The impeachment trial: truth, lies, and narratives
It’s often been said that left and right in this country are watching different movies. We do indeed tend to read different sources of information in which different things are covered and emphasized and others ignored. But regaridng the impeachment trial, we are watching (or in most cases, not watching) the same movie, and seeing two realities.
That doesn’t mean the two “realities” are equally true, however.
When I was in law school, I learned ways to argue for almost any position. That’s what lawyers do if they are to serve their clients – argue the case to the best of their ability. So lawyers are adept at making arguments out of almost nothing at all, and can use emotion or rhetoric or any number of tricks to create what appears to some people to be a sound argument when it’s really all smoke and mirrors.
That doesn’t mean, however, that a thinking person can’t listen to one argument vs. another argument and decide one is correct the other is bunk. Sometimes it is just that clear. But it’s not clear to everyone. People can be swayed by arguments without much behind them, if those arguments happen to touch on certain things that matter to the listener, and fit in with the listener’s pre-existing biases.
In a regular courtroom, our system of law tries to build in rules that encourage a jury to come to the best verdict, one that reflects not prejudice or emotion or a reaction to rhetorial devices, but instead is based on scrupulously validated evidence. Those rules are many and complex, but they include – as an added safeguard against miscarriages of justice – a presumption of innocence for the defendant. Justice does not always triumph, but the idea is to encourage that triumph by those rules.
If has also often been said that an impeachment trial is not an ordinary trial, although it uses the same word. The point of an impeachment trial is different: removal from office. And although the Constitution dictates that a high crime/misdemeanor is supposed to be the charge, there is really nothing to stop the House from disobeying that directive, as we have seen with the Trump impeachment. The voters in the trial portion are neither jurors nor judges, they are senators who will vote to impeach or not, and although they are supposed to be objective they are political actors deeply and personally involved in the trial’s outcome.
I cannot even imagine listening to Schiff and Nadler and not recoiling in revulsion from their obvious lies and the tremendous weakness of their case. Just to take one small example:
“They said things over and over again that are simply not true,” Cipollone added. “One of them is there is no evidence of Donald Trump’s interest in burden sharing.” Yet Burden-sharing was discussed in the transcript of the call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on July 25. The lawyer quoted directly from the transcript of the call.
Democrats, on the other hand, see and hear something quite different, cheered on by the gushing MSM:
The excessive fawning by pundits and reporters over a middling speech by a middling congressman was just insufferable.
If you think I exaggerate, take Greg Miller, a national-security correspondent for the Washington Post, who contended that Schiff is perhaps the most “underestimated” politician California has ever produced, and “will leave a mark on history, exceeding nearly all contemporaries.”
Richard Stengel, the former editor of Time magazine — and now an advocate for overturning the First Amendment — declared: “When we get back to teaching civics in this country—as we must do—Adam Schiff’s sweeping, beautifully-wrought opening argument, should be on the syllabus.”
CNN chief legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, an ostensibly unbiased observer, prefaced his remarks by saying, “I don’t want to sound like a partisan,” before praising a “dazzling” performance — the second-best courtroom appearance he’d ever witnessed. “Adam Schiff knows the facts. That is something that you can’t fake,” Toobin told the panel.
The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin disagreed with both, insisting that Schiff had delivered “the most brilliant legal presentation I have heard. None comes close. The tone, the facts, the anticipated defenses. I am in awe.”
It’s mind-boggling, and yet it’s not. The first element here is confirmation bias. The second is that even I must admit that, given what Schiff had to work with – essentially, nothing but innuendo and lies – he made the most if it in rhetorical terms. It’s hard to see how a better argument could have been made, given the same utter lack of evidence of wrongdoing, the presence of evidence that contradicts the reasons for the impeachment, and the absence of a requisite crime, as well as the high degree of suspiciousness in the actions of the Bidens regarding Ukraine.
So these commentators actually might be in awe of the fact that Schiff managed to use rhetoric to create some sort of case out of nothing.
But I think the heart of it for the MSM is that it’s a good thing the public has mostly tuned out, because then the MSM can create its own narrative, as it so often does. If their readers haven’t been watching Schiff, except for a few moments here and there, and mostly get their news and opinion from the MSM, then the media can act as though Schiff made the incontrovertible, undeniable case for Trump’s guilt that Schiff himself insists he made, and none of their listerners will be the wiser.
I decided to impeach a cup of coffee this morning…
I impeached it good and hard.
