reggieandlee
reggieandlee's JournalBTRTN: Pelosi Reveals Her Trump Card. Now Will She Play It?
Born To Run The Numbers examines the implications of Nancy Pelosi's announcement that she is withholding the Articles of Impeachment pending the announcement of the Senate rules:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-pelosi-reveals-her-trump-card-now.html
"Until last week, it seemed the Dems were bungling impeachment...Then Nancy Pelosi showed her trump card, announcing that she simply was not going to forward the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate until Mitch McConnell clarifies the rules. That one elegant move on her part could solve many of the issues that seemed problematic about the Democrats' approach to impeachment.
"...when (Pelosi) finally turned in favor of impeachment... she insisted on the narrowest possible articles of impeachment, and seemed to want to race through the process, hoping that the Senate would finish the inevitable acquittal as quickly as possible. Democrats would have been better served to follow a slower and more deliberate path, one in which a full array of articles of impeachment might have been explored and considered. As long as there continued to be new revelations and the possibility of new witnesses, there seemed to be no reason to arbitrarily call the process to an end.
"Pelosi knows that Trump cannot wait for the trial to be complete so that he can go on Fox News and hundreds of rallies and scream to the rafters that he has been “exonerated” and “vindicated,” and that he was right all along that the “Deep State” was pursuing a “coup” to undo the 2016 election. How ironic. Nancy Pelosi is holding the Trump card. If she never forwards the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate, there is no trial. No acquittal. No exoneration. No celebration... Pelosi gains many of the advantages of a 'slow impeachment,' without having to wait for the Supreme Court to rule on Congressional subpoenas. If she holds her ground, we either get a trial with witnesses, or Trump will never get his exoneration. Heads Nancy wins, tails Trumps loses."
BTRTN: Pelosi Reveals Her Trump Card. Now Will She Play It?
Born To Run The Numbers examines the implications of Nancy Pelosi's announcement that she is withholding the Articles of Impeachment pending the announcement of the Senate rules:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-pelosi-reveals-her-trump-card-now.html
"Until last week, it seemed the Dems were bungling impeachment...Then Nancy Pelosi showed her trump card, announcing that she simply was not going to forward the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate until Mitch McConnell clarifies the rules. That one elegant move on her part could solve many of the issues that seemed problematic about the Democrats' approach to impeachment.
"...when (Pelosi) finally turned in favor of impeachment... she insisted on the narrowest possible articles of impeachment, and seemed to want to race through the process, hoping that the Senate would finish the inevitable acquittal as quickly as possible. Democrats would have been better served to follow a slower and more deliberate path, one in which a full array of articles of impeachment might have been explored and considered. As long as there continued to be new revelations and the possibility of new witnesses, there seemed to be no reason to arbitrarily call the process to an end.
"Pelosi knows that Trump cannot wait for the trial to be complete so that he can go on Fox News and hundreds of rallies and scream to the rafters that he has been “exonerated” and “vindicated,” and that he was right all along that the “Deep State” was pursuing a “coup” to undo the 2016 election. How ironic. Nancy Pelosi is holding the Trump card. If she never forwards the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate, there is no trial. No acquittal. No exoneration. No celebration... Pelosi gains many of the advantages of a 'slow impeachment,' without having to wait for the Supreme Court to rule on Congressional subpoenas. If she holds her ground, we either get a trial with witnesses, or Trump will never get his exoneration. Heads Nancy wins, tails Trumps loses."
BTRTN: Democrats Rip Into Each Other Competing to Prove Who is the Best Unifier
Born To Run The Numbers provides its overnight analysis of the Democratic debate. Amy may have won on debate points... but did everybody miss the bigger opportunity?
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-democrats-rip-into-each-other.html
Excerpts: "We’ve just been through one of the worst, most acrid, most bitterly divisive weeks in the history of the Republic.Americans appear weary of the incessantly shrill, biting hyperbole of partisan rhetoric, and are desperately hoping for a change. Democrats agree that more than anything, they simply want to know who can beat Donald Trump. Who, they ask, is best able to unify and excite the Democratic Party? Hey, let’s rip into each other to find out!!"
"On just the night when America may have looking to find who on the Democratic stage has the potential to restore our national pride, who could right this radically polarized ship, and who could bring our bitterly divided nation together, we got a lot of snotty, snippy, nastygrams launched sideways at other Democrats. Come on, people. We want to find out how big you can be, not how small you really are..."
"Here’s the bad news for Biden: no one was paying much attention to him. Not even the moderators. When you are a former Vice President of the United States who is the leading candidate in all the national polls, and your competitors appear to be focusing all their energy on damaging the 37 year-old major of a small midwestern city, you have to wonder about the power of your candidacy. Sooner or later, Joe has to win a debate, and it did not happen again last night. Yet again on the debate stage, Joe Biden looked like he was seeking the nomination of the Low-T Party..."
"Here's our scorecard..."
BTRTN: GOP Impeachment Mantra -"What Does the President Want, and How Quickly Can I Get It For Him?"
