Schiff rules
Yesterday I wrote a post about impeachment in which I mentioned that they are about to hold public hearings. The post ended like this:
If this report is correct, Republican counsel will be allowed to ask questions. Fancy that.
Note the sarcasm. I could not imagine that Schiff would be allowing Republicans free rein to point out the flaws in what the witnesses would be saying.
And indeed, my skepticism was warranted:
Just a little earlier today, House Intelligence Committee Chairman and de facto leader of the House impeachment caucus released a directive in which he identified the only three areas potential public witnesses would be allowed to testify about…
Schiff is also requiring Ranking Member, CA Republican Devin Nunes, to submit a list of all the GOP’s potential witnesses no later than “Saturday, November 8” (apparently calendars are not available to the House Democrats) and he must provide “detailed” justification of each witness.
The three questions are as follows:
1. Did the President request that a foreign leader and government initiate investigations to benefit the President’s personal political interests in the United States, including an investigation related to the President’s political rival and potential opponent in the 2020 U.S. presidential election?
2. Did the President — directly or through agents — seek to use the power of the Office of the President and other instruments of the federal government in other ways to apply pressure on the head of state and government of Ukraine to advance the President’s personal political interests, including by leveraging an Oval Office meeting desired by the President of Ukraine or by withholding U.S. military assistance to Ukraine?
3. Did the President and his Administration seek to obstruct, suppress, or cover up information to conceal from the Congress and the American people evidence about the President’s actions and conduct?
Schiff wants to present a semblance of fairness without actual fairness at all. The real question is – as it has been all along – how many of the people can Schiff fool how much of the time?
[NOTE: This may be parenthetical – but I don’t think Schiff is an especially popular figure, even among Democrats. There is something shifty (pun intended) and repellent about him.]
The area in and around Los Angeles County is home to three of the most astonishingly dreadful members of Congress– Schiff, the pathological liar, the smug and smarmy Ted Lieu, and mad Maxine, who is both stupid and corrupt.
Schiff is the slime from your video oozing along on your livingroom floor.
I would presume that then Schiff could deny the Republican’s witness, most likely just before the hearings and after the Rep could find replacements.
Very restrictive questions, certainly not the ones Schiff used for his witnesses.
Not only restrictive questions, but the questions assume an offense has been committed. Apparently Schiff will not permit questioning aimed at demonstrating that no offense occurred.
I understand that Schiff will be first in Nunes list. That should be fun.
But probably stricken. Schiff the frustrated script writer is having the time of his life now! He is living his chef d’oeuvre. He is sure none of the public will notice any of his clever, oh-how-clever machinations along the way, like these restrictions and timetables for the opposition. And it won’t get reported in the media — the media that nobody reads anymore, that is — so his faith is not entirely misplaced. I can picture him going home to his wife and chortling as he tells her what he pulled off today, darling!
But it will surface in blogs like this one, and in so many other sources and places he doesn’t even know about. Schiff thinks the public is hopelessly dumb. Projection.
Kate:
Actually, Schiff’s only going to allow one question: “Have you stopped beating your wife?”
Neo: That’s about right.
The Federalist, Erielle Davidson: Emails Reveal Burisma Consulting Firm Leveraged Hunter Biden To Get State Dept. Meetings
The whole business is an utter fraud. As for Schiff, it’s a reasonable wager he’s cognitively and emotionally incapable of running anything that isn’t an utter fraud. The appendix to the Kavanaugh hearings were the issue of an utter fraud. The Democratic Party is sociopathic. Frauds are what they do.
Will be interesting to see how the still-mostly-wimpy House Reps respond.
Funny sad how tough the minority Dems were 2017-2018, yet how hapless the minority Reps are now.
Unfair limits on questions – who enforces this? Schiff.
I still guess that independents will see this as more unfair and thus unfavorable to the Dems — but recent Dem success around Philly is frightening.
The media is much more important to independent, less political folk, than the truth.
I’d like to think Schiff is also set up to take the fall, should Nancy Pelosi decide she was right the first time — that this process is turning out to be a big mistake. Pull the plug and let the Schifft fall where it may. He has certainly laid the groundwork for repudiation! But it’s probably wishful thinking; it seems too late to step back into that now. I hear NPR News come on (and I’m too far to switch on a CD instead, this time) and they still report as though everything is normal in Washington and the process is marching on as it should. Here is what happened today. Republicans accused the good guys of doing something bad. Aren’t they pathetic. Meanwhile, Chairman Adam Schiff removed his cape for an hour and he described GOP complaints as nothing but partisan spin that cannot stay the hand of almighty Justice.
I presume that the minority will at least have a minute or two to speak. I would hope that Nunes would use his time to read into the record the list of witnesses he tried to call, but was denied. Surely, he will present a comprehensive list.
As to the questions; I suppose they could walk out en masse when he cuts the first one off; or, they could simply persist in asking. I favor the latter. Make Schiff try to quell you in a public hearing. Persist through his attempts to silence a fellow member. The more agitated and dictatorial that he becomes, the better. Good theater; but, I doubt that Nancy would enjoy the show. Her cozy job could be at risk from Schiff’s antics.
I think that Schiff has led his party into a virtual mine field if the game is played well by the Republicans. People call them weak; I doubt that they are inclined to be weak, or civil which some define as weak, from this point.
