If you wrote it in a Hollywood script \u2013 no one would buy it.\u00a0\u00a0No one would buy the impeachment of the President, rocked by the secret book laying bare the criminal actions of the President himself.\u00a0\u00a0They wouldn’t buy Lev and Igor (that\u2019s not Boris and Natasha), spending dollars like water in the Ukraine, working for \u201cAmerica\u2019s Mayor\u201d Rudy Giuliani, but financed by a Russian oligarch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No one would believe an entire television network, not just dedicated to protecting the President, but supplying his spokespeople, his staff, and even his legal defense team.\u00a0\u00a0And who could imagine that the lawyers who got the most infamous child sex purveyor of the century a sweetheart prison deal, would appear in the \u201cwell\u201d of the Senate to intone solemn legal defenses for the President.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No, no one would buy it.\u00a0\u00a0It\u2019s not believable the producers would say, it couldn\u2019t happen.\u00a0\u00a0Yet here we are.\u00a0\u00a0By the way, while all of this is going on, the President himself is announcing his son-in-law\u2019s new Middle East Peace Plan, with the criminally indicted Prime Minister of Israel at his side.\u00a0\u00a0Yeah, it wouldn\u2019t even make it as a comedy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They defense team can\u2019t shoot straight. Monday, their \u201cbig day\u201d in front of the American people, they buried the lead. They started off with a long lecture by Ken Starr, the man who drove the impeachment of President Clinton for lying about a blowjob. Starr lamented the \u201cfrequency\u201d and \u201cpettiness\u201d of recent impeachments, as if he had nothing to do with it. His performance was like a blanket and a warm fireplace: it made it hard to stay awake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And if they were smart, they would have spent the rest of the afternoon on Constitutional issues. But they dropped their \u201cbomb\u201d a four in the afternoon, instead of saving it for \u201cprime time\u201d. They launched their attack on Joe Biden, the leading Democratic candidate for President, while America was finishing up work and heading home to dinner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After all, this is what the entire crisis is about. Trump wanted to attack Biden, and he wanted the President of Ukraine, Zelenskiy, to do it. Trump was willing to leverage American national security to get a Ukrainian investigation into imagined Biden corruption there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And even though Trump got caught and couldn\u2019t get that exposure, he had a second chance.\u00a0\u00a0It was yesterday, when the former Florida Attorney General Pam Biondi, dressed provocatively in what looked like a prototype \u201cSpace Force\u201d uniform, launched her attack on Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It should have been in prime time.\u00a0\u00a0If you\u2019re taking the shot; then take it, don\u2019t hide it.\u00a0\u00a0But they blew that chance.\u00a0\u00a0Instead of trashing Joe Biden in front of the a watching nation, they gave the prime time slot to wizened Alan Dershowitz, former legal prodigy and Harvard Law Professor.\u00a0\u00a0Dershowitz dropped us all into a lecture from his old classroom, Constitutional Law 506.\u00a0\u00a0You know you\u2019ve got your audience when you are describing the legal acumen of the Justice who dissented to the Dred Scott Case in 1857.\u00a0\u00a0That, for sure, cements the deal with the American people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Oh yeah, did I forget the guy who wanted to go back and impeach President Obama? He was after \u201cSpace Force\u201d woman and before dinner. I don\u2019t think he earned much respect from the Senators, or the American people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So here we are today, the last chance for the \u201cgang that can\u2019t shoot straight\u201d. What looked like a sure \u201cwin\u201d for them, with a Senate majority firmly behind the President, is now getting shaky. Senators know that President Trump can damage them politically, they know their \u201c\u2026heads could end up on a pike\u201d if they cross him. But they also know that the truth is out there, in the pages of John Bolton\u2019s new book, in the SDNY evidence for Lev and Igor, and in the unspoken testimonies of Pompeo, Mulvaney, and the rest. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The President\u2019s defenders have spent their time handing out \u201cfig leaves\u201d for Republican Senators to hide behind, giving them cover to vote to end the Trial. But those same Senators can see the future, and that future will make them look naked and foolish. The defenders will have to give them a \u201cbigger leaf\u201d today, if they want the trial to end this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Of course if you are a \u201cswing\u201d Republican Senator, there are no good choices to make. If you vote with the President, you keep a core base, but lose the middle. If you vote against the President, even just to allow witness testimony in the trial, you risk a Trumpian attack that takes you base. And the Democrats in your state aren\u2019t going to thank you with their votes; no matter what you do they are voting for someone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The most improbable ending: Bolton testifies, twenty Republican Senators are moved, and the removal of Donald John Trump from the Presidency becomes a real possibility. But don\u2019t hold your breath for that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It couldn\u2019t even happen in a Hollywood script.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"