Home » The Democrats want to define Trump being president as a high crime and misdemeanor

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The Democrats want to define Trump being president as a high crime and misdemeanor — 68 Comments

  1. The struggle over Brexit in the UK is not dissimilar. Unelected bureaucrats, accountable to none of the citizenry and possessed of much self-congratulatory arrogance, deem themselves to be superior in judgement to those officials elected by the voters.

  2. the president can fire ambassadors for any reason or no reason.

    The President fires an ambassador because someone agreed to pay him 10 million bucks if he does.

  3. Manju:

    If the president ACCEPTS the million dollars and you can prove it was for firing the ambassador, then the president can be impeached and removed for the crime of accepting a bribe. The firing of the ambassador would remain in force, however, and the president could do it for any reason. The firing is not the crime, the bribe would be the.crime of accepting a bribe. Firing an ambassador can be done for any reason. If the new president wants to rehire the ambassador, that president could do so. Or hire a different person of that president’s choice.

  4. The power of “Orange Man Bad” continues to amaze. Daniel Larison over at the American Conservative practically does nothing but blog about what a murderous disaster he thinks U.S. foreign policy is…yet who does he blindly line up to support against Donald Trump? If you guessed the U.S. foreign policy establishment, you win the pony!

    Seriously. He can’t even bring himself to do the “a pox on both your houses” thing.

    Mike

  5. The power of “Orange Man Bad” continues to amaze. Daniel Larison over at the American Conservative practically does nothing but blog about what a murderous disaster he thinks U.S. foreign policy is…yet who does he blindly line up to support against Donald Trump? If you guessed the U.S. foreign policy establishment, you win the pony!

    I first recall being conscious of Larison around about 2006, when he had a personal blog. I had the impression he was hypomanic.

    He was in school continuously for 12 years (1997-2009). He was, at that time, writing a dissertation in Byzantine history. He’d attended Hampden-Sydney College prior to that, a tiny school whose political science department had few course offerings in international relations or comparative politics. Neither he nor his wife (an art historian) have ever been able to build a career in academe. His only admitted occupation is as a contributor to The American Conservative. He doesn’t seem to have undertaken any disciplined study of the subject matter in question, he’s never been in the military, he’s never been in the intelligence services, he’s never been in the Foreign Service, he’s never worked as a foreign correspondent, he’s never worked for a business concern which sent him abroad, and AFAIK his foreign language skills are limited to Byzantine koine. Yet, this is what he writes about.

  6. Wrong, Manju — You get to be an ambassador if you contribute 10 million dollars to the campaign. And no, that is not bribery.

  7. “Yet, this is what he writes about.”

    And our foreign policy consensus is such an atrocity that he’s actually able to make some strong arguments against it, though hypomanic is about as on-the-nose description of him as I can imagine.

    What’s fascinating is that Larison is NOT like Jonah Goldberg or David French or other NeverTrumpers but still has this visceral reaction to him. It’s a bit like leftie Kevin Drum, who is almost the epitome of bloodless liberal technocrat on everything else but gets emotional when it comes to Trump, like Trump reminds Drum of the bullies who used to give him wedgies in school.

    Mike

  8. “The Democrats want to define Trump being president as a high crime and misdemeanor” neo

    I strongly suspect that congressional democrats well know that Trump is not guilty of any “high crimes and misdemeanors”.

    This is about two things; obstructing Trump’s effectiveness in implementing his agenda and instilling in the public’s subconscious a political version of “if there’s that much smoke, there has to be fire somewhere”…

  9. Manju, 10 million dollars. Really? That’s all? It’s barely Melania’s clothes budget. Please be more imaginative.

  10. What percentage of the population of our nation even understands what powers are vest in the three branches of government. What authority and power the president has and what the legislature is supposed to do and then how the judiciary decides how to apply all of that stuff.

    No kidding, I was talking to one member of our family, she now has four college degrees including one in International Studies and she had no concept about the three branches of government. I also have had other family members in the State Department including the husband of a cousin who was and ambassador and shared with me all of the difficulty working with various nations getting any kind of agreement on most anything when those who worship Allah are involved. Another family member who was in the State Department and now is an adjunct prof close to D.C. and who works on special things for special people has had a visceral dislike for Trump since he first announced he would run for office.

    What we see and perceive as fact depends upon which mountain we are standing and which direction at any given time we look. All of those mentioned above, one now deceased and the other overseas most of the time are really good people who I have and still love but they don’t see what I see.

