Project Veritas and Persuasion

[Peter]

Thanks to William for the links. I printed what I thought was relevant. 

[william.scherk]

7 minutes ago, Peter said:

Thanks to William for the links. I printed what I thought was relevant. 

It's usually a good idea not to post the full text of what might be copyrighted material. When you post excerpts and a link to the full text, the author/owner/site is able to count 'clicks' and visits, and so receive advertising revenues.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

btw - What do these things have to do with Project Veritas and Persuasion?

Deflection?

I mean, come on. CNN is that important to protect?

Michael

[Peter]

Tattoo: Da plane! Da plane!

Mr. Roark: My dear guests. I am Mr. Roark, your host here at The House of Representatives. Welcome to Fantasy Island! Here are my questions for you, my well paying guests. What? Oh, you will pay. One. What short and long term political gains will the Democratic House accomplish? Two. If they lose in the Senate what have they gained? Three. What is the cost to America and do they care? Four. How will this affect the election in 2020, and is this impeachment process a dishonest guerrilla war tactic?

From Politico. On the day in 1998, the Republican-led House voted to proceed with impeachment proceedings against President Bill Clinton on charges of lying under oath and obstruction of justice. end quote

Well, wasn’t it really about two affairs and lying? President Bill Clinton was impeached but not convicted in the Senate AND then won reelection. Peter

[Peter]

Some text deleted and paragraphs closed up for easy reading, to get at the core of the matter. I think this impeachment jibber jabber is a fishing and harassment expedition. That is why the Democrats will push forward to a STINGING DEPEAT. It’s not necessarily Trump Derangement Syndrome as it is mean spirited political maneuvering regardless of the harm it causes to America. Peter

The Daily Signal. 4 Keys to Understanding a Trump Impeachment Trial in the Senate Fred Lucas / October 31, 2019/ . . . . The Senate will decide how a trial moves forward, with discretion about some procedures, hearing from witnesses, length of the trial, and other matters. These issues are spelled out in both the Constitution and in Senate rules . . . .

Here are answers to questions about what a Senate trial, probably in early 2020, would look like. 

1. What Do Precedents of Johnson, Clinton Trials Tell Us? The trial of President Andrew Johnson in 1868 on charges of violating the Tenure of Office Act lasted two months, and involved witnesses testifying on the Senate floor, similar to a regular criminal trial. The 1999 trial of President Bill Clinton lasted a month, and was a “sham trial,” said former Rep. James Rogan, R-Calif., one of the House impeachment managers and author of the 2011 book “Catching Our Flag: Behind the Scenes of a Presidential Impeachment.”

Rogan was critical of then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, a fellow Republican, for short-circuiting the trial. “It wasn’t a trial and Trent Lott told me, he said, ‘It’s going to look like a trial. Everybody’s going to call it a trial,’” Rogan said in an interview with The Daily Signal. “It’s the only trial I know of in American history where the prosecutors were not allowed by the jury to call a single witness to prove their case. The Senate voted in secret, 100 to zero, to prevent the House managers from calling one single live witness to prove their case.” Rogan, now a California Superior Court judge, said Lott, of Mississippi, chiefly had political concerns because the Clinton impeachment was unpopular. Rogan recalled that Lott said: 

We don’t care if you have pictures of Bill Clinton standing over a dead woman with a smoking gun. The polls say they didn’t want him impeached. You guys impeached him and for doing that you just lost your majority. We’ve got a majority of Republicans in the Senate. We have 55 Republicans. Seven of my Republicans are up for election in 2000, are in tough races. You guys have just jumped off a cliff. We’re not jumping off a cliff. We’re … going to put this thing to bed, and you’re going to be sorry.

The Senate had the full results of the investigation by  independent counsel Ken Starr, so it didn’t need witnesses, said David O. Stewart, author of the 2009 book “Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln’s Legacy.”

“The Johnson trial had testimony, but the Senate probably didn’t need it,” Stewart, who represented U.S. District Judge Walter Nixon in his 1986 Senate trial, told The Daily Signal. “The facts were widely known.”

