These two witnesses were requested by the Republican minority. Not clear to me they’ll help Trump, but we’ll see. Volker is a particular enigma.
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These two witnesses were requested by the Republican minority. Not clear to me they’ll help Trump, but we’ll see. Volker is a particular enigma.
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Martin
My sense is that Trumps allies were grasping at straws from their testimony, and that this won’t work out how they were hoping.
Yutsano
Isn’t Volker already suspected of lying to Congress?
Yutsano
Annnd my comment just went poof.
EDIT: Wait…it’s there now. But I’m on the work browser which is Win11 on Win7. It just looks so different than on Firefox at home.
NYCMT
Nunes’ voice is unremarkable and forgettable. Did he ever have diction training? It’s very bland and colorless. Yet this listener is somehow still roused to anger by his lying? Schiff has enormous patience.
Cheryl Rofer
@Yutsano: There are some conflicts in his deposition.
Cheryl Rofer
Some of the issues with Volker here.
Yutsano
@Cheryl Rofer: So this could be interesting bordering on fun. I wonder if he’ll back Herr Drumpf or not fall on his sword and spill beans.
Yes I’m having fun with metaphors.
Cheryl Rofer
Side-by-Side Comparison of Kurt Volker’s vs Other Witnesses’ Testimony in Impeachment Inquiry
dmsilev
@Martin: What, you don’t think Ace Strategist Devin Nunes has gamed out all of the possibilities and outcomes here?
zhena gogolia
Volker kind of exudes self-satisfaction and disingenuousness of a sort we haven’t seen in Kent, Taylor, Yovanovitch, Vindman, or even the other witness this morning whose name I can’t remember, the Pence aide.
Mai naem mobile
These fuckers treated Vindman atrociously. Orange Lump gets away with being however loose he wants with his language but Vindman has to be super duper accurate. And they’re criticizing the guy for wearing his uniform for a formal event but Orange Lump had the generals in full garb during the fake Al Baghdadi Operation watching photo. Because you dress up with all your medals while you’re essentially on assignment.
Betty Cracker
Sounds a little like Volker is trying to self-valorize and attach himself to diplomats Taylor and Yovanovitch. He says it was he who recommended Taylor to Pompeo, something Trump is curb-stomping Pompeo about now. A prelude to throwing the other two “amigos” under the bus, maybe?
James E Powell
@NYCMT:
It always amazes me how some of these people got elected to anything, let alone a fairly prestigious job like congress-creature.
zhena gogolia
Okay, I have to go to a lecture on history in a minute. I wish I could stay and watch history being made.
zhena gogolia
Right, his negative view of Ukraine came from Giuliani. It came from Moscow.
Martin
@dmsilev: I think Nunes should feel proud he can find the hearing room each day.
Sab
@dmsilev: Some of his cows are fairly intelligent.
rikyrah
@Cheryl Rofer:
Thanks for the link.
zhena gogolia
He is concocting a very convoluted story here.
Martin
@Sab: He doesn’t have any cows. He doesn’t even have a farm in CA.
LAO
Is it just me, but Volker is coming off as very naive?
zhena gogolia
@LAO:
Disingenuous. The word is disingenuous.
He is not naive.
Mary G
Volker sounds defensive as fuck. “Rudy broke Ukraine, not me!”
Cheryl Rofer
I agree with Emptywheel here. Volker is trying hard to align himself with the foreign policy professionals we’ve heard from, distance himself from Giuliani, who he says was loading Trump up with a negative narrative about Ukraine. I think he’s the first to blame that on Giuliani; others have blamed an NSC aide. Who may have been working for Giuliani.
NotMax
@Mai naem mobile
R’s default mode is to ignore the message, attack the messenger.
Gin & Tonic
Volker was an ally or protege of John McCain, so he’s definitely from the right-wing side of the “foreign policy establishment” but he’s not completely insane.
LAO
@zhena gogolia: I agree with you. His self defense appears to be “I was naive” which is flat out ridiculous.
trollhattan
@Mary G:
“It was that way when I found it.”
psycholinguist
he’s throwing some bullshit now. Wow
JPL
@Mary G: That was my feeling. Over the years he sure has learned how to cover his ass so to speak.
zhena gogolia
Shoot, I have to go!
JPL
Jordan’s questioning might be interesting, so maybe I won’t hit the mute button so quickly
Martin
@Cheryl Rofer: I feel a little bad saying this, but I’m glad Schiff is running this and not Nadler. Schiff seems to be very good with economy of action.
