The Senate voted Yes on witnesses, and then the two sides made a deal that ditched live witnesses in favor of one written witness statement entered into the record. Now that's either grasping defeat from the jaws of victory, or something very unexpected is about to happen.
My guess is a back room deal with The Turtle to cut to the chase and keep some dirty laundry from the rest of the GOP buried.
The only deal I can imagine being worth it is a conviction. Cruz, Hawley and Boebert breathing the biggest sigh of relief.
There will be no conviction. The Dems are the best at showing unimaginable weakness. If they somehow think they made a deal to convict so long as there are no on-camera witnesses providing testimony, it will just be another Lucy with the football situation.
My guess is the White House doesn't want to spend too much energy on this. They want a quick "We voted to convict him, Republicans let him off the hook" and then move on to COVID relief.
I don't think they can take such a short term approach to that, unless they're betting that his current base will decrease over time. As an outsider, I think that they both have reason to get rid of him strongly (impeachment). But no doubt parts of the GOP still think that they can control his base and use it to their own benefit. (Cruz, etc). Reminds me of those snake charming pastors that get bit by their own snakes. I am surprised to see Graham reverse his vote to call witnesses thought.
57-43, acquitted. So why not call witnesses then? Not for the GOP Senators' benefit, but for ours. The one thing we needed from this end of the Trump era was the full airing of all dirty laundry. Every nasty thing from the last 4 years.
Fuck, got me again. I hovered my mouse over and expected it to be meatspin or something. Saw it was a legit link and clicked it. I blame last nights bourbon
Because the Great Spineless Party is too lazy to even put a traitorous sellout’s feet to the fire. Nobody should be surprised by the result of this, even though it’s the wrong result.
So Trump got 3 million fewer votes in 2016 and gets to be President, and then gets 14 fewer votes in impeachment and gets acquitted. What a bullshit system we've got going here.
I think The Turtle’s final remarks were the back room deal. He just totally threw Trump under the bus. I’ve never heard him come right out and call him a liar, said he manufactured an environment, that saying he lost the election was a delusion, etc. This sounds like the GOP 100% saying “enough with Trump”.