People call them weak; I doubt that they are inclined to be weak, or civil which some define as weak, from this point.
There is always a first time, as the bishop said to the nun.
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/11/07/house-democrats-release-impeachment-testimony-of-top-state-dept-official/
Rumors of rumors of said rumors are now facts…
No normal court in the land would accept such as any kind of evidence
The point of early elections is to have them vote BEFORE they find out the substance or lack of such…
According to ABC News, Democrats are evaluating articles charging President Trump with abuse of power, obstruction of justice, and contempt of Congress.
They are destroying the office of the presidency..
Pence called the impeachment inquiry a “disgrace.”
Intermarried Zimri Schiff is a traitor to the Jewish people
Rep. Mark Meadows: “Setting aside the absurdity of these restrictions—note that the Democrats won’t even be able to stay within their own parameters.
The first two witnesses they’re calling have never even talked to POTUS. They have zero firsthand knowledge. How can they speak to his motive?”
Why even bother to have elections and run for Congress? It seems clear that only a handful, perhaps a dozen out of the 435 members in the House, have any real power and influence. There have to be many people there, regardless of party affiliation, who would become frustrated with the lack of meaningful input.
The questions are also stupid, since the US and the American people have an interest in knowing if their foreign aid is being used for corrupt purposes.
Presidential Message on the National Day for the Victims of Communism, 2019
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/presidential-message-national-day-victims-communism-2019/
and
https://www.grassley.senate.gov/news/news-releases/johnson-grassley-call-state-department-release-documents-hunter-biden-and-burisma
and finally, but only a small part:
and as i said, which got no discussion
the president has the power to declassify anything he wants
and its already been discussed that he can do it as payback, not illegal
and he has the power to delegate that power, and has to Barr
so, maybe the people with schiff, and so forth, may find themselves in jail before things are through…
i also said… get out the air poppers and the clarrified butter and find a comfortable chair
“There is something shifty (pun intended) and repellent about him.” — Neo
“He’s got … Marty Feldman eyes” sung to the tune of “Bette Davis Eyes” by Kim Carnes. Except Marty was actually funny. Schiffless is about as funny as a heart attack.
You simply don’t obey the rules- make Schiff enforce them over and over and over. I will just about guarantee that Schiff chickens out.
Meanwhile, public support for impeachment, a political act, has dropped significantly. This looks to whimper off into the sunset. I LOVE that Nunes seeks to call Schiff to testify. Lolgf.
https://donsurber.blogspot.com/2019/11/highlights-of-news_7.html
According to Don S., Durham is impaneling a Grand Jury.
Maybe indictments before Christmas? He says ETA January.
Schiff will be public but fizzle before then; the public sizzle will be well publicized, and the fizzle will be blamed on technicalities, allowing the guilty Trump to walk.
None know how well this will go with the independents. The Reps seem increasingly solid for Trump; most Dems still mostly Trump haters.
He’s sooooo icky.
About three years ago we had an election and found out the “people” were not stupid enough to vote Hillary into office, despite the chuckle’s of the media on election night when they were a bit disappointed. Now as this story that is way to bad to be a plot in a good fiction novel is playing out I think the “people”, the few who are paying a little bit of attention to the Washington Jibber-Jabber are both getting tired and once more not stupid enough to buy into this parody of justice.
Schiff looks as if he was chosen by central casting for the part.
I hope we don’t see any “Let’s get the popcorn out” here because this nonsense isn’t and won’t be amusing. It’s bad, bad, bad, and if this civil war ever does become openly violent no one will be laughing at any of it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSyHFk4PB9s
Picture of Eric C.
https://donsurber.blogspot.com/2019/11/killing-america-in-anonymity.html
Don Surber is totally pro-Trump. But he also seems accurate with his mostly one-sided pro-trump news highlights.
His list of Trump’s promises made and kept, quite long, does include both the Wall (in progress), and “Mexico will pay for it” — Not.
the request by Grassley and Johnson i put up before i had seen john solomon piece
https://johnsolomonreports.com/testimony-bombshell-obama-administration-tried-to-partner-with-hunter-bidens-ukrainian-gas-firm-but-was-blocked-over-corruption-concerns/
miklos000rosza on November 7, 2019 at 8:18 pm said:
I hope we don’t see any “Let’s get the popcorn out” here because this nonsense isn’t and won’t be amusing.
Miklos… too bad.. i already put it up and personally i been beating this drum since the 90s and working for freedom with Batun (baltic appeal to the united nations), for those countries…
I tried to beat the drum on the self extermination of lineage by feminists and how meaningful it was that below replacement for as long as it was, meant extinction (at least in the text books), and even pointed out many salient points as to the coordination of stuff.
i had warned that most do nothing but talk and entertain… in fact, while some like my posts, others were upset they were long, and not entertaining or written better to be more palatable
This nonsense is amusing in a dark way…
VERY amusing that no one was interested in understanding the mechanics of the process
recommended books that were not read, was insulted by a few, and more.. some told me to do my own blog, but i had one, and the left came a calling to my home.