Mary G
@JPL: Diplomats are required to know how to tapdance. He’s moving his feet as fast as he can
I do feel a bit sorry for him; he took the job without even being paid, and ended up between the rock and the hard place, #ETTD
Putin must be seething that all these witnesses talk about how great Ukraine and its people are and how important they are to US national security.
John Revolta
@NotMax: When the facts are against you, pound the table.
Cheryl Rofer
Here’s my current (could change in the next hour) read on Volker.
He truly didn’t realize what was going on with Giuliani for some significant amount of time. It’s through the map and off the mirror, as Adam likes to say, by most foreign policy standards, and thus easy to miss. It also sounds like he was out of a number of loops, which doesn’t comport with the “Three Amigos” tag, though.
His deposition was crafted to at least not irritate Trump, with stuff he “didn’t remember” or other things distorted through the naivete. It was relatively early in the process.
So he’s been learning in real time.
JPL
As much as I love Schiff, Goldman is going to have fun with Volker.
Cheryl Rofer
This is not helping Trump’s case.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Martin: Impeachment will be referred to Judiciary for it’s consideration and vote before it moves to the full House.
Betty Cracker
Volker says the phrase “three amigos” makes him cringe. Prepare for sub-bussening, Rudy and Gordo!
Cheryl Rofer
Cheryl Rofer
Mnemosyne
I was walking past a TV at lunchtime and saw a shot of the hearings. My first thought was, “Who is this Morrison guy, and why does he have such a stupid expression on his face?”
I should have known he would turn out to be an R witness.
Baud
@Cheryl Rofer:
More like Three Stooges, amirite?
LAO
Bingo
patrick II
Are they eventually going to call Parnas? I have read that he is willing to talk and I am Sooo interested in what he has to say.
Cheryl Rofer
OTOH, here’s a former ambassador running for the Senate as a Democrat from Colorado.
Mary G
Betty Cracker
@Cheryl Rofer: I’m with Baer.
Mary G
@Betty Cracker:
Gin & Tonic
@Cheryl Rofer: “Ushering in an era of reforms.” Fuck that. *Ukraine* was ushering in an era of reforms, not Volker or anybody else from the US. Pretty fucking tired of these assholes making like Ukraine has no agency. In the July parliamentary election, nearly 80% of the Verkhovna Rada was replaced. Who’s ushering in reform, you douchebag?
[Obvs not directed at you, Cheryl]
Cheryl Rofer
@Gin & Tonic: No problem. Having worked in Estonia, I know what you’re talking about.
rikyrah
@Martin:
OK, that just made me LOL at work. :)
Cheryl Rofer
psycholinguist
Volker gave it away when he said he was trying to “thread the needle” that means he was well aware that there was a needle to be threaded. Goldberg let him know that he heard that as well, but let him off the hook.
rikyrah
@Martin:
He does, however, have RUSSIAN BUSINESS PARTNERS WITH TIES TO PUTIN.
I honestly don’t grasp why every story written about Nunes doesn’t include this.
Betty Cracker
rikyrah
@zhena gogolia:
Absolutely on point.
wvng
the republican witnesses are not helping the republican cause,
Marcopolo
Speaking of Schiff, can anyone else here imagine anyone else running these hearings? I really can’t.
The other options would be Chair(wo)man Nadler, Waters, Engel, Neal, or whomever replaced Cummings. I’ve seen all of them chair committee meetings at one time or another—only Maxine Waters strikes me as having the kind of forceful personality required to put/keep R Congresspeople in their place but she doesn’t have the legal background. Cummings would also have been great but… Definitely happy for Schiff being there.
Jay
BTDubs, if you embed a Twitter in visual, remove script, post, realize your error, edit to erase visual text, switch to text, re-embed tweet, remove script,…….
Sometimes it posts everything including photo’s and sub texts, just like a Front Pager,
And sometimes not.
Betty Cracker
Democratic House counsel Daniel Goldman is very good at his job.
Cheryl Rofer
Morrison isn’t helping Trump either. Remember, these are witnesses Nunes wanted.
germy
lgerard
Volker is like every episode of Perry Mason
He was already dead wen I got there!
