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https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50246324
"The US House of Representatives has passed a resolution to formally proceed with the impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump.
The measure details how the inquiry will move into a more public phase. It was not a vote on whether the president should be removed from office.
This was the first test of support in the Democratic-controlled House for the impeachment process.
The White House condemned the vote, which passed along party lines.
Only two Democrats - representing districts that Mr Trump won handily in 2016 - voted against the resolution, along with all Republicans, for a total count of 232 in favour and 196 against."
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Trump Impeachment: House Votes to Formalise Inquiry
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The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Fraud is the homage that force pays to reason.
-- Charles Curtis, "A Commonplace Book"
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @03:44PM (30 children)
Christ, this site has descended into a Facebook closed group. Might as well go back to \. What a sad, pathetic state of affairs.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @04:01PM (2 children)
Is you feel this way due to the shortage of orange man bad takes on this news, you may to consider that you might be looking at a more representative slice of society than e.g. the New York Times comment pages.
Trump is now up in the polls following the impeachment proceedings. And it may still be the case that pollsters are understating his support. To put it another way, at least the majority of people find the impeachment stuff rather less than compelling. It's a political circus that's just fueling the stupid partisanship in our nation today. To say nothing of the fact that congress could actually be doing work to make the lives of the people better instead of spending taxpayer resources and their time engaging in said circus. It's a disgrace.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @05:14PM
This used to be a reasonably distinct slice of the population that generally couldn’t, here at least, possibly care less about red-blue poo-flinging.
What a waste. Sad.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 02 2019, @05:20AM
Uneducated rural superstitious deplorables? Not representative, just loud.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Scottingham on Friday November 01 2019, @04:05PM (15 children)
For real, reading this trash feels like taking crazy pills.
What part of withholding hundreds of millions of dollars of already appropriated funds in exchange for a sham political investigation into a democratic presidential candidate's son is NOT a major crime/scandal/impeachable offense?
For fucks sake.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday November 01 2019, @04:49PM (3 children)
It wasn't a "sham political investigation" though. Real crimes were committed in Ukraine, and Biden Junior was privy to a lot of them.
(Score: 1) by Scottingham on Friday November 01 2019, @06:13PM (2 children)
What crimes? Were they ever enumerated? Trump wanted Ukraine to publicly announce they were investigating, but never mentioned into what, or why? They wanted to be able to say 'Look, Ukraine said they'd investigating the Bidens...must be bad! Vote for me!'
Nepotism, while bad, is not a crime (kind of hypocritical to bring up though, given Trumps affinity for it). Not sure why you think I'd think (or any other person thinking what happened was illegal/impeachable) we're A-OK with Biden getting on that board. It's just that -
ugh, fuck this. I was going to continue, but this is a bad-faith bullshit cesspool.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @07:33PM (1 child)
Yup, anyone defending trump at this point is willfully ignoring reality and supporting corruption and outright criminal behavior. It is astoundingly clear, yet we continue to get the same blind bullshit as you say.
Aristarchus and Azuma are absolutely correct about this site.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday November 02 2019, @02:20AM
I hate that it's come to this! I never wanted to feel or think this way, these things, about a site like this! It had so much potential, so much promise, and to see it reduced to this...is nauseating. (Also I'm not too happy to be lumped in with Ari, as we have very, very different methods and I've warned him several times he's blown his own credibility with his stupid trolling approach, but what can you do?)
Have to say this, though: it's been a very educational ride, and one that's allowed me to see what crazy looks like and watch people being radicalized real-time. We have some sad, sorry cases on here who are going to die on this idiot hill, and die laughing. I've learned what it is to deal with beings who willfully, gleefully, maliciously, throw their humanity and critical thinking aside for nothing more than a brief feeling of superiority. I've learned that there are people who will happily sell their souls for nothing more than the equivalent of feeling like they're on the winning side.