    Our family has lost people in the Sand Wars and we have a lot of young folks who have experienced first hand the horror of warfare in the past 20 plus years and we see what we want to see, we develop the reality we want and we hope, and some of us pray, for a decent outcome with the majority of folks having no idea what the hell is going on and they take all of the incredible infrastructure of this wonderful nation for granted, they make no distinction between the mountains and the huge traffic fly-over overpasses, to them they were always there.

  11. What percentage of the population of our nation even understands what powers are vest in the three branches of government. What authority and power the president has and what the legislature is supposed to do and then how the judiciary decides how to apply all of that stuff.

    Let them listen to AG Barr.

    Video of Barr’s address on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/BhjD–oEsGQ

    Begins about 19:00 in.

  12. Trump tweets that Yovanovitch was a lousy ambassador, and somehow that is “witness intimidation” and another impeachable offense.

    Admittedly, it would have been smart if Trump had waited until she had finished testifying. Even so, he’s not allowed to criticize her job performance?

  13. Schiff is a traitor to the Jewish people who helps finish the job started by Heydrich, Müller und Eichman.
    Und Yavonovitch is a corrupt ambassador who covered for Bidens corruption who did nothing when flexible Barrie did nothing when Putin invaded the Crimea

  14. I’ve followed the fake impeachment hearings on Cspan. So far they have been a hilarious kabuki farce. On the first day the witnesses failed to follow Schiff’s narrative and didn’t provide a smoking gun. Today’s hearing boiled down to the former ambassador was sad that she was removed from her position. However, she remains employed by the Statê Department. Very sad.

    Of course LIVs who get their information from the msm will have a different impression,and believe the walls are closing in on orange man bad. Eyes wide open, Schiff is a smug hatchet man trying to conduct a smoke and mirrors impeachment under spotlights.

  15. Today the Dems. aimed the “hearings” directly at Women voters. How dare Trump say something bad about this wonderful Woman. How dare he fire her. That is what today was about.

  16. Articles of Impeachment against President Donald Trump

    Article I

    Donald Trump won the presidential election of 2016.

    Article II

    Donald Trump is a Poopy Head!

    Article III

    Donald Trump appointed supreme court justices we don’t like cause they are Poopy Heads and won’t interpret away the peoples 1st and 2nd amendment rights! How are we gonna get hate speech laws and “rational” gun control with these guys on the court.

    Article IV

    Donald Trump might get to replace Saint RBG the divine on SCOTUS, and if he does, he will no doubt nominate another Poopy Head.

    Article V

    We hatess himm. We hatess himm forever. He stole the preciousss.

  17. As a quick spellcheck, I began to type in a web search for the pajama boy whistleblower. I only got as far as 4 letters “whis”, and DuckDuckGo autofilled
    “whistleblower eric ciaramella”. By now there are pygmies in highland New Guinea who know the name. And yet so many pretend (for feigned noble reasons) not to.

    Let us therefore add this to our long list of reasons we’ll be forced to vote for Trump in 2020. Yes, he has his accomplishments and meritorious efforts, but opposite him on our ballots will be a full slate of liars who know full well they are lying, and who itch for punishment. And punish them we shall.

  18. Banned Lizard,

    I just went to google and after ‘er’ it auto filled Eric Ciaramella as the first choice. After ‘er’ not even Eric. But of course Adam Schiff has no idea what his name is.

  19. Manju on November 15, 2019 at 3:58 pm said:

    The President fires an ambassador because someone agreed to pay him 10 million bucks if he does.
    * * *
    So that’s where Obama got the money to buy his new house!

    https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2019/11/15/flashback-that-time-obama-brutally-fired-all-of-bushs-ambassadors-n2556576

    The incoming Obama administration has notified all politically-appointed ambassadors that they must vacate their posts as of Jan. 20, the day President-elect Barack Obama takes the oath of office, a State Department official said.

    The clean slate will open up prime opportunities for the president-elect to reward political supporters with posts in London, Paris, Tokyo and the like. The notice to diplomatic posts was issued this week.

    Political ambassadors sometimes are permitted to stay on briefly during a new administration, but the sweeping nature of the directive suggests that Obama has little interest in retaining any of Bush’s ambassadorial appointees.

    In this case, at least, Obama did not make the mistake Trump did, of keeping on prior administration loyalists (of course, The Donald would have had to fire 90% of DC’s workforce…).