LuciaMia
Hmmm,if the Republicans aim with these witnesses is to stupify viewers, mission accomplished
LAO
@Betty Cracker: he was a very formidable AUSA in the SDNY.
opiejeanne
Is the counsel who is currently questioning Volker and Morrison, is he the Republicans’ guy?
germy
Journamalism
Betty Cracker
Morrison also says the transcripts were placed in the secure server by mistake. Okay. Let’s find out how many other summary transcripts are on that server and have a look at those too.
germy
@opiejeanne: No, he’s is the Democrats’
LAO
Sounds great!
Jay C
@wvng:
But seriously, what – throughout all these hearings – really HAS?
I think it’s more that the Republicans have already gamed out the impeachment process: they know that the only “audience” they truly need to play to is the Senate, and that the Senate is going to let Trump skate. In any event. So their House-Committee strategy of bluster, insult, CT-mongering, etc. is basically an audition for next year’s campaign ads.
That mindless cult-like devotion to The Orange Moron just might NOT be a winning reelection strategy probably hasn’t occurred to them: but as long as so much of their electoral “base” are propaganda-addled Fox News addicts, they can afford not to care.
Baud
I like the text messaging boards. Effective.
Betty Cracker
Jesus, Mary and Joseph.
BobS
@Baud: I thought the 3 Stooges were Parnas, Fruman, & Rudy911?
Cheryl Rofer
Volker is still doing something like what I surmised upthread he was doing earlier. He’s trying to say that Rudy never gave him instructions, which would have been exceedingly improper. It potentially sets him up for Trump throwing him under the bus, but keeps him on the fp professional side of things and possibly the non-prison side of the law.
His story is pretty convoluted, and I’m not sure I’m following the whole thing. I suspect we’ll get better analysis in a week or so, particularly after Sondland testifies. Watching folks trying to wrestle each other under the bus should be amusing.
Omnes Omnibus
@germy: Who are the people in the picture?
Cheryl Rofer
@opiejeanne: No, Daniel Goldman is the Democratic Counsel. Steve Castor is the Republican Counsel. He is usually incoherent, which is one way to tell the difference.
opiejeanne
@germy: Thanks. We just turned it on. I thought he might be, based on the questions he’s asking, although the Rs’ counsel asked some questions earlier today that could as well have been asked by our guy. He got some answers he didn’t expect, and we laughed.
Raven
@Omnes Omnibus: The dude is that moron Rick Scott.
germy
@Omnes Omnibus: Loomer posing with Elise and whatisname, the florida guy
Mnemosyne
@Marcopolo:
I’m pretty sure the Democratic leadership got together and hashed out who should do what. It’s not just luck that Schiff is running this.
BobS
@Cheryl Rofer: I think you misspelled ‘incompetent’.
LAO
Goldman is on fire. Volker’s plan isn’t working the way he hoped.
BobS
@LAO: If they’re able, the Democrats should all yield their time to him.
LAO
@BobS: I wish they would, but they won’t.
Baud
Has Trump been seen publicly since his hospital visit? I recall reading that he hadn’t as of yesterday.
Marcopolo
@germy: The name you are looking for is Skelator—aka Sen Scott.
BobS
@LAO: I know they all like to bask in the camera lights, but sometimes it’s better to take one for the team.
Marcopolo
@Mnemosyne: Agree. But I find it hard to believe there was much to debate.
trnc
This used to describe Lindsay Graham.
Roger Moore
@Martin:
Schiff was a prosecutor before running for office, so he knows what he’s doing when it comes to building a case.
Marcopolo
I’m getting the feeling that Amb. Sondland’s testimony tomorrow may be pivotal.
germy
@Marcopolo:
More Human Than Human
piratedan
@Mnemosyne: I think that goes back to NJP and how she got all of the relevant committee chairs together to determine where the strongest cases were and who should be the tip of the spear.
I think she could have had her pick of which committee went first and went with Schiff because bribery and treason are pretty powerful charges and the President had already self-incriminated himself.
It doesn;t mean that we won;t see similar scenes from other committee members as they bring the administration to task for the plethora of heinous shit that they’ve been enacting all while skimming the government with friends and family. I can only imagine what will be found in oversight, education, national park service and transportation.
HeleninEire
LOL. I usually mute it when the Repubs ask questions and just follow the live blog here and at Wonkette.
Not this time. I am DYING to know how the he’ll they are gonna try to get out of this.
