The Rude Pundit: Random Observations on a Cover-Up (Impeachment Trial Rules Edition)

[babylonsister]

http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2020/01/random-observations-on-cover-up.html

The Rude Pundit
Proudly lowering the level of political discourse
1/22/2020
Random Observations on a Cover-Up (Impeachment Trial Rules Edition)

1. Early yesterday (well, early for me), I made a prediction that democracy's maggot, Mitch McConnell, would allow for some changes in his ludicrously stringent rules for the Senate impeachment trial of Donald Trump. I said that he would give in on the timeline of the opening statements, which were a punishing 24 hours over 2 days for each side, and on the admittance of evidence from the House investigation, which was going to require a vote on every piece introduced. I thought that it would come in a vote on an amendment from the Democrats, but, instead, McConnell made the changes (three days and accepting all evidence unless there is objection) before anything got started. This was the bone he tossed to give cover to the so-called "moderates," Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Mitt Romney, and Corey Gardner, along with the retiring Lamar Alexander. It will be the only ground McConnell gives. The fix is in so deeply that it would be impossible to pull it out of the clenched anus of the GOP.

2. Yes, you're right. Democratic House managers were incredible yesterday. They were so well-prepared, so eloquent, so passionate about the sanctity of the country, so filled with magnificent retorts and one-liners. It was the kind of ass kicking that even a barely literate electorate would watch, think, "Holy shit, Trump is just a motherfucker and so are these Republican motherfuckers in the Senate," and rise up to shut shit down until all Republicans were all chased out of town. But we are civic illiterates now, just hoping that we can live and die without anyone downvoting our Reddit comments.

3. Yes, you're right. Trump's legal team acted like a bunch of drunk frat douches (including fucking corrupt Pam Bondi) who knew their dads had already paid off the dean to make sure they get good grades so they can play on the lacrosse team this semester. They railed and ranted at the Democrats, accusing them of everything from hypocrisy to flat-out murdering the founders. They heaped praise on Trump, because of course they did. They talked shit and shit lies. They did everything but actually address a single fact. And they won't. They're giving a book report without having read the book. And they know they can do it because Mitch McConnell has already promised that this is a big fuckin' show that they're forced to go through because of that goddamn Constitution, which he can't actually rip up but would if he could.

4. We know how this ends. We know that the likelihood that there will be witnesses is the same likelihood that McConnell's face muscles will function like a normal human being's. And any conviction has the same probability that Lindsey Graham will remove his tongue from Donald Trump's asshole. The GOP does not have honorable people. They are cowards and punks and bitches and worms, dead frightened that Trump will say something fucked-up about them and unleash his bot and bastard online army to threaten to rape their dogs.

5. So if we know the outcome, then what's the game about? It's about 2020, obviously. It's about winning the Senate. It's about peeling away as many putative independents to tell Collins and Gardner to shove their moderation up their Trump-humping peeholes. The message should be as clear as possible: We're impeaching Trump now because he was trying to fuck with the 2020 election. If we waited until after the election, he'd have fucked with it. And Susan Collins and Mitch McConnell and the rest wanted his criminal ass to get away with it.

5a. Oh, and by the way, Trump still doesn't believe there was interference on his behalf in 2016, and McConnell has refused to do a goddamn thing to protect our elections.

5a. This is where the near-complete abandonment of the Mueller Report hurts Democrats. They could forcefully assert that Trump's attempt to get dirt on Biden was part of a pattern of soliciting foreign interference. But Democrats ended up allowing Trump and pudgy doom muffin William Barr set the terms of discussion of the report.

6. So we're getting a bullshit exercise in futility with this trial. But you should absolutely pass around clips of Hakeem Jeffries reaming Jay Sekulow. You should tell everyone about what a cockknob Pat Cipollone is. And you should campaign for whatever Democrats promise to burn the GOP to the ground and piss on the ashes.

[tblue37]

1. K&R. nt

[bullwinkle428]

2. "Pudgy doom muffin William Barr" alone earns a K&R!

[smirkymonkey]

5. That was my favorite insult!

Definitely using that one again!

[Hortensis]

3. Use of the Mueller Report must have been very carefully

considered and reconsidered as the situation evolved. I enjoy Rude Pundit, but he's like any of us. He doesn't know what it is he doesn't know.

But here's some stuff we do know:

The Mueller Report is enormously important. It may not contain the complete, airtight legal case needed to charge Trump with conspiring with Russia against his nation, but it's chock full of evidence and documents many crimes.

The Republicans, particularly by controlling the DoJ, already won the identification of it for the nation, though, and that was "not guilty."

That matters, because we've known for 3 years that the Republican senate would acquit Trump if it came to it. The real trial is being presented in the Court of Public Opinion. The senate itself is on trial. And the verdict will be rendered next November.

Pundit wants house Democrats to present a vast array of details and trigger public preconceptions favorable to Trump,which the Republicans would use to refute everything and create their deadly confusion with.

We've instead chosen to present a very simple case the Republicans literally have no evidence to refute. And we have refused to try to battle to undo already solidly-implanted lies even while McConnell used this procedure to reinforce them to the nation.

And with that decision, Pelosi/Schiff et al must have disappointed the Republicans extremely.

[pangaia]

4. " But we are civic illiterates now,-----------

" But we are civic illiterates now, just hoping that we can live and die without anyone downvoting our Reddit comments."

That says it all right there..

[wendyb-NC]

6. Thank you for posting, babylonsister

I can't agree more. I want to have hope that some how the, democratic managers are able to sway the timid, fearful, "moderates".
We, however, are dealing with a pack of sleazy, warped, greedy criminals,and mobsters on the retrumplican senate side. I am so fed up with the fascist's, and
their 4 drugged, fearful, zombie dump senator followers.

We have to win the 2020, elections, and end the sordid, non-stop, crime spree, going on since the bloated tyrant took office.

[dalton99a]

7. Kick