Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP can you explain, in words, what is "sloppy" and "incompetent" about all this? Either Trump tried to leverage the official power of the U.S. government for personal gain in an election, or he did not. It doesn't even have to be technically bribery. I'm a federal employee, and if I even tried to buy stock in one of my regulated entities, I could be fired or put in jail. It's basic government ethics.

It's definitely not bribery.

It's incompetent because every functional administration has a prepared script when talking with foreign leaders. The staff runs the call with the President adding talking points. This clown puts Ivanka on the calls routinely. It's sloppy because every administration users, to some degree, foreign policy interaction for domestic political gain. You don't do it on a call with dozens listening.

It's not really that material because there was no real damage. Ukraine received the aid, nobody was investigated. The Hunter Biden board membership was obviously inappropriate, so it's certainly topical.

This isn't the worst thing Trump's done this year. The Turkey/Kurds thing was easily 1000x worse. Calling Baltimore names was worse. Insulting allies was worse.

This is inappropriate, but it's not bribery obviously and it's not a high crime.

Anonymous wrote:Clearly it's inappropriate. I'm not sure if criminal, more sloppy incompetence.

But it's not impeachable, and there is zero chance for the Senate to convict.

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being an impeachable high crime and 1 being jaywalking, this is maybe a 6 or 7.

Anonymous wrote:So OP I just want to make sure I understand you clearly.
It is your opinion as a patriotic American that a President can ask his personal attorney and a bunch of corrupt people (Igor and Lev) to conspire with a corrupt foreign official (lutsenko) to spread misinformation about a US ambassador to undermine her efforts to follow official US policy (protecting Ukraine from Russia and bolstering anti corruption efforts in Ukraine). It is also ok with you that these efforts jeopardized the personal safety of our Ambassador so she had to leave the country with a few hours notice. Her departure left the way clear for the three amigos (Rudy, Perry and Sondland) to pursue financial deals that benefited them and their donors/associates and also enabled them to pressure the Ukrainian govt to investigate the President’s political opponent. This is in addition to using tax payer funded military aid to extort these investigations and a public announcement by Zelensky on CNN. Thanks to the whistleblower the scheme was not successful but not for want for trying
The other consideration is that every malign foreign actor now knows that all they have to do is influence a highly suggestible US President with a conspiracy theory that is in his personal self interest and he will run with it and even attack his own institutions to pursue it. They can this destroy our national security apparatus from within (our intelligence community, the FBI, the State Department). Our IC agents and our diplomats are increasingly vulnerable. As Yovanovitch stated in her testimony the system is failing when US foreign policy can be hijacked by corrupt foreign actors. OP the stakes are incredibly high.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP is why we need to bring back civics in high school. Or OP is Russian.

+1

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP can you explain, in words, what is "sloppy" and "incompetent" about all this? Either Trump tried to leverage the official power of the U.S. government for personal gain in an election, or he did not. It doesn't even have to be technically bribery. I'm a federal employee, and if I even tried to buy stock in one of my regulated entities, I could be fired or put in jail. It's basic government ethics.

It's definitely not bribery.

It's incompetent because every functional administration has a prepared script when talking with foreign leaders. The staff runs the call with the President adding talking points. This clown puts Ivanka on the calls routinely. It's sloppy because every administration users, to some degree, foreign policy interaction for domestic political gain. You don't do it on a call with dozens listening.

It's not really that material because there was no real damage. Ukraine received the aid, nobody was investigated. The Hunter Biden board membership was obviously inappropriate, so it's certainly topical.

This isn't the worst thing Trump's done this year. The Turkey/Kurds thing was easily 1000x worse. Calling Baltimore names was worse. Insulting allies was worse.

This is inappropriate, but it's not bribery obviously and it's not a high crime.

