Nightmare Scenario

Snake Pits:  Yesterday House Intel chief Adam Schiff, who will continue to run the impeachment inquiry until it is turned over to the House Judiciary Committee for the drawing up of formal impeachment charges, announced that public hearings will begin next week with William Taylor, the Acting Ambassador to Ukraine and George Kent, the deputy assistant secretary in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs responsible for Ukraine who had been sidelined by Trump and Giuliani’s “Three Amigos” clown crew, scheduled to appear on Wednesday and former Ambassador Maria Yovanovitch, who was smeared, recalled and threatened, scheduled to appear on Friday. Schiff’s committee also released Taylor’s 324 page testimony transcript.  The Taylor transcript reveals a “vivid” recounting of the Ukraine scandal.  Taylor indicated that he had a “clear understanding” that US military aid would not be sent to Ukraine until President Zelensky pursued investigations that could benefit Trump politically.  He described a “Washington snake pit” of bad actors who were willing to cut off aid to Ukraine as it battled Russian backed separatists, a situation he described as a “nightmare scenario.”  His biggest fear, that nightmare scenario, was that Trump would continue to hold up military aid even if President Zelensky agreed to the Biden/Burisma/DNC server investigations and that as a result Ukraine would continue to lose ground and lives to Russian aggression lending further credence to Speaker Pelosi’s assertion that with Trump it always comes back to Russia, and of course, his own self interests.  Overall, the transcripts released to date reveal a consistent narrative, that Rudy Giuliani was Trump’s Ukraine enforcer who circumvented official channels, leaving a series of career diplomats baffled, frustrated and in some cases with their careers in tatters, while he pressed Zelensky to agree to Trump’s demands. Yesterday,  David Hale, the third highest official in the State Department actually showed up to testify, although he didn’t release an opening statement it’s believed that he said that the reason that no one was willing to release a statement in support of former Ambassador Yovanovitch was because of a concern that such a statement would make it more likely that Trump would never release Ukraine’s much needed aid. Today Jennifer Williams, an aide to VP Pence, but also a long time State Department staffer, is expected to testify.  She listened in on the July 25 Zelensky-Trump call and was present during Pence’s visit with Zelensky in Warsaw. Pence may be praying with mother Karen right about now.

Those Republicans willing to go on the record continue to insist that the Ukraine investigation is just another desperate Democratic plot to undo Trump’s presidency. Yesterday, sounding more like a mob lawyer than a member of the Senate “jury” Senator Lindsey Graham asserted that Trump’s Ukraine policy was too incoherent to be intentionally criminal.  He also questioned why Ambassador to the EU/Three Amigo/Trump contributor Gordon Sondland amended his testimony to admit that he now remembers that Ukraine was being pressured to investigate the Bidens and look for the DNC server in exchange for aid by asking if there was a connection between Sondland and Democratic operatives on the committee, suggesting that Sondland had been persuaded to change his testimony by Adam Schiff and his staffers. For their part Democratic leadership remains focused on moving forward.  Confident that they have enough evidence to proceed they have withdrawn the subpoena for John Bolton’s top aide Charles Kupperman who had asked the courts to determine whether he should show up and testify or follow White House instructions to stay away. That’s a clear signal that the effort to force Kupperman’s testimony, and possibly Bolton’s as well, has ended.  It’s not that Schiff and team don’t want Bolton to appear it’s just that they are unwilling to fall into the White House “delay until it’s too late” trap. In other related news the Whistleblower has pretty much been outed, Don Trump Jr retweeted a Breitbart article with his name for all to see because he’s a Trump and as such is allowed to do whatever he wants, and though most of the main stream media still hasn’t published the name, the very right leaning Washington Examiner has.  Also, Rudy Giuliani has now hired a legal team comprised of “his old friend” Robert Costello and two lawyers, Eric Creizman and Melissa Madrigal from the Pierce Bainbridge law firm. Ironically Robert Costello last appeared in the Trump epic as the lawyer who dangled a pardon in front of Michael Cohen, Trump’s last lawyer/fixer. To no one’s surprise Giuliani had a hard time finding a reputable firm to take him on as a client.   

Tossing Stones:  The Roger Stone trial is also growing more interesting.  In opening remarks prosecutors told the court that Trump was more personally involved in his campaign’s effort to obtain the Democratic emails stolen by Russian operatives than was previously known.  They introduced phone records that disclose Trump spoke to Stone repeatedly during the summer of 2016, at a time when Stone was trying very hard to obtain the stolen emails from WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The prosecutors noted that they did not know what Stone and Trump had discussed but that the “timing of their calls dovetailed with other key developments related to the theft and release of the Democratic emails.”  The prosecutors made it clear that the case against Stone is not about who hacked the DNC servers or whether Stone had any communications with Russians and is not about politics. It is about Roger Stone’s providing false testimony to the House Intelligence Committee to obstruct the investigation and to tamper with evidence, something that they say he did because the “truth looked bad for Donald Trump.” 

Zees:  The federal prosecutor running the Stone case is a former member of Special Counsel Mueller’s team named Aaron Zelinsky, not to be confused with the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky, but who knows, if they ever get a chance to play Jewish Geography they could find out that they are long lost cousins.  Likely witnesses in this case involve such notables as Steve Bannon, yes that Steve Bannon, Manafort sidekick Rick Gates, Randy Credico, the guy who goes nowhere without his dog Bianca and conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi. Lastly, keep in mind that while Prosecutor Zelinsky and his team clearly believe that it was the Russians who hacked the DNC server, Trump, Giuliani and Attorney General Barr are trying to prove that the Ukrainians were responsible and Barr is still busy trying to prove that the whole Russia investigation was illegally initiated.  As to Barr, whether he believes that nonsense or is just pretending to placate and bolster Trump, he does have some standards.  The Washington Post reported last night that he refused to agree to Trump’s request that he hold a press conference saying that Trump broke no laws during his infamous phone conversation with Ukraine President Zelensky. And that long awaited reported from the FBI’s Inspector General Michael Horowitz, the one that Fox news pundits insist will excoriate the way the FBI and CIA initiated the investigation into Trump’a Russia related campaign shenanigans, depending on who you ask it will either be released on November 20 or after Thanksgiving.  It’s delay is due to a "complicated and contentious mix of legal, classification and political issues at play."

Other News:  Despite that whole Syria Kurd ethnic cleansing thing, Trump still plans to welcome President Erdogan of Turkey next week.  Their get together is scheduled to take place during the first day of the House’s public hearings on Ukraine.  Just a reminder the last time that Erdogan came to town,  Turkish security personnel attacked Kurdish protestors in Washington. Fifteen bodyguards were indicted, but charges were later dropped ahead of a meeting between Erdogan and then-Secretary of State Tillerson. And one more thing, it’s not just Trump’s phone calls with Stone that could prove problematic, Summer Zervos, the former Apprentice contestant suing Trump for defamation related to her claims that he sexually assaulted her has obtained the phone records that prove he called her several times during the period around that assault and  E. Jean Carroll, the most recent woman to accuse Trump of sexual assault, is now suing him for defamation too.