Send Out the Clowns

(By American Zen's Mike Flannigan, on loan from Ari)

“There must be some way out of here,” said the joker to the thief 
“There’s too much confusion, I can’t get no relief." - Bob Dylan, "All Along the Watchtower"

As promised by the Republican Party, the first day of the open impeachment hearings had all the elements of a circus. It had the usual rodeo clowns Devin Nunes (R-Moo), Jim Jordan (R-No, Seriously, Dude, Where's My Fucking Jacket?!), a right wing hack lawyer named Steven Castor who looked and acted like someone you'd get from the state Bar Association if you can't afford your own attorney. It even featured a New Jersey drag queen named Pissi Myles who might or might not have been Rudy Giuliani doing recon.

     On the Republican side, there was enough nihilism to satisfy Friedrich Nietzsche for a year or more. Indeed, the Republican Crazy Horse started right out of the gate when Devin Nunes advanced several conspiracy theories such as a “three-year-long operation by the Democrats, the corrupt media, and partisan bureaucrats to overturn the results of the 2016 election.” Then he accused Democrats of trying to get nude pictures of Trump from Russia and of fostering a “cult-like atmosphere” in closed door depositions that were done in accordance with rules set by the Republicans during the 115th Congress.

     And this was all before career diplomats George Kent and William Taylor had a chance to say a word. It was a juxtaposition of extreme opposites that otherwise could only be made possible with a resurrection of Dag Hammarskjöld and the Three Stooges of "Disorder in the Court." Barring any guidance from the White House, the GOP had obviously long ago come to the conclusion that there's no way they can defend their boy, who along with his lawyer and acting chief of staff, had admitted his guilt on numerous occasions, with colluding with Ukraine to investigate the Bidens and even themselves in return for $391 million in Congressionally-allocated military aid. So all they have left is conspiracy theories and rodeo clown tricks that, thus far, are not working.

     Republicans all over the Hill are complaining about rules they themselves set in place five years ago because now Pelosi and Schiff control those rules as well as the majority in the House and the three pertinent committees tasked with overseeing the impeachment inquiries. The reactions and tactics of Republicans in both chambers range from outright avoiding answering impeachment-related questions, insulting the reporters who ask them, head-butting cameras, and, in Lindsey Graham's case (after demanding to see the impeachment transcripts), refusing to read the impeachment transcripts.

     Indeed, this study in opposites, the Cronkitean testimony of Bill Taylor and the bow-tied three piece-suited George Kent gave a masterful beginner's tutorial on Ukrainian foreign policy and politics. In response, the Republicans on the Intelligence Committee invited comparisons to Mack Sennett, Hal Roach and the Three Stooges. Because, if one were to accept at face value what just Nunes and Jordan were serving up, the American public would've had to accept:

     That the Ukrainians, not the Russians, interfered in the 2016 election by hacking into the DNC server, which they still have hidden in the Ukraine despite the best efforts of Rudy Giuliani who seeks corruption wherever he goes (supposedly to eradicate it, not to indulge in it), then Ukraine blamed the Russians, that Vice President Biden insisted on Ukraine's Prosecutor General to investigate corruption and instead singlehandedly got Viktor Shokin, an honest, crusading figure who also sought out corruption, fired to protect his son Hunter. And that Donald Trump, himself a crime buster straight out of a comic if the RNC commissioned a comic book, spearheaded this rooting out of Ukrainian corruption because there's none in his own government.

The Regular Irregulars

The whole idea of the public impeachment hearings that will resume tomorrow morning with Masha Yovanovitch was not to dredge up anything new, because, as Nancy Pelosi said recently, the Democrats already have more than enough evidence to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate. After all, the full and unstructured transcripts of the closed door depositions had already been released. The whole idea of opening the doors was to let the American people hear for themselves the testimony. It is transparency at its most American, the kind of glasnost that made Soviet politicos tremble.

     But on that front, new information, undoubtedly the biggest revelation was from Bill Taylor who in his opening statement said that at least one State Department official had overheard (now the number's grown to two) a phone call between Trump and EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland on July 26th, the day after the infamous phone conversation between Trump and Zelensky (that the Russians may have listened in on). The July 26 phone call was intended to follow up on and solidify the Ukrainians' involvement in the announcement of sham investigations into Vice President Biden and his son Hunter, an announcement we now know was to be held, Hostage-of-terrorists style, on CNN's cameras.