2. What’s the Process for a Senate Trial? In preparation for an impeachment trial, the Senate will “issue a writ of summons to the respondent,” in this case the president, for either him or his counsel to appear for the trial on the date established by the Senate, according to the Congressional Research Service.  

“Unlike what happened in the House, which was a departure significantly from past precedent on impeachment procedure, I expect the Senate to rely on precedent,” Thomas Jipping, who served as deputy chief counsel to the Senate Impeachment Trial Committee of U.S. District Judge Thomas Porteous in 2010, told The Daily Signal. 

Jipping, now deputy director of the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation, said a Trump impeachment trial likely would “follow the Clinton model.”

“The Senate is not in an advocacy role, but acts as a judge and jury,” Jipping said. “The House managers and [the] president’s lawyers will likely make motions procedurally to benefit them, and the Senate will vote on how it wants to proceed with the trial.”

After establishing a date, the Senate orders the House managers—members of the House acting as prosecutors—or their counsel to provide the Senate’s sergeant of arms with information about potential witnesses and other evidence to be subpoenaed for presentation during the trial.     

“The Senate will determine questions of competency, relevancy, and materiality,” the Congressional Research Service report says.            

The House managers, or prosecutors, are the first to make opening arguments and—if needed—examine witnesses. The president’s counsel then has the opportunity to cross-examine witnesses. Stewart said he has serious doubts witnesses would be called in any Senate trial of Trump over the Ukraine controversy. 

“At the end of the day, the goal of the House managers and president’s lawyers will be to sway public opinion to drive the vote,” Stewart said. “I assume neither the House nor the president’s lawyers want live witnesses. The thing about live witnesses [is] you can never be certain what they’re going to say.” 

The House managers and the president’s counsel may make motions or objections during the trial. However, the presiding officer at the trial “may choose to put any such issues to a vote before the Senate,” the report by the Congressional Research Service says, and any senator “may request that a formal vote be taken on a particular question.” Short of a rules change—itself requiring a two-thirds vote—a trial of Trump would follow the precedent of the Johnson and Clinton trials, both held before the full Senate. The Senate appoints a committee to try judicial impeachments, Jipping said. However, Senate rules require a presidential impeachment to take place before the full chamber. Judicial impeachments generally have been of district judges, who are appointed by the president. That contrasts with a president elected by voters in 50 states. 

3. Will the Chief Justice Preside? Chief Justice John Roberts almost certainly would preside over a trial of Trump, despite objections from some of the president’s defenders. Article 1, Section 3, Clause 6 of the Constitution states: “ … When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside.” Last year, Roberts issued a statement in defense of the judiciary, implicitly responding to a Trump tweet criticizing federal judges. Some Trump defenders now call for Roberts to recuse himself from presiding over a Senate trial. 

“There is already a crisis of confidence among the American people that we have a fair system of justice,” conservative radio host John Cardillo told The Washington Times. “When you have a chief justice of the Supreme Court overtly making comments that are derogatory to the president of the United States, take all speculation out of the process.”            

The Trump-Roberts dispute occurred after a lower court judge in California temporarily blocked the administration’s bid to revise asylum policies for would-be immigrants. Trump referred to U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar—appointed by President Barack Obama in 2012—as an “Obama judge.” Roberts, who was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2005, in response to an inquiry from the Associated Press, subsequently asserted: “We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.”        

. . . . “The role of the chief justice in an impeachment trial is largely ministerial, an administrative role,” Jipping said. “He keeps order and a sense of solemnity.” Such disputes have nothing to do with impeachment, Stewart said. “It’s ridiculous to complain about Chief Justice Roberts because the chief justice is not a significant figure in the trial anyway; he’s more of a traffic cop,” Stewart told The Daily Signal. “He could rule on objections, but can be overruled by a vote of the Senate.” In 1999, Chief Justice William Rehnquist presided over Clinton’s Senate impeachment trial. In 1868, Chief Justice Salmon Chase presided over Johnson’s trial.