Born To Run The Numbers reacts to yesterday's House "debate" leading up to the ratification of Articles of Impeachment, compiling the full list of Republican reasons to defend Trump without reservation:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-gop-impeachment-mantra-what-does.html
Excerpts: "Each side claimed it was a sad day, but both sides willfully misrepresented why it was sad for them. Democrats said it was sad because impeachment is a monumental step and no one wants to see it used. That is true in the abstract, but not in this instance. Almost all Democrats want Trump to be impeached, and were delighted that, after the fog of the Mueller investigation, Trump handed them the smoking gun that the American public, and even Republicans, could understand and act on.
"But what was truly sad (and worse) for the Democrats was that their Republican colleagues failed to concede anything at all, not even that there was something wrong in the Ukraine fiasco. Instead they lined up and denigrated the senior Trump administration officials who dared to tell the truth..."
"Republicans, on the other hand, said it was sad because the impeachment process was a 'sham' with 'no evidence' to support it. But that’s not why it was actually a sad day for the GOP. It was a sad day for the GOP because almost every member of the party knows that there was something horribly amiss with UkraineGate, but, in the face of their own political cowardice, they were powerless to do anything about it. Some might have expected to be able to adopt a defense that made clear that Trump’s actions were indefensible, though not impeachable. But Trump would not accept this; he made it clear that unconditional support for his “perfect” call was the only acceptable defense. And he got it. And that is sad, and they all know it.
"Here are the (10) reasons the Republicans gave for voting against the articles of impeachment..."
BTRTN: GOP Impeachment Mantra -"What Does the President Want, and How Quickly Can I Get It For Him?"
Born To Run The Numbers reacts to yesterday's House "debate" leading up to the ratification of Articles of Impeachment, compiling the full list of Republican reasons to defend Trump without reservation:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-gop-impeachment-mantra-what-does.html
Excerpts: "Each side claimed it was a sad day, but both sides willfully misrepresented why it was sad for them. Democrats said it was sad because impeachment is a monumental step and no one wants to see it used. That is true in the abstract, but not in this instance. Almost all Democrats want Trump to be impeached, and were delighted that, after the fog of the Mueller investigation, Trump handed them the smoking gun that the American public, and even Republicans, could understand and act on.
"But what was truly sad (and worse) for the Democrats was that their Republican colleagues failed to concede anything at all, not even that there was something wrong in the Ukraine fiasco. Instead they lined up and denigrated the senior Trump administration officials who dared to tell the truth..."
"Republicans, on the other hand, said it was sad because the impeachment process was a 'sham' with 'no evidence' to support it. But that’s not why it was actually a sad day for the GOP. It was a sad day for the GOP because almost every member of the party knows that there was something horribly amiss with UkraineGate, but, in the face of their own political cowardice, they were powerless to do anything about it. Some might have expected to be able to adopt a defense that made clear that Trump’s actions were indefensible, though not impeachable. But Trump would not accept this; he made it clear that unconditional support for his “perfect” call was the only acceptable defense. And he got it. And that is sad, and they all know it.
"Here are the (10) reasons the Republicans gave for voting against the articles of impeachment..."
BTRTN 2020 Vision: Are Democrats Too Exhausted for Disrupters?
Born To Run The Numbers provides its latest, up-to-the minute analysis of the 2020 Presidential race:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-2020-vision-are-democrats-too.html
Excerpts: "Two themes have emerged as the unsettled field continues to jockey back and forth: (1) Do the Democrats need a 'mental health break'-- rather than radical disruptive change -- in the wake of Trump? (2) Are Democrats headed for a brokered convention?"
"Warren’s stall in November has led to a tumble in December... Biden actually improved in Iowa and continued to lead comfortably in Nevada and South Carolina, and Sanders passed Warren to lead in the progressive lane. Pete Buttigieg’s upward surge in Iowa and New Hampshire came to a halt, but he still commands a solid position there, and he also made modest progress in Nevada and South Carolina. Can Amy Klobuchar play the tortoise in a field with no hares? She is finally scoring in the polls, hitting the 10% mark in the latest Iowa poll. Mike Bloomberg’s money-saturated start has given him a foot in the door in California and Texas, but whether he can survive skipping the early four states remains to be seen..."
"The 'brokered convention' is a dreaded term among the old Dem pols. Key point: the Democratic primaries are NOT 'winner take all' and thus it is very difficult to amass delegates with multiple candidates owning segments of support. Typically one needs 15% of the vote to earn delegates, and one can imagine two or three candidates achieving that threshold in a number of primaries. Even if you win 60/40, it’s hard to catch a frontrunner who is 100+ delegates ahead in a two-person race. But in a four or five person race, you have the opposite problem: the frontrunner can’t amass enough delegates to get near a majority..."
BTRTN: A House Impossibly Divided. Now What Are We Going To Do About It?
Born To Run The Numbers looks ahead to the day that the Senate acquits Trump. Then what?
