Republican Senators Are Running Around Like Chickens Without Heads

Everybody keep your powder dry

That Bolton book release over the weekend sure did turn the impeachment trial on its head! Susan Collins' campaign sent out an emergency e-mail yesterday: "Susan has and continues to be a voice of reason that we can ALWAYS count on. But right now, she needs to know if she can count on us. As we type this, Democrats are ramping up their efforts to see Susan defeated. Millions of outside dollars are being poured into Maine to slander her name and completely vilify Susan. We need your help to fight back... The road ahead is going to be difficult." It sure is! Example: Trump's discreet former chief-of-staff, John Kelly, said he believes Bolton over Trump in a speech at a Sarasota, Florida Library Association Town Hall lecture series. "If John Bolton says that in the book I believe John Bolton. Every single time I was with him... he always gave the president the unvarnished truth."

Manu Raju's CNN report suggested that Bolton's revelations "could" turn the tide of the whole case of subpoenaing witnesses. "The President's legal team resumed its second day of arguments just after 1 p.m. ET Monday, but all of the attention will be focused on the Republican senators sitting in the chamber and how they react to Sunday night's New York Times bombshell that Bolton's draft manuscript says Trump told him US security assistance to Ukraine was conditioned on investigations into Democrats, including former Vice President Joe Biden."

Sen. Mike Braun, an Indiana Republican, acknowledged that the Bolton news would "make the dynamic different" but argued it doesn't change anything.

"I'm not going to deny it's going to change the decibel level and probably the intensity of which we go about talking about witnesses," he said.

Both parties are turning their eyes toward two Republican senators in particular: Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, who is not running for reelection.

"I stated before that I was curious as to what John Bolton might have to say," Murkowski said in a statement Monday. "From the outset, I've worked to ensure this trial would be fair and that members would have the opportunity to weigh in after its initial phase to determine if we need more information. I've also said there is an appropriate time for us to evaluate whether we need additional information-- that time is almost here. I look forward to the White House wrapping up presentation of its case."

Alexander declined to comment to reporters on his way into the Senate Monday.

Romney told the Washington Post that he thinks "it’s increasingly likely that other Republicans will join those of us who think we should hear from John Bolton."

Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) said she read the NY Times revelations and she's "curious" to know what Bolton has to say about Trump and Ukraine. And Collins issued a statement saying she's always been likely to vote to call witnesses and that the Bolton book "strengthens the case for witnesses and have prompted a number of conversations among my colleagues." Even Trump apologist and enabler Lindsey Graham is tap dancing around this now.

Kelly Loeffler, the former Democrat, just appointed to fill Johnny Isakson's Georgia Senate seat-- and who under attack by the Trumpist right in an election coming right up-- took a much more pro-Trump stance, slamming Romney to please Trump and his supporters: "After 2 weeks, it’s clear that Democrats have no case for impeachment. Sadly, my colleague Senator Romney wants to appease the left by calling witnesses who will slander Donald Trump during their 15 minutes of fame. The circus is over. It’s time to move on!"

Many Republican senators are just avoiding the media altogether. At the Senate GOP Monday luncheon, Moscow Mitch cautioned his other fellow Republicans to hold off. The last thing he wants is a stampede of Republicans announcing they're backing calling impeachment witnesses.

He and other GOP leaders warn that issuing subpoenas for Bolton, acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and other witnesses being demanded by Democrats, could extend the trial indefinitely.

The GOP leader reminded colleagues at a closed-door meeting in the Mansfield Room that they don’t need to decide the need for witnesses now because they have already voted for an organizing resolution for the trial that sets up a debate on that question after both sides have presented their opening arguments and senators have had 16 hours to ask questions.

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND), who attended the lunch, said McConnell gave senators “the wisest counsel” by telling them “remember we passed a rules package that gives us an opportunity to vote on this very issue of witnesses after we hear both sides and ask our questions.

“It seemed wise at the time and it seems even wiser now,” Cramer said.

In other words, keep your powder dry.

“He just reiterated that a couple times as did some other people just to remind us that we have dealt with this and we don’t have to deal with the next step of it until the end of phase one,” Cramer added.

Democrats need four Republican defections to win a vote on witnesses, and two possible swing votes, Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and Lamar Alexander (R-TN), were keeping a low profile Monday morning.

Murkowski and Alexander said they were going to stick with their timelines, which is to wait until phase one of the trial is over before deciding on the need for new subpoenas.

Murkowski said in a tweet Monday afternoon “there is an appropriate time for us to evaluate whether we need additional information,” adding “that time is almost here” while Alexander highlighted his effort to ensure a vote on witnesses by week’s end.

"I worked with my colleagues to make sure we have a chance after we've heard the arguments, after we've asked our questions to decide if we need additional evidence and I'll decide that at that time," he said.

Republican leaders spent much of Monday downplaying Bolton’s claim in hopes of keeping the call for witnesses within their conference to two Republican senators.

“To me the facts of the case remain the same. There is nothing new here to what the House managers have been saying,” Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Barrasso (WY) told reporters Monday.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (SD) echoed that point, arguing he doesn't "think it changes the facts,” and Senate Republican Policy Committee Chairman Roy Blunt (R-MO) said Bolton’s claim doesn’t change the House manager’s case fundamentally.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), an adviser to the GOP leadership, said he was suspicious of the motives behind the leak given that Bolton is trying to sell a book.

“It seems awfully manipulated, the whole sequence,” he said.

Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN) said Bolton’s manuscript “added some fuel to the fire” but doesn’t change Republicans’ view that the impeachment effort is fundamentally driven by political motives and would interfere with the voters' choice in 2016 and ability to choose in the next election.

“I think what it’s done is take an already hot topic and added some fuel to the fire,” he said.

“For me, from a place like Indiana, it still goes back to the origination of how this occurred: Wanting to malign the president from before he was even inaugurated,” Braun said.

Cramer warned that voting for a motion to consider additional witnesses and information could turn the trial into a fishing expedition.

