Yesterday in The Ukraine Hoax Looks Like Russia Hoax Redux I wrote briefly on the obvious strategy for impeachment. Nancy Pelosi gave that game away when she told the assembled media hoaxers: "All roads lead to Putin with this president." So:
Nancy Pelosi's statement yesterday regarding the ongoing Impeachment Theater made it pretty clear that the endgame is to try to tie Trump's consideration of withholding military aid to Ukraine to renewed allegations that Trump is doing Putin's bidding. That reflects the claim that Glenn Simpson (following others) will make in his book, which we reviewed in What Did Obama Know--And When?
"After four years on his trail, the authors' inescapable conclusion is that Trump is an asset of the Russian government, whether he knows it or not."
I don't think there's any other way to interpret Pelosi's remarks:
Once you understand this, then the parade of seemingly nonsensical charges and witnesses begins to make sense. A bit like a Rohrschach test. Of course there was no quid pro quo in the phone call, not in a formal sense. Of course Trump, like any president, would ordinarily be entitled to fire any ambassador, etc. But just like the Weissmann obstruction theory, in which the President's claimed intentions become obstructive even when his actions are lawful, so too the claim will be made that even Trump's lawful acts are impeachable because--whether he knows it or not!--he's acting as Putin's agent, doing Putin's bidding.
Thus, when the WSJ reports today:
Former Pompeo Aide McKinley Testifies in Ukraine Probe
Michael McKinley, who resigned from State Department last week, faces questions from House committees
A former senior adviser to Mike Pompeo told lawmakers that he left his post over frustration with the secretary of state regarding the treatment of the ousted U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, according to people familiar with the testimony.
...
Mr. McKinley said that in the past month he asked Mr. Pompeo repeatedly to show support for the former Ambassador, Marie Yovanovitch.
we understand that the charge will soon surface--as, indeed, Pelosi has strongly indicated--that Trump fired Yovanovitch (whether he knew it or not) to do Putin's bidding. Yovanovitch was a supporter of Ukraine against Russia. Trump fired her to please his handler, Putin. Just as Andy McCabe said--Trump is an agent of a foreign power whether he knows it or not and so must be impeached. Being an agent of a foreign power in this sense is the "high crime or misdemeanor," the "political crime" that supposedly harms the body politic. It's The Russia Hoax Redux. There's no evidence, but that's not the point. There's never evidence in a hoax.
Imagine the depth of corruption--financial, policy, and political--a thorough inquiry into Ukraine would reveal! Imagine the lengths to which the Deep State will go to conceal everything that's going on. Ukraine is the tip of an iceberg and the American public must not see what's below the waterline.
I continue to believe this morally bankrupt strategy will backfire. Even after the mass GOP betrayal of Trump in the Syria vote yesterday.
They know that if they keep piling this stuff up, it doesn’t matter if any of it is true. It is coming from many sources. Glenn Fusion is simply a rat. The administration turncoats/disgruntled formed employees (many brought on during Obama years) are voluntarily coming forward to vent their spleens under the guise of being sent subpoenas which are nothing more than letters. Those “subpoenaed” (sent these committee letters) are free to show up or not depending upon their respective ideologies. Many who show will be cowardly, vindictive types out to get Trump.
ReplyDeleteVictor Davis Hanson had a great piece “The Strategies of Targeting Trump” which is work seeking and reading. (When I put a link in a comment, it won’t publish) A sample:
“Who says the Democrats ever have to vote on going ahead with impeachment or even hold very many hearings? The point is just to drag everything out under the vague premise that some sort of de facto “impeachment is impending” in sword of Damocles fashion.”
They know if Plan A impeachment fails, Plan B Election is coming soon.
I'll admit I'm troubled by recent developments. I have no love for the GOPe, yet it would cause incalculable harm if they committed suicide.
DeleteCorrection to mine: Glenn Simpson, not Glenn Fusion. When I get really really mad, my fingers sometimes go out on their own!
DeleteHeh. I think we all got it.
DeleteOne major reason why the Obama Administration was meddling in the Ukrainian Government -- for example, demanding that prosecutors be fired -- was that Obama Government had taken effective actions to remove the elected President Victor Yanukovych in February 2014. That is why the Obama Administration felt obligated and entitled to control the replacement Presidents.
ReplyDeleteThat was the context of Vice President Biden ordering the Ukrainian Government to fire a prosecutor in September 2015.
Foolishly, the House Democrats are opening this can of worms by impeaching President Trump. In order that the public understand the context of Biden's pressuring the Ukrainian Government, the public should be informed why the Obama Administration had obligated and entitled itself to control the Ukrainian Government that came to power after the expulsion of the elected President Yanukovych.
