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Opinion

By RICH LOWRY

October 24, 2019

Rich Lowry is editor of National Review and a contributing editor with Politico Magazine.

Republican senators will soon be receiving an invitation to tear apart the Republican Party ahead of the 2020 elections, and they are going to decline to accept it.

Its a trope of pro-impeachment commentary that it should be simple for Republican senators to swap out President Donald Trump, who puts them in an awkward position every day, for Vice President Mike Pence, an upstanding Reagan conservative who could start with a fresh slate in the runup to the 2020 election.

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This ideas only flaw is that is entirely removed from reality.

If Senate Republicans vote to remove Trump on anything like the current facts, even the worst possible interpretation of them, it would leave the GOP a smoldering ruin. It wouldnt matter who the Democrats nominated for 2020. They could run Bernie Sanders on a ticket balanced by Elizabeth Warren and promise to make Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez secretary of the Treasury and Ilhan Omar secretary of Defense, and theyd still win.

A significant portion of the Republican Party would consider a Senate conviction of Trump a dastardly betrayal. Perhaps most would get over it, as partisan feelings kicked in around a national election, but not all. And so a party that has managed to win the popular vote in a presidential election only once since 1988 would hurtle toward November 2020 divided.

How does anyone think that would turn out?

A lot of Trump supporters are going to want to blame the Republican establishment even if Trump loses in 2020 fair and square, with the backing of the united party apparatus. Imagine what they will think if a couple of dozen Republican senators decide to deny him the opportunity to run for reelection, without a single Republican voter having a say on his ultimate fate. Its hard to come up with any scenario better designed to stoke the populist furies of Trumps most devoted voters.

Trump himself isnt going to get convicted by the Senate and say, Well, Im a little disappointed in your judgment to be honest. But it was a close call, and Mike Pence is a great guy, and Im just grateful I had the opportunity to serve this country in the White House for more than three years.

He wont go away quietly to lick his wounds. He wont delete his Twitter account. He wont make it easy on anyone. He will vent his anger and resentment at every opportunity. It will be human scum every single day.

And its not as though the media is going to lose its interest in the most luridly telegenic politician that weve ever seen. The mainstream press would be delighted to see Trump destroyed, yet sad to bid him farewell. The obvious way to square the circle would be to continue to give Trump lavish coverage in his post-presidency. Hed be out of the White House but still driving screaming CNN chyrons every other hour.

In other words, Trumps removal wouldnt be a fresh start for Pence and the GOP in an accelerated post-Trump era; it would be more like getting stuck in the poisonous epilogue of the Trump era, awaiting the inevitable advent of the Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden or Pete Buttigieg era.

All of this is why the cracks in the Republican Senate coverage is so ridiculous and overwrought. It depends on the idea that GOP senators who, it is true, are continually frustrated by Trumps controversies are on the verge of engineering their partys own destruction. There was even some cracks showing analysis around Mitch McConnell saying the other day that he didnt remember a conversation with Trump, as recounted by the president, praising his call with the Ukrainian president. The obvious explanation is that McConnell really didnt recall such a conversation, not that the shrewdest, most realistic politician in Washington was getting ready to immolate himself and his party as soon as the articles of impeachment arrive from the House.

Mitt Romney has gotten a lot of coverage for his excoriating comments about the Ukraine mess and the Syria pullout. He really might vote to convict when it comes to it, but hes not a broad indicator of the direction of the party. As goes Romney on impeachment ... so goes Romney on impeachment.

Its possible to come up with a scenario in which Ukraine developments are much worse than its possible to imagine right now, and Trumps support craters, even among Republicans. Then, you might have GOP senators voting to convict. This is just another path to the destruction of the partys hopes in 2020, though, because theres no way it would snap back from a Nixonian meltdown at the top in less than a year.

In short, Mike Pence might be elected president one day, but its not going to be while presiding over a party that has just jettisoned Donald Trump.

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The Fantasy of Republicans Ditching Trump - POLITICO

A lynching isnt something you can win. Emmett Till was lynched. He was 14 years old.

In 1955, Till was a Chicago teen visiting family in Mississippi. A white woman claimed he grabbed her, whistled at her, and made crude comments. She lied. Her husband and his friend kidnapped him, tortured him beyond recognition, and shot him in the head.

They used barbed wire to tie his body to a cotton gin fan and threw him into the Tallahatchie River. His killers were acquitted by an all-white jury.

What happened to Till? That is a lynching. Last Saturday, the Emmett Till Memorial Commission unveiled the fourth marker dedicated to him since 2008, when the original sign was stolen. The signs have been taken, vandalized, and shot at over and over.

The latest memorial is bulletproof. Sixty-four years after his murder, racists dont want us to remember Till and the racist violence that eats at the soul of America.

Not enough of us learn about the true history of the country in school. When Watchmen debuted on HBO Sunday night, it opened with the Greenwood massacre, the terrorist attack of a Tulsa neighborhood known as Black Wall Street, where there were 300 black-owned businesses.

The scenes show black people murdered in the street, businesses on fire, and a plane dropping a bomb. This is not TV exaggeration. This happened in America. And it was clear from social media Sunday night and all day Monday that thousands of viewers had never heard of what is referred to as the Tulsa Race Riot.

Its been almost 100 years, and this month, archeologists are searching Tulsa for evidence of mass graves. At least 300 black men, women, and children were murdered; 10,000 were displaced. And it took a brilliant television show to get the country talking about it.

Be clear. There was no riot. It was terrorism inflicted on black people by white supremacists, the kind of people Trump likes to believe are very fine. Trump is the same man who called Black Lives Matter activist Mercutio Southall Jr. disgusting and said he deserved to be roughed up by Trump supporters at a rally in November 2015.

The delight he takes in the pain of black people, the way he encouraged the country to turn against football players protesting police brutality and oppression this is the way of supremacy. Racists used to smile and pose for pictures during lynchings.

Trump believes in the lynching of black people. In 1989, he spent some $85,000 on full-page ads to bring back the death penalty to execute Korey Wise, Antron McCray, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, and Kevin Richardson. Teenagers. Five black and brown boys wrongfully accused of raping a white woman. He wanted The Central Park Five, now known as The Exonerated Five, dead. He didnt care about proof. He just wanted murder.

Last year, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice opened in Alabama. The site includes 800 6-foot monuments to symbolize thousands of racial terror lynching victims the Equal Justice Initiative researchers documented 4,075 victims between 1877 and 1950.

It is the nations first memorial dedicated to the legacy of enslaved black people, people terrorized by lynching, racial segregation, and Jim Crow. People who even in 2019 are considered a threat upon sight, their skin criminalized.

Earlier this month, Atatiana Jefferson was killed by a police officer who was supposed to be performing a safety check. Black people are not safe in this country. But Trump considers his impeachment inquiry a lynching.

People say its a distraction and we shouldnt pay attention. Except we must. This is a man who encourages hate. His own supporters happily wear shirts that read, Rope. Tree. Journalist. Some Assembly Required.

Two years ago, when I was a Kansas City Star columnist, I was swarmed with e-mails, phone calls, and letters laced with racist rhetoric and Trump support. The n-word was the norm in my inbox. The words tar and feather were a cheer.

You are exactly why tall trees and ropes were made, a reader named Jeff from Montana wrote to me.

Any time I wrote about Trump or the NFL, or protested police brutality, I would get this kind of violent response. My life was threatened twice. One reader thought I should be tied to the back of a truck and dragged out of town.

This is not shocking. I am not an isolated incident. What Ive experienced is subtle compared with what those whove come before me endured.

Ida B. Wells risked her life as an investigative journalist a black woman, traveling the country and exposing the horrors of racism and lynching.

Our countrys national crime is lynching. It is not the creature of an hour, the sudden outburst of uncontrolled fury, or the unspeakable brutality of an insane mob, she said in a speech in 1900.

It represents the cool, calculating deliberation of intelligent people who openly avow that there is an unwritten law that justifies them in putting human beings to death without complaint under oath, without trial by jury, without opportunity to make defense, and without right of appeal.

Black men were murdered for looking white men in the eye. Black women were raped by white men as punishment. We like to think of these things as Americas tragic history.

Except black people are still dying. They are still being tortured. They are still being convicted upon sight.

We dont want to remember our racist truth. We want to shoot holes through Americas reality the way supremacists tried to destroy the memory of Emmett Till.

Its easier to be retroactively heartbroken while learning of American tragedy and being entertained on HBO than it is to recognize the truth of right now.

Lynching was real. It happened. And the effects of lynch culture live on today.

Police brutality, the school-to-prison pipeline, segregated schools, excessive sentencing, and the continued racial inequity are all rooted in racism and the supremacist mentality that believed lynching was some sort of national justice.

Trump was right. Were witnessing a lynching. But it is not his.

Jene Osterheldt can be reached at jenee.osterheldt@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @sincerelyjenee.

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A lynching is something Donald Trump will never know - The Boston Globe

Graham is one of the presidents key allies, but Trump supporters got a #WheresLindsey hashtag trending Tuesday.