I even pointed out, darkly, what was over the gate of Buchenwald
Jedem das Seine
“to each what he deserves”
Fools dont get 2nd chances.. and NOW your taking seriously what should have been taken seriously a very long time ago… what is clear now, was clear to the farsighted.
i came out of bronx science, but could not go to college and had to be homeless to do that -while my sis who didnt go, got many degrees given the lack of any scholarships for men, and tons for women and men (that mostly women got and alumni). i had a kid, and the lady i was with and the system denied me my parenthood with the judge saying “you have no rights”, only to suffer a faked murder destroying my life without penalty to the faker… paid double child support, one to the mom, one to my parents… but still was a deadbeat. and even after she took the kids with her to rob a bank, i had no rights…
for a very long time i tried to point out what papers were written and raised up and even new ones that you have yet to experience… and tried to point out things before Trump made it freaking obvious.
now… i am just waiting to die.. my art is unwanted because i am not considered oppressed, my inventions are unwanted because when i did submit, they pretended no one did waiting for a more favorable woman or minority to do the same, and on and on…
and your not going to deny me the sit back and watch the entertainment
sorry… but there is nothing left, i no longer have a dog in this as they prevented my wife from Indonesia and me from being able to pay for a child, and spent years putting upon me till diversity awards was a valid abrogation of the EEOC laws and we almost have nothing.
too bad for you. my family had already experienced this and was deeply involved unwillingly
its WAY too late to care either way as there is nothing that can be done
all you have is the waking up moment before the fall… or do you have a stack of Trumps lined up to insure a different outcome after 5 years? are we ready for war? are our kids smart enough to eavne read the directions and act? can they organize? can the men or rather boys fix things and even use their hands as the greatest generation? can men who need puzzles to handle the stress of an easy office job, handle combat, or riots, or civil outbreaks?
from my point of view… nothing to do but make the most of it, and enjoy the view
and be entertained by it all… call it looking at the bright side
sorry if you and others dont agree.. i wasted my life on this stuff..
i might as well enjoy some of it from that perspective
maybe i may still succeed in something… but it pales to the simple life i wanted that so many others have and do not appreciate…
or as my dad would say
tough titties..
If you want to succeed at something as un compelling as this absurd impeachment you need to have at least *some* agreement from members on the other side_
Schiff& pelosi have no one but their own members, how does that not look like a total railroading? Add to that the high negatives of Schiff, he comes across like such a putz. Not attractive, not intelligent, an astute liar someone like that gets zero traction with the public. And Trump, well his fans anyway, respond to him because for all his faults he has charisma. An amazing thing charisma. Why cant the lefties see that? their Obama had his charisma & those of us not under his spell had to endure
Now it’s their turn to have to endure Trump!
Folk’s, in the German sense, we the people are not stupid enough to have a civil war and we, the United States are way too big and complicated to have a civil war, we will probably have some disasters in some places and we are just about due for some terrible civil disruption we are way to strong, large and fat to destroy ourselves. We might have some large metro-areas burn up like they did in the late 1960’s, thank you Jane Fonda & company who gave us Obama, but we are a large strong nation and we will get through this mess in the coming decades just as we have for the last few centuries.
It’s all a work in process and it is my hope that we keep the spark of self determination alive, my grown kids in their 40’s and 50’s have and they are trying to pass it on down. I am also a good old church going guy who thinks the whole thing is ‘God’s Will’ playing out and he does have a sense of humor.
miklos000rosza,
Agreed. It’s going to be bad when it happens. More Balkans than American Civil War. No conveniently placed Mason-Dixon Line.
And, With all respect to you OldTexan, my parents think the same as you and are of your generation. But you lived the bulk of your life in a Golden Age, in a Golden Place, by nearly any standard. I see how that perception colors their judgement, and reinforces their normalcy bias. We are plenty stupid enough here to have real civil war here.
Only one side needs to make war, for war to happen.
I would say that there’s no danger of that occurring; except for the fact that many leftists actually admit to hating and wanting to destroy those who they cannot control, and point as a matter of of ideological pride to recognizing no legitimate limits to that which they feel entitled to control, manage, and utilize.
Your property, your livelihood, your right to be unmolested in your person, and to raise your family as Americans have done since the country was founded, are all at perpetual, and rather exhausting, risk in the presence of these morally insane would-be godlets who think they have been anointed by “Evolution” to rule, not govern, everyone and everything howsoever they wish.
They will make life “fair” if nature is not; there will be no alternative domains of association or recourse for you which will escape their notice; they will demand your affirmation; they will insist on your participation … or else. They are the Red Guards reborn in the U.S.A. They are Krylenko, and Vyshinsky reincarnate.
I don’t believe I have ever seen so many people so morally deconstructed and abased as I have in very recent years, and I can hardly believe it … even though I have myself [along with many others] been saying that this is what would inevitably happen if intellectual trends of two and three decades ago took hold in popular society.
But to see these punk Stalinists unashamedly menacing others as a matter of course – even to the point of a U.S. Representative alluding to nuking a recalcitrant portion of the population, baffles me.
They are angry without reason, care almost nothing for reason, and just don’t seem emotionally capable of stopping or recognizing any limits.
How can you relate to or live at peace with such people – who obviously have no such aim with regard to you.?
The latest thing I’ve seen around — more than once, from different origins — is The Guillotine Is Coming. Well now. Hmm.
