Seth disappointed tonight with ‘Jokes Seth Can’t Tell’. Sorry. Ya Burnt.

Trevor

Stephen

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

Accord reached in Vietnam; North Korea seizes the U.S.S. Pueblo; Roots airs; Bob Keeshan dies; Johnny Carson dies.

Terry Jones (1 February 1942 – 21 January 2020)

Every age sort of has its own history. History is really the stories that we retell to ourselves to make them relevant to every age. So we put our own values and our own spin on it.

Terry Jones

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I object, your honor! This trial is a travesty. It’s a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham.

How are Senate Republicans supposed to defend their impeachment vote?
By Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post
Jan. 22, 2020

Senate Republicans sitting through hours of patient, careful arguments from House managers and the unhinged and false claims from President Trump’s lawyers should think about how they will explain to voters their anticipated acquittal in the impeachment trial of President Trump. For those on the ballot in November in states with competitive Senate races (North Carolina, Maine, Colorado, Iowa, Arizona, Georgia), it will do them no good to repeat the rants they hear from Trump’s lawyers. (The House was unfair! Democrats denied him due process!)

Voters with a passing familiarity with the facts and the coverup (Trump’s and the Senate’s) will ask some pesky questions:

• Senator, Republicans keep saying Trump couldn’t be impeached unless charged with a crime, but didn’t Republicans’ own expert lawyer, Jonathan Turley, say that was wrong? (“While I believe that articles of impeachment are ideally based on well-defined criminal conduct, I do not believe that the criminal code is the effective limit or scope of possible impeachable offenses.”)
• Senator, can you really ask a foreign country to come up with dirt on a domestic rival? What if your opponent tried that in your election?
• Why wouldn’t you allow witnesses and documents? How can that even be called a trial?
• Senator, do you believe President Trump (who has kept his business going, steered business to his properties, allowed his children’s conflicts of interests to persist, indicated interest in repealing anti-bribery laws, hobnobbed with corrupt oligarchs) was just trying to root out corruption in Ukraine? Why did he only mention Burisma and the Bidens in his call with Ukraine’s president?
• Holding back aid to Ukraine broke the law, according to an independent government agency. Why did you think this was no big deal?
• Did the president do something wrong in holding up aid to Ukraine until he got political help from a foreign government? Should we just “get over it”?
• Why was the “ask” from Ukraine an announcement of an investigation and not a real investigation? If the president thought something was wrong, why did he not go straight to the FBI?

You see, Trump’s attorneys can blather all they like, knowing the right-wing media will treat their nonsense as a legitimate defense. Republican senators can pretend to be persuaded and vote to acquit. But then what happens when the senators themselves are asked about the crackpot arguments and defenses by voters outside the Trump cult, by local media and by their opponents in debates?

It is hard to imagine Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) saying with a straight face that abuse of power is not impeachable. Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) will find it mighty uncomfortable to insist to independent voters in Colorado that it is fine to extort a foreign country to force it to announce it was investigating an American. Sen. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.) will likely get grilled in a debate (unless she runs away from those) about why she refused even to hear from key witnesses. How does she explain a trial with no witnesses?

In sum, the “nothing matters, just lie” mode of politics only applies within the Trump cult. As soon as you leave the bubble to encounter voters, the media or opponents who know better, your talking points make you sound dumb or corrupt or both.

That is what Republicans should contemplate: How the heck am I going to defend this to the people back home? Trump’s attorneys are giving them no fig leaves or explanations that can pass the laugh test.

It’s extremely important to remember that Nellie Forbush was a selfish racist bigot who ruined not only her own life, but the lives of those around her.

I love Musical Theater. It’s so uplifting.

Ok, we got two concessions and I don’t want to minimize the importance of either of them.

Without allowing the House Record to stand all that witness testimony you had yesterday, and will have in the coming days, would have been out of order. Were I Parliamentarian I would certainly have ruled that way.

Adding the extra day makes presenting the case much easier. I would divide it into 3 Parts, Article One, Article Two, and a Summation. Reserve a few hours for Rebuttal if possible.

But it’s weak beer to be sure. I don’t think Republicans have even 8 hours in them so, another day.

The other thin reed of hope to cling to (Sue Collins is senile and just made a mistake) is that Republican Motivations and Mechinations are transparently exposed. If further revelations are forthcoming (as seems likely) they should be embarrassed, alas they have shown themselves devoid of shame.

I’d be curious to know how Approval Ratings are trending because that will be 2020.

Making the rounds.

Trevor

Stephen

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

U.S. Supreme Court legalizes abortion; Theodore Kaczynski pleads guilty; Queen Victoria dies; “The Crucible” opens;”Laugh-In” premieres.