  20. LYNN HARGROVE on November 15, 2019 at 10:20 pm said:
    Today the Dems. aimed the “hearings” directly at Women voters. How dare Trump say something bad about this wonderful Woman. How dare he fire her. That is what today was about.
    * * *
    Indeed.
    AP at HotAir suggests that the exchange between Stefanik and Schiff may have been stage as a whataboutism show for exactly that reason.

    https://hotair.com/archives/allahpundit/2019/11/15/adam-schiff-vs-elise-stefanik-no-cant-speak-right-now/

    Nunes and Stefanik surely knew what the rules were but the stunt was worth staging anyway for the optics. One of the things Republicans worried about in Yovanovitch testifying is that she’s a woman and might seem more sympathetic to viewers, especially if she got emotional about being threatened by Trump. (Sean Hannity wondered earlier this week whether Yovanovitch might “cry on cue.”) Trump stupidly made that risk greater this morning when he tweeted about her, handing Schiff a golden opportunity to chat with her about presidential intimidation. The obvious GOP play, if one could be arranged, would be to counter that by maneuvering some Democratic man into behaving imperiously towards a Republican woman, preferably a Republican woman much younger than him. Solution: Have Stefanik break the rules, wait for Schiff to shut her down, then ding him for “silencing” her.

    Is the GOP really that smart, or did things just play out that way?
    Regardless, Stefanik got the best of the bombshells today, confronting Yovanovich with the discrepancies in her testimony showing that she probably lied the first time.

    https://www.redstate.com/bonchie/2019/11/15/sure-looks-like-marie-yovanovitch-committed-perjury-testimony/

    Early on in her testimony, she stated under oath that the issue of Hunter Biden and Burisma was never brought up to her by the previous administration. Later, though, Rep. Stefanik finally got to ask some questions and that’s where things went off the rails. Under intense questioning, including reading of her prior closed-door testimony, Yovanovitch was forced to admit that the previous administration had indeed brought up the Biden/Burisma issue to her.

    And lest someone argue it may have been a forgettable affair, it wasn’t just in passing. The Obama officials prepping her were apparently so concerned about the issue being raised that it was part of her mock Q and A to get ready for her nomination hearing. These are issues she studied up on and she clearly was aware that the previous administration had made briefed her on the matter. Yet, we see her pretty clearly lie about it early on in today’s hearing, only admitting it after being pressed with her prior testimony.

    That sure sounds like perjury to me.

    Now, I’m sure she’ll and her defenders will say she simply forgot or got confused, but that certainly hasn’t been a valid excuse for any number of Trump officials charged for lying. In fact, Roger Stone was just convicted today for lying to Congress, among other things.

    My guess is she can rest easy though. The statutes dealing with lying to government bodies don’t seem to apply to Democrats.

    More red meat at RedState et al. today.
    https://www.redstate.com/sister-toldjah/2019/11/15/boom-elise-stefanik-gets-yovanovitch-confirm-key-detail-roasts-adam-schiff-along-way-video/

    Stefanik read aloud Schiff’s tweets — as well as quotes from news reports and television appearances — where Schiff said that the whistleblower, who remains anonymous, would testify. Schiff has since denied requests for that individual to come forward, calling the potential testimony “redundant” and “unnecessary” last week.

    “The chairman refused to allow us to put these into the record with unanimous consent,” Stefanik, R-N.Y., said. “As we know, it is important to protect whistleblowers from retaliation and firing…but in this case, the fact that we are getting criticized for statements he, himself, made earlier in the process shows the duplicity and abuse of power we see.”

    https://www.redstate.com/streiff/2019/11/15/marie-yovanovich-sorry-feelings-bruised-president-trump-right-not-trust-fire/

    In short, even though Yovanovitch opposed President Trump’s Ukraine policy, rather than resigning she stayed in her position and worked to undercut it. This was known to the White House, and apparently to Foggy Bottom as well, and led to President Trump creating a special task force to deal with Ukraine in order to cut her out. Finally, she was fired. The process might have been ugly, but that is a matter of taste and not grounds for impeachment.