Sab
@Marcopolo: My stepson wants to rename our gray Shadow cat, aka ( by me ) Meankitty, Skelator. Why is this? She and I don’t always get along, but she is otherwise a perfectly nice cat.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: I think Trump had one of the cabinet meetings where everyone goes around the room reading North Korean media-style superlatives about Trump earlier today. It did not go well, I hear. His hair looks even weirder than usual. I’ll see if I can dig up a clip on Twitter.
ETA to add link to a clip: https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1196840538252697600?s=20
Cheryl Rofer
Nunes up
Baud
Nunes up. Click.
Sab
If only Nunes still had cows, any one of the brighter ones would be beter at this than their owner
Baud
@Sab: Cows have too much integrity.
jeffreyw
Shouldn’t Steve Castor’s title be Council?
rikyrah
@Cheryl Rofer:
I call bullshyt here. I’m with Kay. He was always a lowlife. Folks kill me giving these muthaphuckas the benefit of the doubt.
JPL
@Baud: Nunes just turned it over, cuz he’s a coward.
Josie
Nunes passed rather quickly to counsel. I suspect he is unable to figure out what to ask after the questioning by Democratic counsel. Now I will take a nap while listening to Castor question the witnesses.
ETA: or what JPL said.
NickM
Nunes is so awful. Starting with a dog about ratings and calling the impeachment hearing a drug deal. He’s a complete worthless soulless shit. Who does that appeal to?
LuciaMia
Looks like Nunes cant open his mouth without making some smarmy insult
patroclus
Volcker and Morrison don’t strike me as particularly awful persons. They both wanted the military aid to flow to Ukraine and they both wanted the WH meeting so as to cement the U.S.- Ukrainian relationship publicly following Z’s election and the election of their Parliament. Where they went wrong is that they both wanted the above so much that they were willing to go along with (or not really notice) that Trump saw this only as a means to get dirt on Biden. They both knew that that was wrong but their opposition to it was only mealy-mouthed because their desire to support Ukraine was more important to them. I agree with them on the policy and am unable to forgive Trump’s bribery and malfeasance efforts. Thankfully, all this going public has at least made the policy go forward. It doesn’t exculpate Trump though.
patrick II
@Betty Cracker:
I’m not telling you anything you don’t know when I say there is zero chance of documents being accidently added to a codeword classified system by a an even remotely competent administration.
oh, I see the problem there.
Cheryl Rofer
@rikyrah: I’ve been in situations where I didn’t realize what was going on because it was so bizarre. I suspect this is a part of what happened with Volker. But he is pushing that line pretty far, maybe farther than plausible.
bluehill
@Marcopolo: Based on some comments above, sounds like dems questioning of Volker and Morrison are going to force Sondland to choose between protecting himself or incriminating Trump. Should be interesting to see which he chooses.
Roger Moore
@Jay C:
Then they’re even bigger fools than I thought they were. If the Senate is going to let Trump skate no matter what, then the audience they should be caring about is the American Public. People are watching this stuff, and if it’s obvious that Trump is guilty and the Republicans are going to let him off no matter what, that’s not a good look for the 2020 election. Yes, some of these guys are in safe districts and don’t have to worry about anything as mundane as elections, but not all their colleagues are in the same position. It’s going to get awfully lonely for a Republican in DC if the public gets good and mad about the situation.
LAO
@Cheryl Rofer: it’s also possible, I think, that Volker was so invested in the outcome (Presidential support for Ukraine) that he was less concerned by how it was achieved.
BobS
@Cheryl Rofer: multi-lingual former CIA analyst, career diplomat, Wall St. financier- I’m guessing his selective stupidity is an act.
SiubhanDuinne
@Betty Cracker:
Holy fuck, he looks terrible.
opiejeanne
Oh Nunes, you’re such a moron!
You were the only one to laugh at your weak attempt at a joke.
Also, isn’t his name is Castor and not Castro?
JPL
@LAO: He still is but is finding it difficult.
MomSense
@Martin:
He’s suing the person behind the satirical twitter account Devin Nunes’ Cow. I also think he’s suing the Devin Nunes’ Mom account.
