Garrison Keillor liked to begin his tales from the Minnesota prairie by saying “It was a quiet week in Lake Wobegon.” Last week in Washington, there were ample reasons to be woebegone, but it certainly wasn’t a quiet week.
Under the gathering clouds of impeachment, there were several significant developments. On Capitol Hill, a procession of witnesses made it clear that, with respect to Ukraine, President Trump had been running a Shadow State Department under Rudy Giuliani. (Ironically, Giuliani had once campaigned vigorously for the position of Secretary of State, withdrawing only after Rex Tillerson had become the front-runner. Giuliani had also been under consideration for appointment as Attorney General, and it may be considered one of the small mercies in Trump’s record of personnel decisions that he was not placed in either position.) Not surprisingly, Giuliani’s unconventional role with Ukraine had caused acute distress among officials at both the State Department (Kurt Volker, Maria Yovanovich, Gordon Sondland, George Kent, and Michael McKinley) and the White House (John Bolton, Fiona Hill). All, however, had felt obliged to swallow their discomfort and to defer to the dictates of the president.
As the week progressed, Giuliani must have been feeling discomfort of his own as two of his close associates and collaborators in his Ukrainian schemes, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, had been indicted the week before in the Southern District of New York. Giuliani was not named in the indictment, but it was reported separately that his bank records and financial dealings were being investigated, also by the federal prosecutors in New York. Some wondered whether Attorney General Barr might quash an investigation of the president’s personal attorney, but such an act would be difficult and dangerous, as that particular U.S. Attorney’s office (which Giuliani once led) has a long and well-established reputation for independence.
Returning to Giuliani’s Shadow State Department, what were its objectives? They were principally twofold, and in the quid pro quo of the Trump/Zelensky phone call, they each amounted to one half of the quo Trump was requesting for the quid of military aid. The first half was a Ukrainian investigation of events in 2016, and it sprang from Trump’s obsession with trying to prove somehow that his election was not tainted by Russian meddling after all, that the only meddling was by Ukrainians acting on behalf of Hillary Clinton. The attempt to support that bizarre theory is probably the most futile quest since Captain Queeg turned the USS Caine upside down looking for missing strawberries. Nevertheless, Trump made it a driver of his foreign policy. The other objective was to have Ukraine find evidence smearing Joe Biden, Trump’s potential opponent in 2020. In this case, the Ukraine associations of Biden’s son, Hunter, are no doubt a source of embarrassment to the former Vice President, but there is no credible evidence that either of the Bidens did anything illegal, and the possibility that a Ukrainian investigation will find such wrongdoing is remote. In any case, there was no legitimate reason for either objective to become a condition of providing military aid already mandated by Congress and desperately needed by Ukraine.
Onto that muddy landscape strode the President’s Acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, who proceeded to admit freely what had already been obvious to anyone who read the quasi-transcript of the Trump/Zelensky call: that military aid was tied to, and conditioned on, a Ukrainian investigation of events relating to the 2016 election. Despite the obviousness of that fact, Trump and the White House continued to deny it and, perversely, Mulvaney continued to deny the equally obvious tie to Trump’s request for a Biden investigation. Nevertheless, Mulvaney’s admission of half the quo was sufficiently dramatic to severely rattle Trump’s enablers on Capitol Hill and elsewhere. After Mulvaney realized the havoc he had wrought, he attempted, in the currently popular phrase, to “walk back” what he had said. His attempt was utterly unconvincing, and demonstrated the truth of H.R. Haldeman’s famous observation to John Dean, “Once the toothpaste is out of the tube, it’s awfully hard to get it back in.” Mulvaney and the White House were left with a lot of toothpaste on their hands.
After Mulvaney’s “clarification,” Republicans on Capitol continued to attempt a posture of duck and cover, but one notable voice off the Hill was that of John Kasich, former Governor of Ohio and a 2016 presidential candidate. In reaction to Mulvaney’s performance, he spoke on several television programs calling for Trump to be impeached by the House and tried by the Senate. Kasich, however, has not indicated an intent to become a candidate in 2020. A video of one of his interviews is here.