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-house-impossibly-divided-now-what.html
Excerpts: "Turns out Trump was right along about one thing. He could go out and shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue, and his supporters would not budge...And what would Republicans say about that shooting on Fifth Avenue? Some would say it didn’t happen. Some would say it happened but he didn’t do it. Some would say that it doesn’t matter, because you can’t prove it. Fox would tell you that it was just so much fake news perpetrated by The New York Times, The Washington Post, MSNBC, CNN, or CBS. White House lawyers will assert that the police have no right to conduct any investigation of any kind into the actions of a sitting president. Some Republicans would say that he did it, but because he is the President, and he had every right to do it. Some would say that the investigation into the shooting was an illegitimate exercise undertaken by the President’s adversaries deep in the bowels of the police department who were using the excuse of the shooting to attempt an illegal coup on the president. And, of course, there would always be the final line of defense in case somebody actually had a iPhone recording of the President pulling the trigger and blowing someone’s brains out. Republicans would say that it was a bad thing to shoot somebody, but it was not an impeachable offense..."
"The government is not doing the work that must be done. Anyone who believes that Trump will be brought to justice through the institutional mechanisms of government designed for oversight, checks and balances, and the rule of law must now take a moment to google 'Einstein’s definition of insanity.' When the government is unable or unwilling to function, the only hope for our democracy and our country lies with its people. The only way we are going to be certain to find our way out of this horrific mess is if every citizen accepts his or her responsibility to act..."
BTRTN: A House Impossibly Divided. Now What Are We Going To Do About It?
Born To Run The Numbers looks ahead to the day that the Senate acquits Trump. Then what?
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-house-impossibly-divided-now-what.html
Excerpts: "Turns out Trump was right along about one thing. He could go out and shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue, and his supporters would not budge...And what would Republicans say about that shooting on Fifth Avenue? Some would say it didn’t happen. Some would say it happened but he didn’t do it. Some would say that it doesn’t matter, because you can’t prove it. Fox would tell you that it was just so much fake news perpetrated by The New York Times, The Washington Post, MSNBC, CNN, or CBS. White House lawyers will assert that the police have no right to conduct any investigation of any kind into the actions of a sitting president. Some Republicans would say that he did it, but because he is the President, and he had every right to do it. Some would say that the investigation into the shooting was an illegitimate exercise undertaken by the President’s adversaries deep in the bowels of the police department who were using the excuse of the shooting to attempt an illegal coup on the president. And, of course, there would always be the final line of defense in case somebody actually had a iPhone recording of the President pulling the trigger and blowing someone’s brains out. Republicans would say that it was a bad thing to shoot somebody, but it was not an impeachable offense..."
"The government is not doing the work that must be done. Anyone who believes that Trump will be brought to justice through the institutional mechanisms of government designed for oversight, checks and balances, and the rule of law must now take a moment to google 'Einstein’s definition of insanity.' When the government is unable or unwilling to function, the only hope for our democracy and our country lies with its people. The only way we are going to be certain to find our way out of this horrific mess is if every citizen accepts his or her responsibility to act..."
BTRTN: "If This is Not Impeachable Conduct, What Is?"
Born To Run The Numbers provides a comprehensive summary of the House Impeachment Inquiry in its month-in-review for November:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-if-this-is-not-impeachable.html
Excerpts:
"The House Intelligence Committee presented a meticulously conceived and efficiently produced set of testimony from a cadre of Trump Administration officials in the public testimony phase of the impeachment inquiry. The testimony proved conclusively that President Trump personally directed and participated in a scheme to withhold from Ukraine military aid and a greatly desired White House meeting in return for political favors to advance Trump’s reelection prospects (as opposed to U.S. security interests)...
"The GOP scrambled as new revelations emerged that undercut each successive defense the GOP offered – but at the end of the hearings, it was clear that not a single GOP representative or senator was likely to vote against the President when considering either the Articles of Impeachment in the House or a conviction based on those articles in a Senate trial...
"This left the GOP only two strategies: in the near term, to sputter about the impeachment “process” despite the fact that it was conducted according to form, or, longer term to conclude that while the President’s offenses were real and regrettable, they were not impeachable...
"But that ultimate defense begs the question raised by House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff at the outset of the public testimony: 'If this is not impeachable conduct, what is?'"
BTRTN: "If This is Not Impeachable Conduct, What Is?"
Born To Run The Numbers provides a comprehensive summary of the House Impeachment Inquiry in its month-in-review for November:
http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2019/12/btrtn-if-this-is-not-impeachable.html
Excerpts:
"The House Intelligence Committee presented a meticulously conceived and efficiently produced set of testimony from a cadre of Trump Administration officials in the public testimony phase of the impeachment inquiry. The testimony proved conclusively that President Trump personally directed and participated in a scheme to withhold from Ukraine military aid and a greatly desired White House meeting in return for political favors to advance Trump’s reelection prospects (as opposed to U.S. security interests)...
"The GOP scrambled as new revelations emerged that undercut each successive defense the GOP offered – but at the end of the hearings, it was clear that not a single GOP representative or senator was likely to vote against the President when considering either the Articles of Impeachment in the House or a conviction based on those articles in a Senate trial...
"This left the GOP only two strategies: in the near term, to sputter about the impeachment “process” despite the fact that it was conducted according to form, or, longer term to conclude that while the President’s offenses were real and regrettable, they were not impeachable...
"But that ultimate defense begs the question raised by House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff at the outset of the public testimony: 'If this is not impeachable conduct, what is?'"
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