“I just hate to start going down that path,” he said. “My concern is if the Senate becomes the House managers favorite fishing pond, when do you stop pulling fish out?”

“Given how weak the argument is, I don’t see why we should let that happen. If it does happen then I’m afraid ... it could become a very open-ended situation,” he added.

Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD), emerging from the GOP lunch, said Bolton’s reported claim doesn’t appear to have shifted the landscape much within his conference.

Rounds said GOP colleagues don’t think Bolton would “change the focus” of the House managers’ argument but acknowledged “the question is whether or not he would be a material witness to anything that was necessary.”

And by the way, Susan Collins wasn't the only one who sent out an e-mail after the Bolton revelations. Kentucky state Rep. Charles Booker, one of the Democrats vying to take on Moscow Mitch, wrote that "McConnell has the power to either respect our Constitution and the rule of law, or to bring shame upon our country through a sham coverup. It is utterly unpatriotic for Mitch to not bring witnesses and new evidence into the Senate impeachment trial after reading what Bolton has put in his book. The fact that McConnell has not already set rules allowing for witnesses in the trial is exactly the reason Booker feels compelled to run against him.This isn't about Republicans or Democrats; it's about justice. Yet, you wouldn’t know that from watching Mitch. Mitch always puts his partisan vendettas over the needs of Kentuckians, and our country."

Andrew Romanoff, the Colorado progressive running for the Senate seat Trump ally Cory Gardner is holding, also sent out an alert to her followers. "Did Donald Trump withhold foreign aid in order to force an investigation into a political rival? The evidence says yes-- which must be why Cory Gardner doesn’t want to hear it. Gardner voted last week to block the witnesses and documents a fair trial requires. But now he may get a do-over. A new book shows the President demanding that Ukraine investigate the Bidens-- and this time the evidence comes from Trump’s own former national security advisor, John Bolton. The Senate should subpoena both Bolton and his manuscript...  Gardner and his Republican colleagues had a chance to subpoena Bolton last week. They voted no, and they’re not likely to budge now. But we can’t let the President or the Senate off the hook. The White House is engaged in a cover-up, and Cory Gardner’s silence is complicity.


Iowa Senate candidate for Joni Ernst seat, Admiral Mike Fraken (ret.) told me he thinks this whole thing is going to go badly for the GOP. "The silence is deafening from Senator Joni Ernst today; while most GOP Senators are voicing logical or illogical positions on exploring all germane additional evidence, Joni is inaudible. Iowans are not the loud, boisterous type, true…but we do like to see justice served after all the evidence is presented. So maybe Sen Ernst ought to speak up."

The progressive up against John Cornyn in the Texas Senate race is Cristina Ramirez and, like Mike Franken, she seems very offended by the Republican stance on protecting the country. "This isn’t about a party, a president or an election," she told us this morning-- "our entire democracy is on the line. Our President has used his office to betray the American people. Of his own admission, he has withheld foreign aid for his re-election and lied to the American people. We don’t just call that dishonest, we call that corruption, we call that criminal-- the Government Accountability Office has even published a report saying so. And Trump has done all of this with the support of people like his good friend John Cornyn. If Cornyn truly cared about verifying the facts of the impeachment case, he would allow Bolton to testify."

Trump Predicted An Incompetent U.S. President Would Start A War With Iran To Help Him Win Reelection-- Who Could Have Guessed He'd be Right About Something?

After the assassinations in Baghdad this week, CNN reported that the U.S. is deploying thousands of additional troops to the Middle East as tensions with Iran mount. And CNN also reported that Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani says the United States and Iran should “solve their disputes through dialogue… We call on our great neighbor Iran-- with which we share similarities in language, religion, history and culture-- and the United States of America, which is a strategic and fundamental partner of Afghanistan, to prevent tensions and we hope that both sides can solve their disputes through dialogue.” Ghani assured his countrymen and neighboring countries that Afghanistan-- an American client state-- will not be the starting point of any attacks "against a third country or other regional countries," a point he emphasized in a call with Mike Pompeo. No other American allies-- other than Israel-- are backing the U.S. on this.

Yesterday in his New York Magazine column, Jonathan Chait predicted that Trump’s calculation-- the attacking Iran-- will help his reelection bid, is wrong. Watch the video up top for context.

Just like Trump’s notions that Obama would direct his attorney general whom to investigate or not, or pressure the Federal Reserve to loosen the money supply in order to help his party win the next election, Trump’s attacks on Obama were the purest form of projection. They reflect his cynical belief that every president will naturally abuse their powers, and thus provide a roadmap to his own intentions.

And indeed, Trump immediately followed the killing of Qasem Soleimani by metaphorically wrapping himself in the stars and stripes. No doubt he anticipates at least a faint echo of the rally-around-the-flag dynamic that has buoyed many of his predecessors. But Trump’s critics need not assume he will enjoy any such benefit, and should grasp that their own response will help determine it.

One salient fact is that it’s not 2001, or even 2003. A poll earlier this summer found that just 18 percent of Americans prefer to “take military action against Iran” as against 78 percent wanting to “rely mainly on economic and diplomatic efforts.”

What Blows Up Must Come Down by Nancy Ohanian

It is in part due to public war weariness that Republicans have sworn repeatedly, for years, that they would not go to war with Iran. The possibility of such a military escalation was precisely the central dispute between the parties when the Obama administration struck its nuclear deal. “Without a deal, we risk even more war in the Middle East,” argued President Obama. Republicans furiously insisted this was “absurd.” War has “never been the alternative,” said Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell in 2015, “It’s not this deal versus war... It’s either this deal or a better deal, or more sanctions.” The conservative Heritage Foundation argued that blocking Obama’s deal “makes the likelihood of war or a conventional and regional nuclear arms race less likely.”

And as Trump mulled following through on his threat to abrogate the deal, conservatives furiously denied that doing so would lead to military conflict. Here is former Israeli ambassador Michael Oren writing in the New York Times two years ago:

“The only alternative to the Iran nuclear deal is war.” That is what the Obama administration and proponents of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran claimed in 2015. Nobody in the Middle East believed that the United States would ever strike Iran, but enough Americans did that the deal went through... The alternative was never war, but a better deal.