    So, Ambassador Yovanovitch, sorry that your feelings are a bit bruised but this is like shooting yourself in the foot and then complaining because it hurts. You had a choice of faithfully executing the foreign policy of the United States or resigning. You chose neither, deciding instead to carry out your own rogue foreign policy as a member of the #Resistance. You were caught out. You were fired…with a dollop of public humiliation. That’s all that happened. That happens to a lot of people. You’re not special. Get over it.

    https://pjmedia.com/trending/obama-left-an-ambassador-to-die-but-were-supposed-to-be-outraged-over-a-trump-tweet/

    But what really gets me is how it’s been almost seven years since Barack Obama left one of his ambassadors to die in a terrorist attack on a U.S. consulate, and the same people who defended the Obama administration endlessly over that, are feigning outrage over Trump’s tweet expressing his opinion. Democrats have been crying “impeach!” over everything for years, and now every time Trump expresses an opinion, we’re hearing “intimidation.” The same party that defended the Obama administration’s failure to protect our consulate in Libya from an attack that claimed four American lives, including that of a U.S. ambassador, are now trying to tell us that we should be outraged over a harmless tweet—a tweet that, regardless of what one thinks of the content, was written after Yovanovitch started testifying, and as far as Trump knew, she wouldn’t have even had an opportunity to see until well after her testimony concluded? A tweet that she’d have been oblivious to had Schiff not brought it up.
    As White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham said in a statement, the tweets were “simply the President’s opinion, which he is entitled to.”

  21. BTW, what Schiff did with Trump’s Tweet is called “leading the witness” and it’s generally grounds for getting a question ruled out by the judge (Perry Mason told me so).

  22. “leading the witness” QED
    https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/11/the-witness-intimidation-farce.php

    Actually Yovanovitch probably wouldn’t have known about the alleged intimidation had not Schiff brought it to her attention. Schiff asked the former ambassador whether she felt intimidated by Trump’s tweet. She duly affirmed that she did.

    Yovanovitch may have meant she found the tweet unpleasant, not that she was actually intimidated by it. In any event, as far as I can tell, her approach to answering questions didn’t change after Schiff helpfully advised her of Trump’s tweet.

    Indeed, Schiff surely knew the tweet wouldn’t cause her to feel genuinely intimidated. Otherwise, he would not have brought it to her attention. What prosecutor wants to cause his witness to feel intimidated while testifying?

    If Yovanovitch actually was intimidated, as opposed to displeased, by the tweet, that’s pathetic. Anyone who can’t handle the low level criticism in Trump’s tweet shouldn’t be the U.S. ambassador to any nation, and certainly not Ukraine.;
    Trump has the right to criticize the witnesses being called by Democrats in their effort to terminate his presidency. Whether it’s a good idea or not, I don’t know. But that’s how Trump responds in cases like these.

    And there’s nothing illegal about it. Speaking ill of a witness isn’t witness intimidation. Trump made no threat. He has not forfeited his right to opine about people just because the Democrats are calling them as witnesses in their effort to put the president in the dock.

    The Democrats started the impeachment process by fixating on the claim of quid pro quo. Such a claim can be a valid basis for impeachment if it involves a serious enough abuse of power.

    However, “quid pro quo” apparently hasn’t played very well before focus groups. Thus, Democrats are searching for a label that people understand to be a crime. “Bribery” is their main candidate, but “witness intimidation” would be nice to throw in.

    Unfortunately for the Democrats, Trump didn’t engage in it today. And if Trump’s tweets of his opinions about witnesses become the basis for an article of impeachment, I think the public will laugh the Dems out of court, so to speak, on that one.

  23. If the president ACCEPTS the million dollars and you can prove it was for firing the ambassador, then the president can be impeached and removed for the crime of accepting a bribe.

    Right. So the notion that “the president can fire ambassadors for any reason or no reason” isn’t a particularly effective defense if the firing is alleged to be part of a crime or high crime.

  24. The quality of the testimony to date was aptly summarized by a commenter at TAC:
    https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/choking-on-the-democrats-ukraine-fantasy-narrative/#comment-4689191098

    Jr. • 2 days ago
    That’s all well and good but I was standing next to the water cooler yesterday and overheard Jane from accounting telling John from HR that she heard from Nancy’s secretary who was walking by Tim’s office and overheard 30 seconds of a phone conversation in which Tim said that the Ukrainian field team got Javelins from Obama in 2014.

    Of course she didn’t hear what was being said on the other line and they very well could have been talking about Obama providing Javelins for the Ukrainian Olympic team to practice throwing but one thing I know FOR SURE about this damning bombshell evidence that I overheard by the water cooler is that we must impeach Trump based on it as soon as possible.

    A few days ago, AP at HotAir made some observations about the water cooler gossip that I haven’t seen bruited about elsewhere, so I am dropping them in here, for discussion.

    https://hotair.com/archives/allahpundit/2019/11/13/bill-taylor-aide-heard-trump-talking-phone-sondland-ukraine-july-investigations/

    Sondland was so unconcerned about keeping his communications with Trump secure that he was on the phone with Trump at a restaurant in Ukraine, with the people around him able to listen in.

