Tag Archives: political parties

If You’ve Got Nothing to Hide

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Congressman Eric “Nuke ’em” Swalwell (D, CA) has come up with yet another bit of his distortion of our Constitution.

If the president of the United States is innocent, he will send the firsthand witnesses, John Bolton and Mick Mulvaney, to Congress.  If he’s guilty, they’ll stop us from hearing it, hard stop.

Because Guilty. He’s accused.

This is precisely the sort of invasive, prurient, government arrogance against which our Founders, the authors of our Constitution, and us citizens led the fight against, wrote into our Constitution, and ratified—including the 4th Amendment:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Swalwell must get a warrant.  He doesn’t get to peek through our windows—even through an opposing politician’s or associates of an opposing politician’s windows—just because his prying mind wants to peek.  Nothing to hide? Our privacy is all we have to hide, and it’s sufficient that we choose to protect it.  If we’re innocent? We start out that way; it’s on Swalwell and his Government cronies to prove we’re not.

And this gem:

I wanted the American people to see that these [William Taylor and Gordon Kent]…share what they saw as far as wrongdoing….

Except by their own admission under oath during the Wednesday’s hearing they saw absolutely nothing as far as wrongdoing. All they could do was describe things they’d heard others say, through an often highly convoluted grapevine.

Even Congressman Nuke ’em knows this, or he wasn’t watching the hearing. This is a measure of the level of integrity that our Progressive-Democrat politicians hold.

What Do We Have So Far

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Wednesday’s “impeachment” hearing is in the can, and here’s what we know from it.

All Acting Ambassador to Ukraine William Taylor and State Department’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs George Kent could offer throughout the entire 6-ish hours of testimony was hearsay and supposition.

Taylor repeatedly said he’d heard this, or someone reported to him that, or it came to him through a chain of tellings and retellings. “I heard it from a guy who heard it from a guy (who heard it from a guy).” He also insisted that Progressive-Democrat claims of wrongs done by President Donald Trump vis-à-vis Ukraine were his understanding, too, even his clear understanding.  Yet when directly asked how he arrived at his understandings, all he could say was, “Well, I heard it from a guy….” Even his in-hearing “revelation”—that Ambassador to the EU Gordon Sondland thought Trump, in the runup to and during the telecon, only cared about a Biden investigation—was nothing more than that Taylor had heard it from guy: Sondland reporting to Taylor Sondland’s own “understanding.”

Sondland’s understanding? Congressman Jim Jordan (R, OH) spelled out an example of Sondland’s…understandings:

Ambassador Taylor recalls that Mr [Tim] Morrison told Ambassador Taylor that I told Mr Morrison that I had conveyed this message to Mr [Andriy] Yermak on September 1, 2019, in connection with Vice President Pence’s visit to Warsaw and a meeting with President [Volodymyr] Zelensky[.]

When asked if either had talked to Zelenskiy or Trump or Trump associates themselves, both Kent and Taylor had nothing to say except that they had talked to none of the principles or associates of the principles.  All they had was their grapevines.

There were, though, some actual facts revealed in Wednesday’s hearing:

  • Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said—repeatedly and on the world stage during multiple press conferences that he held—there was no pressure, no influence attempted
  • Despite Progressive-Democrat Intelligence Committee members’ claims that Trump had intimidated Zelenskiy into beginning or publicly announcing the need for investigations under threat of aid cut-off, Zelenskiy began no investigations, made no such public averrals. The aid was released shortly after the telecon
  • Ukraine’s government didn’t know aid had been held up until long after the telecon
  • Ukrainian aid had been held up over skepticism about endemic Ukrainian corruption; it was released when the White House staff became satisfied that Zelenskiy and his staff were “the real deal”
  • Progressive-Democrats, having failed in their quid pro quo quest, now are turning to the even more difficult to prove extortion/bribery (they can’t decide which) charge
  • Intel Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D, CA) continues to refuse to allow the principle witness to this affair, the reputed whistleblower—whose own claim is based solely on hearsay—to be called to testify
  • By extension, Schiff also won’t allow the whistleblower’s reputed sources to be called to testify

This is the level to which the Progressive-Democratic Party has sunk.