Best cup of coffee I ever had.
Oh come on haven’t you heard Trump’s crimes are worse than the Japanese internment camps and the Trail of Tears ( both enacted by Democrat presidents of course) and this trial is the equivalent of a Stalin show trial.
Who could possibly disagree with such measured, reasonable analysis.
This is the letter I sent to my Senators this morning. They’re both lefties, so it won’t change their minds. It just reminds them that there are people in their state who don’t necessarily agree with them.
Dear Senator Murray,
The House impeachment managers have wasted the time of the Senate and the American people.
They did not do a thorough investigation. Presumably because they were in a hurry to get to the trial phase before the 2020 election season. So, they declined to go through the normal procedures of issuing subpoenas for witnesses and documents. On one hand they opined that their case was overwhelming. Yet they complained that they needed more witnesses and documents to make their case. These two conflicting stances make their efforts much less credible.
They accused the President of obstruction of Congress, but they refused to follow the time-honored and legally appropriate procedure of letting the courts decide what is protected by executive privilege. They are the ones who failed to follow normal procedures, not the POTUS.
They constructed a theoretical narrative and used snippets of witness statements and parts of documents that seemed to bolster their case. They ignored or glossed over exculpatory evidence. And most of their evidence was hearsay, opinion, or innuendo. None of this made their case more incisive.
What they presented was an overly long, repetitive narrative that proved nothing about any impeachable offense, but covered in excruciating detail all the reasons why they disagree with the POTUS’s policies and personal style. In summary, this was a lengthy, boring description of all the partisan reasons why they hate Donald J. Trump as a person and how strongly they disagree with his policies.
They have wasted our time, your time, and taxpayer money in attempting to impeach the President on strictly political issues. I ask that you search you conscience and reflect on the damage this is doing to our Republic.
Hopefully, the defense team will be brief and to the point. This politically motivated partisan exercise needs to be brought to a swift conclusion.
Schiff’s most obvious and blatant lie (though it’s hard to choose from so many) was the claim that the allegations against the Bidens had been “debunked.” The Democrats own witnesses in the House hearings admitted that Hunter’s position at Burisma raised concerns. What do the lawyers say? “Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus.”
“People can be swayed by arguments without much behind them,” [Neo]
It seems to me that the most convincing false arguments are convincing because they are based upon a false premise. Get the audience to accept the premise and the argument then appears valid. IMO this is how Progressives have set the stage for years as they argue for policies based on non-sense (e.g., 100 genders).
J.J.,
Of course Murray and Cantwell have accused the Senate Republicans of a ‘cover up’ so as you say they are beyond any kind of rational thought.
I really wonder how many of the Democrats in the senate actually truly believe a president should be removed over this. Probably a few like that Hawaii woman but their past statements along with other occasions when they were serious legislators prove their hyper partisan TDS. And I imagine in the same vein that a few Republicans hate Trump enough that they would vote to remove him if they could get away with it.
What a sad state of affairs.
Always worthwhile tuning in to Lee Smith’s and Mollie Hemingway’s twitter feeds and retweets.
https://twitter.com/leesmithdc?lang=en
https://twitter.com/MZHemingway
E.g.:
https://twitter.com/Shem_Infinite/status/1221114113046257664
https://twitter.com/LeeSmithDC/status/1220958561360019461
https://twitter.com/AKA_RealDirty/status/1220927565596151808
https://twitter.com/JohnWHuber/status/1220718829648728066
etc.
And the (or “a”) magnum opus (at least until it’s supplanted with updated information, which must inevitable appear) of the whole disgusting past several years:
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/the-fbi-scandal/
The Democratic Party’s descent into total madness is now, alas, complete and irrefutable:
https://www.foxnews.com/media/cnn-analyst-complains-about-white-men-filling-trumps-legal-team
“So these commentators actually might be in awe of the fact that Schiff managed to use rhetoric to create some sort of case out of nothing.”
Except they don’t think it is nothing. That’s the problem. I’m reminded of that line from ‘The Hunt for Red October:’
“I’m a politician…which means I’m a cheat and a liar and when I’m not kissing babies, I’m stealing their lollipops.”
Yeah, it’s melodramatic but the line is intended to define not just the character speaking it but the world in which it’s said. It’s a world where flawed people often have to make ruthless decisions and everyone is grownup enough to understand that.