    The fact that he and Sondland were chatting directly about “investigations” is potentially significant, though. For one thing, says former Obama ambassador Michael McFaul, ambassadors rarely speak directly to the president:

    “Sondland calling Trump on a cellphone from Kyiv is extraordinary for all sorts of reasons. Normally EU Ambos don’t call presidents. They never do so to discuss Ukraine policy. Doing so on a cellphone from Kyiv means whole world was listening in.”

    The fact that Sondland allegedly mentioned Biden to Taylor’s aide is probably the most significant detail here, if only because it catches Sondland in a lie:
    … [IF he said it]
    We’ll need to hear what Taylor’s aide has to say under oath on Friday. What specifically did Trump say on the call, and what did Sondland say to him?

    Well, Taylor’s aide did testify, in closed-door hearing, so we will only learn what Schiff deems important for us to know, which so far is just his preamble, which is embedded here.
    https://hotair.com/archives/allahpundit/2019/11/15/taylor-aides-opening-statement-sondland-told-trump-cares-stuff-ukraine-insofar-benefits-like-biden-investigation/

    … this afternoon it meant a closed-door deposition with Taylor aide David Holmes. Holmes is the staffer whom Taylor mentioned on Wednesday as having overheard a call between Trump and Sondland in July while Sondland and Holmes were in Kiev. Holmes has been testifying for the past few hours. One obvious matter he had to clear up was how he came to hear a call involving the president in the first place. Did Sondland have Trump on speakerphone — in a restaurant?
    Not exactly, said Holmes. “The President’s voice was very loud and recognizable, and Ambassador Sondland held the phone away from his ear for a period of time, presumably because of the loud volume,” he told investigators today according to CNN.
    Bear in mind that a second aide, Suriya Jayanti, was also there and allegedly heard the call. She’ll obviously be called in to corroborate Holmes’s account.

    What exactly did Trump say to Sondland? Holmes:

    “Sondland told Trump that (Ukrainian President Volodymyr) Zelensky ‘loves your ass,’” Holmes said, according to a copy of his opening statement obtained by CNN. “I then heard President Trump ask, ‘So, he’s gonna do the investigation?’ Ambassador Sondland replied that ‘he’s gonna do it,’ adding that President Zelensky will do ‘anything you ask him to.’”…

    Holmes also confirmed Taylor’s testimony about the President’s thoughts on Ukraine, saying he asked Sondland “if it was true that the Presisdent did not ‘give a s—t about Ukraine.”

    Holmes said Sondland responded Trump only cares about “big stuff.” When Holmes said that the Ukraine war was big, Sondland responded “‘big stuff’ that benefits the President, like the Biden investigation that Mr. Giuliani was pushing,” Holmes said.

    Needless to say, Holmes’s “impression” about Trump’s goals and his memory of what Sondland said won’t cut it. It won’t cut it even if Jayanti backs him up. The million-dollar questions are for Sondland himself: Did you believe that Trump had a corrupt self-interested motive in leaning on Ukraine to investigate the Bidens, and what did you see or hear from the president to make you believe that?

    President Trump has said he does not remember this conversation with Sondland.
    https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/470356-trump-denies-knowledge-of-call-mentioned-in-impeachment-hearing

    Small niggle: Taylor said that his aide said that Trump called Sondland, but McFaul said the opposite; which is it?

    Sondland claims Trump called him, and so his being in a restaurant with witnesses would be “accidental” — but why did he not excuse himself and go somewhere private, or apprise the President that he was being overheard?
    Poor performance review for that one, dude.
    IMO, it beggars belief that Donald Trump, who knows his every word is leaked ot the press and puts “perfect” phone calls in a super-secret-safe place, would reveal his corrupt motives on an open phone line to a State apparatchik sitting in an extremely public place, and also said apparatchik (presumably the president’s secret agent in Ukraine) would then invite “the whole world” to listen in, and subsequently confide incriminating secrets to two even lower-level State functionaries, who just happened to be with him.

    “Bear in mind that a second aide, Suriya Jayanti, was also there and allegedly heard the call. She’ll obviously be called in to corroborate Holmes’s account.”

    After the revelations of Strzok-Page et al, I wouldn’t trust any of the mob’s corroboration of the rest of the mob, but data points are adding up.

    However, even more pertinent, AP catches a distinct anomaly here: if McFaul is correct about “the whole world listening in” — and I suspect he is — then some agency in the US IC has a recording of that call.
    Why didn’t Schiff subpoena those call records immediately?
    (Isn’t that what FISA courts are for?)

