The Impeachment Process Has Officially Begun (11 Viewers)

[Andrus]

By Laura Bassett

After months of internal arguing among Democrats over whether to impeach President Donald Trump, the dam is finally breaking in favor of trying to remove him from office. The Washington Post reported that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would announce a formal impeachment inquiry on Tuesday, following a bombshell report that Trump illegally asked Ukraine’s government to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, one of his political opponents. (He essentially admitted to having done so over the weekend.)

“Now that we have the facts, we’re ready,” Pelosi said Tuesday morning at a forum hosted by The Atlantic. At 5 p.m. the same day, she was back with more. "The actions taken to date by the president have seriously violated the constitution, especially when the president says Article Two says I can do whatever I want," referring to the segment of the Constitution that defines the power of the executive branch of the government. Pelosi's message was that checks and balances of those branches are just as central to the Constitution. And one more thing: "Today, I am announcing the House of Representatives is moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry," she said at a conference broadcast on Twitter by the Huffington Post. ...

Read the Full Story - InStyle

 

[Dadsdream]

There is no record or evidence that any other president has ever politicized US foreign policy for personal political gain in an election like Trump clearly seems to be doing.

Err . . . uh . . . I won't risk condescension here, so I'll just suggest more in-depth study of US presidential history beginning with George Washington.
After all, what was that pesky Revolutionary War all about anyway?

 

[yuyi64]

What do you think about the recent admission by Mulvaney that Trump politicized US foreign policy and the evidence that shows Trump politicized it for personal political gain?

I have no problem with it. All Presidents have politicized US foreign policy for personal or political gain. The same people screaming quid pro quo and abuse of power would have no problem with it if a President of their liking had asked a foreign power to investigate Trump, his family, or his associates. Oh wait, that actually happened in 2015 and 2016, so did any Democrat call for an impeachment inquiry then?

 

[LA - L.A.]

I have no problem with it. All Presidents have politicized US foreign policy for personal or political gain.

There is no evidence this is true. Though this claim keeps getting repeated, not a single example has ever been given to show this is true.

...if a President of their liking had asked a foreign power to investigate Trump, his family, or his associates. Oh wait, that actually happened in 2015 and 2016, so did any Democrat call for an impeachment inquiry then?

President Obama was the president at the time. What foreign government did Obama ask to investigate Trump, his family, or his associates.

If we want to protect civil discourse on this forum, at some point we are going to have to stop making and tolerating such baseless claims that are made just so a person can get a "win for their side."

 

[N.O.Bronco]

The difference is that Trump does this for personal gain - not for the good of the US

And talking about personal gain and impeachment - this is a clear violation of the emoluments clause which by the way is also an impeachable violation. This probably went under the radar due to Syria and Ukraine



https://us.cnn.com/2019/10/18/politics/donald-trump-impeachment-turkey-kurds-g7-mulvaney/index.html

Which gets us right back to the question I have posed to yuyi no less than four times now without answer. Which is how is this not impeachable when this is the very thing outlined in the constitution as a justification for removing an office holder?

Because when you look at the historical context of impeachment through the lens of the founders, that explicitly mentions bribery, where the context of the day was such that it essentially defines bribery as exactly this. An office holder using the power of his office for personal gain. Bribery was not a criminal statute the at time, so the notion it must meet some contemporaneous criminal statute in modern times is out the window. Which leaves only the question of whether you root your principles in a constitutional context or you root your principles is something more morally malleable, like party or personality.

As to the ridiculous assertion that Mulvaney was simply expressing a normal function of foreign policy, maybe some additional context is once again needed.

Unless you think conducting a shadow foreign policy through your personal lawyer aimed to discredit an investigation into your former campaign manager and yourself is normal above the board foreign policy, what Mulvaney admitted to was anything but exculpatory.

When Mulvaney refers to setting conditions on American aid looking into the matters of the 2016 election, what he is referring to is Giulliani’s politically rooted pressure campaign with several convicted Ukrainian kleptocrats and their proxies, most who he is financially tied to, to manufacture an alternative narrative to the Mueller Report that is rooted in baseless conspiracies about Crowdstrike, an American company, and Manafort’s black book that got him thrown in prison. Conspiracies that were disseminated not through any justice department investigation but on places like Fox News. So if coordinating with corrupt kleptocrats and their proxies to bolster conspiracies meant to politically damage an ongoing investigation and his rival political party, spread on American news, under threat of withholding foreign aid, conducted by a personal lawyer, is normal foreign policy, I think the onus is on those making the claim to prove it.

 

[wardorican]

NPR has a little weekly update. No opinion on it, just a nice play by play with testimony updates. Another week coming up with more testimony.