Sab
@Baud: Silly man. Cows don’t have integrity. They have cuds.
bluehill
@Roger Moore: Seems like the repub goal is to make these hearings appear like the “witch hunt” that Trump claims it is. Get the
publicsuburban voters in swing states to view this as partisan politics. Problem is that witnesses have been credible and sympathetic and Rs can’t get anything to stick, not for lack of trying.Marcopolo
So what are Sondland’s options tomorrow? Can he plead the fifth if he’s already given testimony in a prior deposition (and amended it)? It seems there is so much factual evidence & testimony placing him at the center of the scheme (along w/ Rudy) and cementing his taking personal direction from Trump I don’t see a needle for him to thread that doesn’t have a bad outcome for him or Trump or Giuliani or all of them.
LAO
@Marcopolo: technically, Sondland can’t take the Fifth on a matter he has already testified about. I say technically because who knows what these shitheads are going to try.
I actually think there’s a 10% chance he testifies truthfully because he doesn’t want to be the fall guy.
opiejeanne
@Cheryl Rofer: If only we could see the names on the counsels’ table. MSNBC has it covered up with the BREAKING NEWS! block.
Cheryl Rofer
@LAO: I think this is definitely part of it.
lgerard
Political appointees exercising the 5th Amendment is frowned upon
See: Monica Goodling
Mary G
Volker is a McCain guy, and McCain felt selling weapons to Ukraine was crucial, so he tried to get it done. Twitler hated McCain (and hates foreign aid and obeys Putin) and would have probably screwed Ukraine on the aid whether or not Zelensky got on CNN and called the Bidens criminals. So Volker’s work was unimportant. The whistleblower derailed all that.
Jay
Cheryl Rofer
Castor is getting to do the kind of questioning he’s probably been praying for. Cooperative witness, giving him the answers he wants. This is why Nunes wanted him as a witness.
I think some of Volker’s answers are not consistent with what he said earlier in this session. I know others will be looking it over with a fine-tooth comb.
Roger Moore
@MomSense:
And for no legally sufficient reason, he is suing them in Virginia rather than California, where both he and Twitter are nominally based. Of course the reason he’s doing that is California’s very strong anti-SLAPP law, which would quickly toss his suit with prejudice and a requirement to pay the defendants’ legal bills.
Cheryl Rofer
Sab
@Cheryl Rofer: Doesn’t Schiff get to rebut? I hope all the dems yield their time to him.
Sab
@Roger Moore: Also, the cows aren’t in CA. They are somewhere in the midwest.
BobS
@Sab: Schiff, or Goldman. Sadly, it’s more likely they step on their dicks.
lgerard
@Cheryl Rofer:
Glossing over an important distinction.
trump is not interested in actual investigations, he is interesting in promoting the conspiracy theories by a public display of their supposed validity by Zelinsky
Cheryl Rofer
debbie
I listened from work. They’re not working out the way Nunes et al. thought they would. Ha!
debbie
@Cheryl Rofer:
That’s not what I heard. He said he saw nothing wrong with investigating Burisma, but didn’t realize that also meant investigating the Bidens.
Redshift
Which Republicans were in which committee was also a consideration. By letting the Intelligence Committee lead, the Dems were choosing to have Nunes as their primary opposition.
Repub leadership shuffled Gym Jordan onto the committee, forcing them to reveal that they knew Nunes was a dumbass, and still a mostly futile move, because there rules ensured it would still be mostly Nunes.
So many reasons to be in awe of Nancy SMASH!
Miss Bianca
@Cheryl Rofer: I got to interview Dan Baer – he’s a sharp guy!
Cheryl Rofer
Former ambassador
Leto
@Cheryl Rofer: Not just leaked to the press, but also that people were having problems with his performance. Morrison’s lawyer put an end to that line of questioning but not before fuckface asked it.
Frankensteinbeck
@lgerard:
All the leaks say that Trump truly believes The Server is in Ukraine, no matter how insane and dumbass that is. His public behavior supports it, and it explains why he thought his ‘transcript’ confession would make him look good. He wanted actual investigations, because he believed there was something to find. Getting Ukraine to make a formal announcement would rope them in and make them actually give up the goods.
Cheryl Rofer
I think part of what the Republicans are trying to do with these two witnesses is to, as usual, confuse the issue. Volker’s explanation of what he was doing and understood was extremely confusing. Then they throw in character assassination of other witnesses for sh*ts and giggles.
Recess now – the five-minute rounds for representatives come next. Not sure I’ll stick around for that.
Chris T.
@Frankensteinbeck: Yeah, and the funniest thing is that there is no “the” server in the first place.