Oren further insisted that fears the international community would refuse to follow America’s lead by canceling the deal, and that Iran would limit nuclear inspections, would both fail to materialize. “Now they predict that the international community will not follow America’s lead in withdrawing from the deal and reimposing sanctions. Worse, they warn, Iran might use the opportunity to evict United Nations inspectors and ramp up its nuclear program,” he wrote, “All of these assumptions are false.”

In fact, these assumptions have proven true. American allies have stayed in the agreement and refused to reimpose sanctions, and Iran has started restricting inspectors and begun restarting its nuclear program.

Trump’s allies have framed the issue as being about Qasem Soleimani’s moral culpability, or Iran’s responsibility for escalating the conflict. And it is certainly true that Iran is a nasty, aggressive, murderous regime. But none of this refutes the fact that Trump’s Iran policy is failing on its own terms. Having violated a diplomatic agreement on the premise that doing so would not lead to war, they are now blaming Iran for the war they insisted would never happen.

Americans historically support their presidents in foreign conflicts, both the wise ones and unwise ones alike, at least initially. Trump no doubt believes the halo effect will last at least through November-- that he might undertake an action that would harm his reelection out of some larger sense of duty to the nation or the world is unfathomable.

But presidents traditionally benefit from a presumption of competence, or at least moral legitimacy, from their opposition. Trump has forfeited his. He will not have Democratic leaders standing shoulder to shoulder with him, and his practice of disregarding and smearing government intelligence should likewise dispel any benefit of the doubt attached to claims he makes about the necessity of his actions. Trump has made it plain that he views American war-fighting as nothing but the extension of domestic politics. We should believe him.

Friday, Bernie and Ro issued the following statement announcing the introduction of legislation to prohibit any funding for offensive military force in or against Iran without prior congressional authorization. The measure to restrict funds for such military activities passed by a bipartisan, 251-margin vote in the House of Representatives, but was later stripped from the National Defense Authorization Act adopted by Congress in December: 

Today, we are seeing a dangerous escalation that brings us closer to another disastrous war in the Middle East. A war with Iran could cost countless lives and trillions more dollars and lead to even more deaths, more conflict, more displacement in that already highly volatile region of the world.

War must be the last recourse in our international relations. That is why our Founding Fathers gave the responsibility over war to Congress. Congressional inaction in the face of the threat of a catastrophic and unconstitutional Middle East conflict is not acceptable.

After authorizing a disastrous, $738 billion military budget that placed no restrictions on this president from starting an unauthorized war with Iran, Congress now has an opportunity to change course. Our legislation blocks Pentagon funding for any unilateral actions this president takes to wage war against Iran without Congressional authorization.

We know that it will ultimately be the children of working-class families who will have to fight and die in a new Middle East conflict—not the children of the billionaire class. At a time when we face the urgent need to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure, to build the housing we desperately need, and to address the existential crisis of climate change, we as a nation must get our priorities right. The House and Senate should pass our legislation immediately and uphold our constitutional responsibilities. We must invest in the needs of the American people, not spend trillions more on endless wars.

You may have already seen those three asshole-on-parade tweets (above) last night, when the crazy Orange Pig Man, drunk on his power to destroy, issued them. I may be wrong about this, but I thought targeting sites of cultural significance was a war crime. If Trump does that, will Congress share the guilt? They deserve to-- except for the small handful who don't. You know what would be… interesting? Suppose Iran puts out a press release saying they know their enemy is the Orange Asshole, not the American people... just as they launch a coordinated series of attacks against Trump properties all over the world. If they knocked out some Trump golf courses and towers, they’d hurt their tormentor where it counts-- in his purse. And how would Trump explain using the U.S. military because of an Iranian attack on a couple of golf course in Dubai? Or Trump Towers in Pune, Mumbai and Kolkata in India and there's one in Manila… and maybe a Daewoo Trump World apartment building. And Turnberry. Put the mutha out of business. Better if they do it without any lose of innocent life, another way of showing Trump up for the narcissistic sociopath that he is.

Welcome to Dubai

Michael Franken is the progressive running for the Democratic Senate nomination in Iowa for the seat Joni Ernst is wasting. Until recently, though, he was an Admiral. I asked him about this mess last night. "Iran’s General Soleimani was the second or third most important official in Iran; killing him in a directed strike, of questionable legality, will generate a response from Iran and its proxies that will cause more loss of life. My biggest fear with this Administration is coming of age-- an expanded conflict in the Middle East. In any event in the Middle East, one must view the history leading up to the present. If our history begins in the 1950s, 1979, or the beginning of the Trump Administration, the one event that precipitated the current conflict with Iran is the withdrawal from the JCPOA nuclear agreement. That was a Trump feel-good moment without an underpinning of a strategic plan, a common refrain of this Administration. There are no winners in a conflict with 85 million Persians, excluding the Russians, maybe the Chinese, and certainly some Gulf neighbors. This will not go well. Iran is not Iraq, or Syria, or Libya, as detailed simulations and war games have proven. We cannot let waifish populist politics at home drive international relations. It is past time to demand a steadier hand on the tiller."

71% Of Voters Want The Senate To Call Witnesses-- But Trump Has Ordered Moscow Mitch Not To-- Do You Wonder Why?

Friday morning, Señor Trumpanzee went bonkers when he was told that the night before, top evangelical magazine, Christianity Today, had called for his removal from office in a powerful editorial.

Hours later, right-wing polemicist Ramesh Ponnuru, a senior editor of National Review did much the same in a lengthy OpEd, calling on the Senate to remove Trump from office. He wrote that "Advocates of a president’s removal from office by Congress should have to climb over four walls to reach their objective. First, they should have to show that the facts they allege are true. Second, they should show that the fact pattern amounts to an abuse of power or dereliction of duty by the president. Third, they should show that this abuse or dereliction is impeachable. And fourth, they should show that it is prudent for Congress to remove the president for this impeachable offense: that it would produce more good than evil."

