Trump is Going Down as Evidence of His Crimes keep Mounting…That’s my bold prediction! Yes, Trump is going down & he knows it, telling his inner circle he’s worried about impeachment. But he’s not going down without a fight. He can’t win a legal fight, so he’s relying on his dishonest echo to fool his base enough to win the political fight. The truth must win this battle, so please share The VORACS blog as one of the tools to help drown out the evil echo nonsense. In protecting the future of our nation, let’s together help ensure Trump is going down.
When a leader of a country attacks, discredits & seeks to control the institutions of power, such as the legislative body, courts, intelligence community, media, political opposition & other instruments of governing, that is a leader with dictatorial aspirations seeking to lead a nation into tyranny. So whenever we hear Trump claiming the media is the enemy of the people, let’s turn that around by telling the truth, that the real enemy of the people includes the President, his political sycophants, echo messaging & Trumpeter base, since their engagement represents a direct attack on our constitutional democracy.
As for the crimes surrounding the hush money payments to mistresses, even Trump’s buddy at the National Enquirer admits the payoffs they helped make were expressly to help Trump in influencing the election (reported on in part 1). David Pecker has become a corroborating witness to Cohen’s claim Trump committed two felonies of campaign finance fraud which defrauded American voters: cohens-sentence-and-amis-non-prosecution-are-a-serious-double-whammy-for-trump. Mueller also reportedly has more backup proof in the form of tapes, documents & the like. And Trump was in the room when the evil plot with Cohen & Pecker was hatched.
So as we now know rather conclusively in recent Cohen court docs & a statement by the head of National Enquirer, it looks like our president is a criminal. Think about that. And the signals strongly indicate the full extent of his criminal exposure is largely still to be revealed. So yes, let’s hope in the end Trump is going down. I suspect Trump knows as well as anybody his goose is cooked, which is why he’s been lashing out so much. He’s putting up a brave front & incessantly lying to keep on his side the cult followers, all those political allies, echo pundits & loyal base: trump-biographer-on-msnbc-the-president-knows-hes-bleeped. The prez is a master gabber & lifelong con man, so he comes across as very convincing to his merry band of Trumpeters. Even though he’s constantly caught in lies, they somehow believe him. Inside Trumpian world, what’s up is down & down is up if the prez says so.
Prez is Worried about Impeachment & I Believe Trump is Going Down in 2019
The walls look to be caving in on Trump & he knows it. He’s telling those closest to him he fears impeachment, as well he should. He is also rightly concerned about his family & business. With multiple reports of numerous crimes from various investigations being reported, & a Dem House about ready to take over, 2019 looks like a probable impeachment year. Unless like Nixon he resigns first. We’re having to limit live links, but you can search for any of these articles on the topic:
nbcnews/trump-confides-friends-he-s-concerned-about-impeachment
cnn/trump-impeachment-concern
thehill/trump-telling-confidants-hes-worried-about-impeachment-report
dailykos/Trump-is-getting-worried-and-ranty-about-impeachment-sources-say
Fox Fake News
Some complain over my messages that we should respect the office & the occupant, but it’s Trump himself who has disgraced the office. None of what we’re seeing is in any way normal, & it’s about time GOP supporters stop pretending that it is & making excuses for this guy. But many of them tune into Fox fake news & other echo sources where the truth is seldom told, so their mindset has become hopelessly defiled. Occasionally, if people catch the right Fox show mid-afternoons, the real news comes out, much to the chagrin of Fox viewers: fox-news-judge-napolitano-we-now-know-trump-committed-a-felony. For the video with the full interview between Shep & Judge N., see inside fox-news-judge-napolitano-on-trumps-cohen-defense-no-rational-person-could-claim-exoneration.
Powers accurately points out how the echo is keeping their audiences in the dark: kirsten-powers-conservatives-dont-really-know-who-trump-is-because-thats-not-covered-on-fox-news. Of course, as we typically see, most Fox shows work extremely hard to protect Trump by avoiding or distorting the headlines. They repeatedly lie on behalf of a chronic liar. Their efforts are increasingly ringing hollow: Why-Fox-News-can-t-save-Trump-from-Mueller. And in coordination with Trump in recent months, their ire has been pointed squarely at Mueller. When is that Trump base/Fox viewers finally going to look past the noise to understand Mueller is a hundred times the man Trump ever was: profiling-mueller.
