What We’ve Got Here, Is A Failure To Communicate…

-by Bob Lynch

In one of the more shocking political twists in recent memory, the GOP-controlled Senate, under Mitch McConnell, repeatedly voted Tuesday night on various motions along straight party lines (53–47) to ensure that the Impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump will be anything but a fair actual trial.

Essentially, they voted not to subpoena any new evidence or witnesses and rendered the entire trial completely meaningless, despite the delusional glimmers of hope dangled out by everyone from Claire McCaskill to Lawrence O’Donnell to Chris Coons, and even Chuck Rosenberg inexplicably thinking there are 4 members of the GOP Senate that have a conscience or give a shit about what is "right."

To anyone who has been paying attention to Mitch McConnell since his precedent shattering decision to block the nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court in 2016, this should not come as a surprise.

Mitch McConnell’s sole goal as the Senate Majority Leader has always been to protect the Senate majority, President Trump, and the Supreme Court majority (for generations to come) at all costs.

Dems need to wake up and face reality. The GOP Senate will protect the Supreme Court majority and the Supreme Court will protect the GOP. Below the Supreme Court level, over 1/4 of all Federally appointed lifetime Judicial seats are now filled by hopelessly unqualified, and often openly corrupt, Trump appointees that owe a favor back to the party that got them these cushy jobs. The longstanding process of allowing Senators from the state of a Judicial Nomination being able to submit a Blue Slip to kill any nomination. This was just one more “precedent” that Mitch McConnell has openly ignored.

Yet the leadership of the Democratic Party continues to rely on the courts or “precedent” in all matters where the Trump administration or the Senate openly stonewall the constitutional process. Pavlov’s dogs learned quicker than these dopes.

We now find ourselves in a situation that was always inevitable: Whining about the GOP flouting norms, precedents, and tradition.

For whatever reason, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer have been unable to figure out that attempts to highlight blatant GOP hypocrisy in order to “shame” the GOP into doing the right thing are the political equivalent of Lucy and Charlie Brown with the football.

We spent yesterday listening to various Democratic politicians and pundits talking about “history’s judgement” of the GOP vote, the impacts on Senator’s “legacies,” and the tough questions that the vulnerable swing state GOP Senators need to ask themselves.

This is completely asinine to the point of being insulting. Everyone in the GOP has already asked and answered the “difficult questions” of themselves. The marching orders are clear and the same as they always are in Republican Politics.

All hands on deck, and down with the ship.

The ends justify the means, hypocrisy doesn’t matter and to hell with history’s judgement. These guys are on a mission to ensure that THEY are going to be the ones writing the history books going forward…

The decision by Nancy Pelosi to send the Articles Of Impeachment to the Senate AFTER John Bolton agreed to testify before the Senate on the same day as the Lev Parnas document dump will go down as one of the most disastrous blunders in the death of our democracy.

Despite all polling showing that support for Impeachment grew with each new Congressional hearing, Nancy Pelosi decided to eliminate any leverage she had in order to rush a sham trial to the Senate that was always going to go nowhere. Mitch McConnell and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee, Lindsey Graham, made public statements that they were going to kill the trial and exonerate the President as quickly as possible. When people show you who they are, believe them. Still, the talking heads held out hope. Susan Collins was “disturbed” and Mittens promised he would “strongly consider” things.

Instead of driving the narrative, opening up new Impeachment inquiries, and subpoenaing new witnesses/evidence, Nancy Pelosi decided to transfer everything to a venue where Mitch McConnell has relentlessly beaten Chuck Schumer like a rented mule at every turn…

Each time the Democrats rely on some sort of institutional integrity they are let down by the individuals that those institutions are comprised of. Robert Mueller and Bill Barr already ensured that their own names will wind up in the disgraced dustbin of history. Now Susan Collins, Mittens, Lisa Murkowski, and Cory Gardner can do the same. Guess what??? Nobody cares.

There are still a large number of people who think John Roberts will be some last bastion of Democracy despite presiding over numerous court rulings that got us to this exact point. Cognitive dissonance doesn’t even begin to describe it. Now that Nancy Pelosi took the ball out of her own court and threw it to Mitch McConnell, despite knowing he would make whatever rules got him and the ball home as quickly as possible in time for dinner, the game is over. For reasons that will never be explained, Dems continue to overestimate the intelligence and level of sophistication of the American Public (something the GOP never does).

The historically in-over-his-head Chuck Schumer came out Tuesday morning with a long winded, whiny, totally uninspiring rebuke to Mitch McConnell that anyone who didn’t already think Trump was guilty tuned out within 90 seconds of hearing. How do Dems consistently make the mistake of thinking that the majority (or even a sizeable percentage) of the population both Took and Remembers high school civics???

The Dems are entrusting their entire strategy to shape public opinion on some boring and complicated speeches that requires a close following of current politics, a working knowledge of constitutional law, a nuanced perspective on Senatorial procedures, and a detailed recall of the Clinton Impeachment and how this time is different and unfair. The reality is that the general public isn’t even familiar with who the cast of characters in this sordid saga are. They are largely Russian names and we are dealing with an American public that bookies would probably set the over/under at 79% of Americans even knowing who Mike Pompeo is.

Are you kidding me???

