the phone pushing the dodgy deal. And people like Bolton who is currently part on the fence could climb off the fence and screw him.

Its beginning to sounds more like Watergate to me with the attempted cover up becoming worse that the actual crime. Ultimately if they try to pull this stunt it will backfire on them as it already started to already in Luisianna and Kentucky. It's hard enough discrediting one witness but 3 independent ones. Then you have the possibility of the 3 witnesses encouraging more people to come forward and blow their strategy apart. It sounds desperate to me and presents a high risk of failure.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

Its beginning to sounds more like Watergate to me with the attempted cover up becoming worse that the actual crime. Ultimately if they try to pull this stunt it will backfire on them as it already started to already in Luisianna and Kentucky. It's hard enough discrediting one witness but 3 independent ones. Then you have the possibility of the 3 witnesses encouraging more people to come forward and blow their strategy apart. It sounds desperate to me and presents a high risk of failure.

The crime itself is pretty bad, but the cover-up is just one lie after another; each worse than the preceding lie. It's like Watergate on steroids - otherwise known as 'Stupid Watergate'.

The really weird thing is the amount of people who seem to be falling over themselves to protect Trump, and denounce the investigation: the list is pretty long.

Jim Jordan, Lindsey Graham, Rand Paul, Mitch McConnell (although he's gone off the boil a bit recently), Matt Goetz and many others have gone all in with Trump. Unless they are completely detached from reality (which isn't difficult to believe), deep down they must know they are screwed.

 

[Gareth Barry Conlon]

The crime itself is pretty bad, but the cover-up is just one lie after another; each worse than the preceding lie. It's like Watergate on steroids - otherwise known as 'Stupid Watergate'.

The really weird thing is the amount of people who seem to be falling over themselves to protect Trump, and denounce the investigation: the list is pretty long.

Jim Jordan, Lindsey Graham, Rand Paul, Mitch McConnell (although he's gone off the boil a bit recently), Matt Goetz and many others have gone all in with Trump. Unless they are completely detached from reality (which isn't difficult to believe), deep down they must know they are screwed.

Sadly I think that many of these rouges know that their re-election is dependent on the Trump base voter (the minimally educated working poor who admire Trump for his casual racism and grifter in your face style) and without Trump they are screwed, in fact many are now fully hitched to the Trump machine. The old school genuinely conservative middle class / wealthy Republican voters have been mostly discarded along the way.

There will be calculations going on among the various Reps in Washington and around the country as to what is in their long term interest? More of this shit show and keeping the Trump base on board or moving in to the uncertain post Trump Republican world (which would seem to be a difficult place).

 

[Mike D]

The crime itself is pretty bad, but the cover-up is just one lie after another; each worse than the preceding lie. It's like Watergate on steroids - otherwise known as 'Stupid Watergate'.

The really weird thing is the amount of people who seem to be falling over themselves to protect Trump, and denounce the investigation: the list is pretty long.

Jim Jordan, Lindsey Graham, Rand Paul, Mitch McConnell (although he's gone off the boil a bit recently), Matt Goetz and many others have gone all in with Trump. Unless they are completely detached from reality (which isn't difficult to believe), deep down they must know they are screwed.

The conspiracy theory is that he has dirt on each and every one of them which is not beyond the realms of possibility.