There are literally thousands of examples of Fox falsehoods, distortions & conspiracies, along with channeling the seemingly unending lies of Trump, but here’s just a dozen of them from this year: fox-news-mistakes-in-2018. I’ve often speculated the biggest lunatic in all the echo has been having conniption fits because he might be implicated in the Russia scandal himself, as seen from this article thedailybeast/fox-news-sean-hannity-deletes-cohen-related-tweets-ahead-of-sentencing, which comes with a rather curious story posted here:
Fox News host Sean Hannity deleted tweets referencing President Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen shortly before Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison on Wednesday, according to Newsweek. On Tuesday afternoon, Hannity reportedly deleted over 270 tweets—with five of them directly referencing Cohen. The deleted tweets included ones from April 16 that addressed the revelation that Cohen had performed legal work for Hannity. “Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective,” Hannity reportedly wrote in the now-deleted tweet.
More Trump/Fox Lies in Articles you could look up
Crazy interview full of spin & lies, with real softball questions seen on Fox: thedailybeast/cnn-host-se-cupp-rips-fox-news-trump-infomercial-that-was-not-an-interview
Cupp calls out the charade: mediaite/s-e-cupp-lights-fire-to-harris-faulkners-interview-with-trump-it-wasnt-journalism-it-was-an-infomercial
The whole thing looked like a setup: mediaite/foxs-harris-faulkner-panned-for-softball-questions-in-trump-interview-a-cute-attempt-at-journalism
He even blames Fox News that his ratings aren’t higher, but that’s his head cheerleader: mediaite/trump-accuses-fox-news-of-giving-him-bad-polls-harris-faulkner-protests-theres-positive-news-here
Fox viewers already knew of these alternative facts, it’s part of their basic lexicon: washingtonpost/trump-echoes-fox-news-talking-point-fox-news
An equally neurotic spin in a separate interview seen here: washingtonpost/what-trump-said-that-wacky-reuters-interview
More on the Probability that Trump is Going Down
It’s very likely a sitting president can be indicted: trump-indict-sitting-president-statute-of-limitations. As seen in excerpts below from when-impeachment-is-mandatory, when the criminal offenses are proven & serious enough, the House is required to impeach, & from there the Senate should feel pressured & even be obligated to convict. Can it be true Trump is going down? I’d say it’s more likely than not:
Suppose that within the next few months, it becomes clear that President Donald Trump has committed impeachable offenses. Does the House of Representatives have discretion to decide whether to impeach him? Or does the Constitution require it to do so? The simplest answer, and the best, is that the Constitution requires the House to do so. To avoid political bias, let’s bracket all questions associated with President Trump, put current events to one side, and assume that some future president commits (in the words of the Constitution) “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” Imagine that he has betrayed his country, in a way that constitutes treason, or that he has killed or imprisoned journalists and political enemies (clearly a high crime and misdemeanor, and so an impeachable offense). The Constitution says that the House of Representatives “shall have the sole Power of Impeachment,” and that the Senate “shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.” In light of the historical background, use of these powers is best regarded as mandatory rather than optional, at least when a president has clearly committed impeachable offenses. To the founding generation, the impeachment provisions were essential parts of the Constitution.
As Virginia’s George Mason put it at the Constitutional Convention, “No point is of more importance than that the right of impeachment should be continued.” (It is worth pausing over that sentence.) The power of impeachment was designed to ensure that our system would be one of self-government. It gave We the People an ultimate weapon in the event that the president violated the principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence: “A Prince, whose character is marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.” For this reason, it is wrong to say, as many now do, that the Constitution makes impeachment a political question rather than one of law. On the contrary, the Constitution sets out a legal standard, which establishes a very high bar, and which forbids impeachment on purely political grounds. At the same time, the Constitution specifies what has to happen if the constitutional standard is clearly met. Suppose that the House of Representatives were entitled to respond to impeachable offenses with a kind of shrug, or with the thought, “He’s doing a great job, so we’ll let it pass,” or with the admission, “Sure, he’s a bum, but he’s our bum.” That would make a mockery of the constitutional plan. It would allow the project of self-government to collapse. It is exceedingly difficult to read the founding-era debates about impeachment — during the Constitutional Convention and the ratification debates — without concluding that if the president has clearly committed an impeachable offense, the House has a constitutional duty to impeach him.
