Impeachment Thread

[Fuzzy1975]

Well from Sondland opening statement, he seems to be throwing Rudy under the bus...

As well due to his lack of note taking, and fear of lying, he is just agreeing to the Democrats facts! Shame I can't hang around and watch the Republicans twist into pretzels on this.

 

[JackLuis]

Sondland testimony targets Trump, Pompeo and confirms deal with Ukraine

WASHINGTON — Gordon Sondland, the American ambassador to the E.U., pointed the finger at President Donald Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former national security adviser John Bolton in explosive public testimony on Wednesday in which he said explicitly that there was a "quid quo pro" linking a White House visit by Ukraine's president to investigations into a political opponent of the president.

Under fire from all sides after multiple witnesses contradicted his earlier deposition, Sondland blamed everyone but himself for the pressure campaign on Ukraine now driving impeachment proceedings against Trump. He showed up for his televised hearing with reams of new text messages and emails he said prove the highest levels of the White House and the State Department were in on it.

He continues, you can see it live at this site. Nunes feeds Sondland lots of derp to confirm, but Sondland just agrees that Nunes said this.

 

[gunthernehmen]

Another day with virtually no cheerleading from the left.

Must be going swimmingly.

We could talk about Obama Care again!

 

[YDB95]

We could talk about Obama Care again!

Certainly! Are you sure you want to remind anyone with a preexisting condition that you want to destroy their only way of getting insurance? Have at.

 

[JackLuis]

Sondland confirms a QPQ, but can/will not pin it on Trumpster!

Says he didn't know what drugs Rudy was dealing, but it made him feel icky!

Sondland did seem to satisfy both sides and get off the hook, but we will never know who was holding the funds up, unless Donnie confesses, or throws Mick under the bus!

Lots of smoke but no firebug!

 

[gunthernehmen]

Lots of smoke but no fire

You know what they call that in an actual court (as opposed to the kangaroo style of this impeachment witch hunt)?

Nothing.

 

[JackLuis]

‘Going to need a bigger police wagon’: Viewers stunned as Gordon Sondland exposes Trump’s ‘criminal syndicate’ on live TV

The Left Wing Press seems happy!

Gordon Sondland walked into the history books Wednesday morning by delivering damning testimony explicitly implicating President Donald Trump in the Ukraine extortion scheme.

The EU ambassador flipped on the president and other top Trump administration officials — including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Energy Rick Perry — during a devastating opening statement that showed the scheme flowed directly from the White House.

If the PeeResident wanted, "Nothing, NOTHING" from the Ukraine, WHY hold up the money?

 

[JackLuis]

Adam Schiff moves to implicate Pence in the Ukraine scandal as Republicans go off the rails

Williams, for her part, seemed mostly there to affirm Vindman’s testimony on the facts. But as soon as House Intelligence Chair Adam Schiff, D-Calif., began to question Williams, he used her testimony to implicate Pence in the Ukraine scandal. Schiff asked Williams about the contents of a Sept. 18 call between Pence and Zelensky, and before she could answer, the vice president’s counsel interrupted, declaring that the information was “classified” and insisting that a readout released by the White House contained sufficient information.

In truth, the readout in question is a joke — it’s literally 83 words long, and manages to say less than 83 words usually do. Since the Trump White House has a known habit of using the classification system to hide politically damaging information, this episode suggests strongly that Pence is deeply enmeshed in this whole scheme. That, of course, makes sense from Trump’s point of view: He needs the insurance in case Republicans start wondering whether it might be easier to dump Trump overboard and set up Pence to run in 2020.

 

[JackLuis]

Republican analyst thinks the House Republicans are ‘setting up’ Mick Mulvaney to be the fall-guy for Trump

“So, I think there is a strategy coming together at play where they think they could scapegoat all of the crazy meetings and conspiracy theories on Rudy Giuliani but leave the discussion about aid somewhere else because there is one person that could answer that question and it is probably Mick Mulvaney. They are setting him up, I believe. And we’ll see where that goes.”

Donnie's gonn'a need a fall guy and Mick is handy!