Its even worse DNW if you actually know the younger generations
they now WANT segregation, separate but equal… Brown vs Board of ed was a waste of time… just as abortion and a social movement has done away with camps and ovens – to the point they can openly call for population control among people who have a 20% below replacement birthrate for 30+ years…
Yet in real life Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman can break article 88, i mean Aleksandr Semenovich Vindman and his identical twin brother Yevgeny were born to a Jewish family in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, and after the death of their mother, the three-year-old twins and their older brother Leonid were brought to New York in December 1979 by their father, Semyon (Simon). They grew up in Brooklyn’s “Little Odessa” neighborhood.
then again no one cared that Valerie Jarrett was in the white house
Her father had a FBI file: https://www.judicialwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/BowmanFBIfile.pdf In 1950 Bowman was in communication with a paid Soviet agent named Alfred Stern, who fled to Prague after getting charged with espionage. According to Bowman’s government file the Association of Internes and Medical Students is an organization that “has long been a faithful follower of the Communist Party line” and engages in un-American activities.
Jarrett’s father-in-law, Vernon Jarrett, was also another big-time Chicago Communist: https://www.judicialwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Vernon-Jarrett-file.pdf
For a period of time Vernon Jarrett appeared on the FBI’s Security Index and was considered a potential Communist saboteur who was to be arrested in the event of a conflict with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). His FBI file reveals that he was assigned to write propaganda for a Communist Party front group in Chicago that would “disseminate the Communist Party line among…the middle class.”
Faithful to her roots, Jarrett still has connections to many Communist and extremist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood. Jarrett and her family also had strong ties to Frank Marshal Davis, a big Obama mentor and Communist Party member with an extensive FBI file.
The list is humongous and there is no way to clean the swamp..
ESPECIALLY after Obama…
heck, you still cant convince people that the soviet union did not collapse or fall
but that it was reorganized… even if the man telling you is the highest KGB defector
with the highest rate of predictions of future happenings, and more.
Golitsyn worked in the strategic planning department of the KGB in the rank of Major. In 1961 under the name “Ivan Klimov” he was assigned to the Soviet embassy in Helsinki, Finland, as vice counsel and attaché. He defected with his wife and daughter to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) via Helsinki on December 15, 1961
Golitsyn claimed that Harold Wilson (then prime minister of the United Kingdom) was a KGB informer and an agent of influence.
but note… no matter how many times i would bring up such sources, and other such things
they were never discussed or part of anyones assesment of anything
odd that these organs of state have such power, and we dont want to act like they have any!!!
till now, and usually us against ourselves.
In 1984, Golitsyn published the book New Lies For Old, wherein he warned about a long-term deception strategy of seeming retreat from hard-line Communism designed to lull the West into a false sense of security, and finally economically cripple and diplomatically isolate the United States
In 1995, Anatoliy Golitsyn and Christopher Story published a book entitled The Perestroika Deception that claimed:
“The power of the KGB remains as great as ever … Talk of cosmetic changes in the KGB and its supervision is deliberately publicized to support the myth of ‘democratization’ of the Soviet political system.”
how many have been knowingly assasinated? politskya wasnt a topic.. but litvenenko was, only because of polonium… and the latest using nerve toxin in the UK…
of 194 predictions made in New Lies For Old, 139 had been fulfilled by 1993, 9 seemed ‘clearly wrong’, and the other 46 were ‘not soon falsifiable’
yet, who knows what was fulfilled?
Golitsyn’s book New Lies for Old claimed that “as early as 1959, the KGB was working up a perestroika-type plot to manipulate foreign public opinion on a global scale.
and the european soviet used the treaty of rome as a new constitution, not a treaty.. hidden as an economic treaty
similarly nafta was to be eventually the same… open borders… etc..
we never talked about that side of it either.. but now? not so far out is it?
“In 1992 I had unprecedented access to Politburo and Central Committee secret documents which have been classified, and still are even now, for 30 years. These documents show very clearly that the whole idea of turning the European common market into a federal state was agreed between the left-wing parties of Europe and Moscow as a joint project which Gorbachev in 1988–89 called our ‘common European home’.” (interview by The Brussels Journal, February 23, 2006). – Vladimir Bukovsky
the soviet union “fell” in 1995..
“It stretches credulity to its absolute bounds to think that suddenly, overnight, all those who were Communists will suddenly adopt a new philosophy and belief, with the result that everything will be different. I use this opportunity to warn the House and the country that that is not the truth”; and: “Every time the House approves one of these collective agreements, not least treaties agreed by the collective of the European Union, it contributes to the furtherance of the Russian strategy.” spoken to parliment by member Christopher Gill
even now with the talk of Brexit, does this even get included as some knowlege or is it just ignored?
there is 50-60 years of this..
from feminism start and take over.. and the odd coordination around the world where a different person in a different country played the same role.. and how it all converged on most of the things that people are talking now.. destruction of family, change of education, population control, racialism, gender… and on and on.. with women standing guard at the door refusing to believe women, unless they tell them to wear their underwear on the outside of their clothes.
it would be impossible for someone to catch up… given so much is openly there but all are incurious
Oleg Gordievsky? – former colonel of the KGB and KGB resident-designate (rezident) and bureau chief in London, who was a secret agent of the British Secret Intelligence Service from 1974 to 1985. The son of an NKVD officer, he was born in 1938. Although MI6 passed on information provided by Gordievsky to the American CIA, the British would not reveal their source. So the CIA conducted a covert operation to discover who the source was, and after about a year, they realised that it must be Gordievsky. However, a high-ranking American CIA officer, Aldrich Ames, who had been selling secrets to the KGB, passed Gordievsky’s name to Soviet counterintelligence.
you probably dont know his name let alone what he did!!!!!!!!
he claimed he was poisoned with thallium.. something the soviets used to use, before switching to polonium
i think that i neos discussion of that, thallium came up – but only cause i brought it up.
and who can forget Yuri Bezemenov?