There may be a few Democrats/liberals/media members who fully understand this whole impeachment is BS but they’re just trying to take maximum political advantage where they can. Such people may be despicable but they are rational and you can make a deal with rational people.
The vast majority of the Left, however, really believe Trump did something awful with Ukraine. They also believe he colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election. They believe every accusation, charge, allegation and smear leveled at Trump. They are not rational and you can’t make a deal with them.
Mike
MBunge:
But if they are logical people, and certainly if they have decent legal training, they have to know at some level that it’s nothing. Now, some may neither be logical nor have decent legal training, and they may really believe. The rest either have to be in denial and subject to wishful thinking to believe it’s something, or they have to know it’s nothing and be willing nevertheless to use it for propaganda purposes. Ye olde knaves and/or fools.
Of course, it’s they who would probably say that I’m the knave and/or fool. But I think I’ve proven my bona fides by the nature of my change experience, in which neither conformation bias nor previous political affiliation stopped me from looking at the overwhelming evidence before me and seeing a picture differently than I’d seen it earlier, and having no trouble admitting that.
That’s why I respect Dershowitz and Turley so much on this. They argue consistently about the principles, whether it supports their political side or not.
Neo has defined the essence of the problem with lawyers: Argument. No matter how bizarre the allegations, it is The Argument and the skill at Arguing that matters. Reason matters not hardly at at all, as Neo acknowledges. Facts are of course useful, but they can be, and are, twisted to suit the Argumenter’s position.
As to the impeachment and its Senate trial, I fear the Democrats have altered the US political landscape to their longterm advantage. By skullduggery. Lenin would be proud!
“It’s often been said that left and right in this country are watching different movies.”
Yes, one is a factual documentary and the other a fantasy filled with lies.
“When I was in law school, I learned ways to argue for almost any position. That’s what lawyers do if they are to serve their clients – argue the case to the best of their ability. So lawyers are adept at making arguments out of almost nothing at all, and can use emotion or rhetoric or any number of tricks to create what appears to some people to be a sound argument when it’s really all smoke and mirrors.”
“ways to argue for almost any position” is a euphemism for skillfully lying. (def. of lying: “to knowingly tell an untruth”).
“I cannot even imagine listening to Schiff and Nadler and not recoiling in revulsion from their obvious lies and the tremendous weakness of their case.”
Having drunk the kool-aid, lies spoken in service of a ‘greater truth’ are forgiven.
“given what Schiff had to work with – essentially, nothing but innuendo and lies – he made the most if it in rhetorical terms. It’s hard to see how a better argument could have been made…”
Obviously, by ‘better’ you mean skillfully disingenuous… the consequence of which for a society in which skillful deceit bears no personal consequence is an increasingly dysfunctional justice system.
And the media knows that there will be no consequence for them spinning a lying narrative to the public.
I suspect that there’s a reason why “bearing false witness” is the ninth commandment. It erodes the soul of both the individual transgressor and a society that allows it.
Neo: How can Dershowitz and Turley be ‘principled’ and have voted for Hillary?
What sort of principles can they be said to hold?
I find Turley’s blog posts somewhat iffy from the principled standpoint on occasion.
There must be a pipeline which zooms Stanford B.A.s right to Harvard Law. Schiff is one, Cory Booker another. Any others come to mind? No right-wingers in that conduit, that’s for sure!
MBunge wrote (emphasis added),
That’s just it—the Dems view themselves as making and acting upon necessary ruthless decisions in order to make us a better country. Of course, tomorrow they will mandate that each of us has to take homeless persons into our respective homes and supply them with drugs and/or drive them to mental therapy.
Wow–by coincidence, John Hinderaker at https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/01/the-china-myth-exposed.php
just wrote,
This has become a war of adjectives.
Roy,
If only it were that innocuous.
They mean to condition liberty upon State approved thinking, expression and behavior. If a future of living on your knees is acceptable, then thier machinations are of unconcern.
To Neo’s reply to MBunge, on “I’ve proven my bona fides… seeing a picture differently than I’d seen it earlier”:
More important than how you changed, is that you had the “foresight” to have changed, before the Mueller Report blew the “collusion” narrative out of the water.
Those who stuck to that narrative, until the Report spanked them in the mouth, just don’t deserve to have their judgement given any respect.
As pieces of evidence, from the “love bird” texts, to Contreras’ recusal, to the Nunes Memo, continued to cast more suspicion on this narrative, it just kept becoming harder and harder, to believe that this narrative was anywhere near the whole truth.
