Cont: House Impeachment Inquiry - part 2

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Paul2 said:
I imagine that "presides" means to ensure that the rules are applied and enforced, not to make the rules. So if the rules change by majority vote, the CJ would then enforce those rules. I'm guessing. I'm also guessing that others would be guessing, too.
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While they could change the rules to try to force the whistleblower to testify, the whistleblower has legal rights and the protection of the Law (5 USC § 2302). The House could do exactly what Trump has done, and block him from testifying, forcing the Senate to go to court.
 
pgwenthold said:
I'm trying to think about the purpose of calling the whistleblower. What would be the questions?



"Did you hear directly the President ask the Ukraine to investigate Hunter Biden in exchange for releasing the funds?"

"No, Coln Vindman told me he did."

"Oh, so you have nothing to add to this?"

"No, I have nothing to add beyond what Coln Vindman has already testified to. I will just reiterate that Coln Vindman told me that the President was asking Ukraine to investigate Hunter Biden in exchange for releasing the funds."

"Objection, your honor! The witness is providing hearsay."

"Sustained. The witness will only provide information that he has direct knowledge of."

"Sorry, your honor. I cannot testify to having heard directly the President's request. For that information, you need to ask Coln. Vindman."



GOTCHA! Huh?



Redirect:

"Mr. Whistleblower, would you say that Coln Vindman's testimony agrees with what he told you, and is the information upon which you provided your report?"

"Well that, and the information I got from XXX and information I heard directly."

"Your honor, we would like to call XXX to the stand."



If the complaint is that the whistleblower relied on hearsay information in filing the report, then his (or her) testimony is not admissible, right? And the case cannot depend on the information provided in the whistleblower report.



Then again, as far as I know, no part of the case as coming out so far relies on the information in the whistle blower report.
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The questions will also be about any interactions with other people. Any financial contributions to democrats. Anything in their life that is embarrassing. All phone and email records.
 
The House must submit articles of impeachment to the Senate. They can vote on some articles and withhold submission while amassing further evidence for more articles, but this is unlikely to happen. They aren't limited to one submission; they could always submit additional articles when evidence of other crimes presents itself. The Senate has to grant a trial for each submission. Think of the House as a the prosecutor, and the President as a criminal who has committed multiple crimes. Typically, a prosecutor presents charges when they have enough to put the perp away, even if they don't address all of the supposed crimes. I don't know if double-jeopardy applies to the impeachment process, but assuming it does, the House would have to submit articles accusing the President of something else once the Senate gives him a pass on the current batch of crimes.
 
There is an active campaign to against my congresswoman regarding the impeachment process:

https://oklahoman.com/article/5647581/dark-money-group-ads-target-horn

“Their partisan impeachment is a politically motivated charade,” the ad’s narrator states. “Kendra Horn promised to be different but she’s not. Instead of working to secure our border, fix health care and pass a new trade deal with our neighbors that creates real jobs, she supported the partisan impeachment investigation.”
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Is this sort of thing happening in other states?
 
smartcooky said:
He is really getting desperate now.


Firstly, "us" is commonly used as a singular personal pronoun... "Thanks for giving us a ride to the airport" can be singular or plural
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Using "us" for "me" is common in the UK and, apparently, NZ but it is not at all common in the US. I've heard it used a lot by Brits, but I've never heard it used that way here. It's like the use of "our" before a name such as "Is our Sophie coming?" You never hear that in the US.
 
One hears "our" in the US in situations where there are multiple persons with the same first name in the network of family and close friends. More often, though, the surname is tacked on when there's danger of confusion.


In my own family, we use "our" to refer to one of my sons, because he has three friends with the same first name. Since we're Anglophiles, we sometimes also use "proper" to mean "our."
 
smartcooky said:
If the house impeaches Trump, does that mean a Senate trial must happen, i.e. does impeachment automatically trigger a Senate trial.
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Opinion is divided on this question, among the legal experts I've listened to online. It looks like Moscow Mitch is down for a trial, though, so the question probably won't be called.
 
The Senate is compelled to hold a trial upon being presented articles of impeachment from the House, but the Constitution does not provide a time-line. So, theoretically at least, Mitch could just table things for a year or three. However, the point is moot right now, because Mitch has said a trial will happen more or less right away. I'm sure his intention is to make it happen very quickly, so the Senate can vote to dismiss the charges in time to keep the trial from interfering with the 2020 races. [/cynicism]
 
pgwenthold said:
I'm trying to think about the purpose of calling the whistleblower. What would be the questions?

...

Then again, as far as I know, no part of the case as coming out so far relies on the information in the whistle blower report.
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This is the message the Democrats should be using to respond to the GOP diversion.

Bet no one can find where this is being used cleanly as a response to the request to out the whistleblower.

It's in there somewhere buried among long explanations about why whistle blower complaints need to be secret, yada yada.

That only feeds into the false narrative: what are you Democrat hiding?
 
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alfaniner said:
Republicans in the Impeachment Inquiry: "Why are the Democrats having such a fast Impeachment process???"

Trump yesterday: "I want a fast Impeachment process!!!"
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Playing that clip would go a long way. Especially if put in a montage of all the other Trump flip flops and lies about the investigation.

In secret, not in secret.
Republicans excluded, no, they are not.
Trump wants to testify. Trump won't testify.
Aren't letting the GOP call witnesses, GOP witnesses aren't going to testify.
 
