Here are my observations and opinions from my select news of the day.
(Lisa Benson cartoon courtesy grondamorin.com)
A FOOTBALL ANALOGY – I found that a football analogy put forth by Fox News Channel’s Congressional Correspondent Chad Pergram during a break in the Q&A session on Wednesday quite appropriate.
Perhaps you noticed how well-prepared the House managers were with video support to respond to questions from Democrats. Pergram suggested that it was like a football team having its first series of plays set when they have the ball at the start or at halftime. Both sides knew what questions to expect when the session began. And I would surmise that the same was true after a recess or lunch break.
WHY IS IT that some people are so willing to give in when it comes to one of their rights, like their protections under the First or Second Amendment.
Would they be willing to ignore the doctor-patient and attorney-client privileges? Probably not. In fact, with all of the talk about the need for “red flag” rules following a shooting when it is learned that it was known that the shooter had mental problems, we are now seeing opposition to that as intrusion in their lives.
Now, there are members of Congress who want to cast aside executive privilege because they believe those in the executive branch need not be protected for giving the president advice.
Wall Street Journal columnist William A. Galston is one of those willing to sacrifice a privilege, and made his case in his column, “Let’s Hear From John Bolton.”
Galston concedes that “There are no Senate precedents dealing with executive privilege in impeachment, and opines that executive privilege itself is so widely disputed and poorly understood that anyone who purports to provide the answer about its operation, particularly in these unprecedented circumstances, is either deluding herself or deceiving everyone else.”
Yet, Galston didn’t hesitate to quote from the case against President Nixon, which was far more grievous than the charges against President Trump, shows that he, too, is willing to concede to partisan pressure that that “the legitimate needs of the judicial process may outweigh presidential privilege.” Hence, his call to hear from Bolton. How discouraging.
YOU JUST CAN’T MAKE THIS STUFF UP, but as you might expect, a representative of MSNBC, in this case Lawrence O’Donnell, would come up with such a bizarre theory and discuss it in prime time.
Commenting on John Bolton’s tweet @AmbJohnBolton, in which he congratulated everyone involved in eliminating Qassem Soleimani, O’Donnell remarked that Bolton “is an extreme hawk on Iran,” and asked @Lawrence if it were a coincidence that the attack took place two days after Bolton submitted his manuscript to the White House, suggesting that it was Trump trying to influence Bolton not to testify to the Senate.
Simply outrageous.
A MERE SLIP OF THE TONGUE, but since it was from the snarky Democrat Sen. Richard Blumenthal, I couldn’t help but recall it for you. He was sent to the microphones during a break in the impeachment trial to spin for the House managers, and dropped an unintentional truth bomb, reported Victoria Taft in PJ Media.
While commenting on the presentation by the president’s attorneys, Blumenthal said, “it was a fact-free summation of a case bereft of evidence … we need evidence.” It brought a laugh from those who heard it and reported on it, because it is burden of the House managers to prove the case, not the president’s team.
In essence, his Freudian slip served to underscore how hastily the House put their case together – bereft of evidence.
May God continue to bless the United States of America.