His conclusion was that the House met all four requirements. The fourth wall, he asserted, was the hardest to prove... but he concluded that the facts of the matter do show that removing Trump would indeed produce more good than evil.

The strongest arguments against removing Trump fall under the heading of prudence. They hold that while he abused his power, it would be better to let voters judge that abuse in the upcoming election than for Congress to remove him; that his removal would be bitterly divisive; that it would set a dangerous precedent, encouraging Congress to strike against presidents over trivial disagreements. Like a nuclear weapon, in short, impeachment should be deployed extremely sparingly if at all.

The analogy is common but inapt. It is a nuclear weapon that replaces the president with his own handpicked ally, making it less potentially devastating in that respect than a general election. It also can’t be deployed unless the public has a much larger level of support for it than it has mustered for any presidential candidate in decades. Only once in U.S. history has a president left office because Congress was going to remove him. The possibility of impeachment is a weak check on the presidency and cannot be made into a strong one.

It might be possible to regard Trump’s Ukraine misadventure as a lapse of judgment, with little harm done, if he showed any repentance or even understanding of what he has done wrong. Instead it looks more like a window into tendencies of his that are incompatible with performing the functions of his office.

Whether Trump should be removed from office over the objections of nearly half the country is not an important question. He can’t be. There are better questions. Would it be good for the country if a large majority of Americans were to be persuaded that it is unacceptable for a president to use his office to encourage foreign governments to investigate his political opponents? Assuming that the necessary level of support to remove a president from office for that offense will not be reached, should we prefer that more elected officials go on record that it is unacceptable-- or that fewer do?

If you have read this far, you know my answer to these questions. The Constitution provides for impeachment and removal to protect us from officials, including presidents, who are unable or unwilling to distinguish between the common good that government is supposed to serve and their own narrow interests. Though he has done some good things in office, Trump is just such a president. Congress should act accordingly.

That isn't what MoscowMitch has in mind. He-- working with the White House, as he has admitted, has decided on a trial with no impartial jurors, no witnesses-- just an opportunity for senators to make video clips for their campaigns. At this point, all that the Senate trial envisioned by Trump and McConnell would accomplish, as Seth Abramson noted in Newsweek, "would be a disingenuous exoneration for a profoundly disingenuous man, indeed one that would set a terrible example both for future generations and for a country whose rule of law is presently near the tipping point."

The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that Pelosi is going to delay sending the articles of impeachment to the Senate under these circumstances, "seeking more clarity on the rules for President Trump’s trial and potentially pushing the proceedings well into the new year."

Trump and his allies are flipping out again and but Pelosi said that "she couldn’t select impeachment managers and advance the matter without more details about the Senate’s plans for a trial, which she has said should be conducted in a manner that she considers fair. 'When we see the process that is set forth in the Senate, then we’ll know the number of managers that we may have to go forward and who we will choose,' Mrs. Pelosi said shortly before the House adjourned for the rest of the year."

Friday morning, Maria Cardona editorialized in The Hill that "Trump’s legacy is marred forever. But so are the legacies of Republicans who have put party and president over country and Constitution. History will not be kind to Trump. Wednesday’s impeachment already has marked what will be the lead in any history book or internet entry about Donald J. Trump. But history also will not be kind to Republicans who have enabled and stood by Trump with every vile tweet and defended every racist, hurtful policy, even as they privately acknowledged that they don’t like this president and don’t like what he is doing to their party. History will call them cowards, and that will be correct. History will find they were wanting of the qualities the nation needed at an uncertain, dangerous time. At a moment when the chief executive of the most powerful nation on Earth has made clear that he will do what he wants, abuse his power at will and destroy any Republican who dares to speak or act against him, Republicans failed the nation and their constituents miserably. Instead of standing up for truth, honor and American values, they chose the path of least resistance, the one most likely at the moment to lead to their reelections."

In the words of Iowa progressive Michael Franken, a retired admiral running for the Senate seat occupied by Trump enabler Joni Ernst: "The GOP faces a Sophie’s Choice in the Senate: Senators must consider the implications of a 'nay' vote now and what that means at the Republican National Convention next summer, versus an 'aye' vote and attempting to bring a viable candidate forward in 2020 in place of President Trump. Surely the thought of a President, whose popularity has diminished since 2016 coupled with overwhelming evidence of wrongdoing with Ukraine, means the GOP must either brace up VP Pence following an impeachment vote now or face down a roaring President Trump at the convention next summer. The Sophie’s choice is their's."

How Badly Will Their Votes Against Impeaching Trump Cost Swing District Republicans?

Fore! by Nancy Ohanian

Michael Scherer, writing for the Washington Post Wednesday, reported that "When the dust clears, the result is most likely to look more like a draw than a victory, say political strategists from both sides." He quoted Democratic pollster Geoff Garin: "I am confident that not a single Democrat anywhere in the country next year will lose their seat because they voted for impeachment." And he quoted Republican pollster Glen Bolger: "I am not convinced that anybody is in significant danger but the small number that represent the other team’s area, and there are a lot fewer than there used to be." I disagree-- with both of them.

I suppose that an argument can be made that John Katko (R-NY), Fred Upton (R-MI) and Rodney Davis (R-IL) were already among the walking dead. But the argument is, at best, a stretch if not spurious. All three swing district Republicans are putting up an intense fight to hold onto their seats, and despite voting against impeachment, each is raising huge war chests. Katko has already raised this $1,182,000 cycle. Davis has raised $1,504,629. And Upton, who is independently wealthy, has raised $962,016 and is spending as though his political life depends on it-- which it does.