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Segnosaur said:
The most likely questions will be aimed at tarnishing the whistleblower. From a legal point of view, such questions would be pointless/inadmissible, but since an impeachment is largely political, strict legal rules won't apply.

Questions like:

"Did you vote for Trump?" -> suggests they are a never-Trumper with an 'axe to grind'. The proper answer to the question is "A hidden ballot is an important part of democracy", but even such an answer will result in the republicans claiming the whistleblower had an axe to grind

"Why did you not do X" (where X could be anything... like 'raise your concerns earlier', or 'wait longer to see if the aid was released') -> Suggests some course of action that wouldn't really work, but falsely suggests that he had alternatives

"Are you privy to each and every conversation the president has ever had" -> Allows republicans to claim "Oh sure, it sounds like extortion in some of the phone calls, but you didn't hear phone call X where Trump and Zelensky were planning on making a movie together and you just heard them rehearsing the script.

"Did you ever (smoke pot/engage in premarital sex/fail to pray to god some day/any other irrelevant event from the past)?" -> Paints the whistleblower as some sort of immoral degenerate
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All clutter.

Should we care? No, the reply should be to the GOP, you got nothing.
 
smartcooky said:
He is really getting desperate now.


Firstly, "us" is commonly used as a singular personal pronoun... "Thanks for giving us a ride to the airport" can be singular or plural

Secondly, that call summary was released on September 24. If he was really talking about "the country" when he said "us" he would have pointed that out immediately because that would have been his immediate thinking. Instead, he acted guilty for 10 weeks, trying to defend what he said, and coming up with continually changing excuses.

- there was no quid pro quo... then,
- if there was a quid pro quo, there is nothing wrong with that... then,
- there was a quid pro quo, but we do that all the time, get over it... then
- "I wanted nothing"

note: he said "I"... if he truly meant the US, he would have said "We wanted nothing"

Thirdly, does anyone seriously believe Trump was seeking favours for the US that were totally unrelated to his personal political interests and 2020 re-election bid? He held up a White House meeting, and military aid to Ukraine while making political demands. Is the making of an an announcement that Ukraine was investigating the Bidens a legitimate US National priority?
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The highlighted is the only response needed. All the rest is clutter, feeding into Trump's distracting narrative.

[Not saying people should not be posting all this logic here. But be careful because it's like Bobbing Trumping the thread.:p

Sorry Bob, nothing personal. ;) ]
 
d4m10n said:
There is an active campaign to against my congresswoman regarding the impeachment process:

https://oklahoman.com/article/5647581/dark-money-group-ads-target-horn



Is this sort of thing happening in other states?
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I am Canadian, but one of the channels on my cable TV is a station out of (I think) Michigan. And I have seen one ad like that... "Call your democratic Congressman and tell them to stop impeachment and get down to important work".

Sent from my LM-X320 using Tapatalk
 
kookbreaker said:
Yeah, they’ve been targeting ads at Andy Kim, NJ 3rd district, whose election was very tight. His is maybe the only vulnerable district in the Philadelphia region so they are trying to rally Trumpers to bully him.
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I find this particularly frustrating. Congresspersons who act in a role analogous to grand jurors should be encouraged to vote their conscience free from external pressure, just as grand jurors are more generally.

Segnosaur said:
I am Canadian, but one of the channels on my cable TV is a station out of (I think) Michigan. And I have seen one ad like that... "Call your democratic Congressman and tell them to stop impeachment and get down to important work".
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Even more frustrating when based on lies.

Sent from my SM-T560NU using Tapatalk
 
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Skeptic Ginger said:
The highlighted is the only response needed. All the rest is clutter, feeding into Trump's distracting narrative.

[Not saying people should not be posting all this logic here. But be careful because it's like Bobbing Trumping the thread.:p

Sorry Bob, nothing personal. ;) ]
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No offense taken! (There are a lot of us Bobs.)

Has Trump started whining yet about not being allowed representation in the hearings he's refusing to send representation to?
 
Norman Alexander said:
The Dems could goad the GOP into calling Trump and his cronies as witnesses. If agreed, there would be a whole encyclopedia of Dem questions for them suddenly appearing on the presiding officer's desk. Alongside the Dorothy-Dixers from the GOP.
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I had to look that one up. Here in the States the appropriate expression would be "shills".

I understood the relevance as soon as I realized it was "Dorothy Dix", the advice columnist and crime reporter.

My tendency was to automatically read "Dorothea Dix". A woman of quite different history entirely, whose achievements are memorialized all over the country. (Quite unlike Dorothy.)

My mistake, of course.
 
d4m10n said:
I find this particularly frustrating. Congresspersons who act in a role analogous to grand jurors should be encouraged to vote their conscience free from external pressure, just as grand jurors are more generally.

Even more frustrating when based on lies.

Sent from my SM-T560NU using Tapatalk
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The ads I’ve seen are similar to what Seganosaur has seen, if not identical with just the names changed.

As I said they are targeting what they see as the weakest link. I doubt Kim will change his vote on this. His win was weak so the question is if Trump fans are galvanized by the impeachment. I’m kinda doubtful, but it is a very GOP section of NJ (but so was Delaware County, PA and that flipped this year). Kim’s opponent in 2018 did little more than run negative ads about Kim (which didn’t even mention what party either one was in). His opponent was also in that semi-viral video where he stood like a sad sack at a town meeting while one of his constituents hammered him for supporting Trump’s attack on the ACA. If Kim loses i don’t think it will be from impeachment or these ads. I think the GOP is kinda wasting their money here.
 
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