Posted on October 22, 2019, at 8:06 p.m. ET

Donald Trump Jr. and other prominent MAGA stars are driving a new social media campaign to pressure Sen. Lindsey Graham to more forcefully defend President Donald Trump from the impeachment inquiry.

Graham, the chair of the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee, is one of the presidents top allies in the Senate and is set to play a key role in the presidents impeachment defense. But the presidents die-hard supporters and oldest son are now taunting him to immediately do more, including issuing subpoenas on Trumps behalf.

The campaign has used the #WheresLindsey hashtag to call on Graham to start bringing people in to be interviewed by his Senate committee and to air grievances with what they see as Grahams inaction to protect the president so far. The hashtag, boosted by Trump Jr. and his allies, was trending in the United States on Tuesday, even after Graham went so far as to explicitly defend Trumps morning comments about the inquiry being a lynching. The inquiry, Graham told reporters, is a lynching in every sense.

That wasn't enough to save Graham from intense and personal attacks all day online.

Republican House members last week framed the impeachment process as not being transparent after members were blocked from reading the closed-door testimony from Kurt Volker, the former US special representative for Ukraine negotiations, because they arent members of the committees with jurisdiction over the testimony. The Trump-backing Twitter accounts have spread false conspiracy theories about the House Democrats leading the process, in particular Rep. Adam Schiff, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee.

Graham, responding to those concerns on Oct. 9, said if House Democrats didnt release a transcript of Volkers full testimony, it would be an abuse of power.

If this continues, I will call Volker before the Senate Judiciary Committee to testify publicly to ensure the full story is told, he added.

But the MAGA accounts and Trumps son want Graham to stop talking and just fucking do something already.

Remove the first three words from this tweet and try again, one person tweeted at Graham eight days later in a reply that received over 1,000 likes. An hour later, Trump Jr. quote-tweeted Graham to let him know that the problem was continuing.

Dear @LindseyGrahamSC: The chair of the Intel Committee is orchestrating a coup against the President of the United States, complete w rogue CIA spies, secret testimony and his usual leaks to the corrupt press. WHY IS TRUMP FIGHTING ALONE? a popular pro-Trump Twitter account said later that afternoon. The tweet was retweeted over 5,000 times and liked over 11,000 times.

Lindsey Graham is more worried about the invasion of Syria than the coup taking place in Washington, the account added in a follow-up tweet. In tweets from a year ago, the account had praised Grahams appearance during Brett Kavanaughs Supreme Court confirmation hearings and his defense of the president and begged Trump to bring him to rallies.

Trump Jr. escalated the pressure campaign against the senator by promoting his own appearance on Fox News Hannity in early October.

I think we need our guys in the Senate to start pushing back start subpoenaing this. Do you doubt for one second that this team has met with the whistleblower, Schiffs team, that they have dictated every aspect of this? Subpoena em! Ask them! Trump Jr. said in a clip, which was widely shared on Twitter and ultimately retweeted by Trump Jr. himself.

Popular conservative Twitter personalities associated with organizations like Turning Point USA latched onto the rhetoric Tuesday and have encouraged followers to tweet memes and makes posts under the hashtag #WheresLindsey.

Remember based Lindsey Graham? Benny Johnson, Turning Point USAs chief creative officer, posted on Tuesday morning alongside a video of Grahams statements during the Kavanaugh hearings. I do. This Lindsey Graham stopped a bloodthirsty, farcical attack from the Left on our nations most honored institutions. Lindsey crushed these attacks. Do it again Lindsey.

On Tuesday afternoon, Trump Jr. added to the call for Graham to start issuing subpoenas to witnesses like Volker. I repeat... its continuing. #WheresLindsey, he said, quote-tweeting Grahams threat from early October.

Grahams office did not immediately return a request for comment about the Twitter campaign or his relationship with Trump Jr.

Paul McLeod contributed reporting to this story.

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Donald Trump Jr. And MAGA Twitter Are Pressuring Sen. Lindsey Graham To Defend Trump From Impeachment - BuzzFeed News

BRUSSELS European leaders have long understood that President Trump is an unreliable ally, subject to loud tantrums, abrupt shifts and sudden whims. They have worried about his ambivalence toward NATO, resented his personal attacks and bristled at his use of trade policy and economic sanctions to restrict their companies and markets.

Until now, Europeans have done little except complain about him. But Mr. Trumps recent actions in Syria and Ukraine may change that.

The more optimistic now argue Mr. Trumps betrayals in those conflicts are of a different category of seriousness, and may accelerate what has been a slowly building process of European integration and peeling away from the United States. Others are not so sure.

But there is agreement that Mr. Trump has destabilized Europes near neighborhood in a major, even fundamental, way that requires a unified response, if only Europeans can come together.

Mr. Trump this month pulled American troops out of Syria, forsaking the Kurds who were guarding European jihadists, and allowing Turkey to invade. Mr. Trumps impeachment inquiry has laid bare how through the course of the year he prized politics over policy in Ukraine.

Both episodes benefited President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, who has been working to destabilize European democracies, chip away at Western cohesion, and on Tuesday hosted his new friend, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, a NATO member.

As European leaders prepare for a meeting of NATO members in London in early December, Mr. Trumps capriciousness is testing Europes ability to cohere and adjust.

Europeans have put themselves in the position of being dependent on an undependable president, said Robin Niblett, director of Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London.

This just exposes again how Europeans remain overly reliant on the United States, he said, not only to deter Russia but to protect Western interests in the Middle East. But will Europeans do anything about it?

Mr. Trumps sudden withdrawal of American troops from northern Syria, and the quick response of Mr. Putin, have shaken Europeans. How deeply is the question.

This has been more grist to the mill for the need for European governments to take more responsibility for their near neighborhood," Mr. Niblett said. But that doesnt mean it will get done.

The European Parliament is preparing a resolution condemning Turkeys offensive and urging economic sanctions, but governments are split on the matter.

While to some degree Americas allies have priced in Mr. Trumps limitations and behavior, this is a whole different level," said Mark Leonard, director of the European Council on Foreign Relations, playing into all their fears about America as an unreliable ally.

So unreliable has Mr. Trump proved, in fact, that his allies would not dare call the December meeting a summit, NATO officials concede. It will incorporate only a reception at Buckingham Palace and a single morning session at a golf resort hotel an hours drive from central London.

The main reason for that, officials say, is because of Mr. Trumps tantrum about military spending that so distorted the last NATO summit meeting in Brussels in July 2018.

There, Mr. Trump was finally calmed down when the Dutch prime minister, Mark Rutte, told him, We get it, Donald, we need to buy more American arms. The French president, Emmanuel Macron, told him: We understand, we need to spend more so you can spend less.

Such remarks are revealing of Europes deepening disdain for Mr. Trump, even before his meddling in Syria and Ukraine.

European governments have a very low regard for Trump anyway," said Charles Grant, director of the Center for European Reform. They know that they need to work with the United States, but it confirms to them that Trump is incapable of thinking strategically, handing victory to the Russians in Syria.

Mr. Trumps move in Syria was particularly neuralgic for the French. They have been vocally furious with American unreliability ever since 2013, when President Barack Obama decided to ignore his own red line and call off bombing strikes on Syria in response to the regimes use of chemical weapons a decision passed on to Paris just as French war planes were preparing to join the United States in the strikes.

France felt abandoned then, especially after becoming more aligned with Washington under Presidents Nicolas Sarkozy and Franois Hollande and rejoining NATOs command structure.

But this is a whole new level of frivolousness in the way that the U.S. treats allies, Mr. Leonard said.

Mr. Macron was particularly bitter last week about Mr. Trumps unilateral Syria move, in a news conference after a Brussels summit meeting.

I understood that we were together in NATO, that the U.S. and Turkey were in NATO, Mr. Macron said. And I found out via a tweet that the U.S. had decided to withdraw their troops."

Asked about the seeming impotence of the European Union, he added, I share your outrage.

But such decisions also help those in Europe, like Mr. Macron, who are trying to make the case for more European strategic autonomy, both in defense matters but also increasingly in financial ones, as Europeans try to protect their firms from both American tariffs and secondary sanctions against Iran.

Mr. Macron is pressing for more spending on European defense, especially on French armaments, as a way for Europe to counterbalance a long-term trend of American retreat from multilateral obligations.

But whereas the European Union has mostly joined together in a common regulatory system on matters of trade and finance, it often remains a bloc of 28 foreign policies.

Europe is split, Mr. Leonard said. There are those deeply worried about what is going on and wanting to build a Europe that can defend itself, not just in defense but to push back on the extraterritoriality of American sanctions and Trumps weaponization of the international financial system. And there are those who think they have to suck up to Trump bilaterally, like the Poles, who only trust the Americans to deter Russia.

And then there are those like Germany that will follow Macron to a degree rhetorically, but when it comes down to difficult decisions about how much to spend on defense, how assertive to be on sanctions, holds back," he said.

But the more Mr. Trump and Congress go after European national interest and leaders, threatening a trade war with Europe and insulting its leadership, the more countries are driven into the French camp.