Tuesday we looked at polling from their districts showing that most voters are less likely to vote from them specifically because of their impeachment votes. Change Research, which did the polling, asserted in their analysis that "if these Republicans are hoping to take on enough of Trump’s water today to make it through their GOP primary, and rely on their approval ratings on the economy to survive another general election, they should take a look at their dismal approval ratings on voters’ top priority, health care costs. Just 37% approve of Rodney Davis’ handling on health care costs, just 32% approve of John Katko’s handing, and a dismal 26% approve of Fred Upton’s handling of health care costs... It is clear that voters, even in these more conservative-leaning districts, believe that the President’s conduct is wildly inappropriate and worthy of the investigation underway. Regardless of their feelings about impeachment, majorities in these districts believe that Trump has engaged in conduct that will ultimately provide the basis for impeachment articles-- including abusing the power of his office (52%, 47% strongly), withholding military funds to pressure another country to investigate a political rival (52%), putting his personal political interests before the good of the country (51%, 47% strongly), and engaging in corruption (51%). Majorities also believe he has intimidated a witness (53%), undermined the rule of law (51%), and even committed crimes (51%). About half of voters in these GOP-held districts already support impeachment without reservation, while just three-in-ten voters oppose impeachment and think Trump did nothing wrong. This leaves over one-in-five who are still impressionable on the impeachment question. These impeachment persuadables include:

• he 14% who currently oppose impeachment because they “haven’t seen enough evidence to know if his conduct was wrong,”

•  the 6% who believe “his conduct was wrong, but it is not impeachable,”

• the 1% who think “his conduct was impeachable, but impeachment will divide the country 
and the public should vote to remove him in the next election,” and

• the 2% who are undecided on impeachment. 


Change Research emphasized that Katko, Upton and Davis "have few convincing arguments in their arsenal. The argument that 'Donald Trump’s actions are very troubling, but with an election coming next year, Congress should not overturn 63 million votes by impeaching the President now' was not convincing at all to a stunning 55% majority of voters, including 36% of Republicans. A similar argument that says 'Donald Trump may have engaged in wrongdoing, but it is not worthy of impeachment, which will divide our country and stop progress on critical issues like health care and trade deals' was not convincing at all to 52% of voters, including 30% of Republicans. Also unconvincing is an argument that 'President Trump was right to ask his lawyer to investigate corruption in Ukraine. Ukraine has had it out for Trump since the 2016 election,' which was not convincing at all to nearly half of voters. This conspiracy theory seems to have some traction, however, with the Republican base. While 83% of Democrats and 46% of independents give this a 0 on a 1-10 scale (where 0 means it is not convincing at all and 10 means it is very convincing), 47% of Republicans say it is a very convincing argument against impeachment."

Unfortunately for Katko, Upton and Davis, NY-24, MI-06 and IL-13 don't have enough Republican voters to win an election without substantial support from independents, who overwhelmingly reject their arguments for not voting to impeach. Change Research concluded that "A majority of voters in these key districts think what Trump did was wrong and, once they hear the facts, are less likely to support Members of Congress who are opposed to the impeachment inquiry. The message is clear: these representatives should put politics aside during impeachment and do their job."

So will it cost them? Yes, with one caveat. Their Democratic opponents have to make the case against them next summer and fall leading up to the election. Jon Hoadley (MI-06) and Dana Balter (NY-24) are talented political leaders. I have less faith in the DCCC's establishment hack running in IL-13.

It was no surprise that Donald J. Bacon voted against impeaching Donald J. Trump. They're couldn't be more similar and each supports the other. Omaha progressive congressional candidate Kara Eastman noted that "Majorities of people nationally and in NE-02 recognize that Trump did something very wrong and abused his power. While White House propaganda and media bothsides-ism has somewhat tempered the number of people willing to commit to impeach-and-remove, the fact is that Republicans like Don Bacon will seal their political fates with their vote against impeachment across the nation. It's about checks and balances pure and simple."

Liam O'Mara's opponent in Riverside County, Ken Calvert, is a lockstep Trump puppet and no one there, let alone in DC, was shocked when he voted against impeachment. Liam, a history professor, pointed out that "Calvert tried, on the eve of an impeachment vote, to complain that polling did not show voters in favour of impeachment-- saying the Dems had 'failed to make their case.' Not only is this false, it is irrelevant, as any popular action can, in fact, still be found illegal. I can think of quite a few. Impeachment is not a popularity contest. It is part of our system of balanced co-equal branches, meant to ensure lawless officials do not go checked. It involves weighing evidence and deciding a question of legal and constitutional principle. And if Calvert is so unfit to lead on matters of law, and must instead follow the opinion polls, he has no business being in public office."


Now... voting for impeachment may hurt a few useless, worthless Blue Dogs in the reddest of districts, Democrats who tend to vote with the GOP on just about everything. I'd guess Kendra Horn in Oklahoma City and maybe Joe Cunningham in Charlestown, South Carolina and Collin Peterson in western Minnesota. Or maybe the independents in the districts will admire them for taking a tough vote and stickling with their convictions. I suspect it will work with Cunningham and Peterson. 

But the most endangered Democrat is Maine's incredible disappointment, Jared Golden, who campaigned as a progressive and then voted as an arch-conservative all cycle. He was so pathetic on the impeachment vote-- voting for one article and opposing another-- that I think plenty of his 2018 supporters will abandon him next year. "'Standing in the middle of the road is dangerous,' Margaret Thatcher once explained, because you can get hit by cars going both directions. That’s what Golden is experiencing today. Liberals are angry. 'If my congressman, Jared Golden, votes for only one article of impeachment, I will work with all my might to see him defeated next year,' tweeted Stephen King, the best-selling mystery novelist. And Republicans... certainly aren’t placated. 'Golden’s vote to impeach President Trump proves he’d rather stand with the socialist Democrats than Maine voters,' said National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Michael McAdams. Golden’s vote will not impact the outcome... But the fact that Golden stands alone says a great deal about not just impeachment but the political era we find ourselves in. Intensifying polarization and tribalism are forcing members to pick a side-- and fully own their decision one way or another-- in ways that used to be much easier to avoid."