 

[KeithD]

Sure, knock down as many as they want en route to Donnie. At some point it will sink in to the others sticking with Donnie, who is oh so loyal to them, that they'll being dumb chumps.

 

[KeithD]

Adam Schiff moves to implicate Pence in the Ukraine scandal as Republicans go off the rails

Politics time. The Democrats should negotiate with the Republicans to let Pence have his year as president in exchange for removing Trump (who nearly all of the Republicans too want to strangle anyway) and not running on his own anymore (but surviving his own impeachment if he sticks to the deal). Everyone except the Trump mob, wins (I bet Nancy doesn't really want to be president anyway).

 

[bodysong]

Gordon Sondland, Trump’s ambassador to the European Union

Opinion

Sleazy Sondland overcomes his amnesia and dishes the dirt on Trump
-Richard Wolffe

“In the absence of these materials, my memory has not been perfect,”
Gordon lamented. That was shortly before he perfectly remembered
that the entire family of Trump cronies were perfectly looped into the
loopy plan that national security advisor John Bolton memorably called
the “drug deal” that Gordon was cooking up.

“We weren’t happy with the president’s directive to talk with Rudy,”
Gordon said. “We did not want to involve Mr Giuliani. I believed then,
as I do now, that the men and women of the state department, not the
president’s personal lawyer, should take responsibility for Ukraine matters.”

That would be all the men and women of the state department, except for
the actual ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, who was somehow
cut out of every one of our Gordon’s many emails and messages about his
work in her country. Which is not yet a member of the European Union,
where he was supposed to park his rear end.

The late John McCain used to say there was no higher calling than to serve
a cause greater than self.

But for Gordon and Donald, McCain was so obviously wrong about national service.
There is, in fact, an even higher calling in government: serving themselves as greatly
as possible. For Donald, that has led directly to this moment of his own impeachment.
For Gordon, it has led to this pathetic moment of his own public humbling.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/20/washington-gordon-sondland-trump-impeachment

 

[SecretSapphic]

US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland threw President Donald Trump under the bus in his opening statement during the fourth day of impeachment hearings on Wednesday.

Sondland also implicated Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former National Security Adviser John Bolton.

"They knew what we were doing and why," Sondland said in the statement. "Everyone was in the loop. It was no secret."

Additionally, Sondland testified there was an explicit quid pro quo involving a White House meeting that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky desired and investigations into Trump's political rivals.

"Members of this Committee have frequently framed these complicated issues in the form of a simple question: Was there a 'quid pro quo'? As I testified previously, with regard to the requested White House call and White House meeting, the answer is yes," Sondland said.

Witnesses who've offered testimony that's damning to Trump have been dubbed "Never Trumpers" by the president, but this label cannot be applied to Sondland.

Sondland is a documented Trump loyalist who donated $1 million to the president's inauguration committee. Trump handpicked Sondland to be his ambassador to the EU.


The president earlier this month claimed he hardly knows Sondland. In a previous tweet, however, Trump referred to Sondland as "a really good man and great American."

https://www.businessinsider.com/gor...nder-the-bus-in-impeachment-testimony-2019-11

 

[Ltimmy82]

I'm surprised to find any Trump supporters / Conservatives / Republicans on Literotica lol. But I guess it takes all kinds.

Politically I'm probably somewhere between a Libertarian and an Anarcho-Capitalist. I tend to call myself an Anarchotarian. Cute, eh?

My assessment of the current impeachment kerfuffle is this:

• Trump probably did something wrong or improper
• But it probably wasn't *technically* illegal
• And probably not any different than what every other president has done
• Which doesn't really matter matter because impeachment is a political process and not a legal one
• It's still a stretch to get people outraged about a phonecall with Ukraine that no one gives a shit about
• At least Clinton's impeachment was about blowjobs
• This isn't sexy. It's useless and a waste of time and money
• No one gives a shit about Trump's phonecall
• Our last five presidents have committed genocde and are guilty of war crimes
• And y'all are dragging this shit out because of a phonecall?
• This is a political circus. Not a matter of justice
• And it isn't going to move the needle much for most people
• People aren't watching it
• People aren't engrossed with it
• People aren't outraged by it. Anyone who claims to be is posturing for political points. Or lying. To themselves or others. Either way.