There are more structural developments that have shaken the way that Europeans view the United States, said Manuel Muniz, dean of the School of Global and Public Affairs at IE University in Madrid.

He cited Mr. Trumps questioning of NATO and collective defense; his abandonment of the Paris climate accord and the Iran nuclear deal; his imposition of trade sanctions on European products like steel and aluminum; his harsh attacks on individual European leaders at various times, including Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and former Prime Minister Theresa May of Britain; and the behavior of some of his ambassadors toward their host countries and institutions.

Mr. Trumps criticism of European free-riding on defense is accurate, Mr. Muniz said, but it has also led to Europeans ceding responsibility for their own interests and fates.

But given his unreliability as an ally, Trump will accelerate the process of European integration on defense and security, he said.

In fact, in many corners of the world, Americas transformation from the indispensable ally to the unreliable one is now taken for granted.

Americas unreliability as both a global leader and ally or partner is no longer in doubt and countries are adjusting accordingly, and not just in Europe, according to Shlomo Ben-Ami, a former Israeli foreign minister and now vice president of the Toledo International Center for Peace.

The Kurds and Turks quickly scrambled to make a deal with Russia, and India is also pursuing closer ties to both China and Russia. The South Koreans are seeking a form of rapprochement with the North and even Saudi Arabia is looking for better ties with Iran, he wrote in an op-ed article for Project Syndicate.

The main problem is not just what Trump does, but how he does it, Mr. Leonard said. It is not just Mr. Trumps America First nationalism, he said. Alliances need predictability, and Trump is so unpredictable.

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Trumps Syria and Ukraine Moves Further Alienate Americas Already Wary Allies - The New York Times

But the latest concerns about Trump are just a crescendo in a long-running drama. Sam Nunberg, a former 2016 Trump-campaign aide, told me that a colleague once approached him and asked if Trump was losing it, saying they had just had the same conversation twice. Nunberg dismissed such concerns, assuring him that it was only because Trump likely wasnt paying attention the first time.

His speech has changed over time, too. Software programs show that Trump currently speaks at a fourth-to-sixth-grade level. (Politicians are practiced at speaking to wide swaths of Americans, but Obama, for example, according to those speech analyses, spoke at an 11th-grade level in his final news conference as president.) A study last year by two University of Pittsburgh professors examining Trumps appearances on Fox News found that the quality of his speech was worsening. They studied his comments over a seven-year period ending in 2017just as his presidency beganand found that he had begun using substantially more filler wordssuch as um and uh, though the authors did not conclude that the change signaled cognitive decline.

Even a casual observer can see the disordered and nonlinear thinking behind Trumps speech. A case in point was Trumps rally last week in Minneapolis. Within minutes of taking the stage, Trump launched, without explanation, into a dramatic reading of what he imagined was the pillow talk between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, a pair of former FBI officials who had exchanged text messages critical of the president. He gave no context as to why he was talking about them, leaving it to the audience to fill in the Mall of Americasize blanks. Trump never even mentioned that they had worked for the FBI or that Strzok was at one point involved in the Russia investigationjust that they were lovers who disliked him. (Still, as theater, it seemed to work. When Trump cooed, Oh, God. I love you, Lisa! the audience laughed appreciatively.)

Other people who have worked with Trump in the White House and on the 2016 campaign pushed back on the notion that his mental acuity has eroded over time. Every president has a super-exaggerated ego and personality in some way, Tom Bossert, Trumps former homeland-security adviser and a former official in President George W. Bushs administration, told me. I asked him if presidents or presidential candidates should be subject to a fitness test measuring whether theyre up to the job. Various psychologists have floated this idea in response to Trumps behavior. Im not sure what the fitness standard would reveal about people who are already wired that way, Bossert said.

Conventional wisdom in Washington is that impeachment wont lead to Trumps removal, but that view rests on Republicans continuing to stay by his side. Even those most loyal to Trump could lose patience if his rash decision making collides with their own interests. Trumps impulsive decision to pull U.S. troops out of northern Syria last week, setting the stage for Turkeys attack on Americas Kurdish partners, has already infuriated some of his closest friends in Congress. It was soon after the House, in an overwhelming bipartisan vote, rebuked his Syria gambit on Wednesday that Trump lashed out at Pelosi, prompting her to abruptly walk out of their meeting. (Democrats, of course, are seizing the opportunity. For those who dont do politics professionally or even follow it closely: It is getting worse. He is getting worse, Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii tweeted last night.)

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The Unraveling of Donald Trump - The Atlantic

Griffin told POLITICO that her tweet contradicting Trump on promises to the Kurds was based on a conversation with someone extremely senior that took place the previous night and has been part of whats been a wild two weeks reporting on the Syria withdrawal. I am able to fact-check because I am constantly gathering information, she said.

While Trump enjoys unwavering support at Fox News from several opinion hosts and supportive guests, a daily cheering section that serves as media firewall in the face of impeachment, the presidents claims about withdrawing troops, and thereby allowing Turkey to launch an offensive in northern Syria, have come under near-constant scrutiny from Griffin, a veteran national security correspondent at the network.

Griffins critical reporting in recent weeks has not only found a home on several daytime Fox News programs, albeit not in prime time, but has been cited by competitors like MSNBCs Willie Geist and CNNs Christiane Amanpour. Members of U.S. special forces, Amanpour told Defense Secretary Mark Esper, are telling even Fox News thats an ally of president Trumpthat they feel ashamed.

A Republican critic of the Syria withdrawal, Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, referenced Griffins reporting on CNN, while conservative writers like Peggy Noonan, Peter Wehner, and Jonah Goldberg have done so in pieces opposing the decision. Goldberg noted that Griffins reporting is coming from Fox News, which is not normally a target of Trumps fake news broadsides.

Im pleased at the fact that other networks are paying attention to what Fox News is doing, but the way I feel is, weve been doing this for years, Griffin said in an interview with POLITICO. She said Fox News reporters keep our nose to the grindstone and keep out of politics.

That can be difficult as Trump, a faithful Fox News viewer, has blasted journalists who have challenged his claims, such as veteran anchor Shepard Smith, who abruptly left the network earlier this month amid tensions with the pro-Trump opinion side.

I certainly was very saddened to see that Shepard was leaving us, said Griffin, who considers the former Fox News anchor a close friend from their more than two decades at the network. But, she said, Were not doing anything differently since he left.

Griffins work on the Syria story began a few days before Smith exited Fox News. She and husband Greg Myre, an NPR national security correspondent, returned to the U.S. from an anniversary trip in Morocco on Oct. 6 to find Trump announcing plans to withdraw troops in Syria.

This came as a surprise to everyone not just reporters, but members of the national security establishment, Griffin said. Much of the Pentagon was caught off guard. The State Department was caught off guard.

Griffin, who had spent years reporting from the Middle East before starting on the Pentagon beat in 2007, began contacting sources, and said she and colleague Lucas Tomlinson started piecing together what the reality was, because there was a lot of confusion and misinformation.

On the afternoon of Oct. 7, Griffin reported on Fox News how U.S. officials and allies were blindsided by Trumps decision. Two days later, she reported how Trump went off script during his call with Erdogan, whom he was expected to tell to stay north of the Syrian border.

That same day, Griffin tweeted thoughts from a distraught U.S. Special Forces soldier who fought alongside the Kurds and said he was ashamed for the first time in my career. The string of tweets went viral, drawing more than 400,000 likes and retweets and surely contributed to Griffin adding at least 20,000 Twitter followers this month.

In another widely shared tweet, Griffin last week accused Trump of pushing a Turkish talking point that the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) is a greater threat than ISIS. On Sunday, she posted several tweets from a call with Kurdish general Mazloum Kobani Abdi, a key U.S. partner in the fight against ISIS, who accused accused Turkey of ignoring a cease fire and continuing its ethnic cleansing in northern Syria.

The next night, Griffin interviewed former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen at the University of Chicago, and was back at the Pentagon on Tuesday, reporting on Turkey and Russias deal to jointly patrol along the safe zone at the Syria border.

Griffin also appeared this week on a Fox News Radio show with Brian Kilmeade, a co-host on Trump favorite Fox & Friends, who has expressed criticism of the Syria move. Yet Griffin has not appeared in recent weeks on any Fox News opinion shows, which she said isnt unusual as her TV appearances typically occur between 11 a.m. and 7 p.m.

Theyre in the opinion-making business, Griffin said of the primetime line-up. And theyre having guests on who can commentate on the news reports that weve put out during the day. Thats usually how they structure their shows. But theres no hard and fast rule that I cant appear on there.

Griffin acknowledged that some people who dont know her might make certain assumptions because of her employer, though she believes that most view me as an individual.

That assessment jibes with those of her colleagues in the Pentagon press corps.

As far as the Pentagon press corps goes, shes one of us, said Jeff Schogol, a Pentagon reporter at Task & Purpose. Its not that Jennifers the Pentagon Fox reporter, shes a Pentagon reporter. So of course, standards of accuracy and fairness are the same for her as anyone else.

