impeachment inquiry hearings thread

[horncyclist 1387]

2 minutes ago, yoladu said:

Boo Hoo!

How did this guy get through life with the way he treats people?

It is Interpersonal Skills 101. You want people to have your back? Don't shit down their throats.

 

 

 

He got a bunch of money from his Daddy and then, when that ran out, from his Daddy Putin. It's amazing what you can accomplish when everything is handed to you.

[yoladu 4094]

9 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

Correct. If he can’t have the win, he’ll blow everything up. If he can’t have this country, nobody can. Seriously, that’s the level of narcissist psychosis we’re dealing with here.
And the GOP continues to happily strap more dynamite to his suicide vest. And honestly, I think it’s because they’ve bought into that same ideology - let us stay in power, or we’ll destroy everything.
It’s classic terrorist tactics.

[RDCanecutter 26443]

9 minutes ago, yoladu said:

^^^We laugh at Enraged Gamer, but if we were smart we'd open up Table-Top Smash Cardio Fitness Warrior Gym, and fat-ass yuppies would line up demanding that we take all their money.

[4th&Five 41552]

 

[jimmyjazz 45952]

1 hour ago, horncyclist said:

Is it clear they didn't know about it? 

It's the exact opposite.  Of course the were aware aid was being withheld -- THEY HADN'T RECEIVED THE MONEY.

Furthermore, they were aware of the reasons why aid was being withheld.  It's in Taylor's opening statement.  Trump is lying.  (Surprise.)

[pyrohornIII 4814]

16 hours ago, DixonHur said:

Sounds like just another grift to me.

This person is obviously more interested in making a buck than saving the Republic.  

I think this OpEd person was thinking that at some point enough would be enough, and this administration would be held accountable.   So why not make a buck along the way.  Deep Throat never wrote a book, but also never did a face reveal either.  OpEd's problem is believing that we are in normal times and people like the Senate will do the normal thing.

11 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

This is very true.  His whole raison d'etre is Manhattan society's refusal to accept him.  If those douchewads had been more accepting of him, and Graydon Carter and Spy hadn't made fun of his hands, he'd be a low profile rich grifter.

He can accept peripheral, deniable humiliation:  numerous bankruptcies, business failures, paying off whores, all that.  But a conviction by judicial process, appealed and affirmed is a bridge too far.

 

11 hours ago, cactusflinthead said:

Goes back farther than that. It's something that he got as a child. His whole life has been an effort to preserve his own skin. 

I think you are both right.  It goes back to outdoing his father.  While Fred made lots of money he never was accepted in the Manhattan circles, and dickhead took it upon himself to get the family there.  

[SuingToGetAMessageBoard? 3861]

2 minutes ago, pyrohornIII said:

Deep Throat ... never did a face reveal either

Mark felt on his death bed

[pyrohornIII 4814]

As far as DOTUS being impeached, removed, resigned, voted out, dies in office, etc.,  I think he's going to implode and his downfall will be blamed on age.  His base will say it was dementia and pressure from the media that brought this great man down.  His poor decision making in the end was due to the constant badgering of the do nothing democrats and fake news.  It plays right into his HARRASSMENT!! tweets. 

Pardon him, let the SDNY take care of him.  But more to the point, hang his thieving, grifting family by their heels in public.  Over and over.  Make sure the base knows they all were played to enable these crooks to enrich themselves.  Kill the dynasty talk once and for all.  Make that whole family a bad memory for the country, and it will destroy Trump, since his name and reputation is everything to him.  

We are living in that period in 'The Emperor's New Clothes' that is right before the little boy points out their nudity.  The scales will fall from a lot of eyes and although there are quite a few that will stupidly protest and die by Trump, more will slink back into their holes, only to wait for another asshole like the orange asshole. 

 

Oh btw, I think the world should take away all those trump properties and give them to Kurds to run and live in.  Or blow up, I don't give a shit.

[jimmyjazz 45952]

1 minute ago, pyrohornIII said:

Pardon him, let the SDNY take care of him. 

Picking a nit here:  SDNY is a federal court.  I assume you're talking about a state court in New York.

[pyrohornIII 4814]

10 minutes ago, SuingToGetAMessageBoard? said:

Mark felt on his death bed

Sorry, meant he didn't do it while it would impact his life dramatically with money or attention. 

[pyrohornIII 4814]

Just now, jimmyjazz said:

Picking a nit here:  SDNY is a federal court.  I assume you're talking about a state court in New York.