In the meantime, the consequences of Trump’s colossal blunder with Turkey were continuing to unfold. Faced with withering criticism from both Republicans and Democrats, Trump responded by sending a letter, both threatening and puerile, to Turkey’s President Erdogan (“Don’t be a tough guy. Don’t be a fool.”) and dispatching Vice President Pence and Secretary of State Pompeo to Turkey to try to fix things. Pence emerged with an agreement for a pause in hostilities that he described in glowing terms, emphasizing that it had been possible only because of Trump’s “strong stand” and personal relationship with Erdogan. As an aside, it may be recalled that Trump recently told a rally crowd in his typically crude way that that Biden “was only a good vice president because he understood how to kiss Barack Obama’s ass.” It must be said that in the annals of posterior osculation by Vice Presidents, no one comes close to Pence.
For his part, Trump played the arsonist trying to take credit for putting out the blaze he had started. He called the cease-fire agreement “amazing,” “strategically brilliant,” and “a great day for civilization.” Nevertheless, those outside the parallel universe inhabited by Trump and Pence were unimpressed, regarding the agreement as a Nothingburger at best, a document that validated what Turkey had wanted from the outset. The week ended with a scathing op-ed in the Washington Post by Mitch McConnell, a figure hardly noted in the past for criticism of Trump or the administration:
Withdrawing U.S. forces from Syria is a grave strategic mistake. It will leave the American people and homeland less safe, embolden our enemies, and weaken important alliances. * * * * The combination of a U.S. pullback and the escalating Turkish-Kurdish hostilities is creating a strategic nightmare for our country. Even if the five-day cease-fire announced Thursday holds, events of the past week have set back the United States’ campaign against the Islamic State and other terrorists. Unless halted, our retreat will invite the brutal Assad regime in Syria and its Iranian backers to expand their influence. And we are ignoring Russia’s efforts to leverage its increasingly dominant position in Syria to amass power and influence throughout the Middle East and beyond.
So much for a great day for civilization.
In comparison with the Ukraine revelations, and our humiliation at the hands of the Turks, Mick Mulvaney’s announcement on Thursday that the G-7 Conference would be held at Trump’s Doral Resort in Florida was a minor embarrassment. Then, after widespread bipartisan criticism, Trump tweeted on Saturday night that the conference would not be held at the Doral after all, but would take place at some other site, possibly Camp David. Although Trump blamed pressure from the “Hostile Media & their Democratic partners,” the selection of the Doral had drawn negative reactions from many Republicans as well as Democrats.
Trump’s huckstering for the Doral at the last G-7 conference had been noted in Trump New Low No. 7, and somehow it did not come as a great surprise when, after a nationwide survey, it had been determined by the Trump White House that the Doral was the best possible facility in the entire country for the conference. Swept aside were concerns as to whether the revenue from taxpayers and the foreign visitors would violate the emoluments clause of the constitution, the pending litigation over alleged bedbug infestations at the Doral and the weather in June, approximately 90 degrees, with humidity conditions ranging from muggy to oppressive to miserable. A waggish guest might have concluded, as the old joke had it, that if first prize is a week at the Doral in June, second prize must be two weeks. Among our G-7 partners, Trump’s announcement of the Doral cancellation probably inspired audible sighs of relief and possibly the odd chuckle.
How much the week’s disarray meant in terms of Trump’s potential removal from office is hard to say. Impeachment by the House seems nearly inevitable and it is reported that Mitch McConnell has reconciled himself to the prospect of a trial in the Senate. Conviction by the Senate, however, is quite another matter, and no one knows just what it might take to convince Republicans to join Democrats in numbers sufficient to convict. The needle of public opinion appears to have moved in the direction of impeachment, but not dramatically so far. Trump’s end could come as Mike in The Sun Also Rises put it when he was asked how he went bankrupt, “Two ways. Gradually, and then suddenly.”
This too shall pass? Albert Einstein, said; “The value of a college education is not the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think”.
Yes, the waters have been muddied. I’ve attended a few college graduations, but I’m encouraged and heartened by the challenges our young people face over difficult times regarding climate change, conflicts, injustices, political uncertainties at home and abroad, along with obstacles for economic opportunities. We do have optimistic, committed college graduates fully engaged for the important work that lies ahead — for that we must be both proud and grateful. Think positive and be happy.