It’s a shame that the impeachment trial does not follow normal legal protocol for trials. In a normal trial both sides could object to the other’s tactics and the judge would rule on the dispute. Most trial judges don’t allow hearsay and opinion except rarely. Three days of mostly hearsay and opinion from the House managers with no objections is really outrageous. I wonder what Chief Justice Roberts must be thinking?
Too bad the Founders didn’t put more detail into the methods for trying an impeachment. Maybe they assumed that both sides would honor legal traditions and follow normal court room practices. Could they have visualized that a House majority would abuse this awesome power by impeaching a president just because they hate him and his policies? Yes, they probably did. A two thirds majority to convict and remove is a high bar and should have been a deterrent to frivolous impeachment. But these ideologues of the left seem to believe they can win the propaganda war because the MSM is in their corner. What other reason for embarking on such a course?
Trump will undoubtedly be exonerated, but the Senate Dems are laying the groundwork to claim that it was a cover up. Schumer and company are still arguing that it won’t be a “fair” trial unless new witnesses and documents are introduced. Thus they can claim that Trump is illegitimate. Such scummy tactics.
“… still arguing that it won’t be a “fair” trial unless…”
Actually for these goons, “it won’t be a ‘fair’ trial unless” Trump is convicted.
= = = = =
“…the Mueller Report blew the “collusion” narrative out of the water…”
Actually, since Trump’s guilt has become a religio-ideological Truth, the “Narrative” will alas always be TRUE—. Hence the Mueller Report will always be perceived a “cover-up”, as will any exoneration of Trump (including any potential Senate exoneration) from here until eternity.
= = = = =
“… spinning a lying narrative to the public.”
However, as has been oft noted, the “Narrative” (TM) is essentially “True” since the highest order of morality is to rid the “enlightened” world of Trump. (Hence even if the Narrative is “somewhat” untrue in some—or any or all—its details, it supports a “higher, moral truth” that is “indisputable” and which must therefore be supported—firmly, even rabidly—by all “right-thinking”, moral and enlightened people.
(IOW, belief in the “Narrative” has become a cult (totem? fetish?) paralleling the models of the worst that Europe has had to offer. To be sure, the actually killing hasn’t yet begun, but the character assassination, boycotting, blackballing and ostracization are in full swing. This is where we are right now; we’ve been there now for quite a while, actually, and who will design the 12-step program to enable all those people to get “clean”?…)
= = = = =
Turley and Dershowitz are often mentioned, justifiedly, as exceptional individuals for bucking the trend, standing up for law and decency and as a result being scourged, spurned or canceled (or simply ignored) by their former friends and colleagues. Another person who must be lauded (he has, but not as much as the other two, I think) is Matt Taibbi, who has, likewise, put principle above what he would probably prefer to believe.
These three, and others like them—but who?—are truly in the Lions’ Den.
Jennifer Rubin is a satirical character created by The Babylon Bee.
As a trial lawyer for almost 50 years I watched the President’s defense on Saturday and thought that the presentation was excellent. Others might complain that it didn’t contain the histrionics that would sway them, but their audience was the Senators, most of whom are lawyers. Their job was to put the proceeding in a posture for a vindication of the President. Their presentation destroyed the smoke and mirrors case of the Democrats.
Too, Stu, you notice the Pres.’ lawyers introduced the FISA/FBI/DoJ malfeasance as an element in their defense arguments. There will be further development of this theme, i.e. more fulsome exposure of the whole Spygate criminality directed against the Trump campaign and administration by the Obama admin and holdovers, all while the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court sits behind them with the 100 Senators forced to sit and listen, to say nothing of the rest of the nation who may choose to listen in. How’s about them apples, Mr. Schiff?
“…them apples…”
No sweat. He’ll just start attacking the Supreme Court, the justices and ultimately the Constitution…as “racist”, “unAmerican”, “patriarchal”, “sexist”, “fundamentally illegal”, “supporting fascism”, etc., you know, whatever.
(The emphasis will be on “RACISM”, of course. That’s the way they hope to topple the president…with the phony “1619 Project” leading the charge of this unbearable “Light Brigade”.)
Can Schiff get away with it? Of course he can. He has so far. The MSM will be churning away. The “right-thinking” folks will be nodding so hard in absolute agreement that the chiropractors nation-wide will be working through the night and weekends.