Yes.  I was ranting. 

[HenryJames 66052]

1 hour ago, Mrs Whiggins said:

And here we go, GOP doubling down again:

 

[4th&Five 41552]

 

[RomaVicta 29907]

11 hours ago, henrygandorf said:

at this point, if you told me the senate voted to remove him, i would still put it at 50/50 that he still wouldn't leave.

I hope so. Removed from office, he is entitled to no Secret Service, no White House employees, no army, no nothing. He'd be removed in cuffs as a trespasser in the White House. 

Do it.

[4th&Five 41552]

 

[Judge Roybeanbag 11819]

1 hour ago, Mrs Whiggins said:

And here we go, GOP doubling down again:

 

[jimmyjazz 45952]

8 minutes ago, 4th&Five said:

 

The good news is, Mr. Whip, you don't need to come to a hard and fast conclusion.  Vote "no" on impeachment.  Trump will still be impeached if the House Dems decide that's what needs to happen.  "Elections have consequences", indeed.

[kevwun 15788]

They want transparency so they can more easily sabotage the process.

[Horn Under a Bad Sign 20400]

Fooler initiative is a good writer and this is a great thread that he's put together:
 

I loved this bit of tweets from that thread:

 

 

 

 

I mean "Taylor went to Mike Pompeo and was like "promise me there ain't gonna be no fuck shit. Cause I heard there was fuck shit afoot."   Pompeo was like "cross my heart, fam, this is a fuck shit free operation. We're in this bitch trying to protect the sanctity of the sovereign Ukrainian state. We're gonna help this new government legitimize the shit out of itself, and keep the russians at bay like the goddamn americans that we are. Promise"    is gold, Jerry.  Absolute gold!





 

[SuingToGetAMessageBoard? 3861]

sounds like he is paraphrasing an written document, which as we all know, deserves censure and/or impeachment.

[DDD Dad 14339]

Contradicting Trump, Ukraine Knew of Aid Freeze Before It Became Public

Contradicting Trump, Ukraine Knew of Aid Freeze Before It Became Public

Top officials were told in early August about the delay of $391 million in security assistance, undercutting a chief argument President Trump has used to deny any quid pro quo.

A military instructor in the United States Army and Ukrainian service members during multinational drills in Lviv, Ukraine, last month.CreditGleb Garanich/Reuters

By Andrew E. Kramer and Kenneth P. Vogel

• Oct. 23, 2019, 11:10 a.m. ET

KIEV, Ukraine — To Democrats who say that President Trump’s decision to freeze a $391 million military aid package to Ukraine was intended to bully Ukraine’s leader into carrying out investigations for Mr. Trump’s political benefit, the president and his allies have had a simple response: There could not have been any quid pro quo because the Ukrainians did not know the assistance had been blocked.

Following testimony by William B. Taylor Jr., the top United States diplomat in Ukraine, to House impeachment investigators on Tuesday that the freezing of the aid was directly linked to Mr. Trump’s demand for the investigations, the president took to Twitter on Wednesday morning to approvingly quote a Republican member of Congress saying neither Mr. Taylor nor any other witness had “provided testimony that the Ukrainians were aware that military aid was being withheld.”

But in fact, word of the aid freeze had gotten to high-level Ukrainian officials by the first week in August, according to interviews and documents obtained by The New York Times.

The problem was not a bureaucratic glitch, the Ukrainians were told then. To address it, they were advised, they should reach out to Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, according to the interviews and records.

The timing of the communications about the issue, which have not previously been reported, shows that Ukraine was aware the White House was holding up the funds weeks earlier than United States and Ukrainian officials had acknowledged. And it means that the Ukrainian government was aware of the freeze during most of the period in August when Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, and two American diplomats were pressing President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine to make a public commitment to the investigations being sought by Mr. Trump.

The communications did not explicitly link the assistance freeze to the push by Mr. Trump and Mr. Giuliani for the investigations. But in the communications, officials from the United States and Ukraine discuss the need to bring in the same senior aide to Mr. Zelensky who had been dealing with Mr. Giuliani about Mr. Trump’s demands for the investigations, signaling a possible link between the matters.

Word of the aid freeze got to the Ukrainians at a moment when Mr. Zelensky, who had taken office a little more than two months earlier after a campaign in which he promised to root out corruption and stand up to Russia, was off balance and uncertain how to stabilize his country’s relationship with the United States.

