Who is Really on Trial?

The slow drip of damning facts continue to reaffirm The Don and his crime gang’s shakedown of Ukraine.

As a result of Lev Parnas damning and riveting interview with Rachel Maddow this week-which implicated practically everyone in the administration except the president’s cook*-I have been thinking of producing “I Love Lev” t-shirts and buttons.

Anyone want to go in on a business venture with me? For starters, we can set up a cart outside of the Trump Hotel, as I heard there are people paying good coin for the booze; some like Robert Hyde get so intoxicated that they decide to curry favor with The Don by setting up surveillance of Marie Yovanovitch, America’s former ambassador to Ukraine. (Remember, she’s the one that The Don said would be “going through some things.” Never did she imagine she would be monitored by her own government!)

Text’s show that Hyde was sending messages about Marie’s whereabouts in an attempt to catch her doing something egregious and justify her firing.

Here are a few of Hyde’s texts to Lev:

“She’s talked to three people. Her phone is off. Computer is off.”

“She’s next to the embassy.”

“Not in the embassy.”

Rumor has it that Hyde surveilled Maria entering the women’s bathroom and instructed the thug following her to change the sign to “Men”, but he was caught in the act by another woman who called the local authorities on him.

Madcap stuff.

I hope C-Span covers that trial as it will be must see TV and will actually have witnesses. And given the Republican game plan of denial and blind allegiance to The Don, there might be a better chance of convicting him through the trial of the Ukrainian thug.

The Don keeps insisting it was a “perfect phone call” and his Republican colluders say: maybe it wasn’t perfection but perfection is so overrated.

He keeps insisting that he barely knew Parness, even though every day new photos of the two of them emerge with big smiles on their faces. Pictures of Lev with Don Jr, Ivanka and Jared have also just surfaced. Seems there are enough photos to make a family photo album.  We can title it: “Lev and the First Family’s Illicit Adventures,” though we are still waiting for the one where Lev has his arm around Melania before it can go to press. Supposedly, there is a special pullout section with Lev and Rudy G. That part is entitled: “Two Thugs With Some Ugly Mugs”!

Even the finding by the independent Government Accountability Office, that The Don’s withholding of money appropriated by Congress for Ukraine was illegal, had no teeth with the Republican Party, which from this point on will be referred to as the “Immoralist Party.”

The agency found that the White House violated the law because it did not notify Congress about withholding the spending. Instead, the administration was arguing that it had the right to determine the “best use of such funds,” ignoring Congress’s power to set spending requirements.

According to the G.A.O.  “Faithful execution of the law does not permit the president to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law,” the accountability office wrote in an opinion released Thursday. “The withholding was not a programmatic delay.”

The White House response was: “we thought we dissolved this agency; and anyway, why are these people so obsessed with the law as it is so overrated!”

The Republican Senators’ response was: “Did you have to wake us up from my nap to tell me that?”

Republican strategy to the new revelations was summed up beautifully by Martha McSally, Senator of Arizona.

When McSally was asked a by a CNN reporter whether she would consider the new evidence being released, she snorted that the reporter was “a liberal hack.”

An hour or two later, her campaign created a fund raiser with her snort. If you recall McSally lost her race to Krysten Sinema, but was appointed to serve out John McCain’s term. Seems McSally has decided that being as much of a belligerent asshole as The Don will lead her to victory in November. Arizona we turn our desperate eyes to you.

I was not a fan of John McCain, but boy what I would give to see his response to the current circumstances. Between his hatred of The Don (remember the joy he had giving his famous thumbs down Obamacare vote?) and his commitment to protecting our democracy, I believe he would not be cow-towing to The Don. What would have been really interesting was to see what the despicable Lindsey Graham would have done with the conscience of McCain hovering over him. Might have made great political theater.

Let’s face it. The facts are very clear: The Don committed an egregious impeachable offense. He abused his power and has been covering up Congress’s attempt to get to the truth by refusing to turn over documents and not allowing witnesses to testify. He is guilty as charged. Now even the Republican defense that he didn’t commit a crime is neutered by the G.A.O., which unequivocally stated that The Don’s actions violated the law. That sounds like a criminal act, right?

I am sick and tired of pundits lamenting about how The Don has taken over the Republican Party, oops I mean the Immoralist Party. Please spare me the victimhood nonsense.  The Senators are grown-ups. Charged with protecting our democracy, they are enacting the story of Pinocchio in reverse; they have gone from humans to puppets with an evil Geppetto playing them. In this version Geppetto’s nose is always elongated because he never stops lying.

The Don is the person on trial but it is actually the Immoralist Party that really is on trial.

Their unwillingness to honor the oath they took on the Senate floor as Chief Justice Roberts swore them in as jurors is not only dishonorable, but a big middle finger to the people of this country and to democracy itself. Their compliance and collusion with the evil puppet master neuters what is supposed to be a co- equal branch of government; it reduces congress to what Groucho Marx has called “a mockery of a travesty of a sham.”

In essence, once they choose the position of cult member, they bestow upon The Don even more power than he already has; the criminal and huckster escapes again. His vindication allows him to abuse his power even more than he already has.

It makes me think of the moment at a wedding when the person presiding says: “If anyone can show just cause why this couple cannot lawfully be joined together in matrimony, let them speak now or forever hold their peace.” In the Senate, someone needs to get up and say: “Anyone with a commitment to democracy and a sense of morality speak now; if you don’t, we are in for anything but peace”.