Always laugh when you can. It is cheap medicine.

Lord Byron

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True story this. In one of my U.S. History Courses (indeed all of them but I may not be cudgeling my memories with sufficient vigor) I was asked one question I didn’t know the answer to, didn’t even have a good guess-

What political innovation was imported from Australia in 1888?

The answer is the secret ballot, sometimes called the blanket ballot because it listed all candidates regardless of Party (Yup, leaving opposing Candidates off the ballot used to be a thing), labeled Party Identification (Yup, misleading Voters about your affiliation used to be a thing), oh, and above all it was secret so nobody knows how you voted because beating up the opposition was a thing too.

I of course answered, “Kangaroos!” If political innovation was not in the question I would have been technically correct and I misremember if it was simply implicit in the nature of the test but I didn’t quibble because I was already ruining the curve for everybody else and they hated me for it.

What? You don’t read your whole History book at the beginning of the Semester? You’re missing the flow of the narrative.

Anyway, I think we can all agree on what a “Kangaroo Court” is and if you don’t understand the reference look it up yourself.

Barely past noon only halfway through my daily reads and I’m already super cranky.

A big tell in Trump’s own legal brief exposes McConnell’s coverup
By Greg Sargent, Washington Post
Jan. 21, 2020

Now that Mitch McConnell has rolled out the rules for President Trump’s impeachment trial, the full dimensions of the Senate majority leader’s efforts to cover up Trump’s bottomless corruption are coming into view. They’re worse than expected, which is really something given McConnell’s long-running devotion to shielding Trump from accountability.

As it happens, the formal legal brief that the White House just released in Trump’s defense itself illustrates the true nature of this attempted coverup as clearly as anyone could ask for.

McConnell’s rules, which are in a draft resolution, appear designed to make it politically as easy as possible for GOP senators to facilitate Trump’s coverup. After opening statements and questioning from senators, the Senate will vote on whether any subpoenas for new witnesses and documents will be permitted.

If 51 GOP senators then vote “no,” that would be it. Senators would not have to vote specifically on whether to subpoena former national security adviser John Bolton or acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney.

Nor would senators have to vote on whether to subpoena any of the specific documents and evidence that the administration refused to turn over to the House impeachment inquiry. It would be politically harder to vote against specific demands, and McConnell’s rules appear designed to spare GOP senators from that.
…
Trump’s legal team has submitted a lengthy brief in his defense that is packed with the same old nonsense. It insists Trump pressed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden’s activities in Ukraine out of genuine concern over corruption, a reference to Biden’s work as vice president to oust a Ukrainian prosecutor, supposedly to protect his son Hunter.

That narrative is fabricated. And the notion that Trump was genuinely concerned about this invented corruption, as if it were just pure coincidence that Trump also worried he might face Biden in 2020, is laughable on its face.

What’s notable in the White House brief, however, is its treatment of Trump’s conditioning of political acts — a White House meeting and hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid — on Zelensky doing his bidding.

The brief argues that two of the people who spoke directly to Trump about the freezing of military aid both exonerated him. That’s a reference to Ambassador Gordon Sondland, who personally conveyed the extortion demand to Ukraine but said he only “presumed” the money was conditioned on announcing investigations and testified Trump told him “no quid pro quo.”

It’s also a reference to Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), who asserted Trump personally told him he’d “never” demand such a quid pro quo, after Johnson had expressed deep concern about the frozen aid.

But note how the document references Sondland and Johnson: It repeatedly describes them as the only two people on record who discussed this with Trump.
…
This is the “central fact” in this case. But the very use of the phrase “on record” gives away the entire sordid game.

Here’s why. The whole reason Sondland and Johnson are the only people “on record” — that is, the only people who directly discussed the frozen aid with Trump who testified to the House impeachment inquiry — is because Trump blocked all the other people who also discussed this with him from testifying.

Mulvaney froze the aid at Trump’s direction. Bolton privately argued with Trump over it. They both defied House demands for their testimony — at Trump’s direction. And if GOP senators vote against hearing any witnesses, they will be carrying out Trump’s bidding once again.

And so, Trump’s own brief itself underscores the truth about the coverup — that it’s all about keeping all of these other witnesses with direct knowledge of Trump’s freezing of the aid off of “the record.” It’s all about keeping them from sharing what they know under oath.

“The brief reveals the secret sauce to the coverup — to try to keep others who directly communicated with the president from going on the record,” Ryan Goodman, a law professor at New York University, told me.