    Where is the recording, if indeed the call happened, and who knows exactly what was said?

  25. Manju:

    I have regrettably come to the conclusion that you are either stupid or pretending to be.

    My previous answer was quite clear. You either do not understand or are pretending not to understand.

    You are speaking of two separate things: the crime of bribery and firing an ambassador. Bribery is not okay, firing an ambassador is okay. A president can fire an ambassador for any reason, no reason, or a bad reason. It is the bribery that would be the problem in the hypothetical you gave, not the firing of an ambassador.

  26. Such a farce, it’s hardly worth writing or talking about.

    On the other hand, if it’s part of Trump doing things, actual policies that the Dems would otherwise object to and try demonize, this impeachment kabuki seems a fine distraction.

    It sure looks like VP Joe Biden did violate any “quid pro quo” laws in getting the prosecutor fired — to the benefit of his son.
    And his son was receiving the family bribery cash from Burisma.
    So those crimes, whether prosecuted or not, have come out. And if other Dems don’t use them to stop Biden’s nomination, I’m sure Trump supporters will use them to attack Biden.

    Tho it won’t matter to most Trump-haters. It probably will matter to most America lovers who want America to be fair.

  27. The real issue is that the socialists, deep state people, dems, village idiots and the media are intent on the destruction of America and western culture.

    They are besides themselves because Trump has been stopping them and their rape of America and the Constitution.

    Fortunately the people can see what they are trying to do.

  28. It sure looks like VP Joe Biden did violate any “quid pro quo” laws in getting the prosecutor fired — to the benefit of his son.

    Perhaps “looks” to normies the likes of us, but not so according to the testimony of Ambo. Yovanovich yesterday. She only sees handsy Veep Joe doing the lord’s work, carrying out the wishes of the interagency consensus. No harm, no foul. She would rather look away, and did. Nothing to see here. Utterly uninteresting.

  29. So a new witness is claiming he overheard Sondlund talking to Trump on Sondlund’s cell phone cause Trump is loud….cell phone not on speaker phone. Led me to thinking that I’ve never heard anyone’s cell phone convo; the other side of it that is, especially in a noisy restaurant. Anyone here have any take on the reality of that event happening?

  30. Take a look at this recent speech by AG Barr, about the Constitution, the ideas and intent of the Framers, how and why they designed the separation of powers and the Executive as they did, and the recent erosion of that separation, and you will find in it hope that Barr is exactly the kind of tough, well informed, and knowledgeable defender of our Constitutional order that he appears to be.

    It’s a somewhat long speech but it’s well worth reading.

    See https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2019/11/15/ag-bill-barr-speaks-about-the-damage-to-our-nation-from-the-resistance/#more-176234

  31. Just to mention as the caravan passes on, I was bit surprised yesterday when none of the minority committee members took the opportunity to inquire of Ambo. Yovanovich whether she had worked with Eric Ciaramella during Pres. Pseudonym’s administration when Ciaramella held the NSC position now held by Lt. Col Vindman. I’d have thought her answer interesting, either way. But, alas, ’twas not to be.

  32. Neo,

    In fact, approximately two thirds of the ambassadorial positions are reserved for “political appointees”. These are typically given to people who give large sums of money to the campaigns of the winning candidate. Normally, such persons understand that the Deputy Chief of Mission (DCM, a Foreign Service Officer) is actually in charge, and that their role is to go to the State functions and parties and give the speeches. It is often a way for wealthy executives to ease into retirement. Although, I have seen examples where the political appointee ambassador wandered off the reservation and made an ass of himself, to the consternation of everyone.

    In any case, this is actually a sort of official corruption that has become customary in American politics.

  33. From my experience working around the State Department (not for), that entire organization is made up largely of self-serving bureaucrats and is long overdue for a major house cleaning.

    In fairness, they do have some impressive and highly competent people. But, the majority are just pure dead weight, and both they and their invented positions should be eliminated.

  34. sdferr on November 16, 2019 at 9:44 am said:
    Just to mention as the caravan passes on, I was bit surprised yesterday when none of the minority committee members took the opportunity to inquire of Ambo. Yovanovich whether she had worked with Eric Ciaramella during Pres. Pseudonym’s administration when Ciaramella held the NSC position now held by Lt. Col Vindman. I’d have thought her answer interesting, either way. But, alas, ’twas not to be.
    * * *
    There are a lot of questions that aren’t getting asked; and some that are asked aren’t getting answered.

