RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/crying-wolf-on-impeachment-11580428689?mod=opinion_lead_pos9

The impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump is coming down to one big question: Will Democrats, by crying wolf, drown out the more legitimate Republican cry of foul?

“Foul” has served as the GOP’s most powerful and honest argument from the first days of these impeachment maneuverings. Democrats broke every standard of due process, transparency and fairness in their House investigation, making a mockery of their constitutional duty.

They hid the identity of the original accuser, denying Republicans and the country the ability to judge his motives. They held secret depositions, barring more than three-quarters of House members, as well as the press and the American public. They called 18 witnesses, but blocked the president from calling any in his defense. The White House legal team was excluded from the proceedings—prohibited from cross-examining witnesses, denied the ability to introduce any evidence that spoke to the central question of the president’s focus on Ukrainian corruption.

House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff secretly obtained and published the communications records of the president’s private attorney, a member of Congress and a reporter. Democrats withdrew their court challenge to compel a key witness, depriving the White House of the ability to defend its executive-privilege claim in court. And the legitimacy of the first portion of the House inquiry—including numerous subpoenas—is in doubt, since it was conducted before the House voted to open it.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/wrapping-up-impeachment-11580430769?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

The Senate will acquit President Trump on both House articles of impeachment. That much even Adam Schiff knows. The Senate trial is now all about the election and impeachment precedents, which are two of many good reasons for cleaning up the trial distortions and wrapping up the show this week.

Start with the media claim that defense lawyer Alan Dershowitz said a President can do anything to further his re-election as long he thinks it is in the national interest. This isn’t what he said. The Harvard professor said explicitly that a President can be impeached for criminal acts. He could be impeached for soliciting a financial bribe, for example, or seeking a campaign contribution from a foreign source. He could also be impeached for exceeding his constitutional authority.

Mr. Dershowitz differs from the press in believing that a President cannot be impeached for acts of foreign policy that may be in his personal political interest but aren’t themselves impeachable acts. Presidents conduct foreign policy in what they think is the national interest, but they also hope it will be in their political interest. Presidents typically act from “mixed motives,” as Mr. Dershowitz put it, that are difficult to discern or to separate the high-minded from the self-interested.

It is thus too low a constitutional bar for the House to claim, as it does, that Mr. Trump can be impeached because Democrats think his motives were corrupt. The acts themselves must qualify as “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Mr. Trump’s acts don’t qualify—because asking aid recipients to investigate corruption isn’t illegal, and in any case the aid to Ukraine was delivered on time and no investigation of Joe Biden was started. This does not condone Mr. Trump’s request, which was reckless and dumb, but it isn’t an impeachable offense.

 Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., announced Thursday night he will vote against calling witnesses to the Senate impeachment trial of President Trump, likely ending the last real suspense of the trial and opening the door for a speedy conclusion Friday or Saturday.

“There is no need for more evidence to prove that the president asked Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his son, Hunter,” Alexander said late Thursday in a statement, after another day-long session in the Senate, the ninth day of the trial overall.

Alexander said the charges against the president – that he inappropriately pressured Ukraine to investigate the Bidens – had been “proved” by the House managers, and that the president had acted improperly.

https://spectator.us/democrats-dirty-secret-dont-want-witnesses/

The Senate leaders have stated their positions clearly and constantly. Chuck Schumer, who leads the Democratic minority, is demanding that John Bolton testify.

Mitch McConnell, who leads the Republicans’ narrow majority, responds that the Senate already has enough evidence to vote. If more was needed, the House should have gotten it when it had the chance. Anyway, the House managers have repeatedly boasted they have ‘overwhelming evidence’. The president’s lawyers add that, if any witnesses are called, they want to call some, too.

They want to hear from former Vice President Biden, his son Hunter, the whistleblower whose complaint started the impeachment, and Rep. Schiff and his staff, who apparently worked with the whistleblower. That’s really a threat, meant to deter the Democrats in two ways. A parade of witnesses would prolong the trial. It would introduce new evidence that might damage the House managers’ case and perhaps to Schiff and Biden personally.

Those are the declared positions. What about the political calculations below the surface? Actually, neither side wants witnesses. The Republicans say so openly. The Democrats cannot. It’s not just that they have been clamoring to hear from John Bolton and other Trump aides. It’s not just because their base wants satisfaction. It’s because their best political move now is to blame Trump’s near-certain acquittal on a ‘Republican cover-up’.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/01/in_san_francisco_smell_of_poop_overpowered_by_stench_of_leftist_corruption.html

One-party blue city San Francisco has a corruption problem.

Turns out the sewage on the streets isn’t the only thing filthy about San Francisco. Its man in charge of that clean-up, Mohammed Nuru, was busted with a septic tank full of corruption charges.

According to the San Francisco Examiner:

In the biggest public corruption scandal to shake City Hall since 2015, [San Francisco Public Works Director Mohammed] Nuru and local entrepreneur Nick Bovis of famed Union Square sports bar Lefty O’Doul’s have each been charged with one count of wire fraud.

Nuru, 57, and Bovis, 56, allegedly attempted to bribe an airport commissioner to help win a bid for a restaurant lease at San Francisco International Airport in exchange for an envelope full of cash and an apparent vacation.

The alleged kickback scheme was just one of five that federal authorities described in a complaint released Tuesday after surveilling Nuru and Bovis with FBI wiretaps and undercover operators since at least 2018.

The allegations against Nuru also involve sharing a $2,070 bottle of wine with a billionaire developer in China and having city contractors work on his vacation home near the Mendocino National Forest.

The detailed descriptions of the string of corruption crimes Nuru was involved in must have made him a lawman’s dream, given the large number of violations they were able to demonstrate, a veritable sewage pit of systemic corruption.