Will Mitch McConnell Reject the House Articles as Not Stating an Impeachable Offense?

At Instapundit, "COCAINE MITCH: McConnell Rips Apart Democrats’ ‘Partisan Crusade’ on the Floor of the Senate."

Democrat Rashida Tlaib Celebrates Trump's Impeachment (VIDEO)

Actually, it's perfectly natural to celebrate something for which you've worked so hard.

The problem is that Democrats keep moaning about how solemn and sober are the proceedings.

At Pajamas, "Solemn Much? Rashida Tlaib Shares Giddy Video Celebrating Trump's Impeachment," and the Blaze, "VIDEO: Far-left US Rep. Rashida Tlaib can't hide her happiness as she walks to House to vote for President Trump's impeachment."

So solemn. So somber. pic.twitter.com/H6J6sTBBo8

— The Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) December 19, 2019

Pelosi's Impeachment Disaster

At AoSHQ, "Granny Nasty McBotoxRictus: I'm So Proud of Our Fake Impeachment I'm Scolding the Press Not to Ask About It, and I'm Obstructing it from Going to Trial."

The glare Pelosi gave her caucus when some Dems started to clap after she announced the first article of impeachment passed pic.twitter.com/8vONZlEyZ3

— Peter Stevenson (@PeterWStevenson) December 19, 2019

Robert Stacy McCain on Impeachment

The latest at the Other McCain, "Trump Unites Republicans":

Impeachment has united Republicans in support of Trump, and nowhere is this unity more solid than in the Senate, where Mitch McConnell seems determined that the Democrats’ bogus ginned-up charges against the president will get a fair (but brief) hearing before being dismissed with the contemptuous ridicule it so richly deserves. As might be expected, Nancy Pelosi is not happy about this.

pic.twitter.com/DutxclyZw9

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 19, 2019

Even Clownshow Nonsense Network's Polls Show Trump Winning on Impeachment

At AoSHQ, "lol: Trump Ahead of All Democrats In Another National Poll."

#NEW National General Election:

Trump 44 (+3)
Biden 41

Trump 44 (+5)
Sanders 39

Trump 45 (+8)
Warren 37

Trump 43 (+9)
Bloomberg 34

Trump 43 (+10)
Buttigieg 33

Suffolk University/USA Today Poll https://t.co/UMEwcYkoEu

— Political Polls (@PpollingNumbers) December 17, 2019

BONUS: At the Other McCain, "Impeachment Day Arrives":

Today the Democrats will vote to impeach President Trump for . . .

Uh, whatever. Ever since Trump was elected, Democrats promised they would impeach him if Nancy Pelosi ever got the Speaker’s gavel, and today they will keep that promise. The pretext for this was a “whistleblower” — a Democrat holdover on the National Security Council staff — who went running to Adam Schiff with a wild tale about Trump’s July phone call to the newly elected president of Ukraine. All questions about that phone call were answered by Trump through the simple expedient of releasing the transcript. But having worked themselves into an impeachment frenzy over this, Democrats refused to acknowledge that Trump had beat them, and continued stumbling onward...

Keep reading.

Payback: Rep. Doug Collins Warns Next Democratic President Could Be Impeached (VIDEO)

It's true.

Democrats never seem to think their machinations will come back to bite them.

At the Epoch Times, "‘Payback’: Republicans Warn Next Democratic President Could Be Impeached."

Alan Dershowitz, The Case Against Impeaching Trump

At Amazon, Alan Dershowitz, The Case Against Impeaching Trump.

Andrew C. McCarthy, Ball of Collusion

At Amazon, Andrew C. McCarthy, Ball of Collusion: The Plot to Rig an Election and Destroy a Presidency.

Mitch McConnell Rejects Charles Schumer’s Opening Offer on Impeachment Trial (VIDEO)

He's the Senate Minority Butthurt Leader, at Politico, "McConnell rejects Schumer’s opening offer on impeachment trial: “It is not the Senate’s job to leap into the breach and search desperately for ways to get to ‘guilty,’” McConnell says."

This Impeachment is Different

A surprisingly interesting piece, from Lawrence Lessig, at Politco, "This Impeachment Is Different—and More Dangerous":

Thanks to the Internet and a media environment of echo chambers, impeachment in 2019 is fundamentally different from impeachment in 1868, 1974, & 1998https://t.co/aFAQnFHkxQ

— Fareed Zakaria (@FareedZakaria) December 9, 2019

The impeachment of Donald Trump will happen in a radically different media environment — again. (In Clinton’s impeachment, standing between Trump’s and Nixon’s, the effects were consistent but muted relative to today.) Polling persists, indeed it has expanded, and so politicians will know how the proceedings are playing among their own voters. But as information channels have multiplied, real “broadcast democracy”—the shared and broad engagement with a common set of facts—has disappeared. An abundance of choice means fewer focus on the news, and those who do are more engaged politically, and more partisan. No doubt, there is more published today about impeachment across a wide range of media than before, but it lives within different and smaller niches.