An Important & Stunning Letter
Stunning in that it’s incredible many former senators would feel the need to write & sign it. But that’s the reality & the danger in the guy now running the White House. Comments about that letter are posted here from the article budowsky-democracy-on-trial-under-attack. See who signed the letter by clicking on the link:
In one of the most extraordinary moments in modern American history, 44 former United States senators, including 10 Republicans who deserve the admiration of a grateful nation, published an open letter in The Washington Post warning the current Senate about “serious challenges to the rule of law, the Constitution, our governing institutions and our national security.” In another extraordinary moment in modern American history, Chief Justice John Roberts recently rose to rebuke attacks against the judiciary by the president of the United States and call on the nation to defend the independence and integrity of the judicial branch of government. The president responded to the chief justice in a tweet, describing his views, sadly and literally, as “bullshit.” At this moment in history there is a crisis of leadership throughout the Western democracies being debated not only in Washington but in great democratic capitals of Great Britain, France, Germany and the European Union. These matters are so momentous and the consequences so profound that I may discuss them early next year in a full page ad in The New York Times.
In an extraordinary and unprecedented deviation from the entirety of American history, our current president has waged an aggressive war against the free press of the nation, suggesting leading members of the press are the enemy of the people. He has suggested, sounding like dictators over time immemorial, that his Democratic opponent in the last election should be prosecuted, convicted and incarcerated. In another deviation from the entirety of American history, our current acting attorney general opined in 2014 about his legally ignorant and appalling view that the Supreme Court is an “inferior” branch of government and attacked the legal authority of the courts to judicially review the constitutionality of legislative and executive acts. I may legally disagree with many of his judicial decisions but applaud the chief justice for speaking out as he did. It was his finest hour. His defense of judicial independence was a memorable moment in the history of jurisprudence of democratic nations. I pray he will continue to protect the court from being infected by the partisanship that bitterly divides our nation.
I applaud the open letter from the 44 former senators, imploring current senators to rise to the occasion because they believe, correctly, that foundations of our democracy and security are now under threat, as the chief justice believes, correctly, that the independence of the judiciary must be preserved, protected and defended. American and Western democracy are under attack by a Russian dictator, whose nemesis is the devout patriot and legal authority Robert Mueller, the special counsel who was widely admired by almost all Senate Republicans until recent months. His search for truth and justice — wherever it may or may not lead — must be preserved, protected and defended by Congress and courts. With American and Western democracy on trial and under attack, we must vigilantly defend fundamental truths at the core of American democracy. We must never surrender the civic truth that America is a nation of diverse people united by shared values, mutual respect and the rule of law that must be defended by three coequal branches of government that protect America and defend democracy from dangers and threats, foreign or domestic.
In America we do not threaten political opponents with prison simply because they are opponents. We may regard the press as annoying; we never regard the press as the enemy. We believe that one person should have one vote and that foreign dictators should not be allowed to select our leaders. We believe the rule of law is paramount, that every American is equal under that law, that no person is above that law and that all three branches of government have critical and equal roles protecting our freedom and defending our democracy. My hope is that every member of the Senate and House, and every Supreme Court justice, will rise to the occasion at this dangerous moment.
Various Articles from the Newsfeeds
Here’s a scary trend I keep warning about: number-of-jailed-journalists-approaches-record-high-report-says. Trump’s rhetoric is as much to blame as anyone’s. And here’s his dog whistle to violence: Trump-Saying-People-Would-Revolt-if-He-is-Impeached-is-Not-His-Opinion-It-s-an-Instruction. If anyone is capable of sparking a civil war, it’s our current president: trump-just-predicted-revolt-if-hes-impeached-what-point-would-it-be-justified.
Huh? Sarah wants to be known for transparency & honesty, even though she was the biggest gaslighter in press secretary history? She could even make Baghdad Bob blush, the guy who would always make up preposterous tales to excuse his boss, Saddam Hussein: sarah-huckabee-sanders-transparent-white-house. Google was being grilled in Congress over political bias, one example being that a picture of Trump comes up when we Google search the word idiot: idiot-donald-trump-google-ceo-sundar-pichai. We should probably view that as not so much being biased, but rather it shows their algorithms are actually spot-on accurate.