Schiff is on a roll. He and his ilk answer “to a higher court”. It may not be “real” but it plays beautifully—like a dream, in fact—and might as well be considered to be “real”.
For them it is.
File under: Dueling realities (but will Roberts censure both?)
So these commentators actually might be in awe of the fact that Schiff managed to use rhetoric to create some sort of case out of nothing.
It’s possible, but having read “The Fountainhead”, the behavior on display today seems well captured in how the Press handled Mr. Roark.
DJTrump, Twitter: “Shifty Adam Schiff is a CORRUPT POLITICIAN, and probably a very sick man. He has not paid the price, yet, for what he has done to our Country!”
heh
https://mobile.twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1221422761597394944
“…truth, lies…”
(IOW, “Where the truth lies…?”)
Don’t know how they did it, but it looks like the Babylon Bee (seemingly via a possible on-again, off-again affiliate) scooped an interview with Bernie. And it’s a doozy!
https://thefederalist.com/2020/01/25/bernie-sanders-i-dont-know-how-much-my-plans-are-going-to-cost/
Sean Davis:
https://twitter.com/seanmdav
This “Cold Civil War” business is too faux-sophisticated and semi-veiled to become anything but dirtier and dirtier; meanwhile NOTHING is being resolved and more and more cannot even be directly faced. An old-fashioned violent civil war, 19th-century style, would be cleaner. Sometimes a question needs to be answered Yes or No.
Mitt Romney strengthens the case that he would have been a poor president by announcing he is open to “witnesses” being called in the Senate.
He is basically spineless.
He failed to stand up to Obama.
He pulled Paul Ryan out of well-earned obscurity, which led to him becoming a near-Dem House Speaker, who now lives behind his walled estate in retirement, though opposing a border wall.
Utah deserves better than Mitt.
New vocabulary, some of whose words might be useful in dealing with what’s going on with the Impeachment.
See https://getpocket.com/explore/item/38-wonderful-words-with-no-english-equivalent?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Great link and terrific words (but seriously, how is anyone supposed to remember any of them?—well, except for “schlemiel”-“schlemazel”, of course)
Anyway, here’s some useful (let’s call it alt-neu) legal vocabulary, or rather legal conceptualization:
“We know he’s guilty; and the fact that we can find no actual proof of his guilt definitely proves it beyond a doubt.”
File under: Legality unbound(?)
Neo,
Here’s a very basic question on the impeachment process. There is still some question as to whether witnesses will be presented. Assuming that none are, is it understood to be the case that the Senate can vote on removal based only on the (endless) opening speeches of the two sides? That would be like allowing the jury in a criminal case to begin deliberating after opening statements. Or, if the Senate decides not to hear witnesses, is it an automatic non-removal?
Like you, I haven’t been watching the proceedings but only catch a few minutes of speechifying when I go through my regular blogs.
“That would be like allowing the jury in a criminal case to begin deliberating after opening statements.”
Pardon my shouting but THIS ISN’T LIKE A JURY IN A CRIMINAL CASE.
If this were a criminal case, Donald Trump’s lawyers would have been objecting like mad during both the House hearings and the Democrats’ opening statements in the Senate because in both instances the rules and standard practices of the U.S. judicial system were chewed up, spit out, and urinated on.
Mike
MBunge:
>Pardon my shouting but THIS ISN’T LIKE A JURY IN A CRIMINAL CASE.
I understand that. Nevertheless, it strikes me as a violation of basic common sense to have a vote on removal based on the speeches alone. (“Argument isn’t evidence.”) But my impression is that that is an unspoken possibility. Maybe I’m totally out of it and, of course, it’s assumed that the Senate may vote on removal based on the speeches alone. Anyway, that’s still my question.
Watt
“Nevertheless, it strikes me as a violation of basic common sense to have a vote on removal based on the speeches alone.”
Dude, basic common sense went out the window a long time ago. I mean, since we’re on the subject of witnesses, Democrats who REFUSED to go to court to compel the White to produce certain information or provide certain witnesses are now DEMANDING the Republican-controlled Senate do what the Democratic-controlled House would not. That doesn’t make any sense. At all.
I don’t want to be too strident on this but I just read another blog where a supposed grownup used a lot of grownup words to make the following argument (and I am not mischaracterizing it): The Democrats were entitled to conduct an impeachment inquiry in any way and for any reason they saw fit but because Donald Trump didn’t instantly and meekly comply with every Democratic demand and requirement, it is Donald Trump who is causing a Constitutional crisis.