Days earlier, he had listened to Mr. Trump implore him on a half-hour call to pursue investigations touching on former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and a debunked conspiracy theory about Ukrainian involvement in the 2016 hack of the Democratic National Committee. Mr. Zelensky’s efforts to secure a visit to the White House — a symbolic affirmation of support he considered vital at a time when Russia continued to menace Ukraine’s eastern border — seemed to be stalled. American policy toward Ukraine was being guided not by career professionals but by Mr. Giuliani.

Mr. Taylor told the impeachment investigators that it was only on the sidelines of a Sept. 1 meeting in Warsaw between Mr. Zelensky and Vice President Mike Pence that the Ukrainians were directly told the aid would be dependent on Mr. Zelensky giving Mr. Trump something he wanted: an investigation into Burisma, the company that had employed Hunter Biden, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s son.

American and Ukrainian officials have asserted that Ukraine learned that the aid had been held up only around the time it became public through a news story at the end of August.

The aid freeze is getting additional scrutiny from the impeachment investigators on Wednesday as they question Laura K. Cooper, a deputy assistant defense secretary for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia. This month, Democrats subpoenaed both the Defense Department and the White House Office of Management and Budget for records related to the assistance freeze.

As Mr. Taylor’s testimony suggests, the Ukrainians did not confront the Trump administration about the freeze until they were told in September that it was linked to the demand for the investigations. The Ukrainians appear to have initially been hopeful that the problem could be resolved quietly and were reluctant to risk a public clash at a delicate time in relations between the two nations.

President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine at a military training center near the village of Stare.CreditGleb Garanich/Reuters

The disclosure that the Ukrainians knew of the freeze by early August corroborates, and provides additional details about, a claim made by a C.I.A. officer in his whistle-blower complaint that sparked the impeachment inquiry by House Democrats.

“As of early August, I heard from U.S. officials that some Ukrainian officials were aware that U.S. aid might be in jeopardy, but I do not know how or when they learned of it,” the anonymous whistle-blower wrote. The complainant said that he learned that the instruction to freeze the assistance “had come directly from the president,” and said it “might have a connection with the overall effort to pressure Ukrainian leadership.”

Publicly, Mr. Zelensky has insisted he felt no pressure to pursue the investigations sought by Mr. Trump.

“There was no blackmail,” Mr. Zelensky said at a news conference earlier this month. He cited as evidence that he “had no idea the military aid was held up” at the time of his July 25 call with Mr. Trump, when Mr. Trump pressed him for investigations into the Bidens and a debunked conspiracy theory about Ukrainian involvement in the hacking of the Democratic National Committee in 2016.

Mr. Zelensky has said he knew about the hold up of the military aid before his meeting in Poland on Sept. 1 with Mr. Pence, but has been vague about exactly when he learned about it. “When I did find out, I raised it with Pence at a meeting in Warsaw,” he said this month.

In conversations over several days in early August, a Pentagon official discussed the assistance freeze directly with a Ukrainian government official, according to records and interviews. The Pentagon official suggested that Mr. Mulvaney had been pushing for the assistance to be withheld, and urged the Ukrainians to reach out to him.

The Pentagon official described Mr. Mulvaney’s motivations only in broad terms but made clear that the same Ukrainian official, Andriy Yermak, who had been negotiating with Mr. Giuliani over the investigations and a White House visit being sought by Mr. Zelensky should also reach out to Mr. Mulvaney over the hold on military aid.

A senior administration official who was not authorized to speak publicly about the issue said on Monday that Mr. Mulvaney “had absolutely no communication with the Ukranians about this issue.”

Ukrainian officials had grown suspicious that the assistance was in jeopardy because formal talks with the Pentagon on its release had concluded by June without any apparent problem.

In talks during the spring with American officials, the Ukrainians had resolved conditions for the release of the assistance, and believed everything was on schedule, according to Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, Ukraine’s former vice prime minister for Euro-Atlantic Integration.

But by early August, the Ukrainians were struggling to get clear answers from their American contacts about the status of the assistance, according to American officials familiar with the Ukrainians’ efforts.

In the days and weeks after top Ukrainian officials were alerted to the aid freeze, Gordon D. Sondland, the United States ambassador to the European Union, and Kurt D. Volker, then the State Department’s special envoy to Ukraine, were working with Mr. Giuliani to draft a statement for Mr. Zelensky to deliver that would commit him to pursuing the investigations, according to text messages between the men turned over to the House impeachment investigators.

