General Impeachment inquiry launched

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Splinty

Shake 'em off
Admin
Dec 31, 2014
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Predictions?
Transcript of phone call will blow up in someone's face.

If Trump did nothing, this will give cover to him for everything the Dems come up with until 2020. That's it. He's untouchable.

If the phone call is enough to sink Trump in public court, the Dems will impeach and this will stop in the Senate. The GOP will then get dragged down with Trump.
 

Splinty

Shake 'em off
Admin
Dec 31, 2014
44,116
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So what’s your take on Biden?


View: https://youtu.be/UXA--dj2-CY

Shokin was a corrupt dude that stopped the reform occuring in Ukraine. US policy was, "if your fed prosecutor is keeping corruption going and blocking cases, we aren't giving you money. Clean up your act'.

Reforming Ukraine After the Revolutions

This was not a Biden move, but a West vs Russia move in Ukraine post reform:

EU hails sacking of Ukraine’s prosecutor Viktor Shokin

After initially supporting Shokin, U.S. and E.U. officials soured on him. To pressure Poroshenko into removing him, the Obama Administration withheld a billion dollars in loan guarantees. (Ukrainians began calling Shokin “the billion-dollar man.”) A senior official in the White House told me that Vice-President Joe Biden spoke to Poroshenko by phone every few weeks and made it clear that, as far as additional loan guarantees were concerned, “you can meet every single other condition, but until you replace this guy you are not getting this money.” At a protest in Kiev, Leshchenko called on parliament to vote on removing Shokin from office. His fellow-deputies, he said, had to decide “whether they are with the people or with the corrupt officials.” Finally, in February, 2016, Shokin announced his resignation—though not before, in his final hours in office, firing a reform-minded deputy who had pursued the diamond-prosecutors case.
 

Splinty

Shake 'em off
Admin
Dec 31, 2014
44,116
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From the lyin' NY times...


The decision to hold back the aid, which had been approved by Congress, came at a time when the president was looking for ways to curb a variety of foreign assistance programs, and some aides at least initially saw it in that broader context. But Mr. Trump singled out Ukraine as a place he considered corrupt and railed about wasting money there, according to people who heard him discuss the matter, and he questioned the aid package for weeks.

The president asked advisers how to think about Mr. Zelensky, a former comedian outside the Ukrainian establishment who was largely unknown to American policymakers and had shown little interest in Mr. Giuliani’s calls for investigations related to American politics.

It soon became clear that the Ukraine aid freeze was different from the hold placed on other programs. Even after other foreign aid was restored, the money for Ukraine remained blocked.

The suspension of the aid caused confusion and frustration in both Washington and Kiev for months. Mr. Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials were mystified and complained to visiting American lawmakers. For five years, Russia has sponsored separatists in eastern Ukraine, and the government in Kiev had relied on American and European security aid.

American government officials were left in the dark, as well. When staff members at the State and Defense Departments who work on issues related to Ukraine learned of the holds in July, they were puzzled and alarmed, according to current and former government officials familiar with the situation.

Pentagon officials tried to make a case to the White House that the Ukraine aid was effective and should not be looked at in the same manner as other aid. But when those arguments were ignored, and when the other aid was allowed to move forward, the Pentagon officials began to wonder about the White House’s skepticism, a former official said.

The assistance came in two pots overseen by different agencies — $250 million from the Defense Department’s Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative and $141 million from the State Department’s foreign military financing program. The funds were intended to help train and equip Ukrainian forces in their fight to stave off Russian incursion.

Congressional committees had approved the defense assistance to the Ukrainian military in two tranches — the first in early April and the second in early June, shortly after the Pentagon submitted the spending for approval, according to the officials.

told reporters that to invest more taxpayer funds in Ukraine, “the president wants to be assured that those resources are truly making their way to the kind of investments that will contribute to security and stability in Ukraine.”

A handful of Republican and Democratic senators who belong to a bipartisan Ukraine caucus wrote a letter to Mr. Mulvaney early this month expressing “deep concerns” over the delay in releasing the funding. The funding is “vital to the long term viability of the Ukrainian military,” helping it “fend off the Kremlin’s continued onslaughts within its territory,” the senators wrote.

Pressure on the White House from Republican senators intensified. Senator Rob Portman of Ohio spoke to Mr. Trump about the funds, and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina informed the White House that he planned to support an amendment by Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, that would block Pentagon spending to ensure that the Ukraine funds were released. On Sept. 11, the administration told lawmakers it would release the funds.

Two days before, Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, had released a letter he had sent to the acting director of national intelligence revealing the existence of a whistle-blower case that might involve the president — touching off a series of disclosures in the news media that brought the controversy over the Ukraine aid to a full crisis.
 

jason73

Yuri Bezmenov was right
First 100
Jan 15, 2015
72,789
134,170
You all have been saying this for 2 1/2 years. It’s a pipe dream and the left is going to end up looking even sillier than they have, which is saying something. He ain’t getting impeached.
if they were serious about impeachment they would have probably waited until the transcripts of the call have been released and made a decision after the facts come out. they are gambling pretty hard on that call being incriminating
 

Rambo John J

Eats things that would make a Billy Goat Puke
First 100
Jan 17, 2015
71,545
71,468
polls aren't real
isn't that the lesson that was learned

propaganda wars...what is your flavor?
 

Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
8,912
14,237
Transcript of phone call will blow up in someone's face.

If Trump did nothing, this will give cover to him for everything the Dems come up with until 2020. That's it. He's untouchable.

If the phone call is enough to sink Trump in public court, the Dems will impeach and this will stop in the Senate. The GOP will then get dragged down with Trump.
I think you're underestimating how partisan perceptions of what constitutes a scandal have become.

We already know that Trump did bring up investigating Biden (he's already admitted that). So the Dems will stick to that being impeachment worthy no matter what.

And Trump's base would watch him fuck their own grandmothers with a tire iron and pay him for the privilege, so it's laughable to think anything he could possibly say in the transcript would shift their support. Frankly, I don't give too much of a shit about the allegations and, if you haven't guessed, I'm not his biggest fan.

And you're also assuming that Trump will actually release the transcripts just because he said he will. We will likely only see heavily redacted versions, if we get the transcript at all.

Ultimately, I think this is going to be a massive mistake by Democrats no matter what.
 

RaginCajun

The Reigning Undisputed Monsters Tournament Champ
Oct 25, 2015
36,970
93,842
if they were serious about impeachment they would have probably waited until the transcripts of the call have been released and made a decision after the facts come out. they are gambling pretty hard on that call being incriminating
Yep, huge gamble. It this fails they will have no hope at the next election.
They may not have wanted to wait because they knew that without the pressure he would never release the transcripts (just like his taxes) and the whole thing would have went away.