Not sure who, sounded like a Republican politician, said this morning, rather triumphantly: “Democrats had 24 hours to present their case and President Trump’s lawyers demolished it in 2 hours. DEMOLISHED IT!!”
That’s crack talking.
Sekulow and Cippilone did nothing of the sort. They didn’t dispute the facts. They impugned the reputations of the House managers, as is their familiar modus operandi.
Yet, they still think they can haka their way out of this. If they jump up and down and stick their tongues out and bulge their eyes, the rest of us will just give up and go away. Nah gah happen.
Or they think their base really is that conditioned that they can ignore the facts forever. Mebbe.
Well, at least Democrats aren’t underestimating the intelligence of the audience.
Filed under: General |
The Confluence 
Yes, the intelligence of the audience always matters. Propagandists always try to state their wishes and opinions as facts,and count on people to think they must be true. Hence their constant, “Americans want…. ,” and Trump’s “everybody is saying…” Most people want to be on the winning side, go with the crowd, so the bad guys try to convince them how to perceive reality.
The obvious facts ate that the Democratic case is overwhelming. Every single witness they called in the House filled in a part of the puzzle, and it all fit together. There is no rebuttal to that testimony.The awful state of the Republican Party at this point is that they don’t care about facts, evidence, or anything else but winning.. Rick Scott, who has cheated his way to Governor and now Senator, said that “the Rrepublicans presentation of the first day “knecapped Schiff.” Nice choice of words from another one of their thugs. Then this guy on CSPN, saying they demolished the case.
They want it to be so, so they say it and even think it is so, which is even more frightening. And thus, s always, the news media is responsible for filtering it through the lens o f truth, rather than making it, “well, Democrats say this, and Republicans say that,” which of course invites everyone to go with their side. As to whether the average person can understand the facts, I am not too optimistic (Trump “won” after all, and so did Bush),, but it’s all the hope we have. The House managers, particularly Schiff, did everything reasonably possible to lay out the facts. There should be closing statements in this trial, but there are not, so the side which goes second always has that advantage. And as always, the Republicans have the media to amplify their twisted arguments. What they want, is dismissal, or failing that, a vote for no witnesses, and then acquittal; and then their propaganda machine to say that they demolished the Democrats’ case, what a great victory for truth, justice, and the American way. Do they get away with it? Will this march to Orwellian doublethink reality be stopped? Where are Locke and Hume, and the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment?
Not that I’m watching this, so I could be wrong, but from what I gather, the Republicans’ general arguments , both in this trial, and outside it, seem to be these.
1. There is no evidence that Trump did anything wrong.
2. Yes, there was a quid pro quo, but get over it
3. The Democrats did not call any first-hand witnesses like Bolton
4. Whatever Bolton appears to be saying in his book is not to be believed.
5/ The Democrats should have gone through another year of trying to get the courts to enforce their subpoenas, including waiting until the Supreme Court ruled on it.
6. This is an election year, so we cannot prolong the trial.
7. Ukraine eventually got the money, so there was no harm.
8. No one has any right to impeach or try the President. Disregard what we kept saying in 1998.
9. They are trying to nullify Trump;s election..
10. If you try to call Bolton as a witness, we will call Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, Adam Schiff (all said by Cornyn today), plus the whistleblower ,and anyone else we can use to divert attention and help Trump get elected.
11. We are standing up for the integrity of the American legal and judicial process.
So it looks as if the Republicans are going to have to let Bolton testify. But will they let anyone else testify, or is this going to be their one concession which they think saves them from the “The Republican senators did not allow any witnesses” charge? Will Bolton testify in open hearing, or will it more likely be in some kind of closed session, argued to be for purposes of guarding classified information? And most importantly, what kind of witness will Bolton be? He is a longstanding hawkish right-wing Republican, and he recently praised Trump for the killing of Soleimani, as Bolton has always wanted a war with Iran. Is he going to give testimony which is largely supportive of Trump, and “the great work he has done,” while just criticizing this one situation? I have never trusted him in all of this. He is not John Dean. Is he the “don’t throw us into the briar patch” person who is going to perhaps advance Republican interests? Maybe not quite that, but I am wary. I will be surprised if any more witnesses are called, other than perhaps one Republican witness, but we will see. Republicans are not after the truth, they are after the best way to get to the acquittal, while trying to look as if they are being fair, while saving the seats of their endangered senators.
If they let Bolton testify, I assume they will want one or both Bidens to “prove” trump’s corruption concerns were valid and the whistleblower for no good reason other than to out him or her to Fox and the base.
I agree William, Bolton cannot be trusted to put the country before his own personal interests or his party’s.
Today i heard Roberts could exercise his authority in the interest of a fair trial. Wasn’t one of the circus barkers saying this is not a trial, senators are not jurors, this is a “tribunal?” I didn’t listen long enough to hear where he was going with that. Still waiting for Roberts to surprise me but my expectations are low.
Cats, Senator Ernst’s comments today were repulsive. She gleefully asked if the hearings today would cause Democrats in Iowa to vote against Biden next week. This just substantiates the gameplan here. Lie about Biden, do what Zelensky did not yet do when Trump tried to extort him to, and then eliminate Biden as a threat, in favor of someone whom the Republicans can beat. Like Biden or not, agree with him on this or that or not, this is what the Republicans now are, and will always be: a party which will do anything, lie about anything, in order to stay in power.
All accounts are that Biden did not do anything corrupt in Ukraine, not even close. But as we see, the Republicans’ playbook is to come up with some slander, and then repeat it over and over, until many people start to think that it might be true. With Dukakis, it was Willie Horton and Boston Harbor, neither of which he was responsible for. With Gore, it was accusations that he was some kind of fabulist and liar. Kerry’s was, “I was for it because I was against it.” Hillary we know all about, it went on for 25 years, and has not stopped yet. Obama was the one person they were unable to really get that kind of traction against, because of ethnicity, and because McCain would not go in that direction, but they still had the “birther” stuff to use against Democrats downticket from him. Now it is Biden. It is a particular form of gutter, gut punching politics. It is the worst kind of Nazi-derived propaganda. This entire Senate hearing, since they could not avoid it, was intended to be turned into a Trump rally in which Biden and his son would be slandered. Joni Ernst is a disgrace, but they all are. If we can’t do anything else, we should do everything we can to flip the Senate, so Ernst and Cornyn and Graham, McConnell and the rest of them are either out of the Senate, or in the minority for decades. They have no redeeming value at all.