In 1984, he gave an interview to G. Edward Griffin. In the interview, Bezmenov explained the methods used by the KGB for the gradual subversion of the political system of the United States
its near 2020 and how did it turn out so far?
Under the pen-name Tomas D. Schuman, Bezmenov authored the book Love Letter to America. The author’s biography of the book likens Bezmenov to Winston Smith, from George Orwell’s 1984 // In 1983, at a lecture in Los Angeles, Bezmenov expressed the opinion that he “wouldn’t be surprised” if the Soviet Union had shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 007 in order to kill Larry McDonald, an anti-communist Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives.
in fact… there were a lot of people from the Democrat party that ended up replaced and even the lion of the senate ted kennedy after the assasination attempted to get help from the KGB to defeat ronald reagan.
lots and lots of other stuff.. amazing stuff.. validated and verified stuff..
stuff that one famous person claimed that without, we would not even know our own history!
The latest thing I’ve seen around — more than once, from different origins — is The Guillotine Is Coming. Well now. Hmm.
miklos000rosza: The latest thing I’ve noticed is this rote Millenial retort to the Older Generation:
OK, boomer.
I don’t know what I would make of me, if I were suddenly 20 years old. The Kids May Be Alright, but they are not happy.
“The Who-The Kids Are Alright”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbSdHMkWafc
And BTW, there are now more Millenials than Boomers.
oh. i left out Aleksandr Poteyev – Colonel Aleksandr Nikolayevich Poteyev (????????? ?????????? ??????) was the former Deputy Head of Directorate “S” of the Foreign Intelligence Service (Russia) from 2000-2010
thats how long ago? not long..
On June 24, 2010, without having informed his superiors beforehand, Poteyev purchased a rail ticket from Moscow to Minsk. From there, he made his way to Ivano-Frankivsk, then on to Frankfurt, before finally arriving at CIA headquarters in the United States on June 26, 2010. The following day, on June 27, 2010, the FBI began arresting the Russian spies who had been operating within the United States under Poteyev’s direction
Sometime in or around the autumn of 2014, a Russian assassin within the United States is reported to have tracked the whereabouts of Poteyev, as well as members of his family.
On July 7, 2016, Russian news agencies reported unconfirmed rumors that Poteyev had died in the United States
OK boomer allegedly is a retort to anyone who tries to interrupt a youthful argument about climate change or socialism or whatever with numbers or facts. And it can be used on anyone suffering from “oldthought” whether or not they’re actually old.
sdferr on November 7, 2019 at 5:12 pm said:
The Federalist, Erielle Davidson: Emails Reveal Burisma Consulting Firm Leveraged Hunter Biden To Get State Dept. Meetings
Artfldgr on November 7, 2019 at 6:48 pm said:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/11/07/house-democrats-release-impeachment-testimony-of-top-state-dept-official/
* * *
Were the Republicans on the committee allowed to ask if “top State Department official George Kent” was one of the people who knew about the lobbying of the State department?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Tom Grey — a commenter on Surber’s blog makes an interesting observation about Democrat hypocrisy (shouldn’t that be a hyphenated word by now?)
xxxNovember 6, 2019 at 3:53 PM
>>> The Impeachment inquiry is a moot process…The Dems and media have already told us that Biden couldn’t be investigated by Potus as he is a candidate for President and an opponent of Trump. Well, since Trump is an announced/ declared candidate for 2020, I believe since he declared this his first months in office; the Mueller Report, et al. are attempts by the Dem Party to find dirt on a POTUS election candidate using agencies of the U.S. Govt. illegally to do so…Quo Erat Demonstandum ?
John Solomon’s post has the answer to my question about Kent at State (heh).
Thanks ‘dgr.
“Kent testified he personally intervened in mid-2016 to stop USAID’s joint project with Burisma because American officials believed the corruption allegations against the gas firm raised concern.”
and
“Kent’s stoppage of the USAID project adds to a growing body of evidence that Burisma and its corruption issues were causing heartburn inside the State Department during the end of Joe Biden’s tenure as Vice President.
Another State official has reportedly testified he tried to warn Biden’s office that the Burisma matter posed a conflict of interest but was turned away by the vice president’s aides.”
and
“internal State memos I obtained this week under FOIA show Hunter Biden and Archer had multiple contacts with Secretary of State John Kerry and Deputy Secretary Tony Blinken in 2015-16, and that Burisma’s own American legal team was lobbying State to help eliminate the corruption allegations against it in Ukraine.
Hunter Biden’s name was specifically invoked as a reason why State officials should assist, the memos show. ”
and
“So after weeks of Democrats and their media allies suggesting it was a “conspiracy theory” that the U.S. embassy had pressured Ukrainian authorities not to pursue certain investigations, Kent confirmed it.