Kevin Baron, executive editor of Defense One, called Griffin a pro's pro and one of the best reporters I've seen my decade on the Pentagon beat.

Her reputation as a hard-hitting, straight-talking journalist is known by her peers and respected worldwide throughout the military from generals to grunts, said Baron. Never seen her pull a punch. Would be shocked if she ever did.

See the rest here:

Meet the Fox reporter who is bedeviling Trump on Syria - POLITICO

The host of CNNs Anderson Cooper 360 on Tuesday said it is entirely possible that this day may turn out to be one of the most consequential days in the impeachment inquiry, as well as possibly this presidency.

Coopers assessment came at the start of a segment centered on acting Ukraine Ambassador Bill Taylors earlier reported private testimony before House lawmakers, which the news anchor said had been described as that significant by someone whod heard it.

Taylor reportedly revealed in great detail and in no uncertain terms that President Trump himself directed his people to push for a quid pro quo with the president of Ukraine, military aid and a White House visit in exchange for investigating the firm tied to (former Vice President) Joe Bidens son, Hunter, and investigating a conspiracy theory about the 2016 election, said Cooper.

In short, Taylors testimony, which just wrapped up, describes the very thing the president and his supporters have been denying for weeks now, he added.

Read the original post:

Anderson Cooper: Donald Trumps Fate May Have Been Sealed On Tuesday - HuffPost

President Trump made brief remarks on Syria prior to boarding Marine One, but he did not take any questions on the topic or any other matter.

"Its been very successful. Well see what happens," Trump said of his dealing with Turkey on Syria, saying, "Turkey has done what weve asked them to do."

"Its a very volatile part of the world, but so far its been pretty amazing whats gone on recently. Lost no soldiers, didnt have a soldier hurt. We didnt have a finger broken. Its pretty unusual, and we have thousands of soldiers that have moved out or are moving out of various areas."

Trump added that the US has the situation under "very good control."

Remember: Jim Jeffrey, the US envoy for Syria and the coalition against ISIS, said the US believes that Turkish-supported opposition forces in Syria have committed war crimes.

View original post here:

Trump lifts all sanctions against Turkey: Live updates - CNN

Impeaching a U.S. president might not be the be-all-end-allfor their career. We explain why this is the case. Just the FAQs, USA TODAY

We've never had a president like Donald Trump. He falls into every single sleaze category, from women to profiteering to attacking the Bill of Rights.

Weve had presidents who were used by members of their own family for personal gain, likeUlysses S. Grant.

Weve had presidents who stocked their Cabinet with greedy, self-serving mediocrities who took advantage of the public trust, like Warren G. Harding.

Weve had presidents who swore to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution, only to then abuse it, like Richard Nixon.

And weve had presidents who, thanks to a presumptive sense of entitlement, lived slimy private lives, using countless women before tossing them aside Harding again, plus John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton.

President Donald Trump fallsinto every single sleazy category, squarely and shamelessly. Just Thursday, we learned that he'll hold next year'sGroup of Seven meeting (with leaders of Canada,France,Germany,Italy,Japan and theUnited Kingdom)at his own Doral golf resort in Miami.

Trump National Doral golf resort in Miami(Photo: Michele Eve Sandberg/AFP/Getty Images)

Its the latest example of how Trump, who never divested from his businesses,continues to make millions from them. Its also the latest reminder that he constantly violates the Constitutions emoluments clause, which is supposed to ban presidents from accepting money fromforeign governments. This whilethe House is in the middle of an impeachment inquiry and there are two lawsuits pending over the emoluments clause.

"This is unbelievable," said Noah Bookbinder, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which filed one of those suits, speaking for much of America.

Grant was an honest man, yet under his nose, his own brother-in-law and two other grifters tried to corner the gold market. The financial panic that followed was called Black Friday.Then there was the Whiskey Ring Scandal,in which the presidents own secretary played a role in attempting to defraud the government of millions.

And Trump? Unlike other presidents, he never bothered to place his assets in a blind trust. Instead he allowshis family to run his trust, and heremains its one and only beneficiary.

Unconstitutional: G-7 at Trump's Doral resort? The original sin of this presidency is failure to divest

Andthe emoluments clausehasnt stopped diplomats, representatives of government-owned businesses and other foreign visitors from buying his properties andrunning up big tabs at his resorts and hotels. That's stuffing cash, albeit indirectly, into Trump's pocket.

Meantime, finger-pointingat Hunter Biden diverts mediaattention a time-honored Trump tactic from his own children'sbrazen exploitation of their fathers office. As Bloomberg'sStephanie Baker notes, they"have continued working with foreign business partners from Dubai to Indonesia and India while theirfather sits in the White House." First daughter Ivanka and hubby Jared Kushner raked in an estimated $82 million in 2017 alone, records show.

Time and again, notes the Los Angeles Times,Trumps children have blurred the lines of family, nation and business essentially the charge the president makes against the Bidens.

Perhaps youve heard of Teapot Dome, a huge oil reserve scandal involving Warren G. Hardings Interior secretary, Albert Fall.Fall was convicted of accepting a bribeand went to prison.Meanwhile, Hardings Veterans secretary, Charles Forbes, looted the 2019 equivalent of $2.8 billion in a string of shady deals; he, too, was convicted ofbribery and went to prison.

No one in Trumps revolving-door Cabinet has ripped off taxpayers on that scale, but many have fleeced we the people for everything from private air travel (former Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin), running up big tabs in Europe for spouses (former Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin), and ripoffs for everything from new office doors (ex-Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke), dining room furniture (Housing Secretary Ben Carson)and more. Then there is fellow swamp monster Scott Pruitt, whose list of grifting while he headed the Environmental Protection Agencywas almost as long as the list of clean water and clean air regulations he helped the president gut.

And need I mention that Trumps campaign chief (Paul Manafort) and first national security adviser (Michael Flynn) are now convicted felons?And thatone of his top Oval Office aides (Rob Porter) had to leave after it became known that not one but both of his former spouses accused Porter of physical and verbal abuse.

Even a president as shameless as Trump has had to ditch many of theselet-them-eat-cake mediocrities to appease critics. Isn't this the guy who bragged that he hires only the very best? And his base still buys this claptrap.

We all know what Nixon did. AndTrump? It goes well beyond ignoring the emoluments clauseto monetize the presidency.

Trump took an oath to preserve, protect and defendthe Constitution of the United States. But just this month he publicly invitedan adversary,China, to interfere in the 2020 presidential election. Hehas attacked the First Amendmentby tryingto ban reporters whoask unpleasant questions from the White House and suggestingthat TV networks he dislikes lose their broadcast licenses.He has suggested cutting corners on due process for illegal immigrants,aviolationof the Fifth Amendment. He has suggested ending birthright citizenship, a violationof the Fourteenth Amendment.

Preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States? Rubbish.Trump only wants to bother with the parts that are convenient to him.

Harding was so sleazy that as president he once had sex with one of his mistresses in Central Park.He had an illegitimate daughter with one woman, a long affair with another who was suspected of being a German agent during World War I, and trysts in the Oval Office itself.Kennedy'svoluminous affairs were beyond sleazy. One with the girlfriend of a Mafia kingpin,and another with a woman believed to be an East German spy, even exposed him to potential blackmail.

Then there is our most recent philanderer in chief, Bill Clinton, whose lies about an affair with a White House intern got him impeached. Clintons liaisons showed him to be impulsive and sexually reckless in way that left a stain (literally and figuratively) on the presidency.

Making Nixon look good: Donald Trump is much worse than Richard Nixon. He may even have committed treason.

Trumps infidelities fall short of Harding and Kennedy. But sleaze is sleaze: He has cheated on all three wivesand, in the case of porn star Stormy Daniels, did it right after his third wife, Melania, gave birth to their son, Barron.And at last count, no fewerthan 25 women accuse him of either misconduct or flat-out assault.It's certainly obvious why evangelicals continue to call Trump a good, God-fearing Christian, isn't it?

Trump, who even lies about the weather, says every single one of these women is making it all up.Trump, as you know, is a Boy Scout and would never lay so much as an orange finger on anyone. And that Access Hollywood tapethat surfaced in 2016, in which he bragged about assaulting women? Fake. Sure.

A grifting family. A sleazy whats-in-it-for-me Cabinet. Trampling on our beloved Constitution. And all these women. All the boxes, checked.

Paul Brandus, founder and White House bureau chief of West Wing Reports, is the author of "Under This Roof: The White House and the Presidency" and is a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors. Follow him on Twitter: @WestWingReport

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Trump's unmatched sleaze: Grifters, women, trampling Constitution and now G-7 at Doral - USA TODAY

The Editorial Board, USA TODAY Published 9:30 a.m. CT Oct. 22, 2019

Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders aren't the only presidential candidates who deserve consideration. Democrats, take your time: Our view

Going into the 2020 election, President Donald Trump looks vulnerable. He faces an impeachment inquiry in the House.He has the lowest average approval rating in polling history. And his standing among independents is awful, especially for a Republican.