It is only a slight exaggeration to call that pure barbarism because it is a clear declaration that rules are only things which apply to the other side.
Mike
There has been a long record of testimony by multiple “witnesses” under oath created. These are public records. Senators can both listen and read: they won’t lack for information when the Pres’ lawyers finish their opening, whereupon the Sens. have 16 hours in which to ask written questions. Then they will be in a position to make a determination whether to proceed. Or not proceed.
I had assumed that Trump’s lawyers would be able to, in effect, make a motion for Summary Judgement, after they end their presentation, on the basis that the House prosecution presented no evidence of actual impeachable offenses.
Sen. Cruz says he thinks the Senate will defer that motion til later, Snow on Pine. But not much later, if no witnesses are to be summoned. If witnesses are going to be called, all bets for a short proceeding are off.
Cruz would prefer the Senate reach a verdict of not guilty, which could come right after the question period if they so choose. The not guilty makes a better ending.
Watt:
As others have said, it’s not a trial in the usual sense, it’s some other different kind of “trial.” But if I understand your question correctly, you’re positing some sort of analogy to a trial and asking how a verdict can come without even hearing witnesses. So the best analogy (although it’s a highly flawed one) would be to a directed verdict:
In a criminal trial, it happens after only the prosecution has presented its case and it’s so weak that the defense moves for a directed verdict – an acquittal without hearing any more witnesses.
In the case of the impeachment of Trump, the witnesses called in the House procedure would be the prosecution’s case, and the senators would be deciding as a matter of law that there is no need to call any more witnesses because they have failed to come up with any violations that would justify removal.
Schiff is now playing the “victim” card.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-impeachment/house-impeachment-leader-schiff-accuses-trump-of-threatening-him-on-twitter-idUSKBN1ZP0K6
Figures. (Since he is the hero here, the giant killer; and it would therefore, according to his delusions of grandeur, be preposterous for him to have to bear any consequences—except adulation—for being 100% in the right. Besides, this thuggish, truth-challenged imbecile and his gang believe they are the only ones who are allowed to do any threatening in the current farce….)
In any event, it should play exceeding well to the hyped-up base.
To quote from Article II, section 2 of the U.S. Constitution–
“He (the President) shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls,…”
In other words—despite what government employees at the State Department, and at other places in our government might like to think–the President, as Chief Executive, and as Commander in Chief, has the responsibility for, is the primary person who initiates, formulates, directs, and conducts U.S. foreign policy.
The President’s team of lawyers are putting on a very good defense so far, but if I were arguing the President’s case, I think I would lead off my argument by making the above Constitutional allocation of power my first point.
Neo,
Thanks for your response. But my question is, not whether the Senators can vote to acquit (move for a “directed verdict”), but whether they can vote to remove Trump (“convict”) based solely on the opening speeches of both sides, without hearing actual witness testimony. To me, the obvious answer should be “no,” but judging from the other comments here and the general tenor across the blososphere, I’m not so sure.
A subquestion triggered by your response is: Can the Senators rely on the summaries of the House witness testimony, written transcripts of that testimony, etc. with only “new” witness testimony required to be presented, or do the House witnesses need to re-present their testimony before the Senate (as grand jury witnesses would have to do at a criminal trial)?
One result of the last 3 years is that we have discovered that there are irreconcilable differences in the way the 2 halves of the country see and believe reality and rhetoric. It is really the most disturbing thing about all this mess as it presages a great and final break sometime in the future when a situation presents itself in which one side or the other finds the possible result to be completely intolerable.
Either the left or the right will be so threatened by the other side that open warfare results. I’ve always thought that our common heritage would save us. I no longer can.
Watt:
I already answered that question, I believe. But in an attempt to clarify I will add that “it’s not a trial” means that the Senate sets the rules. As far as I know, they can set whatever rules they want, as long as basics such as that the Senate must vote, that is takes a 2/3 majority to convict, and that the Chief Justice will preside, are followed.
Now, would the Supreme Court have a right of review? I don’t know for certain, but there’s this precedent:
That is the precedent.
The question whether the Senate should call witnesses has been given an intensification boost by a NYT’s story based on a leak from John Bolton’s forthcoming memoir manuscript, submitted, Bolton’s lawyer says, solely to the NSC for prepublication clearance. And who clears publications reviewed at the NSC? According to Joel Pollack writing at Breitbart, this official is none other than the identical twin brother of Lt. Col. Alex Vindman, Yevgeny, “ethics” lawyer to the NSC.