Of course I knew it was true all along because before I ever aired Lutsenko’s interview, I interviewed a senior State official who confirmed the embassy had engaged in such pressure. Now it’s time for the rest of the media to catch up.”
New viewpoints
As with all the rest of the testimony leaked by Schiff’s committee, the media (on BOTH sides) discusses it as if the testifier/witness was absolutely telling the unvarnished total truth, no ifs-ands-or-buts allowed. But we don’t KNOW that to be the case, with no cross-examination allowed.
Specifically, what lies did he allege, and how did he prove they are lies, if he did so prove?
The transcript is 355 pages long, and I can’t search it in the embedded Scribd format that seems to be the only thing available on-line right now.
Note that NPR later assumes the Democrats’ claims to be true rather than quoting Kent directly.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/what-diplomat-george-kent-said-about-rudy-giuliani-and-hunter-biden
This one — I don’t think Giuliani is stupid enough to destroy Trump’s case, so I note that he doesn’t exactly say what the headline implies.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/giuliani-ukraine-quid-pro-quo-intended-to-benefit-trump-personally
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/impeachment-through-the-looking-glass
This is why trial courts don’t allow hear-say evidence, excuse me, “evidence.”
https://thefederalist.com/2019/11/06/testimony-transcript-shows-william-taylor-never-talked-to-trump-wasnt-even-on-july-25-phone-call/
Mirengoff cites a NYT story, which I can’t read, but seems to accept the Times’ narrative uncritically. Can anyone else get behind the paywall and check it out?
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/11/report-zelensky-was-about-to-announce-biden-investigation-when-aid-was-released.php
Paul Mirengoff’s readers are not happy.
Some cherry-picked comments – still, they are representative of the universe of comments, because I only found one remark that was even modestly supportive of Paul’s post.
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John Solomon reported that Ukraine opened a Biden investigation in March 2019. There are court filings to verify this.
This NYT story doesn’t mention that at all.
Funny.
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I’m so beyond fed up with what’s considered “news” today. It is 100% impossible to get the truth without working for it on your own, trying to see who is full of it and who is not. I don’t blindly trust John Solomon, either. But until he is proven to be absolutely wrong in this instance, what am I gonna do? Do I need to go to Ukraine myself and figure out this BS? The court records were faked? Solomon said the the U.S. government became aware of this new investigation in April!
Just referring to the NYT like Paul does here, apparently not knowing anything beyond what those clowns put in the paper, is frustrating for me because I’m sick of doing basic work real journalists refuse to do (I’m talking about the NYT, not Paul.) But reading posts like this is not helpful. I like Paul (seriously). I think he’s intelligent. I also think he actually believes the NYT is earnest when it claims it has “All the News That’s Fit to Print.”
That paper is an embarrassment.
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I don’t go so far as others here in saying that anything in the Times is automatically worthless. But for Paul Mirengoff to repeat its claims (about this utterly murky story in particular) as if confirmed and clear in their implications, given all that this site among others who keep tabs on the Times has made clear in recent years, is arrogant and a failure to treat the audience here with some respect.
I myself actually do not find the bare details of this report implausible. However, for Power Line fans especially, I think it is mandatory to clarify why any of this is significant. Why do you think it is significant Paul? In relation to which of the thousands of other presidential calls, about which you know nothing, do you think this one stands out and why? I’ve been waiting for anyone to answer that question. So far, no one has. Perhaps for the very good reason that such calls have ALWAYS been considered privileged and off limits. So for me, the only relevant question is why was that long-standing norm broken here? I have so far seen absolutely no attempt to answer this in the only way possible – by proving the call is out of the ordinary in the extreme. I simply don’t buy that it is.
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This is all hearsay and speculation, as interpreted or perhaps made up by “a senior fellow at the Democratic Initiatives Foundation who has close ties to the Ukrainian government,” and a former foreign minister who “said there was no telling what Mr. Zelensky would have ended up saying in the interview.”
Of course, it’s in the rabidly anti-Trump New York Times, so it must be swallowed hook, line, and sinker, according to Mirengoff. Meanwhile, the President of Ukraine says “there was no pressure.”
Mr Trump did say that he didn’t want to continue with the aid to the notoriously corrupt Ukrainian government until he was reassured that the new President would promise reforms. When Mr Trump was reassured, he OK’d the aid. That is entirely within the President’s duties and responsibilities under Article II of the Constitution.
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Moreover, doesn’t anybody want to know if Biden was a crook, and if he isn’t, doesn’t anybody want an investigation to clear his name? This whole impeachment charade is to obscure Biden’s possible corruption.
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Hey, Paul, Trump didn’t violate Ukrainian law either. Yet the Ukrainians had no qualms about helping Hillary dig dirt on Trump, assisting the Mueller team in digging dirt on Trump and helping convict Manafort. Yet somehow, despite that history, all of a sudden it would not be allowable for the Ukraine to investigate the obvious corruption surrounding Burisma holdings because it would be meddling in US politics.
That only makes sense to Democrats and never-trumpers.
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“… in a case where Joe Biden, however unethically he may have acted, clearly did not violate Ukrainian law.”
I don’t know Ukrainian law, but how do you know there was no violation if there was no investigation? And why do you not seem to care about knowing any details regarding Biden, his son and Burisma? Biden is running for president. Shouldn’t the American people know the details here prior to voting? Why do you seem to not care at all about that? It’s mind boggling.