4. Could the Senate Dismiss the Charges? Republicans’ 53-seat Senate majority means a simple majority vote of 51 is improbable, much less the 67 votes required to convict and remove a president—short of major revelations in the Ukraine controversy. Fox News Channel host Laura Ingraham, a lawyer who once clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas, said Wednesday of the Senate majority leader: “McConnell can and should aggressively push for a blisteringly short impeachment trial.” Constitutional lawyer and former top Reagan administration Justice Department official Mark Levin has said the Senate should go a step further, as it has the authority to stop the trial. “The Senate must not allow itself to be the plaything of Pelosi and the House Democrats, who are violating every rule,” Levin, a bestselling author, said on his popular radio show earlier this month. “And only the Senate has the power to police what House Democrats are doing,” Levin said. “No other body. No court, not the executive branch, only the Senate.”  

Although the Senate might have the authority to do so, at least for political reasons, senators will want to appear to give the impeachment charges a fair hearing, Stewart said. “They will be politically sensitive to the appearance of looking unfair,” Stewart said. “They certainly don’t want to run the risk of being accused of ignoring their constitutional obligations.” Such a move would be similar to a criminal court’s dismissing an indictment before a trial. From a practical standpoint, it would spare the country a waste of time, argued Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder and national coordinator of Tea Party Patriots, a conservative group. “[The] Senate should move quickly to vote on a resolution dismissing the House impeachment charges by a simple majority vote,” Martin wrote earlier this month in USA Today. “This would spare the nation the political agony of a drawn-out Senate trial, where the outcome is a foregone conclusion and the only result will be further polarization.”

[william.scherk]

16 minutes ago, Peter said:

On 10/22/2019 at 10:23 AM, william.scherk said:

It's usually a good idea not to post the full text of what might be copyrighted material. When you post excerpts and a link to the full text, the author/owner/site is able to count 'clicks' and visits, and so receive advertising revenues.

The Daily Signal. 4 Keys to Understanding a Trump Impeachment Trial in the Senate Fred Lucas / October 31, 2019/

https://www.dailysignal.com/2019/10/31/4-keys-to-understanding-a-trump-impeachment-trial-in-the-senate/

18 minutes ago, Peter said:

From Politico. On the day in 1998, the Republican-led House voted to proceed with impeachment proceedings against President Bill Clinton on charges of lying under oath and obstruction of justice. end quote

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/08/house-votes-to-impeach-clinton-oct-8-1998-243550

 

Edited November 1, 2019 by william.scherk
Added links to Peter's Daily Signal and Politico copy-pastes

[Peter]

Thanks for the link Wilhelm but I deliberately made in plain I wanted to brief'en the content for emphasis. I left enough clues to search for the original site. Peter 

[william.scherk]

55 minutes ago, Peter said:

I left enough clues to search for the original site

Just think of me as a helpful editor ... adding a URL is pretty simple. I'd suggest you try it out sometime, but those suggestions have never worked.

[Peter]

Thanks, William. Sometimes OL reports the news but usually it reports commentary on the news, which is why I cherry pick and shorten news items but leave enough clues to find the original story if it is wanted. I like to discuss news items though the eyes of objectivism or simple common sense, without too many twists of lemon. edit. and I think a shortened or some of a quoted story is more likely to be read and commented upon.  Peter 

[Peter]

From Rasmussen. October 29, 2019. Voters clearly aren’t happy with the major party choices they’re likely to get in the 2020 presidential election. Nearly four-out-of-10 say they’re likely to vote for a third-party candidate. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 38% of Likely U.S. Voters say they are likely to vote for someone other than President Trump or the Democratic presidential nominee in next year’s election. That includes 22% who are Very Likely to do so. end quote

Of course there must be a “sure to be a loser” who selects themselves (and it probably will not be a publicity seeking Bloomberg) so what if 22 percent of likely voters will vote for that third party candidate? How will that affect the Democrats or the Republicans? My guess is it will be a Socialist third party idiot. 78 percent divided by 2 equals 39 percent for the two big boys of politics. But if it is a socialist like Pocahontas or a modern Ralph Nader, that will pull more votes from the Democratic candidate.