Marcopolo
@Leto: Morrison’s lawyer tried to put the kibosh on him criticizing Vindman but Castor ignored that (apparently along w/ Morrison) and went right on through and had him do it. Fuckers.
Marcopolo
@Cheryl Rofer: I am holding out hope that there will be a lot of ceding time to Schiff & Golden for cross questioning.
TS (the original)
@Cheryl Rofer: The GOP got it’s talking points from their lawyer’s questions and the answers. It is what they wanted.
Cheryl Rofer
And there are a number of statements like this that don’t help the Republicans at all.
It’s going to be a hard night for Sondland and his lawyer. I cannot imagine what he is going to do tomorrow. Throwing himself on the mercy of the law might be a good idea, but I have many doubts that he will do that.
Jay
@debbie:
He’s trying to be “too cute” in his attempts at faking naive,
BobS
@Frankensteinbeck: I’ve been hoping someone would ask Trump to explain what a ‘server’ was, exactly.
Omnes Omnibus
@BobS: Aside from half-assed cynicism, do you have any reason for saying that?
Baud
The server is a metaphor. Has no one read Moby Dick?
Frankensteinbeck
@Chris T.:
It’s completely god damn insane. He even seems to think it’s the thirty thousand supposedly deleted emails from Hillary Clinton’s Secretary of State server, and that they prove she framed him. You have to be a world class dipshit to think that could exist, much less be in Ukraine, but we already knew Trump is a world class dipshit.
Jay
@Frankensteinbeck:
outside of “Trump”, I doubt that Trump believes anything, he just seizes on the mcguffin du jour to misdirect, deflect and attack.
inside of Trump it’s so full of,……..
lgerard
@Frankensteinbeck:
I don’t know. I don’t see much of any effort to interface with prosecutors or law enforcement. The entirety of the effort seems focused on the public statement, to the extent that they actually crafted one for Zelensky to read. Of course the Amigos may just trying to placate trump hoping that afterwards he will be distracted by something else and stop bothering everyone about this.
I think the first rule of trump comes into play here. trump doesn’t care about reality, he only cares what people say about it on TV.
BobS
@Omnes Omnibus: Because they’re politicians, and that’s what politicians do?
O. Felix Culpa
@BobS: Goldman is an accomplished prosecuting attorney, as is Schiff.
TS (the original)
Volker is rewriting what the investigations were about. Purely to stop corruption. The man is self effacing and still lying. “It is a generic investigation.”
Bill Arnold
@Betty Cracker:
And/or real transcripts, and/or recordings.
Also, call it “The Server” (alternate with secure server with embarrassing secrets, or whatever) at every opportunity, to induce cognitive dissonance (there’s surely a real psych word for this) among those infected with the butter emails server propaganda.
Mary G
<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>“Let me go off the record for just a second,” Mark Meadows tells a scrum of reporters, apparently not realizing he’s being broadcast live on C-SPAN3. <a href=”https://t.co/AJ2nMLEcMJ”>pic.twitter.com/AJ2nMLEcMJ</a></p>— Connor O’Brien (@connorobrienNH) <a href=”https://twitter.com/connorobrienNH/status/1196923920072486913?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>November 19, 2019</a></blockquote>
ETA: please ignore
Mary G
debbie
debbie
@Mary G:
They should ask Meadows to prove it.
BobS
@O. Felix Culpa: It shows with both of them, and for continuities sake in clarifying a narrative, I would prefer to hear either of them for the duration, rather than the ‘scattershot’ approach of 5 minutes per member.
JPL
Volker is not good at this … just sayin
FlipYrWhig
@Frankensteinbeck: I totally agree. IMHO Giuliani has been feeding him that stuff and he’s been swallowing it because he can’t bear to admit, even to himself, that he won the election by cheating. I think it’s a Saddam Hussein WMD situation where his cronies have been pumping him up with false information about his unmatched strength, and he’s stupid and prideful enough not to ask questions about it.
TS (the original)
Nunes is back arguing process – I wish Schiff would preface all his polite rejoinders with “as you know”
Volker getting well caught out by Schiff
Mnemosyne
@piratedan:
IIRC, Maxine Waters is the head of one of the finance committees and I can’t WAIT until she has a chance to walk us all through Trump’s tax return. It. Will. Be. EPIC. ?
Served
@Cheryl Rofer: I imagine tomorrow could produce our first invocation of the 5th
TS (the original)
Schiff showing his skills and highlighting lack of integrity of these witnesses
Omnes Omnibus
@BobS: In other words, no.