Is that not just too delicious a turn of events for words?
Gee, I wonder whether John Bolton knew that before his submittal?
Neo:
As you say, it’s not a trial in the usual sense. And the outcome is not “guilty” or “innocent,” either. The party that brought the matter to the House knows that too, and probably doesn’t really anticipate a “guilty” verdict. What they want is to tarnish the President sufficiently that he cannot, or will not, be re-elected.
Did Schiff accomplish that? I think not, but that’s my bias. We can anticipate that the impeachment will figure heavily in campaign ads this year — “how can you vote for an impeached and disgraced candidate?” — and we can further anticipate that this will influence some voters. The real question is, how many?
We have reached a new place in the history of our republic where one party can spend a full presidential term trying a whole handful of tactics to defeat the other party’s candidate (and office-holder) rather than trying to build the case for supporting their own candidate. It’s called, I think, lawfare.
Yet another Democrat dirty trick, of which, I’d imagine, there are several others waiting in the pipeline.
If the above information from sdferr is correct, even more reason to just clear cut the NSC.
According to what I have read, a couple of decades ago the NSC used to consist of a couple dozen people, but it has now ballooned into a couple hundred people, apparently Obama holdovers, many of whom–perhaps all of whom–are apparently intent on “resisting” and sabotaging Trump, his policies, and his Administration.
Trump should keep a couple dozen key people he can actually trust, drum the most likely resisters out of the Federal government, and send the rest packing, back to the agencies from which they came.
I really can’t figure out why Trump still keeps these resisters around, and hasn’t kicked them out of the White House long ago.
According to what I have read, a couple of decades ago the NSC used to consist of a couple dozen people, but it has now ballooned into a couple hundred people, apparently Obama holdovers, many of whom–perhaps all of whom–are apparently intent on “resisting” and sabotaging Trump, his policies, and his Administration.
Unless my memory is failing (it does) or I’ve read bad info, the Obama people quadrupled the size of the NSC staff, assigning 400 people to Bush’s 100. IIRC, Henry Kissinger’s NSC staff was about 30 in number. (The White House staff during the Nixon years had about 550 people in it and was considered bloated by some observers; Dwight Eisenhower’s was about 250 in number; Teddy Roosevelt employed a couple dozen chancery employees and x number of chamber employees).
Since the White House staff appears to be the echt example of Parkinson’s law, one thing we might attempt in the future is a personnel specialist’s version of what used to be called ‘zero-base’ budgeting. Assume the appropriate number of staff is nil and justify each position.
cont’d—Could it be one of those “keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer” kind of things, where it was thought best to keep these resisters where their actions could be more closely monitored?
This, of course, raises the question of who among Trump loyalists might be available, and have the time and tools to do that monitoring?
Or, could it be that by keeping them as federal employees and assigned to the White House the Trump Administration retains more control over these “resistors,” and they can be more easily questioned and forced to testify to various things, whereas, it would be harder to force them to testify if they returned to their parent agencies, and even harder if they were kicked out of the federal service, or “retired” and became ordinary citizens?
P.P.S.–Sorry for that, for a moment there I dipped into fantasy land, where people, especially those on the Left, who were called to testify by, say, Congressional committees, actually did come forward and testify.
How many people—Federal employees, major figures in the Obama Administration, for instance, even heads of Agencies–have we seen who were called to testify, and “resisted,” and just didn’t show up.
Or who, after long delays, finally showed up, only to contemptuously claim massive memory loss, or to plead the Fifth?
How about former Attorney General Erik Holder, who was held in “Contempt of Congress”?
Did that contempt citation result in Holder suffering any actual penalty? Not as far as I know.
Did any of these largely Leftist “resisters” actually suffer any consequences because of their defiance and resistance?
I don’t recall that any did.
Bolton’s soon to be published book contains the Ukraine allegation, and Bolton’s allegation is only that and no more, i.e., an unsubstantiated allegation. “I heard it”.
Bolton’s obvious, though maybe not sole, motive is to drive sales of his book.
I am dismayed that he turns out to be as greedy as everyone else inside the Beltway.
As to the longer-term effects of the Democratic assault on the president, I think we should look at the map and begin to decide how to carve up the USA into two countries.