How did it become the Obama Administration's business to decide who can be prosecutors in Ukraine?
Also, the public should be allowed to examine all the State Department's documents about Victor Shokin -- in particular, all the documents related to Biden's pressuring the Ukrainian Government to fire Shokin. The public should be able to examine all the memoranda, briefing papers, position papers, and all the correspondence with other foreign governments and international organizations regarding Shokin.
And yet, Mike, I believe it goes deeper. We need to look into the motives behind the US staging the coup in Ukraine.
DeleteI think that the Obama Administration's subversion of elected President Yanukovych in Ukraine was rather mindless. The Obama Administration reflexively supported any street demonstrations against "authoritarian regimes".
DeleteAfter Yanukovych was elected -- fairly according to the European Union's election observers -- Ukrainian zealots began conducing street demonstrations endlessly. Basically, these Ukrainian zealots did not like the fact that Yanukovych had assembled a political coalition that succeeded because it included the country's ethnic-Russian citizens and also the country's pro-Russia ethnic-Ukrainian citizens.
Simply because those Ukrainian zealots were demonstrating in the streets, the Obama Administration supported them reflexively and mindlessly.
The Obama Administration did not foresee that the expulsion of the elected President Yanukovych would backfire disastrously. All the ethnic-Russians who had voted for Yanukovych decided that they might as well secede from Ukraine, where their votes no longer counted.
Within a few weeks, Crimea, populated by ethnic-Russians voted overwhelmingly to secede from Ukraine and to join Russia.
The same would have happened in the Donbass too, but the Ukrainian Government has managed, so far, to prevent a peaceful secession of that region.
I don't see the Obama Admin backing demonstrations "reflexively". Iran and Venezuela stand out but there were others that they decidedly "took a knee" on. Obama is a "Community Organizer", NewSpeak for Political Agitator. He trained for it at the knee of Frank Marshall, took a degree in it at Columbia and his mentor/confidante is Valery Jarrett of the Chicago branch of the ComIntern nobility. They're both knowledgeable and cunning political knife fighters, trained specifically to instigate and win street brawls using mobs as weapons. That their goals were opaque doesn't mean that there was no purpose. That things didn't work out necessarily as planned, assuming their plan can be correctly discerned, or they weren't able to go as far as they would have liked, does not inherently mean that they were directionless or even unsuccessful as far as their ultimate goal, whatever that may have been.
DeleteBecause chaos exists we shouldn't assume chaos is spontaneous. Arguably the universe leans towards order and rationality so possibly the opposite is true; to have chaos a catalyst must be introduced. That is the sole purpose of a Political Agitator. Just because things in Ukraine (or Libya) didn't turn out the way I would have liked it doesn't follow that they didn't turn out precisely as Barak, Valery, Hillary, and John intended. Leninism means never having to say, "There's been enough blood."
The same can be said about what the Democrats are up to now. We can't assume they are adrift and rudderless or even paniced. Even if they are cornered, which is unlikely, they will fight to the last breath. Are we in September 1917? Is a Kornilov affair being orchestrated? The House GoP.Inc Syria vote makes one wonder.
October is coming and Bill Barr is a very slender thread for the fate of the Republic to swing by.
Tom S.
See my update on the House vote. McConnell is on board and wants something STRONGER from the senate.
DeleteJust as the Obama Administration weaponized various federal agencies in service to his political ends, Nancy Pelosi is now weaponizing the House of Representatives and it's Constitutional process of impeachment for political ends. This is no trivial matter, and it will have serious long term consequences if not redressed.
ReplyDeleteIn a sane world, the few remaining adults in DC would understand that weaponizing Congress's Constitutional Check & Balance power is a very bad idea and seek to reign in this misconduct before the precedent becomes business as usual. This issue goes well beyond Trump and represents a dangerous tipping point for our system of governance. If the new standard of impeachment becomes the "Pelosi Rules" then all future presidents will henceforth be at a structural disadvantage in the Constitutional balance of power. All policy differences will be negotiated under the shadow of threatened impeachment.
This is what Barr is supposed to be all about--defending the Executive from the encroachments of the other Branches. It's what he was known for the first time around, it's why he says he came back. By those measures he's the adult in DC. It's time.
DeleteWait a second here, if Trump is an asset to Putin, then anytime the democRATS agreed to do something with Trump, they thus became assets to Putin. So when the democRATS agree on a budget with Trump, they are really working with Putin.
ReplyDeleteRob S
I only wish the American public could think through these things.
DeleteThe Moon of Alabama website recently published an article titled When Ukraine's Prosecutor Came After His Son's Sponsor Joe Biden Sprang Into Action. Before I summarize that article, however, I will point out the first comment under that article. The comment, written by a Finn named Petri Krohn, provides little-known context.