All in all, it's things I've needed to learn, as it's a microcosm of a distressingly large segment of the US voting public. But it's been unspeakably painful and disappointing, too. The best I got out of this is giving myself permission to give up on people, to stop trying to pull their souls out of the solipsistic vortices they have willfully created and thrown said souls into, laughing all the while. These are not functioning human beings any longer; they are perverted mockeries, things that still wear a human skin. I have given myself permission to let them go, and defend myself and my peace from them if need be. But what a sad way to end...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @05:05PM (8 children)
Do you think Biden's son earned his position in Ukraine on merit? Wiki has a decent bio [wikipedia.org] on him. He's a grade A silver spooned loser. He started off his career at MBNA America, a bank which was also a major contributor to Biden. He stumbled around to Daddy's various gigs until Daddy won the vice presidency. That's when things get really good. One great one was his military commissioning. Even though Jr had absolutely no military training or experience, had a drug record, and was too old to join the military - he got a special exemption from Daddy and become a direct commissioned officer in the navy. He even got a special commissioning ceremony in the White House, administered by.. yeah, Daddy. A month later he was kicked out of the Navy after testing positive for cocaine. You really just can't make this stuff up, it sounds too absurd to be real.
Anyhow on day 1 of Daddy becoming VP he sets up a new 'consulting' firm, and stumbles onward finding himself 'somehow' on the board of Burisma Holdings shipping a salary of about $50k/month. Perhaps they were were seeking cocaine expertise. And go figure, the prosecutor that Joe Biden gloated about firing had previously been investigating Burisma Holdings for corruption. Seriously, please try to set aside your biases for just one minute. This is what real corruption looks like. It's in your face. Trying to frame the request to investigate this corruption, as corruption, is something straight out of Saul Alinsky: "Accuse your opponent of what only you are doing, as you are doing it, to create confusion, cloud the issue, and inoculate voters against any evidence of your guilt."
---
Beyond this, in the log of the call there is no suggestion that the funds would be withheld if Ukraine did not investigate. By contrast, Biden did exactly what the DNC is trying to claim Trump did. This [cfr.org] is a transcript of Biden's talk with the CFR. These words are literally how Biden himself describes the situation:
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That is what "quid quo pro" looks like, that is what corruption looks like, and what we see today is what projection -on a radical scale- looks like.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @05:26PM
Stick to Twitter, Donald.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @06:14PM (1 child)
I wish I hadn't been so sardonic above. I think many people do not realize these things. After all the media is not exactly being forthcoming with these sort of facts. If my juvenile tone pushed somebody away, please do reconsider. And definitely check out Biden's interview especially as contrasted against the recent Ukraine phone call.
It's tiresome reading everyday at sites such as the New York Times that 2+2=5. But you only realize that 2+2=5 if you actually have a decent understanding of the facts of a situation. And most people do not, since they rely exclusively on the media to inform them. And the media today has relatively little interest in providing an impartial overview of the facts. And so it makes it easy to become somewhat more radicalized in the opposite direction, which is obviously reflected in my tone in that post. But in rereading it, it's easy to see me as loony as the guys claiming the border detentions are just a step away from Auschwitz. I promise I'm not! ;-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @07:31PM
“Sardonic” is not a word that springs to mind from that wall of text.
“Bloviating,” however...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @08:05PM
Your lack of self-awareness is astounding, to say the least.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday November 02 2019, @04:42AM
According to an interview I heard a while back (can't think of the guy's name and too lazy to go find it again) the real root here was that Putin had made life uncomfortable for Ukrainian mobsters, who concocted a scheme to discredit (and hopefully depose) Putin so business could go on as before. All the hoorah that devolved onto Trump was, from their POV, mere collateral damage; and Biden was just a convenient access point for leverage against Russia.
I don't know how true that is, but the guy had names and dates and made a convincing argument, and it all dovetails neatly into Diana West's information (The Red Thread).
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Saturday November 02 2019, @07:13AM
Good post, except the job was actually more like $80k/month. https://www.nationalreview.com/news/hunter-biden-served-as-ceremonial-figure-on-burisma-board-for-80000-per-month/ [nationalreview.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 05 2019, @05:16PM (1 child)
Except that you're wrong about the following things...
... Nepotism is when the party with higher power arranges or allows favors in exchange for a position. Like when Trump becomes President, and suddenly all his kids are working in the West Wing for him. Have you shown that Vice President Biden arranged the Burisma position for him? No. And the naval commission, well, all commissions are by direction of the President, so that's a non-starter.
... Corruption is when the party inside the corporation (Hunter) arranges or asks for favors in exchange. Like when Trump, in response to being told Ukraine wants to buy arms (and, implied in background, is waiting for money), asks for "a favor," instead of saying, "Yes, you get the money and the missiles just because we want you to win. Now could you do something for us in addition?" Did Hunter ask Daddy to intervene in Ukraine? No.