In other words, Republicans should be panickingor scouting aroundfor another candidate, or both.But they know they have an ace in the hole:the Democratic Party.

To win in 2020,all the Democratsmight need is a capable, relatively uncontroversial candidate within shouting distance of the political center, someone who can be competitive in the key battleground states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. But, at least so far, Democratic votershave beengravitating toward candidates who lack some of thesequalities.

Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders who have led national polls aren't the only hopefuls who deserve consideration.A hint that the field is fluidcame Monday in the form of aSuffolk University/USA TODAY poll of Iowa voters. It showed that PeteButtigieghad moved passed Sanders into third place in the first caucus state. Amy Klobuchar did not see her numbers go up, but the senator from Minnesotahas seen a big fundraisingbump after her favorably reviewed debate performance last week. Several others in the field of nearly 20are plausiblegeneral election candidates.

Bidens experience and decency might well make himthe most electable of the bunch. But his halting performances on the campaign trail and in the debates, coupled withhis fundraising struggles, have party insiders doubting whether, at 76, he meets the capability threshold.

Democratic voting.(Photo: Comstock Images/Getty Images)

ANOTHER VIEW: Betrayed Trump voters want a leader to take USA back from the rich and powerful

Warren and Sanders, the two other septuagenarianswho routinely poll in double digits and have fervent supporters, have espoused massively costly policies on health care and educationthat have little buy-in outside the Democratic Party's progressive wing.

Their hostility to corporations is understandable, considering the damage some companies have done to public health and the environment. Even so,the two senators'anti-corporate mantras have an over-the-top quality that would play into thehands of Trump, who would lovenothing more than to run as the free-enterprise candidate saving the nation from socialism.

Given Trump's abuse of power, chronic dishonesty and incompetence, the stakes in the 2020 election could not be higher.Whats more, the Republican Party'sembrace of Trumpism gives the Democrats the chance to claim the mainstream and become the ascendant party.But for these things to happen, the Democrats would do well to field a candidate who cant be characterized as too far left or too far beyond theirprime.

History shows that polls in wide open primary races often go through multiple phases. At this point in the 2004 election cycle, thetop ratedDemocrat wasHoward Dean.Four years later, Hillary Clinton had a more than25-point lead,while the top Republicans were Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson. None of those erstwhile leadershas a presidential library.

Democrats still have time to check outthe field before they settle on Mr. or Ms. Right.

If you can't see this readerpoll, please refresh your page.

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Donald Trump and Republicans have an ace in the hole for 2020: the Democratic Party - Daily Advertiser

Ever since Donald Trump began his bid to become US president he has been given an ample platform on his favourite network, Fox News. It carried many of his campaign events live and its pundits gave him full-throated support. In response, Trump has pushed his supporters on Twitter to watch his favourite stars on the network and often takes up their talking points.

Joining Anushka Asthana to discuss the powerful relationship between Trump and Fox News is journalist Luke ONeil.

Now, as Trump faces the twin perils of an impeachment inquiry and next years presidential election, there are signs that the relationship might be souring.

Also today: Jonathan Franklin on the protests in Chile that have turned deadly.

Support The Guardian

The Guardian is editorially independent.And we want to keep our journalism open and accessible to all.But we increasingly need our readers to fund our work.

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Are Fox News and Donald Trump falling out of love? podcast - The Guardian

It's hard to keep track of the news that President Donald Trump generates.

This week was particularly visual, so we decided to help you keep track of the news with this photo story, much of it generated by The White House.

Trump met with the president of Italy, Sergio Mattarella, on Wednesday, in an otherwise uneventful press event.

What stood out, however, were the Italian interpreter's facial expressions during this appearance. Here, she is responding to Trump saying, "If my opponent would have won, China would right now be the most powerful country economically in the world."

"Nervous Nancy"

Three hours after his presser with the Italian president, Trump met with Democratic leaders, Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, and Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader.

It didn't go well.

Trump tweeted out the photo above with the caption, "Nervous Nancy."

And he wrote in a later tweet: "Nancy Pelosi needs help fast! There is either something wrong with her 'upstairs,' or she just plain doesnt like our great Country. She had a total meltdown in the White House today. It was very sad to watch. Pray for her, she is a very sick person!"

According to Pelosi, she was asking Trump tough questions about Russia.

Speaking to reporters afterward, she said, The Russians were the beneficiaries of any withholding of assistance or encouragement to the Ukraine. Again, Putin benefits.

"The Russians benefited, Putin did, when the president placed some doubt about our commitment to NATO, right from the start of his administration. All roads seem to lead to Putin.

"Then, the president said, Well, the reason Im taking the troops out of Syria is because I promised in the campaign to bring the troops home.

"My question to him is, is Saudi Arabia home? Is Saudi Arabia home?

"He said Well, the Saudi Arabians are paying for it.

"Really, were putting our troops in harms way for Saudi Arabia because theyre paying for it?

"What it did do was cause a meltdown on the part of the president because he was unhappy with those questions.

Critics of the president noted that the image showed a woman standing up to a room of white men.

Nikole Hannah-Jones of The New York Times took issue with this analysis on Twitter:

"I get whats being said/attempted here, but its always interesting to me how white women un-race white women while racing white men as if white women dont experience both gender discrimination and racial privilege at the same time."

And with that, the Dems left the room. Trump then tweeted this photo from the meeting:

Letter to Turkey: "Don't be a fool!"

On the same day, a letter that Trump wrote to the Turkish president, on Oct. 9, was leaked to the press.

"Don't be a tough guy. Don't be a fool!" Trump wrote. "I will call you later."

Trump had ordered American troops to withdraw from northeastern Syria three days before he wrote this letter. American soldiers had been there supporting Kurdish allies.

On the day Trump wrote this letter, Turkish air strikes began.

In an NPR interview, a senior advisor to the Turkish president said the letter was not taken seriously, "especially given its lack of diplomatic finesse."

On Thursday, Trump flew to Texas, where he toured the Louis Vuitton Workshop. On the airstrip, he held up this banner:

On the flight, Rick Perry, resigning:

Rick Perry (energy secretary, 12th place Dancing With The Stars contestant, presidential candidate remember "Oops"?) submitted his intention to resign on Thursday.

Perry had recently emerged as a central figure in the impeachment inquiry of Trump. According to NPR:

"Perry was part of what was dubbed 'the three amigos' in addition to Gordon Sondland, ambassador to the European Union, and Kurt Volker, former envoy to Ukraine charged with managing the U.S.-Ukraine relationship."

Trump stopped in Dallas for a mega rally. "Trump's Tweets Matter" is a dog whistle reference to the movement "Black Lives Matter" and hints at the appeal of Trump's racist messaging.

TGIF with a flurry of tweets, including this one:

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36 hours with Donald Trump, in pictures - KUOW News and Information

Former Defense Secretary James Mattis roasted his former boss at the Alfred E. Smith dinner in New York City on Thursday night.

Mattis took the stage at the annual dinner -- an opportunity to crack jokes about local and national politics -- with an introduction from comic legend Martin Short.

"According to the president hes the 'most overrated general,'" Short cracked in his intro. "I think hes an American hero."

"I'm not just an overrated general. Im the worlds greatest overrated general," joked Mattis, who received a standing ovation as he stepped to the dais. "I'm honored to be called that by Donald Trump, because he also called Meryl Streep an overrated actor. So I guess Im the Meryl Streep of generals."

The rebuttal came a day after President Donald Trump called Mattis the worlds most overrated general during a meeting with lawmakers about the situation in Syria.

Mattis had said in an interview in August that his silence about Trump was "not going to be forever.

One of the general's most biting jokes came in relation to Trump's infamous deferment of military service in Vietnam over alleged bone spurs in his feet.

"I earned my spurs on the battlefield; Donald Trump earned his spurs in a letter from a doctor," Mattis said.

Mattis, a retired Marine Corps four-star general, served as Trump's first defense secretary, but resigned in December 2018 over policy differences, particularly Trump's plans to pull out American troops from Syria, writing in his resignation letter that Trump should have a defense secretary "whose views are better aligned" with his own.

He joked on Thursday that his work in combat zones overseas was easier than being in Trumps Washington.

I tried to bring some peace and order to the places with no organized government, chaotic and warring factions, irrational fears, and toxic hatred. It was hard work, but it wasnt until I started working in Washington, D.C., that I realized how easy I had it overseas in the combat zone.

He also knocked Trump for his many hours of executive time:

Its been a year since Ive left the administration, the recovery process is going well," he joked. "The counselor says Ill graduate soon. A year according to White House time is about 9,000 hours of executive time or 1,800 holes of golf."

Mattis, who has been critical of many of Trump's foreign policy decisions since leaving office, also got serious for a moment Thursday, mentioning the U.S.'s Kurdish allies in Syria. He called for the U.S. to again back the population, which has been attacked by Turkey.

"Let us restore trust in one another," Mattis said.

The president was onstage in Dallas at the same time as Mattis' keynote, delivering a campaign speech to a packed crowd at American Airlines Center.