I think if Dems want to get Trump out of office they should be focusing on running someone in 2020 who can beat him and not trying to oust him because they didn't like what he said on a phonecall no one cares about. This whole ordeal may have the opposite effect of what they're hoping for.

They flunked on Mueller. Now they're going with this? Meh. This is just silly. Only my most hardcore left-wing friends think this is a serious matter. The rest of them, left and right, think this whole thing is a reach.

And it is. Personally I think Dems just hate him so much (understandably) that they're hoping to just keep throwing shit at him and hope either something sticks or the country gets so tired of it that they don't vote for him in 2020.

But I think anyone who really thinks Trump is going to be impeached and removed from office is kidding themselves. Anyone who really thinks Trump is going to be convicted of anything is kidding themselves.

We have a genocide going on in Yemen right now. We've been waging illegal, un-Constitutional wars in the middle east for decades. Illegal drone strikes murdering civilians every day. American soldiers who weren't even born when 9/11 happened are dying in Afghanistan today, fighting against people who weren't even born when 9/11 happened.

Both parties are content to spend us into oblivion without any regard as to what happens when the bill comes due, and it will.

And I'm supposed to be outraged by a phone-call?

I'm not. This is all just a political pissing contest in the ever-continuing Washington power struggle.

 

[DawnONight]

Ambassador Gordon Sondland has just testified that everything he said in his opening statement was nonsense and gave a reason to end impeachment....

“I decided to ask the president the question in an open-ended fashion, because there were so many different scenarios floating around as to what was going on with Ukraine.

“So rather than ask the president nine different questions, is it this, is it this, is it that? I just said, what do you want from Ukraine? I may have even used a four-letter word.

“And he said, ‘I want nothing. I want no quid pro quo. I just want Zelensky to do the right thing,’ words that he ran under, to that effect,” he said.

Later, when speaking to counsel he said “No one told me directly that the aid was tied to anything. I was presuming it was.”​

C. Sabia, Sondland Just Killed Schiff's Impeachment, Trump Said "I Want Nothing' From Ukraine, Federalist Papers (Nov. 20, 2019).

 

[gunthernehmen]

I'm surprised to find any Trump supporters / Conservatives / Republicans on Literotica lol. But I guess it takes all kinds.

Politically I'm probably somewhere between a Libertarian and an Anarcho-Capitalist. I tend to call myself an Anarchotarian. Cute, eh?

My assessment of the current impeachment kerfuffle is this:

• Trump probably did something wrong or improper
• But it probably wasn't *technically* illegal
• And probably not any different than what every other president has done
• Which doesn't really matter matter because impeachment is a political process and not a legal one
• It's still a stretch to get people outraged about a phonecall with Ukraine that no one gives a shit about
• At least Clinton's impeachment was about blowjobs
• This isn't sexy. It's useless and a waste of time and money
• No one gives a shit about Trump's phonecall
• Our last five presidents have committed genocde and are guilty of war crimes
• And y'all are dragging this shit out because of a phonecall?
• This is a political circus. Not a matter of justice
• And it isn't going to move the needle much for most people
• People aren't watching it
• People aren't engrossed with it
• People aren't outraged by it. Anyone who claims to be is posturing for political points. Or lying. To themselves or others. Either way.

I think if Dems want to get Trump out of office they should be focusing on running someone in 2020 who can beat him and not trying to oust him because they didn't like what he said on a phonecall no one cares about. This whole ordeal may have the opposite effect of what they're hoping for.

They flunked on Mueller. Now they're going with this? Meh. This is just silly. Only my most hardcore left-wing friends think this is a serious matter. The rest of them, left and right, think this whole thing is a reach.

And it is. Personally I think Dems just hate him so much (understandably) that they're hoping to just keep throwing shit at him and hope either something sticks or the country gets so tired of it that they don't vote for him in 2020.