     Republicans who otherwise insist the Ukrainians are corrupt and untrustworthy nonetheless found it in their better nature to believe President Zelensky when he said recently that he felt no pressure from Trump to do any such thing in exchange for the military aid and an invaluable trip to the White House. Which is about the standard line one can expect from a man who still has a gun to his head and still completely dependent on the caprices of his kidnapper for survival.

     But Ambassador Taylor, who is still the State Department's top man in Ukraine, also gave us more detail regarding the shadow "diplomatic" policy working at odds with the official State Department policy that had just one thing in common- Engineering a White House visit between Trump and Zelensky. At one point, the GOP attorney, Steve Castor, was reduced to asking Taylor if this irregular foreign policy spearheaded by Giuliani was "less outlandish" than it could have been. 

     In response, Taylor laughed at him and admitted, yes, it could have been more outlandish. Taylor laughed, obviously, because he just realized the Republicans' own legal counsel essentially admitted it was outlandish on some appreciable level. There were a few other laughs to be had in yesterday's otherwise serious testimony but they were inevitably at the expense of Republicans. One example was when Jim Jordan demanded the whistleblower testify because that's the person that "started this whole thing" and Congressman Welch agreed and said the guy who actually did put the impeachment inquiries in motion, Donald Trump, is invited to take a seat where the ambassadors were then sitting.

     And with Masha Yovanovitch's testimony tomorrow, we again should not expect new revelations, although we may again hear greater detail about certain things, such as Giuliani's role in trying to secure lucrative positions for two of his cronies in a Ukrainian energy company or why she felt she needed to flee Ukraine even while she was still our top ambassador there. Perhaps she'll reveal very real reasons to fear for her life just prior to her abrupt and wholly unnecessary recall.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Vienna

Meanwhile, hardly mentioned in the hundreds of pages of Congressional deposition transcripts are Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas, two Soviet-born crooks who were arrested on October 9th at Dulles Airport over campaign finance violations. Both Fruman and Parnass, who have close ties to Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, have been called to testify to Congress during the impeachment hearings. Since they're now incarcerated and considered a flight risk, considering where they were captured, it remains to be seen whether or not they'll be forthcoming in their testimony (Hint: Don't expect much, considering both men had pleaded not guilty to the campaign finance charges). They were on their way to Vienna via Frankfurt, Germany.

     But just hours before their highly-publicized arrest, Fruman and Parnass had had lunch with Rudy Giuliani, their personal attorney, at Trump International Hotel in DC. While that in itself could not have boded anything good for Team Trump, what was truly interesting was what they'd found in the mobsters' luggage when they searched it. Among the items were five cell phones, a lot of cash and, most bizarrely considering all the money they had on them, straws from that same Trump International. Most interestingly, they also found the business card of a Ukrainian prosecutor who'd already met with Giuliani to discuss the conspiracy theories that helped touch off the impeachment investigation.

     The business card belonged to Nazar Kholodnytsky, the current corrupt Prosecutor General who'd last May met with Giuliani in Paris to discuss the twin conspiracy theories involving the Bidens and Ukraine's so-called interference in the 2016 election. Kholodnytsky was caught on tape "coaching a witness to give false testimony and tipping off suspects to police raids" in unrelated cases. So, if we're to believe Giuliani valiantly tries to root out corruption wherever he goes, he won't have to look very far or hard considering the company he keeps.

    Vienna, by the way, was where Giuliani was about to fly to when his lunch dates Fruman and Parnas were arrested at Dulles. To this day, Mayor Rudy still won't tell anyone what he was going to do there or with whom he was going to meet. But odds are pretty good they would've met with Kholodnytsky to discuss Trump's pet fever dreams.

    Parnas was the one who, by his own account in conversations with fellow henchmen associates, personally convinced Trump to recall Marie Yovanovitch from Ukraine. Actually both Russians lobbied for her removal when they saw she was going to be an obstacle to their corrupt wet dreams and Giuliani was right in the thick of it. This was part of the "irregular" shadow foreign policy in Kiev.

      Considering how much time and money Giuliani had spent jet setting all over Europe like a bloated, aging playboy, one thing is clear- He is the linchpin in this whole impeachment inquiry and we obviously have not heard all the facts, yet. Maybe Fruman and Parnas will surprise us and be forthcoming before Congress. But, while Giuliani may claim Trump, a man who regards loyalty to others as a sign of weakness, will never roll over on him, in case he does, he's got an insurance policy in place.

     Right after Mayor Rudy said that, his lawyer cut in and sharply said, "He's joking!" before abruptly terminating the interview.