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Former defense secretary roasts Donald Trump: 'I earned my spurs on the battlefield' - ABC News

[The stream is slated to start at 11:00 ET. Please refresh the page if you do not see a player above at that time.]

President Donald Trump said in a tweet on Wednesday that there's been "big success" along the Turkey-Syria border since he decided to withdraw U.S. troops.

"Safe Zone created! Ceasefire has held and combat missions have ended. Kurds are safe and have worked very nicely with us. Captured ISIS prisoners secured," he said.

Trump's controversial move to pull U.S. troops from the Syrian border in recent weeks met with condemnation around the globe as Turkish troops began attacking Kurdish forces who had fought alongside Americans to defeat ISIS in the region.

As a five-day cease-fire between the two sides ran out, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan agreed to a deal in which Russian and Turkish patrols will split up to keep Kurdish forces away from the Syrian border, creating a buffer zone between the Kurdish controlled area and Turkey. Turkey has long viewed the Kurdish YPG militia as a terrorist group, known in Turkey as the PKK.

Kurds felt betrayed by Trump's move to withdraw U.S. troops from the area. Local news outlet ANHA Hawar published video showing Kurds throwing rocks and potatoes at the retreating U.S. forces.

A Quinnipiac poll released on Wednesday found that two-thirds of American voters disapproved of Trump's Syria troop decision.

Erdogan is scheduled to appear at the White House on Nov. 13.

Subscribe to CNBC on YouTube.

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Watch: President Trump makes a statement on Syria following US troop withdrawal - CNBC

Former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci has suggested President Donald Trump will soon be told to "take one for the team" and leave office, if he isn't impeached before then.

Speaking to Vanity Fair, the political consultantwhose time in White House communications totaled six dayssuggested that "more damning" information on Trump would emerge and force Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to take action.

"In the next three to six weeks, there will be more damning information related to the president" that will come out, Scaramucci said at Vanity Fair's 6th Annual New Establishment Summit at California's Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts.

"He's aware of it. I believe that McConnell will eventually go to him and say, 'Hey, man. You've gotta take one for the team you've gotta go back.' He'll probably end up back at Mar-a-Lago or something."

Scaramucci suggested that it would require "more lawless activity exposure" for such a conversation to take place between McConnell and Trump.

"He's going to get impeached, I predict he will be out of office before the next election" Scaramucci stated. "He's literally turned our foreign policy and elements of our domestic policy and our national security system into a world of personal transactions. I do believe he's cornered now and as the facts unfold, they're so overwhelming in their criminality that he'll be out of office."

The former communications director has been an outspoken critic of Trump since leaving the White House, with the president responding in kinddescribing Scaramucci as a "highly unstable nutjob" who had "made a fool of himself... abused staff, got fired," USA Today reported at the time.

Following news of the impeachment inquiry announced in September by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Scaramucci suggested that the president was "a felon and a traitor" over his conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in which Trump brought up potential political rival Joe Biden and his son Huntera conversation that has since become a focus of the inquiry.

"You trying to get dirt on @JoeBiden from the leader of Ukraine on the phone is not like playing a game of 'Telephone' in middle school. You are a felon and a traitor to the United States," Scaramucci tweeted in the wake of Pelosi's announcement, also sharing a meme that implied the president would not be in his role for much longer.

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Donald Trump Will Soon Be Told to 'Take One for the Team' and Leave Office, Says Anthony Scaramucci - Newsweek

There was a time, not so long ago, when it was widely considered suicidal for an American politician to pay hush money to porn stars, cosy up to Russian leaders, or use national security dollars to buy foreign interference at election time.

In those quaint days of yore, an experienced politician might have steered well clear of anything that smacked of being on the wrong side of civil rights.

At some point over the last generation, even the conservatives who hate todays civil rights came to love yesterdays civil rights. Martin Luther King Jr was no longer a Commie revolutionary but a beloved national icon. Segregation and the Klans reign of terror was as obviously, stunningly immoral as Nazism.

Until today, and until Donald Trump. You may not have known this, but Trump is himself a victim, no different from the poor souls who were publicly tortured and murdered by the Klan and its mobs. Despite his German roots, and his familys business history of race discrimination, Trump thinks hes suffering just as much.

So some day, if a Democrat becomes President and the Republicans win the House, even by a tiny margin, they can impeach the President, without due process or fairness or any legal rights, tweeted the president who has no recollection of a predecessor called Bill Clinton.

All Republicans must remember what they are witnessing here a lynching. But we will WIN!

Trump is strange, but hes not a strange fruit. And so it came to pass that the only people who can stop Trumps conviction at his forthcoming impeachment trial were forced to spend the day talking about lynching.

To do so, you need to suspend a little reality and a lot of self-respect. You need to become a human shell that blurts out words with no meaning, that sparks thoughts with no intelligence. To wit: one Hogan Gidley, who holds the hallucinatory role of deputy press secretary in Trumps West Wing.

The presidents not comparing whats happened to him with one of our darkest moments in American history. Hes just not, Gidley told reporters, ignoring Exhibit A in the days proceedings: the presidents tweet that did just that.

I understand there are many people in the media who dont agree with his language. He has used many words to describe the way he has been relentlessly attacked.

He has indeed used so many words, to such remarkable effect. Much like the hapless Hogan himself. They flow like endless rain into a paper cup.

As a defence of the presidents position, Hogans explanation is the equivalent of going back to bed to pull the covers over your head. Theres a reason why there are no White House press briefings any more: because you literally cant make sense of the boss without getting fired, indicted, or shamed into permanent unemployment.

Other Republicans not employed by the White House found it easier to express what they thought. Both Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leaders in the Senate and House, said they disagreed with Trumps choice of words.

Adam Kinzinger, an Illinois Republican, went even further by saying that Trump should retract his comments immediately. May God help us return to a better way, he tweeted.

The almighty ought to be busy in Syria right now, so this unusually orange challenge rightly falls into the lap of Republicans like Kinzinger himself.

Like a fatberg blocking the sewers of Capitol Hill, Trumps sense of victimhood and love of lying is creating unbearable pressure in a system designed to flush away an extraordinary volume of political waste material.

So Republicans were talking about Trumps self-styled lynching instead of defending Trump from the blockbuster impeachment evidence of his current ambassador to Ukraine.

Until now, Trump has drawn what he might call a red line in the sand around the notion that there was no quid pro quo in Ukraine no withholding of military aid in exchange for political dirt on the Biden family.

But ambassador William Taylor flatly contradicted Trumps defence, much like his chief of staff Mick Mulvaney did last week before Mulvaney was forced to swallow his words and regurgitate them back into the public square in an unspeakable puddle.

Never mind all that quidding and quoing now. Its time to run for the vomitorium.

How did the party that gave the world freedom fries find itself locked in this Trump-shaped prison? The simple answer is that they built it themselves. Trump didnt invent it; hes not nearly enough of a very stable genius.

In the days after the 9/11 attacks, Republicans looked at the world and decided to see its enemies: an amorphous group of freedom-haters. Only Republicans could protect America from such global threats.

But in the absence of a torrent of al-Qaida insurgents at Americas borders, the party rapidly switched to protecting America from Latinos. Once you unleash the politics of fear, you create the space for your own fear-peddling president.

Where you once pretended to be strong on terrorism, you now follow a president who just conspired with Turkey and Russia to revive Isis from near-death in Syria.

Where you once claimed Obamacare was an abuse of the constitution, you now support a president who claims that some part of the same founding document is phony.

Where you once claimed to defend freedom, you no longer have the freedom to speak your mind or your values. Unless you call yourself Pierre and join the cheese-eating surrender monkeys on Twitter.

Until now, Trump has assumed he can get away with murder because Republican senators will acquit him in an impeachment trial. That may be a reasonable assumption, even for someone as smart as Trump.

But theres one thing that Republican senators value, and its not Trumps leadership or his personal charm. Its survival.

At some point, Mitch McConnell will look at the polls and his projected losses in the Senate and realise that theres something even worse than Trump unleashing his tweetbots in a Republican primary.

For now, the GOP is clinging on to a half-baked Trumpian deal: supporting their leader in exchange for him holding his fire and fury. But nobody seriously believes that Trump can stop the projectiles that barrel out of every orifice. Never mind the quid pro quo: this status quo is untenable.

Richard Wolffe is a Guardian US columnist

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Republicans are finally realising Trump is his own worst enemy and theirs - The Guardian

One day after caving to public pressure and reversing course on his plan to host next years G7 at a resort he owns, the president who broke decades of precedent by refusing to divest from his business interests tried to turn corruption into a line of attack against one of his political rivals.

During an hour-long interview on Mondays installment of Hannity, President Donald Trump claimed that if his sons Donald Jr. and Eric accepted payments from questionable foreign sources, it would be the biggest story of the century.

But Trumps suggestion is the height of hypocrisy. The Trump Organization a business the president still owns and profits from while it is ostensibly being run by Donald Jr. and Eric does indeed accept payments from questionable foreign sources.

Trump made that statement after pushing unfounded conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden, son of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, who seemingly leveraged his family name to a well compensated gig on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company while his father was vice president. Trumps suggestion was that the Bidens had benefited from a form of corruption that would be unthinkable for his family. But that just isnt the case.