Dems are going up against Gym Jordan and Donald Trump Jr. going on Fox News and repeatedly boiling things down into the most simple and repetitive terms possible: Hunter Biden, Burisma, Fake News, Deep State, Clinton, Lisa Strzok, etc. They will continue to say that the House should have called witnesses(despite knowing the administration blocked them all from testifying), they are applying the same rules as the Clinton Impeachment(not true), and that the House sent over a rushed investigation(hard to argue with them on this one in light of the Parnas dump).

You could look at every speech Chuck Schumer has ever made on the Senate Floor in his entire career and still not string together a 45 second sound bite that could remotely be construed as compelling or inspiring. He’s like a walking embodiment of the teacher in Peanuts…

Dems walked right into McConnell’s trap and spent the day arguing procedure (boring) instead of substance (compelling and damning). This is an automatic loser. Yes, Adam Schiff did a thorough and remarkable job. However, anyone listening to him in his entirety has already made up their mind and anyone who NEEDS to hear from him will be catching him in soundbite form after months of him relentlessly being branded by the President of the United States of America as basically a "crooked, shifty, pencil necked Jew."

Part of this self-inflicted debacle is due to having no real message other than McConnell being transparently corrupt, the other half was having all of the wrong messengers. The GOP has brought out a bunch of clowns that are disavowed by everyone in reputable legal circles but are beloved by the Fox News audience and Right Wing radio. They are made for TV and sound bite friendly. More importantly, they are speaking for an audience of one, who is no doubt binge watching Fox News tonight from a Cheeseburger stained bed at a hotel in Davos.

In stark contrast to the diversity of the House Impeachment Managers, Senate Dems trotted out Chuck Schumer, Debbie Stabenow, Dick Durbin, and Patty Murray. We have a rare cold snap down here in Miami, which I love, and I had enough of today’s proceedings before they even began. I decided to take a break and went out to my building’s pool where I watched a group of widowed retirees playing Mahjong and it was about a million times more exciting than this group of Dems giving written speeches about how bad McConnell is and how everyone in the GOP’s legacy will suffer. Sorry folks, but the only legacy these crooks care about is the amount of money they can leave to their spoiled kids before the ever expanding Estate Tax limit kicks in.

Like seriously Dems, of everyone in the caucus, that’s the four you go with? Obviously, Kamala Harris isn’t too busy these days. It wouldn’t have made sense to have a former prosecutor with extremely high name recognition go present the Dem’s case? Twitter darlings Brian Schatz or Chris Murphy? Mazie Hirono? Veteran War Hero Tammy Duckworth?? Literally anyone other than the founding members of the Senate Librarian Caucus…

We can talk about all of the mistakes that led up to this point, and believe me, I have and will continue to do so. But here we are. The future of the country is now up against a GOP controlled Senate, Supreme Court, and overreaching Executive Branch. This seems insurmountable on its surface but it isn’t.

The Democrats need to immediately circle the wagons and focus on the fact that they still maintain control and have influence in three crucially important areas: The House, The Media, and Public Opinion.

The House is the only venue where Dems get to set the agenda and make their own rules. They never should have ceded that to the Senate but nothing precludes them from getting back in the driver’s seat now. Start impeachment proceedings against Bill Barr, Mike Pompeo, and Mike Pence. Adding more impeachment articles against Trump will just seem weak and pathetic at this point, that ship has sailed but there are plenty of other witnesses to call.

The Dems can easily drive the media cycle. Instead of complaining about the rules of the Senate trial and things happening in the middle of the night and not on prime time, they can band together and change every subject right back to their own talking points. If the media wants to ask about the Warren vs Bernie feud, pivot back to impeachment. Stop letting the media set the narrative. The Russia investigation and Impeachment have been good for ratings. Boring horse race politics have not. People tune out when Dems are going after other Dems. Always know who the real enemy is. If you build it, they will come. Force the Media to cover real hearings.

As Nicolle Wallace pointed out about a hundred times today, Public Opinion is on the Dem’s side. However, Dems need to stop being beholden by what the polls say and DRIVE the polls. Set the agenda and force Public Opinion to come around. Do this by holdings hearings and beating the truth to death just like the GOP does with their lies. You know, do something like lead instead of follow?

The 2020 election will not be won by a reapportionment of the existing electorate. Fox News and Right Wing Radio have already installed enough safeguards to ensure that the Dem’s message will never penetrate down to the level where it could actually move the needle with existing voters. The path to victory is by energizing independents and non-voters. Focus on the people who never get calls from pollsters and convince them why all of this matters to them.

With the Super Bowl on everyone’s minds, football metaphors come easily. Dems play like a weak willed team that is scared of its own shadow. They are constantly playing a prevent defense. They are so worried about making a mistake that they are letting the GOP do whatever they want on offense rather than blitzing and forcing the GOP into making an error.

When the 49ers line up, you know they are going to run the football and you still can’t stop it. This is what the GOP does. You know exactly what is going to happen and they just shove it down your throat over and over. For some reason, Schumer has decided that attacking McConnell on a procedural moral basis is the way to make a big play, but he doesn’t have the Chief’s personnel to do so. You can’t win with a bad message and even worse messenger. Debbie Stabenow just doesn’t have the speed on the outside to move the ball down the field. Change the strategy and the lineup or we all lose.