If a VP is in charge of foreign policy of a country and that VP’s son makes 3 million from an energy company in that country, this is apparently of no interest to you? That is the next best thing to a direct 3 million dollar payment to the Vice President. No problem there? I’m sorry, but WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH YOU!
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Zelinsky cancelling his statement is hardly a bombshell worthy of a post. The bottom line is, the aid was released without conditions. Motivation for releasing the money is irrelevant. [Unless you are a Republican; then motive is the only thing that matters. – AF]
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Biden may not have violated Ukrainian law; he violated several American laws.
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Why do you do completely uncritical reprints of claims from the NYT? What value are you adding? How does that comport with the mission of this blog?
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If you conceded there is a reasonable suspicion about breaking US law by Biden (seems evident) strong enough to warrant criminal investigation, then Ukraine is bounded by treaty to help with it. You say that Ukraine preferred not to pursue criminal investigation due to high status of the suspected criminal in US, the textbook definition of corruption, like it is something good.
In reality, if true (and NYT most probably lies again) this means Ukraine accepts that high US deep state are intouchable, akin to Chaves family in Venezuela or any other banana republic. And this is exactly what Trump was elected to fight: Hillary avoiding responsibility for clear breaking laws gave him the edge.
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Maria Butina served fifteen months in prison for being an unregistered foreign agent.
When are they going to prosecute Hunter Biden?
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No matter how hard you try, you aren’t going to expose Trump doing something that literally didn’t happen… now you say it almost happened. What?
You are impeaching Trump because Biden took bribes. What kind of logic is that?
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Wasn’t it reported that Ukraine had reopened an investigation into burisma a month before trump spoke with Ukraine?
Also Paul writes “Zelensky wanted to avoid getting caught in the middle of American partisan politics”
Except biden got the prosecutor fired IN UKRAINE. Thus it is inherently about Ukranian politics as much as it is about American politics.
Also one of the dem witnesses that was supposed to be the nail in trumps coffin testified that HE had an issue with Biden’s son working for a ukranian company and went to the Vice Presidents office, but they ignored him.
So, no one was allowed to look into this when bide. Was VP and no one is allowed to look into this when biden is runnin for president. Is it Paul’s positon that all is allowable as long as it’s done overseas by a democrat? Would he have the same standard if it was don jr. And if not, maybe don should get himself set up on the board of a ukranian oligarchs company and start raking in the cash. It wouldn’t be illegal, right?
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Paul starts from the position that the New York times is telling the truth. Again….
But it fits his – “its makes sense” narrative wheeling around in his head. Now we know the one sided testimony is accurate because the really unattractive former ambassador, who looks strangely like Dr. Evil’s henchwoman in the Austin Powers movie, has testified to it being true. The same woman we know, from documentation, was actively involved in PROTECTING Biden by issuing to the Ukrainians a list of who not to investigate.
The only truth is that the Ukraine is caught in the middle. But that is what happens when you bribe Joe Biden, work to undermine an American election, and HRC doesn’t win.
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A great fisking of the commentary on impeachment over at the Washington post I highly recommend Paul in particular read.
Opening paragraph:
“As a lawyer, when I receive a brief that argues to the judge that my client is lying about facts central to the matter at issue, I expect the brief to contain quotations from my client’s alleged lies, along with hard evidence proving that my client’s statements were, in fact, lies. It’s obvious that the so-called journalists at the Washington Post never attended law school – or at least, that’s the only conclusion one can draw judging by the “opinion masquerading as fact” article that it took two WaPo employees to write”
But Paul did attend law school. And yet his commentary is yet more of the opinion masquerading as fact that is being criticized. In fact he’s taking that opinion masquerading as fact and then forming an opinion as if it was fact. So whats Paul’s excuse?
THE END
The bug-eyed Grand Inquisitor is beginning to make Joe McCarthy seem savory.
The information mentioned by Artfldgr on Hunter’s Biden’s role on Burisma’s board to possibly influence State Department matters may come to make the impeachment inquiry appear to be an attempt to obstruct justice.
From Psalm 146: “the way of the wicked he turneth upside down”.
AesopFan at 3:04 a.m.:
“…arranged for Ciaramella to step forward as the whistleblower and for Vindman to follow up by testifying to the truth of a story of which he himself was the author.”
Sounds likely, since that’s almost exactly the M.O. of the so-called Russian collusion exercise (AKA fhe first incarnation of the Trump impeachment farce):
– Create facts (e.g., secret dossiers, entrapment, forging official docs, lying and covering up).
– Leak those facts.
– Leakers confirm—independently(!!)—those facts.
– MSM echo chamber gets all excited and reports those “facts” non-stop (AKA “All the news that’s fit to print!!”)
– Rinse and repeat over and over and over again.
It’s just too ingenious to fail…
But if, by chance, at first it does not work, try and try and try again.
(A real Protestant work ethic!)
Give them Dems an “A” for effort!!
here is the “popcorn moment”
funniest thing is that the billionaires, high level millionaires and more… might be waking up to the fact that if they keep giving to the left, the left going to take their arms and legs after getting a pinky… gates is like WTF? Bloomberg wants to be president, so at least he has power if that happens… Bezos would lose over 7 billion, and of course he doesn’t have that in his pocket, he would have to liquidate… but who would be wealthy enough to buy it without liquidating what they have to pay, and with what left?