What if it is a moderate right wing former Republican? That’s not going to happen. Will Rush sponsor an “operation chaos” campaign to help the third party candidate to flourish? I doubt it, though he may still do it for the worst Democrat to make it to the final four in the late primaries. RealClear Harvard polling shows little change even from a month ago. In a recent poll it was Biden 22, Warren 15, Sanders 18, Harris 5, Buttigieg 4, Yang 2.

Of course, Beto dropped out. Alas! We will never hear his like again. Bay Toe! Bay Toe! Big Toe!

[william.scherk]

1 hour ago, Peter said:

From Rasmussen. October 29, 2019. Voters clearly aren’t happy with the major party choices they’re likely to get in the 2020 presidential election.

LINK: Surprising Number Say Third-Party Presidential Vote Likely in 2020

[Peter]

A message for Socialized Medicine, especially for William who already has it. Hello, I’m Bernie. And I’m Elizabeth. Two or three million jobs will be lost in the insurance and medical fields due to “Medicare for all.” Of course some of them can work FOR the new department of socialized medicine and perhaps in a higher paying capacity too!. Will doctors and other medical workers suffer? Some.  It will take getting used to. Doctor’s annual incomes may decrease as it did in England. Some may quit the profession. But this will do away with private insurance so workers and businesses will not have to pay for medical insurance directly as they do now. We’ll work that out later. If everybody has Medicare, will people go to the doctor more often? Of course! But everybody will be treated for their illnesses, right now. Will shots and boosters be required for kids and adults? Of course, Silly. That is part of living in a healthier America! We Progressives are great people but you must obey the new laws. It’s for our own good.

Notes. Elizabeth Warren: 2M lost jobs 'part of the cost' of 'Medicare for all' by John Gage October 31, 2019 03:38 PM . Sen. Elizabeth Warren acknowledged in an interview that "Medicare for all" would cause two million jobs to be lost because of the disruption to the healthcare industry. "Regardless of what kind of money is involved, 'Medicare for all' would likely result in a pretty significant kind of shift in how our healthcare system is structured, and even supporters of that approach within the health policy world have said that would likely mean lost jobs in some form," Casey McDermott, a reporter for New Hampshire Public Radio, told the Massachusetts Democrat during a Wednesday interview. "An economist at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, told Kaiser Health News earlier this year that that could result in about two million jobs lost." "So I agree," Warren responded to McDermott. "I think this is part of the cost issue and should be part of a cost plan."

The 2020 contender has struggled to explain how she would pay for her "Medicare for all" plan. Warren has dodged whether middle-class taxes would be raised to pay for universal healthcare. "I want to get insurance that covers everybody. I don't want to tax anybody. I'm not trying to make this harder on your family. I just want it to cover all the families," she said at a recent town hall in New Hampshire. When pressed on the topic, Warren responded by saying it would be "Big corporations and really wealthy people are going to see their costs go up."

Fellow 2020 presidential contender, Sen. Bernie Sanders, is the author of the current legislative version of Medicare for All. The Vermont independent admitted in the June presidential debate that the middle class would have to pay more in taxes for his universal healthcare plan. Warren and Sanders are both top contenders in the Democratic primary polling at 21% and 17%, respectively, according to RealClearPolitics.

[Brant Gaede]

The stupidest bumper sticker, and on a Prius, I ever saw (two days ago): "If you're against socialism get off my public roads".

--Brant

 

[Peter]

In rebuttal, my sticker might read, "You may not use toll roads because paying capitalists or the state capital, to drive is anti socialist."  By tomorrow morning I may think of something better. It's 12:21 old time. Or is it DST? I forget. I think we were going to set the clocks back tomorrow. Interestingly my computer and my heating and air-conditioning wall unit reset themselves.