In the Iowa U.S. Senate race, I think Admiral (Ret) Michael Franken has what it takes to make the case in regard to Joni Ernst's refusal to seriously consider impeaching Trump. "Republican senators," he told me on Wednesday, "face a Sophie’s Choice: An acquittal will only embolden Trump and cause the GOP even more trouble with suburban, female and independent voters. But if Republicans remove Trump from office, he will just run again in 2020 and take down every GOP incumbent along the way. Republican Senators have to decide whether they want their political destruction coming from outside or inside their ranks. Neither will be pretty."

How Badly Is Trump Treating Rural America?

It surprised me to see Trump's coalition in the Midwest falling apart. In the most recent Morning Consult state-by-state Trump tracker, it doesn't look like rural America will be coming to his rescue in 2020. His net approval in state after state he won in 2016 in underwater:

• Iowa- minus 14
• Wisconsin- minus 11
• Michigan- minus 10
• Ohio- minus 5
• Nebraska- minus 2

And even in the states he's still ahead in, his numbers have collapsed. Indiana is just +2. North Dakota and South Dakota, states Trump took in landslides in 2016, are each +1. Kansas is +4 and Missouri is his only safe seat in the region: +5. Trump's numbers in Iowa are seriously endangering freshman Senator Joni Ernst. Michael Franken is the non-Schumer candidate for Ernst's seat. This morning he told me that "The ample amounts of unsold ethanol in storage, the lag in recovering in the China marketplace, and the contracts already let for this year's crop will offer no salvation to Midwest farmers if Trump and Xi cut a deal. A promise of better markets next year won't help Ernst since her Iowa farmers have been betrayed before, repeatedly."

And J.D. Scholten is running for the last Iowa House seat occupied by a Republican-- and in this case, that Republican is neo-fascist lunatic Steve King who even the GOP was so disgusted by that they kicked him off the Agriculture Committee-- which is exactly where J.D. will be serving once he wins the seat next year. "IA-04," he said this morning, "is the 2nd most ag-producing district in America. Farmers are being hit with a trade war that has cost this district $558 million alone. Also, this administration’s abuse of the Renewable Fuel Standard which is directly depressing corn prices, closed or idled plants and lost good rural jobs. All the while, Ag monopolies are squeezing farmers on both the input and output sides. Farmers are looking for solutions, giving Democrats a huge opportunity in November 2020 but we have to go out there and earn it."

Last week, the Council on Foreign Relations published a blog post by Benn Steil and Ben Della Rocca, China’s “Massive” Trade Offer Leaves U.S. Farmers $7 Billion Worse Off. Does Trump know what the word "massive means? He's been "talking up the “massive” trade deal he expects to sign with President Xi in November," wrote Steil and Della Rocca. 'China,' he said, will soon be 'buying much more farm products than anybody thought possible.' But is this true?" Trump said it, so you would be pretty safe betting the farm that it isn't true; after all, virtually nothing he ever says is.

The latest news from China indicates that it will “aim” to buy $20 billion in U.S. farm goods in the first year of an initial deal. It also says that such purchases “could” eventually rise as high as $40-50 billion. Trump is hailing the latter suggestion as an “incredible deal for farmers,” though he fails to note that the numbers have no empirical or analytical basis and are premised on his repealing all his punitive tariffs-- that is, ending the trade war.

So is the U.S. now really “winning,” as Trump likes to say?

Let us focus first on what China actually has on the table: an offer to buy $20 billion in ag goods in return for Trump killing his planned October tariff increase, from 25% to 30%, on $250 billion in imports, as well as abandoning new 15% tariffs on a further $112 billion in imports scheduled for December. Is this a good deal?

The right way to evaluate China’s offer is to ask how much U.S. farmers would have exported to China in 2020 had Trump never started his trade war. In the graphic above, the dotted blue line projects such sales by assuming that, after 2017, China’s purchase volumes of each type of agricultural good would, absent Trump’s trade war, have continued growing at the rates seen since 2010. As the yellow marker highlights, China’s 2020 purchases would have exceeded $27 billion. That is, China would have bought over $7 billion more than what it is now offering. And this is a conservative estimate, given that the projections assume prices stay fixed at last year’s trade-war-depressed levels.

As regards China’s tease that a complete end to the trade war could push its U.S. ag purchases up to $40-50 billion, this is wholly implausible. As the dashed line above shows, Chinese ag imports before the trade war had barely been on pace to reach $30 billion by 2022.

In short, if Trump accepts what he is calling a “massive” deal with China, he will actually be leaving American farmers at least $7 billion worse off than they would have been without his policies. As for China’s hints of a far-off bonanza for U.S. farmers, these should be taken with a grain of soybean.

Can Trump Bribe His Way Out Of Impeachment? He's Certainly Trying

Yesterday, the House Republicans showed us-- once again-- what they're made of: TREASON. Every single Republican stuck with Trump and spat in the face of the Constitution and in the face of the United States. Now, of course, everyone is wondering what will happen in the Senate once the House impeaches Trump. If you want to look at it transactionally-- and these are politicians we're talking about here-- among the Republican-held Senate seats up for grabs next year, several will be decided by independent voters (who have increasingly turned against Trump)-- not in zombie-Republican states like Tennessee and Arkansas, where the GOP can win without any independents, but these 8 states:

• Maine- Susan Collins
• Colorado- Cory Gardner
• Arizona- Martha McSally
• Iowa- Joni Ernst
• North Carolina- Thom Tillis
• Montana- Steve Daines
• Alaska- Dan Sullivan
• Georgia- David Perdue

Yesterday, before the House vote, Alex Isenstadt reported for Politico that Señor Trumpanzee "is rewarding senators who have his back on impeachment-- and sending a message to those who don't to get on board." Rewarding as in C.A.S.H. "Trump," he continued, "is tapping his vast fundraising network for a handful of loyal senators facing tough reelection bids in 2020. Each of them has signed onto a Republican-backed resolution condemning the inquiry as 'unprecedented and undemocratic.'... With his new push, Trump is exerting leverage over a group he badly needs in his corner with an impeachment trial likely coming soon to the Senate-- but that also needs him." And Susan Collins (R-ME) gets squat.