I’m told, “Happiness is an inside job”
Bob – Thanks for your upbeat comment.
I just read a PBS News Hour report entitled “What Gen Z college grads are looking for in a career.” One grad said, “Always half-full.” Another said, “Make a life, not just a living.” A third said, “And perfect for college grads just moving into the job market, right? But is follow your bliss a really good idea at this point?” And another said, “I, like recently was working on my senior thesis. And I had to learn how to code. And I had never taken a course in computer science or anything like that, but I actually found that just kind of Googling was super helpful, and I was able to do it.”
So maybe these Gen Zs will discover a way to fly over the moon.
I’m inspired by the wisdom of the Dalai Lama: “We have bigger houses but smaller families; more conveniences, but less time; we have more degrees, but less sense; more knowledge, but less judgment; more experts, but more problems; more medicines, but less healthiness; we’ve been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet the new neighbor. We’ve built more computers to hold more information to produce more copies than ever, but have less communications; we have become long on quantity, but short on quality. These times are times of fast foods, but slow digestion; tall man but short character; steep profits but shallow relationships. It is time when there is much in the window, but nothing in the room.
Reads like a fairytale about a strange land. Were it so!
Stranger still, our Comedian in Chief may get re-elected if we don’t bother to vote or, worse yet, hordes of us vote for Trump. He is a clown and a devil wrapped into one. Let’s not underestimate his extremely devious and clever use of hate tactics and legerdemain to frighten and fool ordinary people. The evil magician must be defeated, even if we don’t particularly like his opponent. I’ll take Old Testament prophet Bernie Sanders over Trump any day of the week.
A delightful romp through the bramble bush of American politics in the World of Donald Trump. I’ve reluctantly come to the conclusion that I cannot get into the mind of our Comedian in Chief. Nor can I possibly explain how disheartening it is to see his face or read his name in the news every day. I worry that our buffoon president may be re-elected for another miserable four years of political intrigue and acrimony.
It does seem possible that our best country status will fade away and disappear entirely before mid-century.
We had a splendid beginning when the early Americans won the Revolutionary War and established a new kind of government, one that put human freedom and initiative on the highest pedestal. But at some point in our history we lost our sense of community, our concern for others, our strong love of country. Alas, we are now at war with each other, an absurd state of affairs that has arisen due to a deeply flawed presidential election that put a filthy, uncouth man at the head of state. A man who thrives on hatred and lies.
The “quid quo pro of the Trump/Zelensky phone call” should be plastered on billboards, inside of subway cars and buses, throughout the land, until a majority of the American people understand what it means and what it says about the present occupant of the Oval Office. It means this for that. Nothing wrong with the “that” so long as the “favor” is not to spread lies to help an enemy of our country, or, as seems apparent from the transcript of the call, to engineer a smear campaign against a political rival by a foreign country. Other countries (nation states) are not welcome to mess in our elections under any circumstances. And thus we have the full quo in the Trump/Zelensky phone call warranting the impeachment of Donald Trump. All Americans, of every class and color, should understand that such “deal-making” is treacherous and undermines our most precious freedoms, including the right to a free and fair election of our highest officer, the president of the United States. Only one past president to our knowledge engaged in such unpatriotic behavior. Richard Nixon when he postponed the peace agreement with Vietnam until after his re-election in 1972. We saw what happened to him.
Have we forgotten what it means to uphold the Constitution and faithfully execute the laws?
“…posterior osculation…” I’ve put this in long-term memory as a valued addition to my otherwise impoverished vocabulary. Just imagine the reaction when I tell some boor to ‘osculate my posterior! Can’t wait to see the expression.
On a more sober note: lost in all the week’s broohaha was the report by the State Dept IG virtually exonerating Hillary of any malice or criminal intent re. those e-mails. Damn! Another Trumpian lie de-bunked, and by his own people, no less! Oh, yes – another note: Is no one astonished by the Trumpian concern over ridding the Ukrainian govt. of corruption? Truly a case of the kettle calling the pot black. Stunningly unbelievable.
So true, Bill. The bugger thrives on corruption.
My bad. So true, Ken. Please forgive my lousy eyesight. Best. -Roger
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