Evangelicals
It is evangelical Christians who as much as any group have elected & kept Trump in power. As a member of that faith, I find this incredibly problematic & disturbing. This next link has another chapter in the book about the corruption, deception & immorality from the likes of Jerry Falwell Jr., evangelical leaders turned charlatans. As the faithful continue to recognize this type of leadership & even follow their examples, they are destroying the authenticity & witness of their own church. I say these things for the very same reasons I bash the GOP, in that we must fix these institutions before they self-destruct. Yes, evangelicals are obliterating their personal testimonies which undermines the faith itself. Even those who aren’t Trump supporters, those church-goers are being perceived as guilty by association. It’s far better to have no church affiliation than one defined by deception & hypocrisy. I try to heed the instruction of the founder & ex-pastor of my own church upon resigning as an usher right after the 2016 election, which is to keep our eyes on Jesus, something we can do even should the evangelical church itself crumbles. But too many evangelical leaders have lost that vision: politics-government/election/article.
Young people are turned off by the hypocrisy & declining standards: evangelicals-republicans-trump-millenials. In the next article, Rubin explains evangelicals are about the last demographic group left still worshiping an earthly leader who’s clearly an unprincipled demagogue. Their obvious moral duplicity signals that somehow a spirit of deception must have infiltrated the faithful & turned that religion into a conflated basket case. And it pains me to say that. Here’s a paragraph pulled from suburbs-women-some-working-class-whites-now-even-swamp-creature-abandon-trump:
Trump doesn’t even have the affections of his entire white, working-class base. Ronald Brownstein dives into the poll numbers to find that the white, working class is no longer uniformly in Trump’s corner. Brownstein finds that evangelicals, whatever their education level and economic condition, remain staunchly in Trump’s camp (raising a real question as to what religious tenets justify their support for a lying, racist, xenophobic, cruel narcissist). However, “Democrats carried fully two-thirds of college-educated whites that are not evangelical Christians. That included not only a head-turning 71% of college educated white women who are not evangelicals but also 59% of the equivalent men. The shares that said they disapproved of Trump’s performance were even higher in both groups: 74% of the women and 63% of the men.”
Conservative columnist Cal Thomas wrote these concerns in an article this week: The key for conservatives, and especially Trump’s loyal base of evangelical Christians, is how much more of this are they willing to take before Trump becomes an embarrassment to them, to their agenda and even their faith? Evangelicals, especially, are paying a price for their dismissal of Trump’s past behavior and present tweets, which are becoming increasingly nasty. Another renowned evangelical leader with a large following, Franklin Graham, has obviously left his morality behind, as can be gathered from this ending to law-vs-morality-in-the-trump-campaign-finance-flap:
This is a point that conservatives once understood. Here is Franklin Graham, the son of Billy Graham, writing about Bill Clinton in the Wall Street Journal in 1998: “If he will lie to or mislead his wife and daughter, those with whom he is most intimate, what will prevent him from doing the same to the American public?” Graham added: “The private acts of any person are never done in secret. God sees and judges all sin, and while He seeks to restore the offender with love and grace, He does not necessarily remove all the consequences of our sin.” In May, when weighing in on the allegations of infidelity against Trump, Graham completely reversed his stance on the topic of private versus public behavior. “That’s for him and his wife to deal with,” he told the Associated Press. “And I think this thing with Stormy Daniels and so forth is nobody’s business.”
The point here isn’t hypocrisy, though there’s plenty of that going around. Before the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Clinton’s defenders considered his past sexual behavior “old news.” After the revelations, they insisted that perjury about sex was no big deal. Now, many of those same people are arguing that illegal cover-ups of affairs are grounds for impeachment. It’s not quite an apples-to-apples comparison, but that’s irrelevant. The point is that we’ve lost the ability to speak clearly across partisan lines about basic notions of decency and morality. The debate over impeachment highlights the problem. A president can be impeached for any reason Congress sees fit. It’s a political tool for sanctioning a president who violates the public trust. The rules of criminal procedure are only relevant, if at all, procedurally. Instead, they are used as a substitute for moral or civic judgment. I am not arguing for impeaching Trump based on what we know now. The precedent of Clinton’s impeachment (but acquittal in the Senate) demonstrates, among other things, that politically you need more than this for a binding national consensus. I am arguing that we’ve lost anything remotely like a moral consensus in this country because legalism has crowded out morality. That’s the naked truth.
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