monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

DAMNING NEW EMAILS SHOW TRUMP KNEW HE WAS BREAKING THE LAW ON UKRAINE

Oh, and that the Department of Justice tried very hard to cover it up.

Of the two dozen different defenses and counting that Donald Trump’s allies have trotted out re: why he shouldn’t be impeached for attempting to extort Ukraine, the one most frequently cited is that the freeze on nearly $400 million in military aid in exchange for investigations is much ado about nothing because said aid was ultimately released—no harm, no foul, everyone can go home. That, of course, is a lot like arguing that a mafia don didn’t do anything wrong in ordering the murder of a snitch, if all he did was send his capos to break the guy’s kneecaps, tie to him to a chair, cut off his ring finger and utter the words “we’re gonna kill you and your whole family,” if the guy happened to make it out alive after the cops showed up at the abandoned warehouse. The ring finger is just ornamental! He’s still got both pinkies!

The other problem with this defense is that it appears quite-to-very likely that the only reason the aid was eventually released was because Adam Schiff sent a letter concerning the existence of the whistle-blower complaint, which preceded the unfreezing by just one day. Also, in November we learned that the Office of Management and Budget and acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney scrambled to come up with an after-the-fact justification for the hold, which they insisted was legal, despite pushback from officials at the State Department and National Security Council who thought otherwise. Oh, and then there are the unredacted emails, the existence of which was reported by Just Security’s Kate Brannen on Thursday, which show that Trump knew the freeze was considered illegal but pressed for it anyway. And just to top things off, the transparent attempt by the Justice Department to cover up the concern from the Pentagon about the whole breaking-of-the-law thing.

Per the Washington Post:

The emails were previously released in redacted form, but many of the redaction choices are puzzling and even suspicious. The redactions include repeated references to legal problems with withholding the aid, basic questions about that subject, and warnings that waiting until too late in the fiscal year (which ended Sept. 30) might mean that some of the funds would never get to Ukraine.

That latter fact appears to have been doubly obscured—including in an official communication. OMB general counsel Mark Paoletta wrote a letter to the Government Accountability Office on Dec. 11 that suggested that the Defense Department had not flagged such a risk. “In fact, at no point during the pause in obligations did DOD [Office of General Counsel] indicate to OMB that, as a matter of law, the apportionments would prevent DOD from being able to obligate the funds before the end of the fiscal year,” Paoletta wrote.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/01/donald-trump-ukraine-aid-emails

Iraqi TV Reports Strike Kills Powerful Iranian Revolutionary Guard Commander

The death of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani was reported in Iraqi and Lebanese official media.

By Falih Hassan and Alissa J. Rubin
Jan. 2, 2020
Updated 8:42 p.m. ET

BAGHDAD — Iraqi state television reported Friday that the powerful commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, was killed in a strike on the Baghdad International Airport early Friday.

Iranian and American officials have not confirmed the death of General Suleimani.

The strike killed five people, including the pro-Iranian chief of an umbrella group for Iraqi militias, Iraqi television reported and militia officials confirmed. The militia chief, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was a strongly pro-Iranian figure.

The public relations chief for the umbrella group, the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq, Mohammed Ridha Jabri, was killed as well.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/02/world/middleeast/qassem-soleimani-iraq-iran-attack.html

WASHINGTON -- The United States military will pre-emptively strike Iranian-backed forces in Iraq and Syria if there are indications the paramilitary groups are planning more attacks against American bases and personnel in the region, Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper said Thursday.

using depleted uranium

Quote:

Iraqi TV Reports Strike Kills Powerful Iranian Revolutionary Guard Commander

The death of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani was reported in Iraqi and Lebanese official media.


The strike killed five people, including the pro-Iranian chief of an umbrella group for Iraqi militias, Iraqi television reported and militia officials confirmed. The militia chief, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was a strongly pro-Iranian figure.

The public relations chief for the umbrella group, the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq, Mohammed Ridha Jabri, was killed as well.

Tactical victory, strategic screwup.........

......{snip} making him the 1st resident of the WH to be Impeached twice?

Republicans call for overturning Roe v. Wade in Supreme Court filing
As the election year starts, over 200 lawmakers are taking an ideological stand against abortion.

Tactical victory, strategic screwup.

It scares me to death, the action was tantamount to an act of war.

With Iran involved, it is scary.

This will unforeseen events happening all over the Middle East because of it.

Not to mention opening up another reason for terrorist attacks.

Liberty Bell Notes From All Over

Nothing says "liberty!" so much as forcing all citizens to abide by a particular religious orthodoxy.

Quote:

Tactical victory, strategic screwup.

It scares me to death, the action was tantamount to an act of war. With Iran involved, it is scary. This will unforeseen events happening all over the Middle East because of it. Not to mention opening up another reason for terrorist attacks.

For a guy who campaigned on getting us out of costly unending wars, he sure has made a mess of it.

Quote:

Tactical victory, strategic screwup.

It scares me to death, the action was tantamount to an act of war. With Iran involved, it is scary. This will unforeseen events happening all over the Middle East because of it. Not to mention opening up another reason for terrorist attacks.

For a guy who campaigned on getting us out of costly unending wars, he sure has made a mess of it.

Levin: Trump Didn’t Have to Alert Democrats of Airstrike – Especially When They’re ‘Orchestrating a Coup’

Levin explains that President Trump not only has the authority to authorize such military strikes, but also has little reason to do so, considering how Democrats, such as those in the House Intelligence Committee, are actively seeking to effect a coup against him and leaking information that endangers U.S military personnel:

“Trump didn’t confer with Congress? Uh, Congress has been on recess. Moreover, the House Intelligence Committee has spent months orchestrating a coup against our president rather than doing its job protecting America from, among others, the terrorist regime in Iran.

“But a president is not required to alert Congress to a real-time defensive military action. So Pelosi and her ilk can leak and put the military action at risk? These Democrats are undermining our security. We were attacked by the Iranian regime.”

We'll see down the line how this plays out. For all our sakes, innocents over in region and us the US, I hope more diplomatic means are deployed, but given the reactions thus far, I admit, I am scared for the long haul.

If the US government is declaring that high officers of other nations governments can be kill in a third nation

Obama launches 2,800 strikes on Iraq, Syria without congressional approval