TS (the original)
GOP questioner – Wasting his time by making statements rather than asking questions
Bill Arnold
@Jay C:
I’m OK with this. It means a higher probability that the Democrats take the Senate and the Presidency, and keep the House, and a higher probability that the Republican Party is disemboweled (a metaphor, alas) at the national level.
Jay
@FlipYrWhig:
Dubya Dubya Me Too never believed the “Weapons of Mass Destruction” bs., as shown by,
#1, it was the 3rd “excuse” they tried to use to justify the war, and they seized on it because it was the most sucessful, 9/11 and “he shot my Paw”, didn’t play,
#2, the care and attention paid in secureing the alleged WMD sites vs say, the unimportant Ministry of Oil or Saddam’s security forces headquarters and files.
BobS
@Omnes Omnibus: You convinced me- politicians DON’T seek out the limelight.
Mnemosyne
@Jay:
This is what’s tricky about dealing with a narcissist: Trump really does believe everything he says, because he needs to believe it in order to protect his inner core.
And if he needs to sincerely believe the exact opposite 10 minutes later, he has no problem at all doing that, because it’s still in service of protecting his fragile self-image.
He is so inner-directed that there is literally no outside reality as far as he’s concerned. It’s all about what’s good for him and what protects his self-image and NOTHING else matters. Truth is an abstract concept to him.
piratedan
@Mnemosyne: agreed, I imagine that there’s more than a few skeletons to be uncovered in other committees as well, it’s a thoroughly scandal ridden enterprise. Hell, I bet these guys have even fucked over the Park service, nothing to small to rob in order to make a buck.
Cheryl Rofer
The Republicans are going all in on “If Zelensky didn’t publicly say that Trump was extorting him, then there was no problem.”
JaySinWA
@Served: I would be surprised if Sondland takes the 5th, he is way more likely to either revise his remarks or try and talk his way out of this. Taking the fifth actually gets him in deeper trouble. He may be stupid enough to do it and take the risk that nobody is going after him but it wouldn’t play well for Donnie.
mrmoshpotato
What is this attitude from Mike Conaway (R) about the whistleblower?
Omnes Omnibus
@BobS: Wow.
Cheryl Rofer
Gym Jordan up
ETA: Man, he has an annoying voice.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@mrmoshpotato: They want to know who the whistleblower is, so they can leak it to their “supporters” so they can threaten the whistleblower and/or his family.
BobS
@Cheryl Rofer: what I’d imagine a methed up hobbit to sound like. And move like.
mrmoshpotato
@Cheryl Rofer: Turns out the volume down button on my phone turns the volume down.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Cheryl Rofer: He’s annoying AF.
lgerard
I can;t think of any still serving political appointee who has exercise the 5th amendment before the Congress.
The last one I remember was Monica Goodling, and she resigned in order to do so
debbie
@Cheryl Rofer:
It’s the steroids from his wrestling days. They never really leave you.
Jay
@Mnemosyne:
Narcissists don’t “believe” anything. What they profess as “beliefs” are situational lies and excuses that they adopt and passionately defend as long as it does the job fooling or manipulating other people, and they will 180 it the moment it stops working.
They adopt the illusion of holding beliefs, but they don’t have beliefs.
Beliefs are an internal thing, often a moral guide, sometimes practical, but it’s internal.
Narcissists adoption of “beliefs”, are external, a means of manipulating others rather than as a guide for self.
Emailz/Server is just a Trump “tell” that he’s still grifting the same marks as he and the FTFNYT/Comey and the other Ususal Suspects did in 2016.
He doesn’t know what a server is, what it does, or even really, what’s so important about EMailz!!!!, but it riles up the rubes and is part of “his greatest hits”, so he runs with it.
Guy’s like “noun, verb, 9/11” think they are grifting Dolt45 with server CT, but the reality is, Dolt45 doesn’t care, he recognizes that “noun, verb, 9/11” is feeding him a line of grift that already has traction with the base, even if Rudy’s too dumb to be aware of it’s potential.
Mike G
If GOP talking points were applied to bank robbery:
1) it isn’t bank robbery if you don’t get the cash;
2) it isn’t bank robbery if you don’t like some of the people who work there;
3) I can rob any bank I want; it isn’t bank robbery if– look! A bird!
