Larry Schweikart: Don’t Worry About Mitch McConnell On Impeachment

Poor old Mitch McConnell. The Senate Majority Leader is frequently accused of being part of the “Swamp.” Perhaps he is, but he has been superbly effective for the last four years, and almost nobody notices. Indeed, Yertle (as I affectionately call him) has been a one-man Senate wrecking crew against liberals.

Yet he is constantly under fire, most recently from Rush Limbaugh who cited Yertle’s comment that if the House impeaches President Trump, the Senate must have a trial. Well, duh.

But I don’t think it means at all what it seems, and I think Nancy Pelosi (who I refer to as “Botoxic”) is realizing that. But let’s review Yertle’s record first, shall we?

In 2015, at no one’s urging, Yertle took it upon himself to block Barack Obama’s U.S. Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, from receiving a vote, claiming (with no particular historical precedent) that because Zero (my nickname for Obama) was in the last year of his presidency, that would not be fair. Keeping Garland off the Court and preventing a Democrat 5-4 majority would have been huge, to say the least.

*Lucy Koh, nominated to the Ninth Circuit, was reported out of the Judiciary Committee but Yertle didn’t give her a floor vote. Instead that went to a Trump appointee, Daniel Collins.

*The same story was true of Donald Schott, a Seventh Circuit nominee. The seat ultimately went to Trump pick Michael Brennan.

*In the Eighth Circuit, the nominee Jennifer Puhl likewise was not given a vote. That went to. Trump pick Ralph Erickson.

*At the Supreme Court level, Yertle promised that both Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh would be confirmed. They were. (By the way, yesterday Russell Bucklew was executed: his appeal, Bucklew v. Precythe involved the issue of capital punishment, and the Court ruled against Bucklew. That very well may not have happened without Kavanaugh.)

*He promised to bring Obamacare up for a vote (note: Yertle did NOT promise to pass it, as I think he knew John McCain would do his infamous “thumbs down.”)

So as best I can tell, every time Yertle says he will do something, it gets done. Let’s return to Yertle’s comment about holding a trial if Botoxic passes impeachment: I don’t think this was Yertle laying down at all (or, I guess, retreating into his shell). I don’t even think this was him absentmindedly saying he’d follow the Constitution.

This was a shot across Botoxic’s bow. This was Yertletalk for “Make my day.” This tells me Yertle knows he hsa 34 hard “acquits” in his caucus (and likely another 10 squish acquits—that is, RINOs who, when they see how the vote is going, will be on the winning side). Indeed, I think Yertle is right now just a couple of votes away from something that is rarely mentioned: a “dismissal.” The Senate must convene a trial, but in Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial, two weeks in, Senator Robert “Sheets” Byrd filed a motion to dismiss.

It only failed by seven votes—for a president who had clearly lied and obstructed justice. Therefore, I think Yertle probably could count on about 45-47 votes to dismiss right now. If the impeachment charges from the House are lame (as almost certainly they will be), Yertle can reach 50, and Mike Pence breaks the tie. By saying “We’d have to have a trial,” Yertle was promising Botoxic and the Democrats would lose in a most embarrassing way, that there would be no stalling, and that it would be over before Ilhan Omar could marry another male relative.

Yertle knows his caucus, and he knows that other than Mitt (“Minion”) Romney, no one will vote to convict Trump of anything. I can almost hear Yertle, in his best Pedro Serrano voice (from “Major League”), “You bring dat chit to me, mon. Bring dat chit to me!”

Larry Schweikart, co-author of the New York Times #1 bestseller, A Patriot’s History of the United States with Michael Allen and author of Reagan: The American President, has regular court and political updates at his site www.wildworldofhistory.com on the VIP side. For a free “Reagan” webinar, email him at larry@wildworldofhistory.com.

I think McConnell is doing OK overall but both McConnell and Graham can do far, far better on the federal judge front. Last week the Senate voted on and confirmed ZERO District Court nominees. The week preceding that the Senate voted on and confirmed ZERO District Court nominees. Earlier in September the Senate returned from a six week summer recess. And now they’re on yet another recess for two weeks.

When Trump assumed office there were 86 vacant District Court judgeships. You know, the District Judgeships which sabotage President Trump when they’re occupied by an agenda-driven ‘RAT appointee. The number of vacancies has increased and there are now 97 vacant District Court judgeships.