ReplyDeleteUkraine is poor in petroleum fields, but does have one region with great potential for fracking natural gas. That one region is the Donbass, especially around the city of Slavyansk. This region is populated mostly by ethnic Russians. After President Yanukovych was expelled in late February 2014, the secession uprising in Donbass began primarily in Slavyansk.
In April 2014 -- a couple months after President Yanukovych was expelled -- the Burisma natural-gas company hired Hunter Biden onto its Board of Directors. Burisma is a Ukrainian natural-gas company that might be able to frack natural gas in this rebellious, ethnic-Russian region.
If Donbass does secede from Ukraine, however, then Ukraine will be deprived of that potential fracking field and will remain a petroleum-poor country.
If Ukraine does manage to keep Donbass and to frack the fields there, then Ukraine -- in particular, Burisma -- might enjoy a bonanza.
By placing his son Hunter onto Burisma's Board of Directors, Joe Biden enriched his son and also made him a valuable source of information about the problems and developments in fracking the natural-gas field in Donbass.
I will elaborate on the Moon of Alabama article in my next comment here.
Thanks, Mike. I was puzzled about this energy angle in Ukraine because I'd always thought it was energy poor--hadn't heard about the fracking possibility. Very enlightening.
DeleteClearly the Neocons like Nuland who engineered the coup screwed up, thinking they could bully Putin into accepting our takeover.
Here I am following up my previous comment about the Moon of Alabama article titled When Ukraine's Prosecutor Came After His Son's Sponsor Joe Biden Sprang Into Action.
DeleteThe article explains why Vice President Biden took effective action in early February 2016 to cause the firing of prosecutor Victor Shokin.
Ukraine's natural-gas company Burisma is essentially a shell company that is owned actually by Mykola Zlochevsky, a former Minister for Natural Resources. The shell enables Zlochevsky to deny his ownership.
Supposedly, prosecutor Shokin was not investigating Burisma when Biden caused him to be fired.
However, Shokin was investigating Zlochevsky, the secret owner of Burisma. Shokin's investigation took active steps at the beginning of February 2016.
On February 4, 2016, Interfax-Ukraine reported:
[quote]
The movable and immovable property of former Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine Mykola Zlochevsky in Ukraine has been seized, according to the press service of the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine (PGO) [Shokin].
"The PGO filed a petition to court to arrest the property of the ex-Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine, the Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine, Mykola Zlochevsky, from which arrest was withdrawn, and other property he actually uses, namely housing estate with a total area of 922 square meters, a land plot of 0.24 hectares, a garden house with a total area of 299.8 square meters, a garden house in the territory of Vyshgorod district, a garden house of 2,312 square meters, a land plot of 0.0394 hectares, a Rolls-Royce Phantom car, a Knott 924-5014 trainer," reads the report.
The PGO clarifies that the court satisfied the petition on February 2, 2016.
...
Zlochevsky is suspected of committing a criminal offense under Part 3 of Article 368-2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (illicit enrichment).
[end quote]
The Moon of Alabama article continues:
[quote]
On February 2 Shokin confiscated four large houses Zlochevsky owned plus a Rolls-Royce Phantom and a "Knott 924-5014 trainer". ...
Ten days later Biden goes into overdrive to get him fired. Within one week he personally calls Poroshenko three times with only one major aim: to get Shokin fired.
The Washington Post falsely claimed that the Zlochevsky case was "dormant". The executive director of the U.S. and EU financed Anti-Corruption Action Center falsely claimed that the prosecutor was "not pursuing the investigation". The NYT repeated that false claim and added an obvious false claim from unnamed Zlochevsky "allies". Why did the media claim Shokin did nothing against Zlochevsky when the record shows the opposite?
....
The timeline above seems to support Shokin's claim that he was fired on Joe Biden's order because he went after Zlochevsky who paid Biden's son ....
[end quote]
OK, so there actually IS evidence supporting the allegations against Biden. Who woulda thunk it?
Delete"I continue to believe this morally bankrupt strategy will backfire. Even after the mass GOP betrayal of Trump in the Syria vote yesterday."
ReplyDeleteI agree with you. As you and I have both noted, if the Dems/Media/Deep State were confident, this stuff wouldn't happen behind closed doors.
Not everybody in this country loves Donald Trump. I know that to be true. But 40% or more of this country loves him. 40% or more fears him.
Why do they fear him? Hint. It's not because they believe that they have more political clout, more political capital, more support, etc. It's hatred and envy.
The 2020 election will decide a lot. If DJT is reelected, oh boy! But we need more conservatives, to help him.