Anonymous wrote:So OP I just want to make sure I understand you clearly.
It is your opinion as a patriotic American that a President can ask his personal attorney and a bunch of corrupt people (Igor and Lev) to conspire with a corrupt foreign official (lutsenko) to spread misinformation about a US ambassador to undermine her efforts to follow official US policy (protecting Ukraine from Russia and bolstering anti corruption efforts in Ukraine). It is also ok with you that these efforts jeopardized the personal safety of our Ambassador so she had to leave the country with a few hours notice. Her departure left the way clear for the three amigos (Rudy, Perry and Sondland) to pursue financial deals that benefited them and their donors/associates and also enabled them to pressure the Ukrainian govt to investigate the President’s political opponent. This is in addition to using tax payer funded military aid to extort these investigations and a public announcement by Zelensky on CNN. Thanks to the whistleblower the scheme was not successful but not for want for trying
The other consideration is that every malign foreign actor now knows that all they have to do is influence a highly suggestible US President with a conspiracy theory that is in his personal self interest and he will run with it and even attack his own institutions to pursue it. They can this destroy our national security apparatus from within (our intelligence community, the FBI, the State Department). Our IC agents and our diplomats are increasingly vulnerable. As Yovanovitch stated in her testimony the system is failing when US foreign policy can be hijacked by corrupt foreign actors. OP the stakes are incredibly high.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"High Crime" is not defined. PPs proclaiming that this is not a high crime are offering opinions and nothing more.

Of course. But it's going to be the opinion of a majority of the Senate. And I'm guessing they are not Russian spies.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP can you explain, in words, what is "sloppy" and "incompetent" about all this? Either Trump tried to leverage the official power of the U.S. government for personal gain in an election, or he did not. It doesn't even have to be technically bribery. I'm a federal employee, and if I even tried to buy stock in one of my regulated entities, I could be fired or put in jail. It's basic government ethics.

It's definitely not bribery.

It's incompetent because every functional administration has a prepared script when talking with foreign leaders. The staff runs the call with the President adding talking points. This clown puts Ivanka on the calls routinely. It's sloppy because every administration users, to some degree, foreign policy interaction for domestic political gain. You don't do it on a call with dozens listening.

It's not really that material because there was no real damage. Ukraine received the aid, nobody was investigated. The Hunter Biden board membership was obviously inappropriate, so it's certainly topical.

This isn't the worst thing Trump's done this year. The Turkey/Kurds thing was easily 1000x worse. Calling Baltimore names was worse. Insulting allies was worse.

This is inappropriate, but it's not bribery obviously and it's not a high crime.

Anonymous wrote:"High Crime" is not defined. PPs proclaiming that this is not a high crime are offering opinions and nothing more.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP can you explain, in words, what is "sloppy" and "incompetent" about all this? Either Trump tried to leverage the official power of the U.S. government for personal gain in an election, or he did not. It doesn't even have to be technically bribery. I'm a federal employee, and if I even tried to buy stock in one of my regulated entities, I could be fired or put in jail. It's basic government ethics.

It's definitely not bribery.

It's incompetent because every functional administration has a prepared script when talking with foreign leaders. The staff runs the call with the President adding talking points. This clown puts Ivanka on the calls routinely. It's sloppy because every administration users, to some degree, foreign policy interaction for domestic political gain. You don't do it on a call with dozens listening.

It's not really that material because there was no real damage. Ukraine received the aid, nobody was investigated. The Hunter Biden board membership was obviously inappropriate, so it's certainly topical.

This isn't the worst thing Trump's done this year. The Turkey/Kurds thing was easily 1000x worse. Calling Baltimore names was worse. Insulting allies was worse.

This is inappropriate, but it's not bribery obviously and it's not a high crime.

Anonymous wrote:OP can you explain, in words, what is "sloppy" and "incompetent" about all this? Either Trump tried to leverage the official power of the U.S. government for personal gain in an election, or he did not. It doesn't even have to be technically bribery. I'm a federal employee, and if I even tried to buy stock in one of my regulated entities, I could be fired or put in jail. It's basic government ethics.

Anonymous wrote:OP is why we need to bring back civics in high school. Or OP is Russian.

Anonymous wrote:This was a perfect phone call. I cannot wait to vote again for president trump!