Friday, November 22, 2019

The Kangaroo Court of His Dreams

Not because Trump had a change of heart.
And Trump imagines he's going to have the kangaroo court of his dreams:

“President Trump wants to have a trial in the Senate because it’s clearly the only chamber where he can expect fairness and receive due process under the Constitution,” spokesman Hogan Gidley said in a statement.

“We would expect to finally hear from witnesses who actually witnessed, and possibly participated in corruption – like Adam Schiff, Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, and the so-called Whistleblower, to name a few,” Gidley said, referring to House of Representatives Intelligence Committee Chairman Schiff, who is leading an impeachment inquiry into Trump. 

Adam Schiff may be one of the prosecutors of Trump in the Senate.   He is not, in any sense, a fact witness in an impeachment trial.  There's no way the Senate produces enough votes to authorize a subpoena to Schiff, much less that he complies with it without a lengthy court fight Trump will insist on taking to the Supremes.  Which would keep this trial green in public memory until this time next year and allow the Democrats to publicly wonder why the Senate can't get anything else done.  So please, Mr. Trump, draw up and insist on your witness list!  Let nothing dissuade you from making those witnesses testify before the Senate!

Then again, Trump also thinks this is the way you impeach (wholly different use of the term, please note) a witness:

“This ambassador [Maria Yovanovich] that everyone says is so wonderful, she wouldn’t hang my picture in the embassy,” he said. “This was not an angel, this woman, okay? And there were a lot of things that she did that I didn’t like.”

I'm sure, in his mind, he imagines this is true, and that it is damning.  Reality says otherwise, on both counts.  And when he went on "Fox & Friends" this morning and babbled out:

While insisting that he’s sincerely working to fight corruption at home and abroad, Trump said, “I do want, always, corruption — I say that to anybody!”

It's either a sign of mental decline, or that he doesn't care what words mean, he just thinks they are magical things.  Since he never said "quid pro quo" or "bribery" to Zelensky on any phone call anyone overheard, he's not guilty of a crime.  Since he said "corruption" he's waved the magic wand of concern.  How he uses words don't seem to matter to him; that he uses them, or not, is all that seems to matter.

And due process does not mean "I get to present crack-brained conspiracy theories as a legal defense."  It is also no protection against being your own war room or worse, your own lawyer.  As recent losses in court prove out, Trump is acting as his own attorney through the attorneys he's paying to act as attorneys, but who clearly aren't.
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