Oh… and if the US falls to those ideologies, there wont be a place on the planet safe for them… where?
standing at the precipice of two implementations of socialism:
Bloomberg and others somehow think that they would not become slaves in their own firms (fascism)
or instead be shoved aside and their property redistributed (communism)
Most here would not know the actual famous story (in other circles) where when the forces came into the baltics, they ordered the servants to take over the houses… one of the key stories was that the rich who were nice to their servants found that the servants would let them have a room in their old home… those that werent, didnt
but thats the part of these things we dont read..
having been programmed for several generations, we have packet excuses and automatic refusals
thats how pavlovian training for decades works…
and he way the brain works, you wont realize it, you will just keep giving rationalizations
the rationalizations are really messages to the other to not go there..
no different than putting heads on pikes and telling you its the forbidden land
without breaking through that, your world is smaller and fits neatly into the current thing and is comfortable
take that from someone who has traveled the forbidden land..
and wasted his time, knowing that, when things change, his attempts will be evidence for death sentence
The revolutionary is a dedicated man, merciless toward the State and toward the educated classes; and he can expect no mercy from them. Between him and them there exists, declared or concealed, a relentless and irreconcilable war to the death. He must accustom himself to torture.
All the gentle and enervating sentiments of kinship, love, friendship, gratitude, and even honor, must be suppressed in him and give place to the cold and single-minded passion for revolution. For him, there exists only one pleasure, one consolation, one reward, one satisfaction – the success of the revolution. Night and day he must have but one thought, one aim – merciless destruction. Striving cold-bloodedly and indefatigably toward this end, he must be prepared to destroy himself and to destroy with his own hands everything that stands in the path of the revolution.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
When a list of those who are condemned is made, and the order of execution is prepared, no private sense of outrage should be considered, nor is it necessary to pay attention to the hatred provoked by these people among the comrades or the people. Hatred and the sense of outrage may even be useful insofar as they incite the masses to revolt. It is necessary to be guided only by the relative usefulness of these executions for the sake of revolution. Above all, those who are especially inimical to the revolutionary organization must be destroyed; their violent and sudden deaths will produce the utmost panic in the government, depriving it of its will to action by removing the cleverest and most energetic supporters.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
regardless.. this will be the adventure of a lifetime you always wondered at watching movies, reading books and more… will you be heroes, or zeroes?
Well, hold Shiff to the Saturday, November 8 requirement – the next one is in 2025!
Barry Meislin, you left out the part of foment lots of feminism, kick the men out, and then the ladies are forced to put the kids into indoctrination that breaks their thinking, makes them weak against stress, love socialism as a fix, and reinforce that through three generations!!!!!!!
go feminism!!!
it was always said to be the way to communism in america
as they also said that america was the way it was due to families and if you destroyed that, you would be able to cause what?
the ladies did us in, and the only way to have prevented it was to be oppressive hateful men to them… but being nice to them, did what?
not suggesting not being nice… just laying out what has occured in 40 years
not that naiomi goldstein wasnt betty friedan
not that erin pizzy warned you when she fled the UK after opening the first abuse centers for both sexes describing how it was taken over by socialists
and tons more..
the ladies want warren..
they think they will do well under socialism
they wont need their mates
and creches and so on will raise their kids
ie. they want to be cattle, work hard, high taxed, funding the elite and their families who often have 4-8 kids.. like nancy pelosis 5…
funny… but if you have below replacement in the general population and population control, arent you doing the survival of the fittest by insuring your kids populate the future with more of their genetics than the losers who listen to you?
just saying
pass the popcorn..
I suspect Ciaramella — let us continue the hypothesis — was involved in a role reversal with Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman….
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/impeachment-through-the-looking-glass
AesopFan: Thanks for posting that. I had read it earlier but forgot where and was getting a little crazy trying to remember.
That’s a clever bit of work — having a fake whistleblower pose as the true whistleblower then using the true WB to validate the fake WB. Devious. Efficient.
A shame these guys aren’t working their voodoo against real enemies. It’s going to be very bad if they all get off.
I do not know, nor can I confidently construe the stance Republican committee members propose to take in this upcoming
hearingdebauchery of House committee processes. Today I find the Minority Leader has appointed Rep. Jordan to the committee for the duration of the charade of impeachment proceedings, while Rep. Rick Crawford steps aside to make way for Mr. Jordan — so I take it this appointment seems to indicate the Republicans are going to participate in some manner.Here’s hoping the befouling of Congress and justice Schiff and Pelosi aim for won’t be aided by bumbling Republican acquiescence; that the Republicans retain enough respect for their constituents, for the forms and traditions of the institution, for the dignity of the Constitutional structure they embody in part that they will know when to say loudly “No! No farther! We will not submit, we will not participate in this unjust disfigurement of our polity!”
I don’t trust they know. They’ll have to show it.
And where exactly is the Senate Intelligence Committee during all this House silliness?
Too many GOPe Reps remain too afraid of big, mean TV news folks saying bad things about them.
Senate Intel has a Republican chairman up to his neck in the Spygate hoax. You don’t want that mess of fools involved.