[Peter]

I am curious about William. Say, if you lived in America who would be the candidate you would vote for? 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

It's ABC's time!

Amy Robach, co-anchor of Good Morning America, no less, caught on hot mic backstage talking to her producer.

ABC had the whole story on Epstein three years ago and killed it.

An ABC insider leaked this video of Amy Robach. The insider is still at ABC, so more videos are coming.

Here's a Breitbart article with some details.

Project Veritas: Anchor Amy Robach Says ABC News Killed Jeffrey Epstein Story

Have you noticed that there has not been a drumbeat in the press about the rich and famous who were involved with Epstein?

That's on purpose.

The fake news mainstream media is complicit in the gradually eroding cover-up.

In these days of "muh Russians!" and "muh Bidens did nothing!" and "muh telephone call impeachment!" so on, we can call the fake news media the "cover-up media" and be 100% accurate. They keep covering for the Deep State and ruling class elitists.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Seems like more is coming from Veritas about ABC.

James got an extra bonus this time around from stretching it out. The fake news mainstream media has already put the Robach story to rest as inconsequential, move on, folks, nothing to see here. Besides, we are covered by our competitors--they've got our back.

I wonder what the fake news mainstream media will do with the next release if it is as good as the Robach tape.

When I said above, "They've got our back," I was referring to CBS. The person who acquired the Robach tape while working at ABC quit ABC back then (or not too long after) and went to CBS. And what did CBS just now do? It fired this person for what he or she did in uncovering wrongdoing while at ABC.

Can you imagine if this happened normally in other companies?

Mr. Employee, I'm glad you have been such a good worker for Gerber. You have done honor to your job and kept the baby food products under your responsibility top quality. In so doing, you have helped us give great joy to babies the world over. But recently, we discovered that you anonymously blew the whistle when you were at our competitor, Nestlé, about their rat droppings in baby food scandal. We cannot tolerate such misbehavior in our employees, so your ass is fired.

 

(Just for the record, there was no such scandal. I made it up as rhetorical excess.  )

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnddd...

It looks like CBS fired the wrong person.

LOL...

James O’Keefe: Leaker of Epstein Coverup Tape ‘Still Working for ABC News’

and 

Fired TV Producer Ashley Bianco Says She Didn’t Leak ABC Clip on Epstein Coverup

Here's Megyn Kelly interviewing the fired lady.

The tears seems a little too coached for my taste, but if they were coached, I chalk it up to Megyn trying to get back into the game and get some audience going, seeing how she gradually eroded hers when she was a regular on two different networks.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Just a little more:

If you want to see what the press looks like in a tinpot dictatorship, look no further than ABC and CBS.

Morally, they are bullies and toadies and little more.

When they get caught, they use innocent fall guys (and girls) to keep sucking their toady mouths up to their political masters.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Another one is on the way.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I didn't expect the next Veritas drop to be about Bernie, but it is.

Notice how the Bernie dude talks so casually about sending Americans to reeducation camps, about how Stalin's Gulags weren't so bad, etc.

And notice how the other Bernie dude is salivating about Milwaukee burning if Bernie doesn't get in.

The commies are really showing themselves for who they are here.

Finally, there is something in the O-Land orbit in contemporary politics that normal Rand-fed O-Land people can relate to as the enemy--that is, a typical O-Land enemy acting like a villain.

Despite all the nuance and controlling the narrative, the closer hardcore lefties get to real power, the more they show their fists.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Here's some more.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Bernie Part 2

Dumbasses.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Part 3--without comment so far.

I haven't even seen it yet. But I know it's good.

I've seen Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham comment on it this morning. That means it is going to get a bigger splash audience than normal.

Michael

[ThatGuy]

Talk about "earthquakes in Valhalla"...

"BREAKING:

@BernieSanders

Staffer Martin Weissgerber "The Soviet Union was not horrible"; began studying Soviet Union while in college.
https://twitter.com/JamesOKeefeIII/status/1219651438869131264?s=20