'The expression "Fish rot from the head down" does not begin to capture the Trump presidency'

[Demovictory9]

https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/10/14/trump-cronies-put-careers-before-country/

The flood of fraudulent blather from the mouths of Donald Trump and his fact-resistant defenders has gotten so torrential that one may be forgiven for forgetting some of the oldies but goodies that The Great Bamboozler employed to get himself elected in the first place. “Drain the swamp!” was a particular favorite. Each day, however, brings fresh evidence that if Washington was a swamp when the president took office, it has gone positively putrid since then, and it is Trump himself, certifiably the most crooked president in our history, who has turned the nation’s capital into a toxic waste dump.

The expression “Fish rot from the head down” does not begin to capture the Trump presidency, which resembles nothing so much as a pile of rotted fish. Even before the revelations that the president had schemed to use his office to extort assistance from the Ukrainian government in conjuring up “dirt” on Joe Biden to help the president win re-election, itself a federal crime, the rotting fish head was obvious for anyone to see — or smell. The president’s own Justice Department had asserted in a federal court that he had directed his personal lawyer to commit felonies. The Republican special counsel appointed by a Republican Justice Department appointee had amassed voluminous evidence that the president had committed 10 separate acts of obstruction of justice, each its own felony. In the face of the conclusive evidence that the president solicited assistance of value from a foreign government for his re-election effort, the leader of the world’s hitherto greatest democracy has gone into full lock-down, ordering his entire administration to disregard Congressional subpoenas seeking the facts about what occurred. Those subpoenas complied fully with established Supreme Court precedent grounded in the Constitution itself. The president’s directive that these subpoenas be ignored is, quite simply, lawless; his purpose is to prevent not only Congress but the American people from learning the truth.

But it may be too late. With his longtime personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, in federal prison in significant part for carrying out Trump’s orders, Cohen’s replacement, Rudy Giuliani, may soon be joining him. If so, it will be because he, too, chose unwisely in doing Trump’s bidding. Giuliani is under federal investigation for potential violations of a variety of federal laws, including those prohibiting the president from soliciting things of value from foreign countries. Two of Giuliani’s associates, both Trump donors with Ukrainian ties, were arrested in an airport jetway last week with one-way tickets to Europe, not ordinarily a badge of innocence. They will shortly be offered the choice of “flipping” on Giuliani or receiving substantial jail terms. They will probably choose the former, which will not benefit Giuliani. And Trump, emitting increasingly untethered nonsense on the White House lawn and to crowds comprised of die-hards, must know that faced with his own choice between “flipping” on the president and a potentially severe prison term, Giuliani will likewise opt to protect himself.

Some relief from the foul odor of Trump’s swamp was provided by career public servant Maria Yovanovitch, the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine canned by Trump at Giuliani’s urging because they deemed her too honest and honorable to abet their activities there. “She is going to go through some things,” bragged a swaggering Trump to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a now-famous telephone conversation. Ordered by the president to withhold evidence from the Congressional committees investigating Ukraine-gate, Yovanovitch told him to stuff it. She appeared in Congress on Friday and testified for nine hours.

[struggle4progress]

1. What would Edna St. Vincent Millay say?

The fish in the outhouse rots from both ends
It stinks throughout the night