But I think anyone who really thinks Trump is going to be impeached and removed from office is kidding themselves. Anyone who really thinks Trump is going to be convicted of anything is kidding themselves.

We have a genocide going on in Yemen right now. We've been waging illegal, un-Constitutional wars in the middle east for decades. Illegal drone strikes murdering civilians every day. American soldiers who weren't even born when 9/11 happened are dying in Afghanistan today, fighting against people who weren't even born when 9/11 happened.

Both parties are contend to spend us into oblivion without any regard as to what happens when the bill comes due, and it will.

And I'm supposed to be outraged by a phone-call?

I'm not. This is all just a political pissing contest in the ever-continuing Washington power struggle.

By and large I agree, but Carter was no angel, either. He kept us in Thailand and provided funding and arms to assorted despots in the third world. But for all his bloodthirstiness he STILL couldn't get back a few student hostages.

Still, out of the last several dozen presidents, he'd probably be the nicest guy to hang out with. JFK, Trump or possibly Bill Clinton would be the most fun. If JFK had been born 30 years later, chances are HE would have been the one getting (impeached for) a bj in the White House.

 

[Ltimmy82]

By and large I agree, but Carter was no angel, either. He kept us in Thailand and provided funding and arms to assorted despots in the third world. But for all his bloodthirstiness he STILL couldn't get back a few student hostages.

Still, out of the last several dozen presidents, he'd probably be the nicest guy to hang out with. JFK, Trump or possibly Bill Clinton would be the most fun. If JFK had been born 30 years later, chances are HE would have been the one getting (impeached for) a bj in the White House.

Yep. Very true. Agreed on all points.

 

[JackLuis]

There’s no way to back Trump without backing Putin

After the explosive testimony of Gordon Sondland — the EU ambassador and major Donald Trump donor — on Wednesday, it was hard to imagine how Democrats might build on it in Thursday’s hearing. On the surface, the witnesses seemed less significant: Fiona Hill, the former Russia director for the National Security Council, and David Holmes, a U.S. diplomat working in Ukraine.

But, nope, it was another day of riveting testimony that made excruciatingly clear that the entire Ukraine extortion scheme was directed by President Trump — and was not, as Republicans have begun desperately hinting, some “freelancing” by Trump’s subordinates in which he somehow played no part.

After a lengthy break for lunch and a House vote, all that an increasingly listless Nunes could do was, in weary tones, to run down his list of conspiracy-theory buzzwords — “Alexandra Chalupa,” “the Steele dossier” — while rattling papers around and acting busy. House Republican counsel Steve Castor, with barely any more enthusiasm, walked through some similar paces, trying to bolster the weak talking points that Fox News and Republican politicians are clinging to in order to justify defending Trump.

Trump’s extortion scheme was no doubt primarily motivated by his personal interest and, frankly, by the sheer pleasure he takes in cheating and using his power to bully others —including other nations’ leaders — who he sees as less powerful than himself. But it’s also clear that this entire scheme also goes back to Trump’s unshakeable affinity for Putin and Russia’s authoritarian government. Trump’s loathing of Ukraine appears to stem from Putin. His actions in Ukraine served Putin’s ends. His undermining of American democracy and his eagerness to cheat in elections serves Putin’s aim of reducing international faith in democracy.

There’s no way to back Trump without backing Putin. Republicans have made their choice.

Rack one up for KeithD.

 

[JackLuis]

David Holmes blows up one of Trump’s key defenses in Ukraine extortion scheme

David Holmes blew up one of the central arguments in the impeachment defense of President Donald Trump.

The president’s Republican allies have argued that Ukraine was not aware that congressionally approved aid had been held up by the White House as Trump demanded an investigation of Joe Biden, but Holmes explained why that’s wrong, reported the Washington Post.

“(Ukrainian president Volodymyr) Zelensky had received a letter, a congratulatory letter from the president saying he would be pleased to meet him following his inauguration in May,” Holmes said. “We hadn’t to able to get that meeting — and then the security hold came up with no explanation, and I’d be surprised if any of the Ukrainians — you said earlier, we discussed earlier, you know, sophisticated people — when they received no explanation for why that hold was in place, they would have drawn that conclusion.”