For instance, just weeks ago, Forbes reported that Eric and Donald Jr. have sold more than $100 million of the familys real estate since the January 2017 inauguration including a $3.2 million deal in the Dominican Republic last year that is the clearest violation of their fathers pledge to do no new foreign deals while in office. Foreign money has also poured into the Trump International Hotel, located just blocks from the White House, which the presidents most recent financial disclosure indicated made him $41 million last year alone.

In August, the New York Times reported that a $1.7 billion Trump Organization project in Indonesia received a $500 million infusion from a state-owned Chinese construction company. And its not just Eric and Donald Jr.: Ivanka Trump, despite working in the White House, continues to do business in China as well, and her husband, White House adviser Jared Kushner, received a massive cash infusion from Qatar last year.

Innumerable examples of the hypocrisy involved in Trump attacking the Bidens for foreign business dealings are at hand. To cite another glaring instance, despite Trumps denials that he has NO DEALS in Russia, Donald Jr. claimed in 2008 that Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets. We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia. Trump could clear up the discrepancy by releasing his tax returns, but he refuses to do it.

Earlier this year, the Trump Organization announced it provided the Treasury Department with nearly $200,000 to cover the amount they say theyve made from foreign governments during the Trump presidency. But its completely unclear how the presidents company arrived at that figure.

If you expected Sean Hannity to press Trump on any of this, however, you would have been sorely disappointed. The Fox News host has a long history of conducting fawning interviews with Trump that fail to generate much news, and Monday was no exception.

To close the interview, for instance, Hannity teed up this softball for the president: Ive known you for a long time you thrive on battle, you thrive on fighting, you said to me privately, and publicly, you want your promises fulfilled, and I guess thats what reelection is going to be about. With all this impeach, impeach going on, do you care? Would you care at all what they do, as long as you win in November?

Trump didnt even pretend to try to answer that question, but instead started rambling about China and Hillary Clinton. And at another point, Hannity went as far as to help Trump finish his thought as he struggled to remember the name of the Obama-era Fast and Furious scandal.

In short, the interview illustrated the extent to which Fox News functions as an unofficial arm of the Trump administration. It was a piece of public relations more than it was journalism.

Perhaps nothing better illustrates the sheer shamelessness of the Trump family than their efforts to make corruption a central issue in the 2020 campaign.

Trumps comments to Hannity came on the heels of both Donald Jr. and Eric Trump displaying a stunning lack of self-awareness during Fox News interviews in which they pretended, absurdly, as though the idea theyve benefited from nepotism or are exploiting their fathers administration for profit is unthinkable.

Of course, a central tenet of Trumpism is to never to pass up an opportunity to attack your political foes, even if youre guilty of the exact thing youre accusing them of and then some. As a result, Eric Trump apparently feels no shame about, for instance, posting a tweet bashing Hunter Biden for his alleged profiteering from corruption, following it up in his very next post by bragging about a new Trump Organization development in Scotland and then the next day attacking Democrats for alleged hypocrisy.

And Fox News lets them get away with it.

The news moves fast. To stay updated, follow Aaron Rupar on Twitter, and read more of Voxs policy and politics coverage.

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Trumps latest interview with Hannity was the height of shamelessness - Vox.com

President Donald Trump listens during a Cabinet meeting in Washington, D.C., January 2, 2019. (Jim Young/Reuters)If the GOP had worked harder at constraining Trump from the beginning, they might not be looking at the implosion of their party.

Upon hearing the news that President Trump bowed to pressure from congressional Republicans and reversed his decision to hold next years G-7 summit at the Trump National Doral Miami, my immediate response was, Ah, what might have been.

No, Im not wistful about the missed opportunity for taxpayers to throw a lifeline to Trumps struggling resort. Rather, Im a bit misty-eyed about what the last three years might have looked like if Republicans had shown this kind of spine all along.

There is an interesting consensus among the fiercely pro-Trump and anti-Trump forces on the right. For simplicity lets call them Never Trumpers and Always Trumpers. Among the Never Trumper Republicans, its a given that Trump is not only unfit for the job but unteachable. No amount of on-the-job training will help.

For the Always Trumpers, the Trump they got was the Trump they wanted all along. Theyre like the person who deliberately set the bull loose in the china shop. They look upon the shattered vases and listen to the caterwauling of the shop owners and grin at a mission accomplished.

In other words, both camps agree that Trump cant change. They only quarrel over whether that is a good thing or bad.

Obviously, I am much closer to the Never Trumper position on this. As Ive written many times, I believe character is destiny, and waiting for Trump to act presidential is like waiting for bears to stop using our woodlands as toilets. Still, I dont think that means Republicans should take a hands-off approach.

Most of the Always Trumpers who dominate Fox prime time and conservative talk radio voted for Trump not because they liked him but because they disliked Hillary Clinton more (though dont expect them to admit that). And even though most conservatives wont say this to pollsters, in private conversations they will generally acknowledge that Trump is often his own worst enemy.

Most conservatives try to focus on Trumps results rather than on the president himself. Republicans like his judicial appointments, tax cuts, deregulation. And his support for culture-war priorities like the Second Amendment and abortion have also kept conservatives on board. They simply tune out the price the party and the country has paid for these wins.

But theres a part of the equation that has been forgotten. Thanks in part to the polarized climate, the near-banishment of critical voices from pro-Trump media outlets, and the psychological need to defend the leader of their side, conservatives forget that many of these wins are the result of Trumps hand having been forced in a political transaction. Until Trump launched his hostile takeover of the GOP, he was pro-choice, pro-gun-control, and utterly unconcerned about fidelity to the Constitution. He became pro-life and proSecond Amendment because that was the price of widespread conservative support. He agreed to outsource his judicial appointments to the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation precisely because no one trusted his judgment.

Once elected, however, Trump used his ability to influence his core supporters who have outsize power in primaries to punish GOP critics. By taking the scalps of politicians such as former GOP senator Jeff Flake of Arizona, Trump also took the spines of countless others. As a result, the GOP lost control of the House in 2018 and may be on the cusp of losing the Senate and the presidency in 2020.

In a self-pitying tweet over the weekend, the president said he reversed his decision on Doral because the Hostile Media & their Democrat Partners went CRAZY!

This is a dangerous admission. Trumps popularity with Republicans is sustained by the fact he drives the Democrats and media CRAZY! His supporters dont want to hear about him caving to the demands of liberals. But admitting the truth would have been worse; too many Republican legislators couldnt or wouldnt defend his indefensible decision, and they let the president know hed gone too far. Normal presidents feel constrained by the political needs of their party, and it turns out even Trump isnt immune to pressure from his team.

Of course, he feels more constrained by GOP congressional support now that hes staring down the barrel of impeachment. But if Trump had cared more about reciprocating the loyalty he so often demands from the party, he might not be looking at impeachment in the first place. And if the GOP had worked harder at constraining Trump from the beginning, they might not be looking at the implosion of their party.

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GOP Pressure on Trump Was Long Overdue - National Review

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Fourth Estate

Stop punishing the president for lying. Start rewarding him for honesty instead.

By JACK SHAFER

October 22, 2019

Jack Shafer is Politicos senior media writer.

As Donald Trump approached the 1,000th day of his presidency last week, the Washington Post fact-checking team commemorated the milestone by noting that he had made 13,435 false or misleading statements since occupying the White House, an average of 13.4 falsehoods a day. The Posts tally, as well as similar efforts by FactCheck.org, PolitiFact and CNNs Daniel Dale, all but prove that the author of Trumps wetware must have selected lie as his default setting.

In his hourlong remarks during a Monday meeting with his Cabinet, Trump was at it again, repeatedly lying and stretching the truth. He lied about the number of people who attended his recent Dallas rally. He falsely claimed that President Barack Obama tried to call North Korean leader Kim Jong Un 11 times. Once again, he falsely asserted that he was bringing our soldiers back home. He bent reality with the stupid claim that no president besides George Washington ever forfeited his salarywhen both Herbert Hoover and John F. Kennedy did so. He called the emoluments clause phony. And so on and so on. CNNs Dale and co-author Tara Subramaniam identified 20 fibs from Trumps Cabinet monologue.

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A lesser liar might be deterred by platoons of fact-checkers dispensing Pinocchios and Pants on Fire labels to his utterances, but Trump is anything but a lesser liar. No matter the amount of truth-squading the press throws at him, he remains determined to manure the discourse with his lies. Its enough to make the most dedicated fact-checker stop tracking Trump and assume that every word he speaks is a lie.

So should we give up on monitoring him? Of course not. The weatherman doesnt suspend his forecasts just because they fail to discourage hurricanes, tornadoes and superbolts from inflicting mayhem. But perhaps the fact-checkers could be persuaded to augment their approach. Fact-checking starts with the premise that politicians mostly tell the truth and offer only the occasional brazen lie. Trumps case reverses that equationhis true statements are his notable outliers. Because they are so unique, perhaps we should start giving them greater notice in hopes of nudging the president in the direction of accuracy and honesty. As a petulant but devoted reader of the press, Trump would notice a headline reading President Trump Said Something True Yesterday, and maybe tamp down on the lying.