As it is, the argument that Sondland and Johnson exonerated Trump is nonsense. In the same call where Trump supposedly told Sondland “no quid pro quo,” Trump also told him to convey to Zelensky that he must do Trump’s bidding, even as Trump continued withholding the money.

“The brief carefully relies on these third-person accounts to claim what the president did or did not say,” Goodman told me. “The irony is the Sondland call is actually one of the most incriminating parts of the record. When Sondland told other officials of this very call, it set off alarm bells.”

And Johnson’s statements actually undercut Trump’s case, because Johnson’s concern about what Trump had done itself illustrated how indefensible it was. There is zero reason to accept Trump’s phony denials to Johnson or Sondland at face value: The extortion demand actually was conveyed to Zelensky by Sondland, who was acting at Trump’s direction throughout, and Trump himself directly expressed it to Zelensky on July 25.

What this all shows is that, if GOP senators vote as McConnell hopes, they’ll actually be voting to never hear from the people with the most direct knowledge of the very conduct Trump and his defenders say was entirely above reproach. After all, Trump blocked them from speaking to the House as well.

Those GOP senators will be voting to carry Trump’s coverup all the way through to completion.

I’m skipping Cartnoon and putting this up in its time slot because I think we’ll have plenty to be outraged about this afternoon.

Oh, and this is the most important piece.

Trevor

First of all, MLK Jr. with Roy Wood Jr..

Ok, Impeachment.

Stephen

His get was Tom Steyer-

And, because we are collecting wealthy Democratic Presidential Candidates, I give you Andy Yang-

Seth

And again, first of all, Amber Ruffin on MLK Jr..

Pretty On Topic as usual.

And his big get? Michael Moore.

Now I’m not saying there are many new crimes (with the definite exclusion of the ongoing Obstruction which has continued) in this summary, but we do have new information about them and the important point is this-

These are new facts and documents, corroborating in every detail the testimony of the witnesses before the House Intelligence Committee AND they have all been revealed since the Articles of Impeachment were approved by the House.

The original piece from The Bulwark is here- The New Evidence Against Trump Since He Was Impeached by Kim Wehle, January 21, 2020. It’s a bit long for this page but full of linky goodness and pretty much a must read.

So much criming, so little time.

Raw Story has a summary of the summary which, while not comprehensive, is a good deal shorter by Travis Gettys.

Here’s all the new evidence discovered about Trump’s Ukraine corruption — since he was impeached
By Travis Gettys, Raw Story
January 21, 2020

New evidence emerged over the holidays, when the public is distracted, showing Trump’s knowledge of the Ukraine quid pro quo and awareness of the scheme’s illegality.

Two days after the articles of impeachment passed, 300 pages of new emails were made public showing White House officials directed the Department of Defense to block military aid to Ukraine, and made clear the order came from the president.

Those documents also showed worried White House officials then worked to cook up a justification for the pause, after the whistleblower complaint came out, because they feared Trump’s order would violate the Impoundment Control Act.

Documents released by an indicted associate of Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani shows the president was directly involved in his personal attorney’s efforts to conduct foreign policy on his behalf in Ukraine in violation of longstanding foreign policy against the country.

Giuliani, working for Trump, then worked to oust Ukrainian ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, who was maybe placed under surveillance by his associate Lev Parnas and Robert Hyde, a Republican congressional candidate.

Parnas appeared last week on MSNBC and CNN, and he told broadcasters the Ukraine scheme involved Vice President Mike Pence, Attorney General William Barr and Rep. Devin Nunes, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee.

That matches testimony by EU ambassador Gordon Sondland, who told the impeachment inquiry that “everybody was in the loop,” and notes from Trump’s July 25 call to Ukraine president also mentioned Barr was involved.

Foreign efforts to interfere with the U.S. election were shown Jan. 13 to remain ongoing, after a cybersecurity company reported that Russia’s government hacked Ukrainian oil company Burisma Holdings — which is at the center of the Trump scheme.

I dunno. Think we need some witnesses? Moscow Mitch McConnell doesn’t and his draft rules forbid inclusion of the Testimony and Documents from the House proceedings.

So basically they prevent the House Managers from presenting any evidence at all.

When you grow up you develop “Object Permanence”. This is the knowledge that just because you’re not looking at something doesn’t mean it went away, the whole point of the Peek-A-Boo Game.

I’m past playing Peek-A-Boo except with the extremely gullible (which isn’t in the Dictionary, you could look it up) and babies. Moscow Mitch evidently needs a refresher. Just because you suppress the facts doesn’t mean they won’t come out and then you’ll be exposed as the Conspirator and Traitor you are.

That applies equally to every Republican Senator.