Hard to believe that the Ukraine didn't know about the Trump-Fuckery because they have people in the US who probably track $390 Million dollars of aid for ridding the Russians in their eastern half! Plus Trump wasn't sly about it.

 

[JackLuis]

Nunes cuts off GOP lawyer when cross-examination flops as Fiona Hill outlines damning case against Trump

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) was forced to cut off the House GOP’s own attorney after he gave former National Security Council official Fiona Hill an opportunity to outline the damning case against President Donald Trump.

She then relayed to Sondland how she believed this divergence in policy goals was “all going to blow up” and then added, “And here we are.”

At this point, Nunes interjected and started asking Hill questions about the Steele dossier.

Because pee hookers are so much more important than TREASON!

 

[JackLuis]

Who's Colluding Whom???

Devin Nunes, who spent the last month howling about DEMOCRAT COLLUSION with the whistleblower, was actually colluding with Rudy Giuliani's indicted Ukraine fixer Lev Parnas. The Daily Beast reports that Parnas arranged travel for Nunes and three of his staffers to Europe between November and December 3, 2018, racking up $63,000 in travel expenses on the House Intelligence Committee credit card before he had to hand it over to Adam Schiff in January. So weird that he failed to mention his own connection to the Ukrainium One scandal, huh?

That train is never late!

Parnas, who came to the US from Ukraine as a small child and maintains ties there, spent this past summer as Rudy's sherpa in his quest to dig up dirt on Joe Biden in that country. Parnas also worked as "the best-paid interpreter in the world" for indicted Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash. But in 2018, he was but a wee scam artist (allegedly), trying to break into Republican political circles using foreign cash as bait. How he got hooked up with Congressman Cowpat, to the extent that he was arranging meetings and calls in Europe, is not clear. Also unclear is what countries Nunes visited at a cost of $16,000 per day for him and three aides. But it's a safe bet Parnas wasn't sending Nunes et al. on a field trip to examine German wind farms.

Another Rethuglicunt to bump the bus!

 

[ishtat]

I just watched Fiona Hill's testimony. Very impressive woman, her characterization of Sondland on a"political errand" was precisely accurate.

It's embarrassing to compare her, a consummate professional, with the amateurs and their political puppets at the White House.

Her shifting of responsibility for interference back to Russia where it belongs was important.

 

[icanhelp1]

I just watched Fiona Hill's testimony. Very impressive woman, her characterization of Sondland on a"political errand" was precisely accurate.

It's embarrassing to compare her, a consummate professional, with the amateurs and their political puppets at the White House.

Her shifting of responsibility for interference back to Russia where it belongs was important.

We didn’t need her to identify anything. The Mueller report indicted several Russians already. Everyone knows by now that Russia and Ukraine interfered with our elections.

 

[JackLuis]

We didn’t need her to identify anything. The Mueller report indicted several Russians already. Everyone knows by now that Russia and Ukraine interfered with our elections.

Now WHY would the Ukraine collude with the Russians? It would not be in their interest to fuck around in our elections, they need America to help fight the Russians. The EU is only a group of 'fraidy cats without the balls to face off Putin. There is no where else they can turn but to the USA. Putin knows that.

Putin and the Russian Mob have Trump by the short hairs, he owes them too much money to pay them off any other way than TREASON!

 

[JackLuis]

‘They weren’t man enough to stay’: Ex-GOP chairman rips Republicans who bailed after attacking Fiona Hill

Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele was interviewed by Chris Matthews on MSNBC’s “Hardball” on Thursday.

“We watched a pathetic performance,” Steele said.

“So pathetic, at the end they couldn’t ask questions, because they knew the moment they did she would shred them alive on live television,” he explained.

“To the point that after they would trash her, they’d get up and leave the room — they weren’t man enough to stay,” Steele concluded.

Republicans are not happy with their Tea Party Pissants!