Republican senators on the ballot next year are lagging in fundraising, stoking uncertainty about the GOP’s hold on the chamber, and could use the fundraising might of the president. Trump’s political operation has raked in over $300 million this year.

On Wednesday, the Trump reelection campaign sent a fundraising appeal to its massive email list urging donors to provide a contribution that would be divided between the president and Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst, and North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis. Each of the senators are supporting the anti-impeachment resolution despite being endangered in 2020.

“If we don’t post strong fundraising numbers,” the message warned, “we won't be able to defend the President from this baseless Impeachment WITCH HUNT.”

Next week, Trump will lend a hand to Georgia Sen. David Perdue, a staunch ally who has also spoken out against impeachment. On Nov. 8, the president will host an Atlanta fundraising lunch that will jointly benefit his campaign, the Republican National Committee, and Perdue’s reelection effort. Attendees are being asked to give up to $100,000, according to an invitation obtained by Politico.

Trump is also set to appear next week at a reception for Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC closely aligned with Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and party leadership.

The offensive comes as Trump presses Republicans to remain united behind him. During a cabinet meeting last week, the president implored Republicans to “get tougher and fight” while lamenting that Democrats “stick together. You never see them break off.”

...“The donors listen to the president, and he has the most capacity to energize small-dollar contributions by making the case that he needs a Senate majority to be successful,” said Scott Jennings, a former political aide in the George W. Bush White House.

Trump’s interest in assisting down-ballot candidates has heartened Republican strategists who worry that the 2020 election is turning out to be a re-run of the disastrous 2018 midterms, when GOP candidates were vastly out-raised. The hope is that Trump can harness his massive small-donor network to help Republican senators, who are trying to protect a narrow majority.

“The hard lessons from 2018 were that elections have consequences and it is the president’s party now,” said Scott Reed, the senior political strategist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Trump, Reed added, “has the ability to turn on the money spigot like no one else.”

Michael Franken, a retired admiral currently running for the Iowa Senate seat occupied by Joni Ernst pointed out that "The unknown is when the influx of extravagant GOP funding does little more than annoy the voter. In Iowa, for instance, the middle third, who question Trump’s suitability for decision making and may very well be losing their farms due to disastrous trade policies, may already be lost. Recent polling numbers for Senator Joni Ernst fell to a 39% approval rating from a high of 57% in February. (She parrots Trump.) Getting bombarded by TV ads may lull some listeners to vote for Trump’s acolyte, but not if the farm is on the auction block."

Dr. Al Gross is an independent candidate for U.S. Senate, officially endorsed by the Alaska Democratic Party. Last night he told me that "Here in Alaska, if we want to survive, we think for ourselves. That's why Alaska has the greatest proportion of independent voters of any state in the country. 55.25% of voters are registered as independents. Yet Dan Sullivan keeps showing us that he's in lock step with Washington DC's partisan political game-playing. We appreciate our freedom here in Alaska and make sure to have each other's backs. Dan Sullivan is beholden to Mitch McConnell and the DC political class. He's not looking out for us. He's looking out for himself and for his own career. He appears to prefer to rise or fall with McConnell and the National Republican Party rather than stake out an Alaskan position on any issue at all."

"Torpedo" Joni Ernst on Impeachment

-by Vice Admiral Michael Franken (ret.)

If America had a dollar for every time DC insiders gave a reason not to hold President Donald Trump accountable, the $22 trillion national debt would be zero. Politicians and pundits of both parties have ignored common sense, moral decency, and even their own self interest to adequately confront Donald Trump first as a candidate and then as president.

Even though it appears that President Trump was caught red-handed shaking down the President of Ukraine, the conventional wisdom in Washington is that an impeachment inquiry is bad politics for candidates like me. I don’t think so...

It’s not only time to hold President Trump accountable, but those who abetted his assault on the constitution, our laws and values should be concerned.

My opponent Senator Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) is just such a person.

Unlike “conservatives with a conscience” like Sen. Barry Goldwater, who despite his fringe views, helped “torpedo” Nixon over Watergate, Joni is among those who refuse to do their job and hold Trump accountable.

Watch my first TV ad (above) to see how we can take on Republicans like Joni, who have let Donald Trump off the hook for far too long.

Joni earned national scorn for her silence on Trump’s abuses of power. At a town hall earlier this month, Joni was confronted by a constituent from Manning, Iowa, who asked, “Where is the line? When are you guys going to say enough and stand up and say, 'You know what? I'm not backing any of this.'"

Last Thursday, Joni again repeatedly refused to answer reporters' questions on whether it’s proper for Trump to ask a foreign country to investigate a political opponent. “I don’t know that we have that information in front of us,” said Ernst; even though Trump made the request on camera on the White House lawn.

By contrast, in 2014, Joni alluded to impeaching President Obama for making recess appointments, calling him a “dictator” that was “running amok.”

In September 2019, after reviewing the transcript that launched Trump’s impeachment inquiry, Joni claimed she “didn’t see anything there.”

If Joni won’t do her job, then I will. But I need your help first, join my campaign today to keep this ad on the air.

The Worst Of All Possible Worlds For Joni Ernst

2 politicians Ernst should never be near when a camera is around: white nationalists Trump and Steve King

Maybe she was making a play for a bipartisan conservative ticket with Biden-- or maybe she's crazy. But Iowa freshman Senator Joni Ernst (R) looks like she made a classic rookie error this week when she intimated that Social Security benefits had to be cut. First a little background on Iowa, a classic swing state. Despite why the imbecile pundits are all agreed on now-- that Iowa is so red Democrats should not even bother campaigning there, exactly what the abysmal hillary Clinton campaign chose to not do-- Iowa is about the swing very blue (or, at least, very anti-red). Ernst has one chance at reelection: split party voting. Being seen as advocating cutting Social Security is not a way to encourage that. A little recent Iowa electoral history:

2000

• Al Gore- 683,517 (48.54%
• George W. Bush- 634,373 (48.22%)

2004

• George W Bush- 751,957 (49.90%)
• John Kerry- 741,898 (49.23%)

2008

• Barack Obama- 828,940 (53.93%)
• John McCain- 682,379 (44.39%)

2012

• Barack Obama- 822,544 (51.99%)
• Mitt Romney- 730,617 (46.18%)

2016

• Señor Trumpanzee- 800,983 (51.15%)
• Hillary Clinton- 653,669 (41.74%)

All the pundits declared Iowa is so red that it's no longer a swing state, although I don't recall them saying that it was so blue as to be incontestable for Republicans in 2008 when Obama won more overall votes and a bigger percentage of votes than Trump did. Why are they so stupid? And, what's worse, they're still saying that-- to the extent that Biden isn't planning on campaigning or winning there in the general and the only campaign that is prioritizing Iowa after the primaries is Bernie's. What does Bernie know that the others don't? How about that 2018 happened and Iowans gave Trump a huge thumbs down?