Impeachment Inquiry Update: What This Week Revealed About The Ukraine Affair

President Trump commissioned Rudy Giuliani as his top guy for Ukraine, and the White House also appointed "three amigos" to carry out its policy. The administration says nothing's wrong here.

www.npr.org

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

Today's testimony by Bill Taylor was pretty interesting. I think if you take him at his word, then it becomes clear the President was using the powers of the United States to benefit himself politically.

 

[Beach Friends]

Today's testimony by Bill Taylor was pretty interesting. I think if you take him at his word, then it becomes clear the President was using the powers of the United States to benefit himself politically.

Testimony from a witness who has not been subject to cross examination is pretty meaningless to me.

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

Testimony from a witness who has not been subject to cross examination is pretty meaningless to me.

Really? That seems pretty strange. You could never indict anyone then since witnesses are not cross examined during grand jury testimony. So how do you propose that one goes about starting an investigation?

 

[cuddlemonkey]

Testimony from a witness who has not been subject to cross examination is pretty meaningless to me.

You are aware that the Republicans on the committees holding these depositions are given equal time to ask questions, right?

 

[Ayo]

Really? That seems pretty strange. You could never indict anyone then since witnesses are not cross examined during grand jury testimony. So how do you propose that one goes about starting an investigation?

at some point, all the straws will have been grasped

 

[wardorican]

Today's testimony by Bill Taylor was pretty interesting. I think if you take him at his word, then it becomes clear the President was using the powers of the United States to benefit himself politically.

Did you read his opening statement? I'll link it later. I read it all. Really connects the dots.

The only legit defense that can be made is that his interpretation of events wasn't accurate. However I think there is a lot of corroborating evidence / events happening that make him credible.

 

[MT15]

This is one of the excerpts from The NY Times:

“Mr. Taylor said he was told by Gordon Sondland, the American ambassador to the European Union, that military aid for Ukraine and an Oval Office meeting between President Trump and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine were contingent on the Ukrainians announcing that they were investigating a company, Burisma, that had hired Hunter Biden, the son of Joseph R. Biden Jr. Rudolph W. Giuliani, the president’s personal lawyer, helped convey the demands, he said.


By mid-July it was becoming clear to me that the meeting President Zelensky wanted was conditioned on the investigations of Burisma and alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections. It was also clear that this condition was driven by the irregular policy channel I had come to understand was guided by Mr. Giuliani.


Later in his statement he said,


Ambassador Sondland also told me that he now recognized that he had made a mistake by earlier telling the Ukrainian officials to whom he spoke that a White House meeting with President Zelensky was dependent on a public announcement of investigations — in fact, Ambassador Sondland said, “everything” was dependent on such an announcement, including security assistance. He said that President Trump wanted President Zelensky “in a public box” by making a public statement about ordering such investigations.”

6 key revelations of William Taylor’s opening statement to impeachment investigators — The New York Times

William B. Taylor Jr., the top American diplomat in Ukraine, delivered detailed testimony on Tuesday about the actions at the heart of the inquiry.

apple.news

 

[wardorican]

I love the "it's not a quid pro quo" ... "he should want to do this"

I'm not asking for a favor, I'm telling them they should want to do this on their own... then I'll release the aid..

 

[MT15]

It is said he took exhaustive contemporaneous notes, as befits his professional training in diplomacy.

He is a career diplomat, used to serving both Republican and Democratic administrations. It’s gonna be hard to spin this away, IMO.

 

[wardorican]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/context/opening-statement-of-ambassador-william-b-taylor/6b3a6edf-f976-4081-ba7f-bce45468a3ff/

Form your own opinions. Here's the opening statement from Bill Taylor.

 

[bdb13]

The same people who earlier essentially said "there's nothing to see here" unless the quid pro quo could be proven will now just shrug their shoulders and say "so?" as it is proven. And so on and so forth. That's the game.

What was done was done to harm the other, inherently more objectionable, party. As such, the ends will always justify the means.

That's what Trump has truly figured out: if his interests are tied to harming Democrats he can get away with murder.

 

[Beach Friends]

Really? That seems pretty strange. You could never indict anyone then since witnesses are not cross examined during grand jury testimony. So how do you propose that one goes about starting an investigation?

Really? That seems pretty strange that you would confuse what is happening here to a grand jury.

You are aware that grand jury testimony is not selectively leaked out correct?

This false comparison to a grand jury proceeding is tiresome. People overlook the fact that, for example, that the leaked opening statement was obviously not subject to cross examination. Someone else says, oh yeah - they can cross examine the witness.
But they conveniently overlook the fact any testimony taken under cross examination is under lock and key.

Certainly you can appreciate that if we can't see the entire testimony that the portion you can see doesn't mean a whole lot.

 

[yuyi64]

Today's testimony by Bill Taylor was pretty interesting. I think if you take him at his word, then it becomes clear the President was using the powers of the United States to benefit himself politically.

Shocking I tell you , shocking! Tomorrow Schiff will leak the bombshell that the President is acting like a politician running for re-election.