Today’s hearing will be…interesting?

Another Bout of Foolishness

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Congressman Eric Swalwell (D, CA) was on the late-week talk show circuit complaining about President Donald Trump’s removal of Marie Yavonovitch from the position of Ambassador to Ukraine. It’s wrong, he insisted, to remove an ambassador for nakedly political reasons.

This is just ignorant, shockingly so from a Congressman.  An ambassador’s job is to represent our government, headed by our President, politically on the world stage, beginning in the nation to whom she’s our ambassador.  It’s an inherently political job.

It’s impossible to remove an ambassador from an inherently political position for any reason other than politics.

Contempt

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Here is the plain, palpable contempt the Progressive-Democrats have for Republicans and for us average Americans.  This excerpt is from the transcript of LtCol Alexander Vindman’s “testimony” during House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff’s (D, CA) closed door…hearing (excuse the differing image sizes):Aside from blocking legitimate questioning, this lawyer for Schiff’s witness (while Republican witnesses are routinely denied the presence of their or of State or White House counsel) openly called the Republican Congressman a liar.  Without objection or correction by Schiff.

And we average Americans are supposed to be stupid enough not to understand either the naked stonewalling or the slur.

Remember this next November.

Stonewalling

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We’re seeing it already in the witnesses that House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D, CA) will permit the minority Republicans on his committee to call during the public hearings the Progressive-Democrats are holding, beginning tomorrow, pursuant to their partisan effort to impeach President Donald Trump.

The Republican list—required to be submitted before Schiff identified the scope and subject matter of his hearings in sufficient detail to allow a proper list to be assembled—is this:

  • Devon Archer—knowledge of Burisma’s alleged role in Ukrainian corruption in general, central to Trump’s desire to be sure of the degree to which the new Ukrainian government is getting corruption under control
  • Hunter Biden—knowledge of Burisma’s alleged role in that corruption: “Mr Biden’s firsthand experiences with Burisma can assist the American public in understanding the nature and extent of Ukraine’s pervasive corruption….”
  • Alexandra Chalupa, former Democratic National Committee staffer—alleged to have worked with Ukrainian embassy to the US to “gather political dirt” on Trump’s then-campaign for office. Also admitting to providing such dirt to the DNC and to Hillary Clinton’s then-campaign for the same office. “…Ms Chalupa is a prime fact witness…understanding facts and circumstances surrounding Ukrainian involvement in the 2016 election.”
  • David Hale, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs—”firsthand knowledge of events preceding and surrounding Ambassador Yovanovitch’s recall from Ukraine…[and] Hale’s communications with Ambassador Taylor regarding Ukrainian matters….”
  • Tim Morrison, former Senior Director for European and Russian Affairs on the NSC—three House Progressive-Democrat-run committees have questioned Morrison; those transcripts are not yet released. Morrison was present on the telecon in question and worked with the NSC immediately afterward. If LtCol [Alexander] Vindman is called to testify, Morrison must be as well.
  • Nellie Ohr, former contractor for Fusion GPS—she “is a prime fact witness…understanding facts and circumstances surrounding Ukrainian involvement in the 2016 election.”
  • Ambassador Kurt Volker, former US Representative for Ukraine Negotiations—”primary interlocutor and trusted confidant of the Ukrainian government” and firsthand knowledge of discussions, including those with Rudy Giuliani, Ambassador Gordon Sondland, Ambassador William Taylor
  • The anonymous whistleblower
  • All witnesses used by the whistleblower “in drafting his or her second hand complaint”

This is a much too short list, driven by Schiff’s withholding the scope of his “inquisition.”  I would have liked to have heard directly from Yovanovitch, Fiona Hill, and Vindman, also, all of whom seem to have lied to one degree or another during Schiff’s secretive Star Chamber questionings.

Withal, though, Schiff already has barred Biden, the whistleblower, and presumably by extension the whistleblower’s “sources.”  It’s plain that the Progressive-Democrats only want those “facts” convenient to their predetermined outcome to be heard by us average Americans.  All the facts seem to be anathema to the Inquisitors.