The text messages between Mr. Volker, Mr. Sondland and the top Zelensky aide did not mention the hold up of the aid. It was only in September, after the Warsaw meeting, that Mr. Taylor wrote in a text message to Mr. Sondland, “I think it’s crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign.”

After being informed on Sept. 1 in Warsaw that the aid would be released only if Mr. Zelensky agreed to the investigations, Ukrainian officials, including their national security adviser and defense minister, were troubled by their inability to get answers to questions about the freeze from United States officials, Mr. Taylor testified.

Through the summer, Mr. Zelensky had been noncommittal about the demands from Mr. Volker, Mr. Sondland and Mr. Giuliani for a public commitment to the investigations. On Sept. 5, Mr. Taylor testified, Mr. Zelensky met in Kiev with Senators Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, and Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut.

Mr. Zelensky’s first question, Mr. Taylor said, was about the security aid. The senators responded, Mr. Taylor said, that Mr. Zelensky “should not jeopardize bipartisan support by getting drawn into U.S. domestic politics.”

But Mr. Sondland was still pressing for a commitment from Mr. Zelensky, and was pressing him to do a CNN interview in which he would talk about pursuing the investigations sought by Mr. Trump.

Andrew E. Kramer is a reporter based in the Moscow bureau. He was part of a team that won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting for a series on Russia’s covert projection of power. @AndrewKramerNYT

Ken Vogel covers the confluence of money, politics and influence from Washington. He is also the author of “Big Money: 2.5 Billion Dollars, One Suspicious Vehicle, and a Pimp — on the Trail of the Ultra-Rich Hijacking American Politics.” @kenvogel • Facebook

[Doc Sam Beckett 5793]

Quick, new talking points! 

It's not transparent seems to be the new one... 

[Lurch 5930]

[Mrs Whiggins 13050]

D*mmit, rule of law you idoits:

 

[Mdhorn 5949]

19 hours ago, Michael Knight said:

Smocking gun? More lying covfefe from the fake news. 

[Nice Guy Eddie 13512]

Everyone knows that Trump withheld the govt money for political gain. I don't believe that any GOP would disagree in private. The real question is whether Trump has any evidence or reasoning that can provide him cover that Congressional GOP can stand behind. 

Many in the GOP have already publicly agreed that foreign govts cannot be allowed to meddle in our elections. And now they are being faced with the facts that Trump not only invited them to interfere, he bribed them with congressional funding.  

I don't think the Mulvaney argument of "Trump didn't use the words 'quid pro quo' " will hold much water.

[henrygandorf 29191]

1 hour ago, kevwun said:

They want transparency so they can more easily sabotage the process.

republicans want transparency so that this process does not turn into a circus.

once they make all the hearings public and televised, they can use their 5 minutes to (checks notes) turn the proceedings into a circus.

[jimmyjazz 45952]

9 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

I don't think the Mulvaney argument of "Trump didn't use the words 'quid pro quo' " will hold much water.

That's the kind of argument a 12 YO kid would make.

Imagine if this were a court of law -- would anyone actually dispute the overwhelming evidence, including the defendant's own testimony, that this "crime" was committed?

[kevwun 15788]

In the immortal words of Darren Hambrick, "What do do me a favor mean?"

[RomaVicta 29907]

1 minute ago, henrygandorf said:

republicans want transparency so that this process does not turn into a circus.

once they make all the hearings public and televised, they can use their 5 minutes to (checks notes) turn the proceedings into a circus.

The last thing they want is transparency, and they know that the hearings won't go public. By claiming they do want transparency, the GOPs make the process look sneaky. It's cheap dishonest theater for the morons looking for a way to keep believing in the Trump lie.

I loathe these people. I used to believe that at least some of the GOPs were just doing what they thought was best for the country even if I disagreed with them. With each bit of dishonesty since the 2016 election, they prove they are rotten through and through. Susan Collins' speech about Kavanaugh proved it once and for all.

[Nice Guy Eddie 13512]

23 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

That's the kind of argument a 12 YO kid would make.

Imagine if this were a court of law -- would anyone actually dispute the overwhelming evidence, including the defendant's own testimony, that this "crime" was committed?