  35. In fact, approximately two thirds of the ambassadorial positions are reserved for “political appointees”. –Roy Nathanson

    A tiny subplot I have followed, because I enjoy the cynical celebrity angle to American politics, was Anna Wintour (the real Vogue editor behind “The Devil Wears Prada”) and her pursuit of an ambassadorship to England or France under Obama or the hypothetical Hillary administration.
    _________________________________

    The Wintour-as-ambassador rumors go back a long way — all the way to 2009. Wintour held fundraisers in her home last year and, in the end, she finished fourth on the list of Obama donors after the election. After that, the rumor mill picked right back up again. There was talk she might get posted to France, though the Times reports that’s out of the question now.

    Hopefully we can finally stop talking about this and Wintour can go back to being the terrifying editor of a fashion magazine striking fear into the hearts of interns everywhere.

    https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/01/there-was-some-truth-ambassador-anna-wintour-rumor/319294/

  36. AesopFan,

    Ukraine, being a country with which relations are sensitive or belligerent, is not one of the countries that get a political appointee ambassador. Yovanovich was a late Obama appointee and is a senior Foreign Service Officer.

    Trump should have gone through all of the sitting ambassadors early in his presidency and made sure that they were actually representing him and his policies.

  37. Roy Nathanson–It’s always puzzled me that we would install some “donor” as Ambassador to some country, and the guy quite often apparently had no real in depth knowledge about that country, or even spoke its language.

    I could envision state dinners, for instance, in which the native staff would be passing snide remarks about our “Ambassador” which he wouldn’t have a clue about.

    I understand, for instance, that the competition among such donors for the post of Ambassador to the Bahamas is fierce.

    Not a good practice.

  38. Snow – thanks for the transcript link. sdferr gave us a link to a “live blog” thread on the culture 2.0 post, but the entire speech is remarkable.

    Anybody else remember the furor caused by Schlesinger’s “The Imperial Presidency” back in 1974? Barr explains in detail how Congress and the Courts have “fixed” that — for Republican presidents, anyway.

    “In so many areas, it is critical to our Nation’s future that we restore and preserve in their full vigor our Founding principles. Not the least of these is the Framers’ vision of a strong, independent Executive, chosen by the country as a whole.” – Barr’s concluding sentence.

  39. Snow,

    I agree, it is not a good practice. Obviously, it started with presidents appointing “friends” as ambassador to countries with which we had secure relations, and the custom snowballed. No doubt, it was considered harmless.

    It makes one wonder… if there is this sort of official corruption in the one sector of the federal government that I actually have some personal experience with, how much is there in all the other sectors that I don’t know about personally?

  40. The problem with just naming career diplomats or the like as the ambassadors has been amplified by the last couple of years with Trump. These people are so egotistical and sanctimonious there is no way they can be trusted by any president attempting to make changes in foreign policy.

    The term ‘interagency consensus’ and it’s apparent religious like devotion by career diplomats makes it very hard to trust these people.

    So you hire people you think you have a better chance to trust I guess and what you lose in experience you gain in peace of mind. Hopefully.

    P.S.- Of course, the funny thing is that the best I can tell the ‘interagency consensus’ was the US should provide aid to Ukraine which Obama didn’t but Trump did. So it’s all politics and style I guess.

  41. Just in closing, on the subject of political appointees to ambassadorships, these appointments are subject to Senate confirmation. So, this practice can be stopped by either the President or by the Senate simply by refusing to confirm Ambassadors that obviously have no skills or background for the position.

  42. Roy Nathanson–As I’ve written on another thread here, perhaps one of the signal accomplishments that President Trump has performed for the country is how the reaction to his Presidency has caused to come into public view all of the actors and corruption present in our government and key institutions that we would not otherwise have any awareness of.

  43. Snow on Pine- Now we know it (kind of already did, but now know for sure) but will anything change? Sadly I doubt it.

  44. So what comes after Trump, impeached or not? Does impeachment become a standard partisan crowbar for the the out-of-power House to use against the
    President?

    That will be real trouble. But it seems to be the way things keep going.

  45. The policy dispute is just an excuse to take out Trump. Many “outsider” presidents say they’ll change D.C., some have even tried, but Trump is actually doing it, and the Beltway Elite spotted that he would do so early on in his campaign. How can he fight City Hall and those who buy ink by the barrel? His much-maligned tweets. Twitter has done what the easily-affordable printing press did – break thru the media domination of the news. Essential today when we have a totally-corrupt Dem propaganda MSM.