4) It isn’t a bank robbery if the robber says it isn’t;
5) It isn’t a bank robbery if witnesses are afraid to finger the perp;
6) It isn’t bank robbery if another bank was robbed a long time ago;
7) Who cares about this bank? It’s not like it was an important bank.
8) Bank robbery isn’t illegal;
9) You can’t fire someone just because they robbed a bank;
10) Everyone robs banks;
11) Ugh, talking about bank robberies is boring;
12) Your preoccupation with bank robbing makes you look dumb;
13) {shouting};
14) If the witnesses don’t like you, their testimony doesn’t count;
15) Whats a bank?
chris
LOL from the Wonkette live blog:
mrmoshpotato
@?BillinGlendaleCA: I know. Fucked up that there are concerns for Vindman’s safety too.
Matt McIrvin
So, the anti-Democratic-Party left is going all in on opposing impeachment, I gather? Had a very strange exchange with someone on Twitter about how the Democratic leadership is distracting us with impeachment so they don’t have to give us single payer.
mrmoshpotato
@Matt McIrvin: ? Oh wingnut left.
Miss Bianca
@Matt McIrvin: Wait, is this the same anti-Democratic Party Left who whined that Nancy Pelosi wasn’t going all in on IMPEACHMENT NOW on their command, or a different one? I confuse so easily these days.
pinacacci
gaaaahhhhhhhhh I CAN’T STAND ITTTTTTTT!!!! Holy crap every republican is just a smarmy nasty asshole and I cannot CANNOT believe we are here as a country, as a society, omfg I just can’t believe it. I don’t usually watch these things but it’s riveting and fucking horrifying and I’m sorry I watched. Sorry I just had to vent. Going back to watching but my skin wants to peel itself off my body and run out the door.
Jay
@Matt McIrvin:
there are a lot of “lefties”, who ain’t left at all.
StringOnAStick
@pinacacci: I so, so hear you. I usually read this stuff but I was doing errands today and heard a lot of it on the radio. Holy shit Gym Jordan is a raging asshole.
Cheryl Rofer
Swalwell is bringing it! Just backed Tim Morrison into a corner on whether he believed Trump’s “request” to Zelensky was a “lawful order” or policy.
mrmoshpotato
Yeah Volker! You go on record calling Russia and Turkey corrupt. ?
mrmoshpotato
Did Will Hurd just call Yovanovitch an “awesome ambassador?”
pinacacci
They’re all so fucking creepy
pinacacci
The way Jordan is going after Vindman might even piss off my right wing racist dad and brother, both military. This is so awful
MisterForkbeard
@Cheryl Rofer: I’m still at work and can’t watch. What did Morrison say in response to that?
pinacacci
Val Demings. nice
pinacacci
wow this conspiracy theory crap is getting read into the congressional record by a congressman.
Cheryl Rofer
@MisterForkbeard: Nothing.
MisterForkbeard
@Cheryl Rofer: That’s good, I guess? Hopefully the video is embarrassing enough to make good fodder online or on the evening shows.
Aleta
If anyone is interested, here’s Nune’s letter to Schiff on Nov. 9 requesting that Volker and Morrison (and others, such as the whistleblower and H. Biden) testify at the hearing.
https://republicans-intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/rm_letter_to_chm_re_witness_request.pdf
Mary G
Schiff brings a great closing statement. You can see why he got so many convictions.
ETA:
If Democrats nominate Biden and he only serves one term, Schiff could win the presidency in a walk.
Mary G
Rachel makes a good point – should only do one set of two witnesses a day; these marathons are exhausting.
Matt McIrvin
@Miss Bianca: The person is still going on about it, saying impeachment is the reason they’re not fixing the high cost of insulin.
Jay
Mock, Paper, Sissors.
Matt McIrvin
@Matt McIrvin: …this is getting stranger: now she’s saying the distraction of impeachment is the reason Kamala Harris isn’t doing better in the primary? I’m not quite following the logic…
Jay
@Matt McIrvin:
in other words, an idjit,…..
tell them to check the paperwork on Yurtle the Turtles desk, pretty sure the insulin fix is in there somewhere, look for the one with the thick coat of dust,….
Jay
@Matt McIrvin:
so, troll, not really a sentient human or leftie.
is this twitter or the book of faces?
either one you can go back to check bonafides and profiles to see if they are “real” or fakes of some kind.
Miss Bianca
@Matt McIrvin:
“Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain.”