... The prosecutor, Shokin, was not investigating Burisma at all according to people who worked in his office. Burisma had been investigated by the prior prosector, and Shokin sat on that handed over investigation and did nothing with it, just like he did enough other investigations that the remainder of the world recognized Shokin was either incompetent or corrupt. That Shokin had problems was known to IMF, EU, and the State department.
The entire world knew that the US would play hardball, and approved.
As opposed to Rudy's continuing to persist in believing in theories that have already been defunct. And maneuvering in secret that nobody in the world knew about or approved of.
.... By the way, do you notice that what Biden did was a threat, yes, but one that was not carried out? It would be interesting to see what would have happened if Ukraine had called the bluff, but they didn't, and no aid was actually withheld. BIG difference.
You see, by Biden getting Shokin kicked out he did Burisma no favors. Shokin's successor actually did work the investigation, and found evidence that before Biden joined their board there were tax irregularities that were then settled by fine in 2017.
So, what you actually see with Biden is someone playing by the rules. (Yes, the very edge of the rules. And what Hunter did was not smart, but not illegal. And Daddy had nothing to do with that, unlike Trump.)
What quid pro quo looks like, by contrast:
1) Establish aid as approved by Congress - direct funds that will be given to them.
2) Actually withhold those funds, in contravention of Congress' orders. To a degree that responsibilities were shifted around when OMB wouldn't accept what the President wanted in withholding the funds because they weren't sure it was legal. Quid.
3) Ukraine needs weaponry which they'll by from the US, and needs the money to do it with. Quid.
4) Place Ukraine into a position where they desperately wanted reassurance from the United States about their partnership.
5) Make that reassurance (and future aid) conditional on their playing ball on Burisma/Cloudstrike/Biden, BY NAME. Quo.
6) (I wouldn't say that it's reciprocal necessarily because things are happening that are not good but the United States has been very very good to Ukraine.... [we want aid, says Ukraine]... I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it." [whitehouse.gov]) - Pro.
7) President may actually believe he never established a this-for-that relationship because idiots on his staff tell him so. Yet Ukraine was indeed manipulated. And this is not about corruption, this is about political investigation in a way which benefits Donald J. Trump personally without providing any added benefit to the nation itself. "I'm not shooting at you, I'm not shooting at you..." as you pull the trigger. See?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 09 2019, @02:22PM
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/08/opinion/letters/quid-pro-quo.html [nytimes.com]
Extortion is the more accurate term.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @07:28PM (1 child)
Why are these "funds" appropriated in the first place?
Who basically installed the government of Ukraine a few years back?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @10:44PM
Who set up the agency that was doing this investigation?
Hint: its starts with a b.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @04:06PM (2 children)
Everyone thought Aristarchus was being hyperbolic, but as the ac above illustrates nicely this place is filled qith alt-right dips.
Yes, orange man bad you morons. Orange man very bad, very stupid, not even legal.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Runaway1956 on Friday November 01 2019, @04:50PM
You could at least get the man's name right. It's Alt-starchus.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 02 2019, @07:13AM
And "Big Lie" Democrats.
(Score: 4, Touché) by VanessaE on Friday November 01 2019, @05:05PM (7 children)
Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @06:10PM (6 children)
Gotta love all the accounts with female first name and last name initial.
Like anyone would actually do that except alt-right trolls trying to generste some sort of feminist legitimacy. Sad.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @06:17PM (2 children)
As long as they identify as female, that's what matters, right?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @07:15PM (1 child)
Apparently that is what you trolls think.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @08:01PM
Quiet incel!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 01 2019, @06:40PM
Sounds like a misogynistic conspiracy theory. You're #Sad!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday November 02 2019, @02:23AM (1 child)
I really do wonder about people like that. It's not as if alt-right women don't exist, though the internal contradictions necessary to hold those ideas as a woman would tear me personally apart inside.
Makes me wonder, though...self-hating transwomen who refuse to transition? Self-loathing gay men doing the equivalent of dressing in drag? It's a mystery to me.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 02 2019, @05:47PM
It is possible they might actually be women, but the tendency for the trolls to pretend they are someone from the opposition makes me very skeptical. Doesn't overly matter, the message is still dumb and conservatives vastly over rsted the identity politics on the left. Projection as usual.