  46. That will be real trouble. But it seems to be the way things keep going.

    Let’s ruminate on this a bit, huxley.

    The Republicans had their lesson with Clinton’s impeachment, though granted the lesson may eventually be forgotten. Still, they did not act during Pseudonym’s admin when by rights many causes were available. So I think the lesson had stuck so far.

    The Democrats are in process of getting a lesson for themselves. Perhaps even more forcefully, we may hope. But a thwacking of one sort or another, I reckon. So may they be cautioned in future.

    Here’s where it gets weird though. We Americans still require the genuine threat. But if the idea of impeachment is gutted, what will the executive who thinks himself immune be inclined to do? Maybe something not so good.

    I think of the article about the Israeli Iron Dome system I saw this morning, evaluating the success of the system against its costs in terms of strategic error, popular expectation, miscalculation on the part of adversaries, and even mere financial costs. It’s a head scratching piece of work (the article) initially, though in the case of Iron Dome, generally favorable in its conclusion. But the unintendeds there are my point– they seem to come from out of nowhere against what on the surface appears altogether a successful enterprise.

    So perhaps with our views of impeachment, particularly in view of this era of abuse.

  47. sdferr: So you believe Democrats will be punished for this impeachment charade the feedback will be dampened and things won’t go further? Could be.

    I just notice how the overall process is becoming more polarized — like court and cabinet votes.

  48. So you believe Democrats will be punished for this impeachment charade the feedback will be dampened and things won’t go further? Could be.

    Yes, I think they will suffer at the polls, though I’m not sure they’ll even risk a vote to impeach. But the charade is beginning to be widely understood, better so with every misstep. Whether other “things” of a deleterious nature ensue (perhaps precisely on account of the polarization you see), I don’t know, can’t tell. But I do think the Dems have a lesson coming. And expect they’ll learn something from it.

  49. sdferr – I’m all in favor of affectations, but I don’t remember who you are referring to by “Pseudonym.”
    Help??

  50. Obama, who communicated with HRC on her insecure server using a pseudonym. I aim to harp on it, that’s all.

  51. Too, I believe AesopFan, that he was asked in a press conference when he learned Clinton was disobeying classification security protocol and this was one of a number of occasions when his response was I learned it from newspaper reporting, just like everyone else. POS.

  52. Thanks – I remember the incident, but didn’t remember seeing it used as a nom for Obama.
    Lying was his standard operating procedure.

    I just noticed that POS and SOP are palindromes —

  53. Can you imagine if Trump said he just heard about anything in the newspaper.

    It really is breathtaking the difference in the coverage and the benefit of the doubt given and not given to the last two presidents.

  54. I think the outrage the left feels towards Trump boils down to two main issues.

    I disagree. The Left’s “outrage… towards Trump” is due to one and only one thing: Trump didn’t run as a Democrat.

    Trump has flip-flopped mightily between enthusiastic Democrat and begrudging Republican many times. Mr. New York City Values has also been Hillary Clinton’s favorite campaign donor. There is little that Trump has done that couldn’t be heralded as accomplishments of a Democrat agenda. What about Trump’s court picks? Why that would be spun as the second coming of Scoop Jackson, D-WA.

  55. What about Trump’s court picks? Why that would be spun as the second coming of Scoop Jackson, D-WA.

    No, it wouldn’t. Jackson was a dissident within the Democratic Party because he never bought into functional pacifism and craven deference to the sort of grifters you find in Third World governments and international NGOs. He was a mainstream labor-oriented Democrat in every other respect (and mainstream in every respect prior to 1968).

  56. Trump has flip-flopped mightily between enthusiastic Democrat and begrudging Republican many times.

    He was never an enthusiastic Democrat. He was a Republican from 1969 to 1985, then flipped back and forth between Republican, Democratic and non-partisan (“blank” in New York parlance) registration. He’s a New York businessman and to New York businessmen, politicians are fungible. Real estate development is abnormally dependent on the regulatory regime, and the discretion incorporated into that regime exceeds that you find in other realms. You need to build relationships with politicians so your permits get approved.

  57. Just in closing, on the subject of political appointees to ambassadorships, these appointments are subject to Senate confirmation.

    They all are. The constitution requires that ‘ambassadors’, ‘heads of executive departments’, and the superordinate layers of the judiciary receive Senate confirmation. (Statutory law provides for a much more extensive menu of executive positions requiring such confirmation; it’s really a big waste of everyone’s time).

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