"ya honor, when I told Tommy "Ice Pick" Bonnano to take care of our friend, I meant to take him out for a nice dinner and show. I had no idea Ice Pick would interpret that as a request to kill him.  As your own tape demonstrates, I never used the words, stab him with an ice pick"

[4th&Five 41552]

 

[horncyclist 1387]

The cycle of Trump putting up a defense and the media knocking it down within hours is becoming comical. Unfortunately, many people will only see his defenses and have no reason to doubt them. Nevertheless, the tide is turning. That Quinnipac poll was before the Taylor testimony. Have to imagine support for removal is above 50% now. 

[Mrs Whiggins 13050]

37 minutes ago, RomaVicta said:

The last thing they want is transparency, and they know that the hearings won't go public. By claiming they do want transparency, the GOPs make the process look sneaky. It's cheap dishonest theater for the morons looking for a way to keep believing in the Trump lie.

I loathe these people. I used to believe that at least some of the GOPs were just doing what they thought was best for the country even if I disagreed with them. With each bit of dishonesty since the 2016 election, they prove they are rotten through and through. Susan Collins' speech about Kavanaugh proved it once and for all.

I think it was on this forum but I may have read it elsewhere, where it was posited that most if not all of the GOP (and probably not a few Democrats) have been the recipients of Parnas and Fruman type funding. The DeSantis return of $$ was the tip of the iceberg. Money and power. Power and money. Very few Jimmy Stewarts (Mr. Smith...) that stick around for long. I suspect if one isn't willing to play their game, then one gets shut out. Mitt was a freshman senator, and it's not like he didn't know DC, but I think he underestimated just how corrupt it had gotten. And look what it got him when he began to make a little noise.

[Longhorn_Fan68 33870]

man, the stunts pulled today by GOP congressman and everything Trump and his cohorts have done to date make me think that we'll be amending the Constitution for a decade to make sure this shit doesn't happen again. What we seem to be seeing is a "well, the framers didn't think of this bullshit, let's try it" approach that is largely working - but destined to fail. But these clowns sure have exposed all the holes in our constitutional defense.

[Mrs Whiggins 13050]

1 minute ago, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

man, the stunts pulled today by GOP congressman and everything Trump and his cohorts have done to date make me think that we need to impeach William Barr, too.

FIFY

 

Although the rest of what you said is valid.

[AnTiM 1666]

Great, now they are preventing hearings from being heard.  Time to throw every last one of these cocksuckers out of office./

[Longhorn_Fan68 33870]

lulz: 

 

[Horn Dog 9855]

Repub congressman wanted a censure vote?  It's time to give it to them.  If that doesn't stop the BS, start throwing their ass in jail.

[Celery Man 20949]

Maybe if they eat their fruit roll ups and take a nap they’ll calm down

Edited October 23, 2019 by Celery Man

[Longhorn_Fan68 33870]

seriously how they not all in custody right now?

[triplehorn 2664]

Re impeaching Barr, he's got some splainin' to do.

 

 

[wildcat09 29354]

3 minutes ago, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

seriously how they not all in custody right now?

Democrats are pussies. 

[Irwin F Fletcher 3550]

9 minutes ago, Celery Man said:

Maybe if they eat their fruit roll ups and take a nap they’ll calm down

I'd say lock them out when they leave to use the restroom, but we all know those old white men put on their depends today. 

[lemonlime 5503]

18 minutes ago, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

man, the stunts pulled today by GOP congressman and everything Trump and his cohorts have done to date make me think that we'll be amending the Constitution for a decade to make sure this shit doesn't happen again. What we seem to be seeing is a "well, the framers didn't think of this bullshit, let's try it" approach that is largely working - but destined to fail. But these clowns sure have exposed all the holes in our constitutional defense.

We could amend the Constitution repeatedly and it wouldn't make any difference whatsoever.  It's a piece of paper.  If the people in charge of our government want to use it as toilet paper, it doesn't matter what words are on that paper.

[Biff Tannen 45685]

Just now, wildcat09 said:

Democrats are pussies. 

This.  There will be riots in the end if they don't do their job.  There will probably be riots anyway.

[lemonlime 5503]

1 minute ago, Biff Tannen said:

This.  There will be riots in the end if they don't do their job.  There will probably be riots anyway.

There should have already been riots.  

[Longhorn_Fan68 33870]

seems relevant:

 

[henrygandorf 29191]

totally normal behavior.

 

[Doc Sam Beckett 5793]

12 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

Democrats are pussies. 

They should have removed those fucking idiots immediately. Instead they let them sit there and send out tweets about Schiff's secret lair and Schiff's hidden chamber and shit. Unbelievable.