There are 4 congressional seats in Iowa and going into the election, the Republicans controlled 3 and the Democrats controlled 1. The Democrats held onto their one seat in 2018, picked up two Republican seats and nearly picked up the 4th one as well! Impressive, but look at the numbers.

In the last midterm election (2014), the Republicans took 595,865 votes statewide (53.19%) and the Democrats took 509,189 (45.45%). In 2018? Turnout grew substantially and Democrats took 664,676 votes (50.48%) while the Republicans won 612,338 votes (46.51%). That doesn't look off the table. It looks like Iowa, Classic Swing State.

Pundits all say Joni Ernst is favored to beat whichever Democrat wins their party's nomination, even though there are two grassroots progressives and a Schumer-picked conservative running. I guess the pundits don't think it matters. Maybe they'll change their minds when Ernst's stupid Social Security comments get out. She said: "So it’s, you know, a broader discussion for another day. But I do think, as various parties and members of Congress, we need to sit down behind closed doors so we’re not being scrutinized by this group or the other, and just have an open and honest conversation about what are some of the ideas that we have for maintaining Social Security in the future."

In Republican-speak that means doing a Grand Bargain that includes cutting benefits for future retirees and raising the retirement age-- something near and dear to the hearts not just of Republicans but also to Joe Biden but out of the question for Bernie and Elizabeth Warren. Ed Kilgore wrote about it for New York Magazine, asserting certainty that "Ernst will claim she didn’t mean what she said, or that the solutions she had in mind might involve giving Social Security beneficiaries more money or Starbucks gift cards. But anyone even vaguely familiar with Republican thinking on 'entitlement reform' knows the drill: The GOP is terrified of intense public hostility to conservative schemes to 'save' Social Security by reducing benefits (usually by privatizing them and then cutting them over time), and needs Democratic 'cover' to get ’er done. But Democrats, you see, are as afraid of doing this as Republicans, which is why it needs to happen in private where those pesky seniors can’t see what’s going on." She's suggested privatizing Social Security before-- and next year would be a very bad year for Iowa voters to be reminded of that, especially if Bernie or Elizabeth are on the top of the ticket vs Trump.

Trump... the guy who has destroyed Iowa's multi-billion dollar soy bean industry and has sent the farm belt into recession. In fact, on Thursday Brendan Cole reported for Newsweek that Iowa corn farmers have had it with Trump not just because of the trade war but for betraying them to oil companies over ethanol.

Corn farmers are now reeling from the move by the Trump administration to drop the requirement for 31 oil refineries to blend ethanol into their fuel.

Using ethanol in fuel was part of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Exemptions would normally be granted to smaller refineries experiencing financial hardship. However, it emerged that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had given waivers to oil giants like ExxonMobil and Chevron.

Around 40 percent of the U.S. corn crop is turned into ethanol. Corn farmers, already struggling with five years of low commodity prices and mediocre harvests due to bad weather, say the EPA waivers are another setback.

Two months ago Trump came to Iowa, the country's biggest ethanol producer, to talk up his administration's approval of E15-- gasoline blended with 15 percent ethanol-- which he said would drive up demand for corn in the Midwest.

But opinion against Trump is turning, with the waivers more than canceling out any gains made from the policy.

Nick Bowdish, CEO of Elite Octane in Atlantic, Iowa, backed Trump in 2016 because he was encouraged by the rhetoric about taking on China.

He said: "Since he got himself involved in agricultural policy issues, it has been a complete disappointment to any of us out here in the heartland.

"Where the president went wrong and made a serious misstep was when he made the decision to start destroying the market for agricultural products at home with these refinery waivers," he told Newsweek.

"He added that much more burden to the back of the American farmer at a time when they were already impacted by the trade war with China-- and that's not acceptable.

Trump won 93 out of Iowa's 99 counties in the 2016 presidential race-- the most for a GOP nominee since 1980. The state is also where the 2020 presidential race kicks off, with its caucuses on February 3.

Bowdish said: "So many people out in the Midwest have tended to vote for a conservative Republican candidate and right now, I can't tell you that support is locked up in there for the president."

"There are a lot of independent voters and a lot of moderate Republicans that are weighing their options and listening to what is the rural vision for the other candidates on the ticket," he added.

He said the most efficient ethanol plants in the U.S. are only just breaking even-- the average producer is losing 15 cents a gallon and the most inefficient producers are being forced out of business.

Trump's touting of E15 was greeted with optimism. However, even though it would increase demand for corn by 100 million bushels, this amount pales into insignificance compared with the impact of the refinery waivers, which represent over a billion bushels of corn.

"It is 10 steps backward for one step forward," Bowdish said.

Since Trump took office, the EPA has approved 85 waivers for 4 billion gallons of renewable fuel, ending demand for 1.4 billion bushels of corn.

This evening I spoke with Michael Franken, a progressive taking on Ernst and asked him about Ernst's apparent plans to wreck Social Security. "I think Iowans deserve better than smoky backroom deals and a privatization scheme cooked up by DC politicians like Joni Ernst and Mitch McConnell," he told me. "They gave us a top 1% tax cut in that same smoky room."