That division will have a profound effect on how this impeachment will matter to Americans. In short, it will matter differently depending on how those Americans come to understand reality. In a study published last month, the research institute PRRI found that 55 percent of “Republicans for whom Fox News is their primary news source say there is nothing Trump could do to lose their approval, compared to only 29 percent of Republicans who do not cite Fox News as their primary news source.” That 26-percentage-point difference is driven not just by politics but by the media source.

This means that as the story of impeachment develops, it will be understood differently across the network-based tribes of America. The correlation among conservatives and liberals alike that drove Nixon from the White House won’t be visible in 2020—because it won’t be there. Regardless of what happens, on one side, it will be justice delivered. On the other, justice denied.

That difference, in turn, will radically constrain the politicians who Americans have entrusted to render judgment on the president. The reality of Fox News Republicans will be persistently visible to red-state representatives. More idealistic, less inherently partisan senators, such as Ben Sasse of Nebraska, might have a view of the “right” thing in their heart of hearts, but they will be forced to choose between what they know and what they know their very distinctive voting public believes. So far, few have faced that choice with courage.

Though the president was wrong to invoke it in this context, the Civil War may well have been the last time we suffered a media environment like this. Then, it was censorship laws that kept the truths of the North separated from the truths of the South. And though there was no polling, the ultimate support for the war, at least as manifested initially, demonstrated to each of those separated publics a depth of tribal commitment that was as profound and as tragic as any in our history. That commitment, driven by those different realities, led America into the bloodiest war in its history.

We’re not going to war today. We are not separated by geography, and we’re not going to take machetes to our neighbors. But the environment of our culture today leaves us less able to work through fundamental differences than at any time in our past. Indeed, as difference drives hate, hate pays—at least the media companies and too many politicians...

RTWT.

No One is Above the Law (VIDEO)

From Tucker's show last night, a real barn-burner.

Declining Public Support for President Trump's Impeachment

This is the Emerson poll everyone was citing yesterday, which includes the significant drop off in support for impeachment among independents.

The Democrats are losing on this.

November National Poll: Support for Impeachment Declines; Biden & Sanders Lead Democratic Primary. Via ⁦@EmersonPolling⁩ #impeachment ⁦@JoeBiden⁩ ⁦@BernieSanders⁩ ⁦@realDonaldTrump⁩ https://t.co/ijbM8q8uNC

— Major Garrett (@MajorCBS) November 21, 2019

How Republicans Won Phase One of Impeachment

From Mollie Hemingway, at the Federalist:

The first phase of impeachment did not go well for Democrats. It needed to be a time when support for the inquiry and impeachment grew. Instead, it shrank. Here’s why. https://t.co/iynnqKRnV5

— Mollie (@MZHemingway) November 22, 2019

Elise Stefanik, Sole Republican Woman on Intelligence Committee, Stood Up to Adam Schiff During Marie Yovanovitch Testimony (VIDEO)

Schiff's a bully and a clown.

At Fox News, "GOP Rep. Stefanik mocks Schiff, reads his tweets and interviews about whistleblower testimony."

Holy cow. Rep. @EliseStefanik absolutely wrecks Adam Schiff & the Democrats’ entire impeachment premise.pic.twitter.com/sUJEMwa0Tw

— Liz Wheeler (@Liz_Wheeler) November 15, 2019

Sham Impeachment

Seen just now:

This impeachment is a sham! pic.twitter.com/VsA5N3FGxY

— Trump War Room (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TrumpWarRoom) November 13, 2019

House Republicans Plan to Call Hunter Biden in Upcoming Public Impeachment Hearings

Well, this oughta be good.

At the Epoch Times, "Republicans Request Hunter Biden, Whistleblower, DNC Consultant Testify in Impeachment Inquiry."

More at Memeorandum.

Trump's Campaign Says Election Is His to Lose

A great piece, at McClatchy, "Trump’s well-oiled campaign has everything planned — except Trump":

“He’s no Mr. Nice Guy” but sometimes it takes a Donald Trump to get the job done.@realDonaldTrump’s campaign is ready for battle. https://t.co/4YFnFBpX3z

— Brad Parscale (@parscale) November 5, 2019

President Donald Trump fiddled for months with a 2020 election message that would be ready for primetime. His top two campaign aides — Jared Kushner and Brad Parscale — sought a message that would resonate with the president’s core political base and also reach skeptical independents.

Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and most trusted adviser devising the campaign’s strategy, and Parscale, his campaign manager, turned to Larry Weitzner, a top political advertising consultant behind many of Trump’s 2016 ads.

Weitzner produced a spot with a new slogan: “He’s no Mr. Nice Guy.”

Trump loved it. He called Parscale and told him to air it during the World Series.

One year away from a referendum on his presidency, Trump and his campaign are embracing elements of his political identity that have sharply divided the nation. The same instinctive, mercurial president remains at the helm. But this time he sits atop a campaign infrastructure fueled by an unprecedented war chest, a sophisticated digital operation and a disciplined staff.