There are 71 of Trump’s Judicial nominees pending confirmation in the Senate (of which 51 are pending in Lindsey Graham’s Judiciary Committee). This is INEXCUSABLE! Graham needs to no longer allow the DemocRATS to use the Blue Slip process to stop consideration of Trump’s nominees. And McConnell needs to schedule confirmation votes on nominees quicker after they’re out of the Judiciary Committee.

An interesting twist on impeachment!

LET THEM GO AHEAD AND IMPEACH TRUMP.... HERE’S WHAT HAPPENS THEN......

By: Hyram F. Suddfluffel, PhD, (Political Science)

I have a degree in Political Science, and I am a card-carrying Libertarian. I’ve been studying politics and political history for the past 30 years. My specialty is U.S. Presidents. That said, I hope that the House of
Representatives impeaches Trump. Let me tell you what will happen next!

1. The House can pass articles of impeachment over the objections of the
Republicans, and refer to the Senate for trial.

2. The Senate will conduct a trial. There will be a vote, and the Republicans will vote unanimously, along with a small number of Democrats, to not convict the President. Legally, it will all be over at that point.

3. However, during the trial, and this is what no one is thinking about right now, the President’s attorneys will have the right to subpoena and question ANYONE THEY WANT.. That is different than the special counsel
investigation, which was very one-sided. So, during the impeachment trial, we will be hearing testimony from James Comey, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Bruce Ohr, Glenn Simpson, Donna Brazile, Eric Holder, Loretta Lynch, Christopher Steele, Hillary Clinton, John Brennan, James Clapper, and a whole host of other participants in this whole sordid affair and the ensuing cover up activities. A lot of dirt will be dug up; a lot of truth will be unveiled. Finger pointing will occur. Deals will start being made, and suddenly, a lot of democrats will start being charged and going to prison.
All this, because, remember, the President’s team will now, for the first time, have the RIGHT to question all of these people under oath – and they will turn on each other. That is already starting.

4. Lastly, one more thing will happen, the Senate will not convict the President. Nothing will happen to Trump. Most Americans are clueless about political processes, the law, and the Constitution. Most Americans believe that being impeached results in removal from office. They don’t understand that phase 2 is a trial in and by the Senate, where he has zero chance of conviction. Remember, the Senate is controlled by Republicans; they will determine what testimony is allowed — and **everything** will be allowed, including: DNC collusion with the Clinton campaign to fix the election in favor of Hillary, the creation of the Trump dossier, the cover up and
destruction of emails that very likely included incriminating information. They will incriminate each other for lying to the FISA court, for spying and wiretapping the Trump campaign, and for colluding with foreign political actors, especially George Soros. After the Senate declines to convict the President, we will have an election, and Trump will win. It will be a backlash against democrat petulance, temper tantrums, hypocrisy and dishonesty. Even minorities will vote for Trump, because, for the first time, they will see that democrats have spent 2+ years focused on maintaining their own power, and not doing anything at all about black murders in Chicago, homelessness, opioids, and other important issues that are actually killing people. And, we will spend the following four years listening to politicians and pundits claim that the whole impeachment was rigged.

So let’s move on to impeachment.

Hyram F. Suddfluffel, PhD

No sh!t; I'm much more of a hard liner on this topic. I think Trump should aggressively challenge whether impeachment itself is a wholly political act subject to the sole discretion of congress.

Any constitutional disagreement, conflict and/or confusion should reflect both original intent and basic presumptions made by the framers. For example, an essential core assumption was that elected leaders would be comprised of those who held high moral and ethical standards who would act honestly to work in the best common interests of the health and welfare of the union.

However, what if the state has been so thoroughly corrupted that those basic assumptions have become now null & void? What then of impeachment, which can be (and has been) weaponized as a purely political tool to overturn elections? Is there no recourse available to either the president or the people if a conspiracy to overthrow the legally constitute government merely follows rough outlines that have no bearing on actual intent ie HIGH crimes & misdemeanors?

Lincoln challenged the idea that states could secede - even though the constitution is silent on the matter. So too Trump should challenge the notion that certain parts of the constitution can be unilaterally interpreted as justification for extra-legal procedures to attack valid electoral results.

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