"Toontime: Low Flow

credit: Dave Granlund

Latest: As the full House debates the two articles of impeachment, certain to pass with a nearly unanimous Democratic majority, an interesting idea has floated to the surface: delaying sending the Articles to the Senate for trial to prevent a travesty of justice. With the Majority Leader vowing to bring the trial proceedings to an abrupt end without the introduction of evidence, delaying the transmission of the Articles will accomplish several salutary ends: prevent Il Douche's partisans from exonerating him well in advance of the election, give Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer more leverage in negotiations over Senate procedural rules, allow more time for the collection of evidence, permit resolution of court cases affecting that evidence, and even time to add to the bill more articles of high crimes such as violation of the emoluments clauses, and obstruction of the special prosecutor investigation.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, second in command to Nancy Pelosi, says the idea "needs to be talked about." The Democrats' constitutional law advisor, Professor Laurence Tribe of Harvard advocates for this idea in a recent op-ed. Congressman Blumenauer (D-OR) says he has talked to all the House leadership and there is interest in first obtaining a commitment from Senator McConnell to allow a legitimate and fair proceeding before the House names impeachment case managers, a necessary predicate to a trial. Speaker Pelosi controls who and when managers are named. US Person agrees that this tactic is a legitimate response to the expressed willingness of the Senate leadership to ignore the evidence by conducting a Soviet-style show trial in which the outcome is predetermined, and about the only way to prevent a whitewash of King Orange's serious and fundamental abuse of the public trust. Allowing Repugnants to nullify an impeachment on purely partisan grounds would further deligitimize the only constitutional process for removing a criminal executive outside an election. If Mr. Putin wants to attack the credibility of our political institutions, he could not have asked for a more potent weapon. Professor Tribe notes, the right of the public to observe a criminal trial despite the opposition of a defendant is a right that "inheres in our system of government."

{13.12.19}The Trump goons in the Senate led by their chief flying monkey, Moscow Mitch, have already abdicated their constitutional role as impartial jurors of the Tangerine Terror by announcing their complete abdication to the wishes of the Very White House.  He announced to the press that there would be no differences between the Senate and the regime in how the trial would be handled, and that he was in total cooperation with king's counsels on how to proceed once the House sends its Articles of Impeachment to the upper chamber.  The goons know no bounds in their attack on our system of republican government when it comes to defending their ten cent Mussolini.

Of course House Democrats did not do themselves any favors in the way they handled impeachment.  They completely ignored tangible evidence of obstruction of justice minutely detailed by Special Counsel Mueller.  By leaving Volume II out of the bill, they have undercut the authority of future special counsels appointed to investigate high-level wrongdoing.  Nor was King Orange's grievous violations of the emolument clauses deemed worthy of inclusion.  All of the omitted crimes are indicative of his intention to his office for his own gain from day one of his reign.  A slim two count indictment was voted out of the Judiciary Committee today, ripe for attack as "impeachment lite".  How much debasement of the national government are 'Merican willing to take?  Stay tuned as the comic opera gets underway early next year.