“We’re going to be attacked. We don’t care. But we’re not going to be nice about it,” said Katrina Pierson, a senior advisor to Trump’s reelection campaign, about the slogan her bosses loved so much.

But Trump’s senior aides have a slogan of their own that reminds them of their task: Only Trump can beat Trump. The race, in their minds, is his to lose.

Trump’s allies worry those same political instincts that won him the presidency also led to the impeachment inquiry — a strategy to collect opposition research on a political opponent gone too far, involving foreign powers, that might have circumvented the official campaign.

Some aides fear that Trump’s effort to compel Ukraine, and possibly China, to investigate and release information on former Vice President Joe Biden and his family is just one example of his unpredictability.

Indeed, it is the first time in modern political history that a president has been subject to an impeachment inquiry during his first term.

“On issue after issue the president has accomplished the things that he ran on despite the most devastating headwinds that any president has ever faced with a Democrat Party doing everything they can to nullify the election of 2016 since day one,” said Ronna McDaniel, chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, who participates in daily calls with Kushner and Parscale on strategy.

Matt Schlapp, American Conservative Union chairman and a White House ally, said the president is favored to win — if he can stay focused on his agenda and good news on the economy while fighting the impeachment inquiry.

“Are you asking me if I wish the president would stay on message? My answer would be one word: Yes,” he said...

More.

One Year Out, a Nation Divided

It's one year until election 2020, and we're divided as a nation, as divided as ever.

At the Associated Press, "1 Year Out: A divided nation lurches toward 2020 election":

One year to go: A divided nation lurches toward the 2020 election, a contest that will be a referendum on Trump’s vision for American culture and the nation’s role in the world, reports @jpaceDC: https://t.co/chgFu10xTq

— AP Politics (@AP_Politics) November 3, 2019

WASHINGTON (AP) — One year from Sunday, voters will decide whether to grant President Donald Trump a second term in office, an election that will be a referendum on Trump’s vision for America’s culture and role in the world.

Much is unknown about how the United States and its politics will look on Nov. 3, 2020.

Who will Trump’s opponent be? How will Democrats resolve the ideological, generational and demographic questions roiling their primary? Will a strong economy shore up Trump’s support or will recession warning signs turn into a reality? Will Trump face voters as just the third American president to have been impeached by the House of Representatives?

“It seems like Republicans and Democrats are intractable,” said Mark Updegrove, a presidential historian and chairman of the Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation. “They are both adhering to their own versions of reality, whether they’re based in truth or not.”

The political divisions today reflect societal and economic schisms between more rural, largely white communities where the economy depends on industries being depleted by outsourcing and automation, and more urban, racially diverse areas dominated by a service economy and where technology booms are increasing wealth.

Many of those divisions existed before Trump, but his presidency has exacerbated them. Trump has panned his political opponents as “human scum,” while Democrats view his vision for America’s future as anathema to the country’s founding values.

Indeed, no president in the history of public opinion polling has faced such deep and consistent partisan polarization.

Polling conducted by Gallup shows that an average of 86% of Republicans have approved of Trump over the course of his time in office, and no less than 79% have approved in any individual poll. That’s compared with just 7% of Democrats who have approved on average, including no more than 12% in any individual poll.

One thing that does unite the parties: voters’ widespread interest in the presidential campaign, even at this early phase. A poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows 82% of Democrats and 74% of Republicans are already interested in the election.

To win, Trump’s campaign needs to recreate the enthusiasm among his core supporters, a task that isn’t always easy for an incumbent burdened with a four-year record in office. But Trump is already leaning hard into the strict immigration policies that enlivened his supporters in 2016, while trying to convince more skeptical Republicans that Democrats are moving so far left as to be outside of the mainstream...

Keep reading.

Whites Without College Degrees Are the Reserve Army of the GOP

From Matthew Continetti, at Free Beacon, "The Reserve Army of the GOP":

The Democratic difficulty has a name: the Electoral College. Twice in the twenty-first century, the level of the presidential vote has mattered less than its distribution. Trump's people are spread much more evenly across the country than his opponents are. His base of white voters without college degrees, say Teixeira and Halpin, "make up more than half of all eligible voters in critical Electoral College states he won in 2016—including Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania—and in key target states for 2020 such as New Hampshire."

Non-college white voters comprised the largest part of the electorate in 2016. Trump won them 63 percent to 31 percent. That margin more than compensated for his 7-point loss among whites with college degrees. Teixeira and Halpin predict that the number of white voters without college degrees will drop next year. But they also recognize that Trump can still win. "If he increased his support across states among these voters by 10 margin points, he would in fact carry the popular vote, albeit by just 1 percentage point."

Keep reading.

New York Times Upshot / Siena College 2020 Battleground Polls: Across 6 Battleground States Voters Oppose Impeaching & Removing Trump 52-44 Percent

Democrats are going to hate themselves in the morning.

At AoSHQ, "Poll: Across Six Swing States, Voters Oppose Removing Trump From Office."