Subjecting the president to this sort of operant conditioning through press coverage is not an entirely new idea. Michael Kinsley tried something like this two years ago in a brief series of New York Times opinion pieces under the rubric of Say Something Nice About Trump that sought to reinforce the presidents policy successes and his creative destruction of the political order. But Kinsleys project didnt do much to steer Trump toward the truth. For that, I think we need to heed the finding of psychological researchers who, several years ago, found that children who lied habitually were more open to reform if told that truthfulness was good than if told lying was bad. Chiding the liars for lying seemed only to make them lie more. Trumps childlike demeanorhis tantrums and fits, his narcissism, his breath-holding when he doesnt get his way, his heavy reliance on mean words, his endless poutinghints that treating him like a kid and rewarding him for truth-telling rather than punishing him for lying might pay modest dividends.

The fact-checkers at PolitiFact already do a version of this by keeping a running score of disputed Trump statements ultimately judged to be true (5 percent of the 723 Trump statements examined so far). A more comprehensive list of things Trump has gotten right wont turn Lyin Trump into Honest Abe overnight. But in a political culture starved for an agreed-upon set of facts from which to debate, a pamphlet (however slim) of collected Trump truths would come in handy, especially should a national security or economic crisis strike. Such a pamphlet might also benefit the president and his staff by giving them a sense of where to find common ground with their foes. Im agnostic on who this job should go toit could go to the fact-checkers, the commentariat, or even Chris Cuomo. Cant you just imagine him in a muscle shirt scribbling like mad on a whiteboard about Trumps latest expression of truth?

The idea that we could prod Trump toward honesty might overestimate his relationship with the truth. Does he even know the difference? As the writer Windsor Mann tweeted this week, When Trump tells the truth, it is by accident. We probably dont want to do anything that might increase the number of Trump accidents, lest we inspire one that causes everything to go kablooey. But even Pinocchio, the Washington Post fact-checkers avatar of lies, was capable of telling the intermittent, rare truth. If a boy born with wood for brains could achieve personhood by proving himself brave and truthful, theres got to be hope for Trump.

******

Lies by the Knickerbockers was my favorite faux Beatles song. Yours? Send hot jams via email to Shafer.Politico@gmail.com. My email alerts reprogrammed my Twitter feed. My RSS feed is still defunct and Im pissed about it.

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How To Trick Trump Into Telling the Truth - POLITICO

Impeaching a U.S. president might not be the be-all-end-allfor their career. We explain why this is the case. Just the FAQs, USA TODAY

As theimpeachment inquiryagainstPresident Donald Trump rapidly unfoldsin Washington,the president is venting his frustration atcampaign rallies where his attacks on House Democrats and the media are serving to further energize his supporters.

Trump, facing impeachment over allegations he improperly used the power of his office to pressureUkraine to investigate his political enemies, isrousing his devotees on the road rather than hunkering down at home. He has derided the accusations as a "witch hunt."

While Trump has faced intense criticism in Washington over the Ukraine scandal and his abrupt pullout of U.S. troops from Syria, he has reveled in the rock-star reception he has receivedat rallies thousands of miles away in Minneapolis and Dallas.

Supporters echo the president'sattacks on impeachment, House Democratsand what Trump calls the "swamp" of Washington, D.C. Like the president, they view impeachment as an illegitimate effort to take him down and defend his phone call with Ukraine's president in which he pushed for an investigation of former vice president Joe Biden, a top political rival. Impeachment, many said, will wind up re-electing Trump in 2020.

President Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2019, at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.(Photo: Jeffrey McWhorter, AP)

James Wilson, 47, a payroll manager in Rowlett who grabbed a front-row seat at Trump's rally in the Dallas sports arena Thursday, saidimpeachment was just another in a long line of attacks including special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

But he likened it to a "boomerang."

"Every time the other side throws something, it comes back and it hits them," Wilsonsaid.

It will never stop, he said.

"The Democrats don't want him in," Wilson said."They're going to do everything they can legally and illegally to get him out. But they're going to lose in 2020."

Supporters of President Donald Trump hold a "Stop Impeachment" rally in front of the US Capitol Oct. 17, 2019 in Washington, DC.(Photo: OLIVIER DOULIERY, AFP via Getty Images)

It's not just Democrats going after Trump, supporters said; it's also members of what the president calls "deep state" of the government bureaucracy.

"I think the swampis fighting back and they're going down hard," saidMary Shea, 65, a retiree from Houston who waited for hours to get into the Dallas arena.

"I don't think he did anything that most other presidents haven'tdone," she said. "All presidents cut around the corners."

The impeachment inquiry centers on Trump's July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Vlodomyr Zelensky, in which he repeatedly urged him to investigate Biden and his son Hunter, who served on the board of Burisma, an energy company in Ukraine.Ukrainian officials have found no evidence of wrongdoing bythe Bidens.

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Trump supporters slammed hisaccusers.

"That's a bunch of guilty people trying to keep their crooks covered up," said Naomi Hodgkins, 64, a semi-retired business consultant from nearby Mesquite, Texas, who wore a button that said "Trump 2020: No More Bullshit."

"They're doing a psychological transference of their guilt to him ... The Biden thing is going to go real deep."

Origins of a conspiracy:Trump's conspiracy theories thrive in Ukraine, where a young democracy battles corruption and distrust

Hodgkins' sentiment was echoed among the president's supporters hundreds of miles north in Minneapolis, where Trump held a rally on Oct. 10, his first campaign event since the impeachment inquiry was announced on Sept. 24.

Impeachment signs sailed above crowds outside the downtown arena, where protesters blew whistles and beat drumsin the rain along Minneapolis' First Avenue. Dallas saw its own share of protesters thrusting similar impeachment signs into the air.

Supporters react as U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a "Keep America Great" Campaign Rally at American Airlines Center on October 17, 2019 in Dallas, Texas.(Photo: Tom Pennington, Getty Images)

Meanwhile, his supporters flocked to rallies, lining up hours and in some cases days ahead of time to get in.

Barb Koy, a Bloomington, Minn., resident who attended Trump's Minneapolis rally, said the inquiry is "another game by the Democrats."

Everybody is tired of it. I know people who voted blue and theyre voting red now because theyre sick of it, she said."I'd think even if you're a Democrat you'd be sick of it."

The Minneapolis rallycame on the heels of a new FoxNews pollthat found 51% of voters supported impeaching Trumpand removing himfrom office, the latest in a string of polls showing a plurality of Americans have shifted their attitudeon impeachment.

Trump campaign press secretaryKayleigh McEnany dismissed the poll as inaccurate.

The campaign and the Republican National Committee are pushing back, spending$10 million onads attacking the impeachment inquiry, with $8 million coming from the campaign itself, McEnany said.

Trump's schedule over the next few weeks has plenty of events that will take him out of Washington.He will attend a 2020 presidential candidate forum in Columbia, S.C. and a natural gas conference in Pittsburgh next week, and has rallies in Tupelo, Miss. and Lexington, Ky. at the beginning of November.

What Americans think:Nearly 3 weeks into the Trump impeachment inquiry, polls show a shift in public opinion

Not all Trump supporters were shrugging of the impeachment inquiry. Some worried it could cast a shadow over his re-election effort.

University of Minnesota student Blake Paulson,one ofdozens who slept in a downtown Minneapolis skywalk ahead of Trump's rally, said he's concerned at how his classmates perceive the impeachment inquiry.

Paulson said students scrolling through social media are taking their cues from headlines that he believes are misleading.

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"They see these headlines and think, 'Oh, he did something bad,' and that's what they go offof," said the 20-year-old, who will cast his first vote for Trump in 2020."These are new voters who are going in with that shallow information and not thinking it through."

"I'm afraid ofa lot that's happening next year," he added.

While several supporters in Minneapolis and Dallas said theyexpect the Democratic-led House to impeach Trump, they contend it would bepolitical act with no meaning. They expressed confidence that Republican-dominated Senate would never vote to convict and remove Trump from office.

Caiden Anderson, 15, a high school sophomore from Alvin, Texas, and a volunteer at the Dallas event, said House Democrats'impeachment drive is "nothing."

"Even if they get it past the House, they won't get it in the Senate," Anderson said.

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Wayland Hunter, a 24-year-old who didn't vote for Trump in 2016 and was attending his first rally in Minneapolis, dismissed the inquiry's legal implications.

"It's just an inquiry," the dental school studentsaid. "It's not even like an official, drawn-out government procedure. It just seems like political staging."

Impeachment will only embolden voters, backers said Trump voters like themselves.

Halona Porter, 45, who works in an auto parts store in Fort Worth, said Trump's enemies "need to give it up, because it's not going to happen."

After 2020, she said. "we're going to have him for another four years."

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'We're going to have him for another four years.' Impeachment fight riles up Donald Trump supporters for 2020 - USA TODAY