On December 5, following a whirlwind trip to Madrid for the United Nations’ COP25 “Climate Change” conference, Nancy Pelosi rushed back to Washington, D.C., to announce in a press conference that the Democratic Party is now drawing up articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump. This comes after the release on December 3 of a 300 page report by Rep. Adam Schiff’s Intelligence Committee, accusing Trump of “abuse of power”, among other charges, and after a Judiciary Committee hearing, which featured three anti-Trump, highly partisan “legal scholars” who asserted that the Founding Fathers included impeachment in the U.S. Constitution as a measure to defend against precisely the actions taken by Trump in dealing with Ukraine! A fourth witness, Jonathan Turley, a law professor from George Washington University and a self-identified Democrat, dissented in his testimony, insisting that the “rush to judgement” against the President represents an “abuse of power” by the Congressional Democrats!
Pelosi, who as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives is the highest ranking elected Democratic Party official, stated, “I am asking our chairman (Rep. Jerrold Nadler) to proceed with articles of impeachment….Our democracy is what’s at stake. The president leaves us with no choice but to act.”
In elaborating why she and her party have chosen to do this, she said, “The president has abused his power for his own personal political benefit at the expense of our national security by withholding military aid and a crucial Oval Office meeting in exchange for announcement [by the government of Ukraine] of an investigation into his political rival [Joe Biden].” When asked what convinced her to reverse her previous caution when it came to moving ahead with articles of impeachment, she said, “The facts of the Ukraine situation just changed everything.”
It is fair to ask, as Republican members of the two committees holding hearings have asked, exactly what “facts” are these? When the three legal scholars were asked by Rep. Matt Gaetz if they have any direct knowledge that Trump committed a crime, not one of them raised their hand or offered proof. Even anti-Trump media were forced to acknowledge that all of the evidence presented before Schiff’s committee was hear-say, based on second and third hand reports, that no one who testified has heard Trump issue an order or threat to Ukrainian officials, nor state that he would withhold aid until his demands were met. Further, the terms of the alleged “quid pro quo”—announcement of an investigation of Joe Biden and his son, in return for a meeting with Trump and release of military aid for Ukraine—were never met. The aid funds were released, Zelenski had a public meeting with Trump, and there was no announcement of a Ukrainian investigation into Biden. Nevertheless, lacking any evidence of a crime, Schiff’s committee insisted in its report that Trump is guilty of impeachable acts.
Watch last week’s Fireside Chat with Barbara Boyd and former CIA Analyst Larry Johnson
The President responded to Pelosi’s statement by charging that the Democrats have no impeachment case, but they don’t care, “nothing matters to them, they have gone crazy.” He added a challenge: “if you are going to impeach me, do it now fast.” This would force a trial in the Senate, which is controlled by the Republicans, which would insure that he would get a fair trial, allowing actual facts to emerge regarding the circumstances of Trump’s dealings with Ukraine. For a president to be removed, an impeachment in the House must be followed by a two-thirds majority vote in the Senate for conviction, which would only be possible if twenty Republican Senators vote to convict him. So far, not one Republican Senator has indicated support for his removal.
Nadler, who will preside over the final hearings on December 9 to decide whether to proceed with impeachment, made clear his intent in a tweet on December 7. He tweeted that Trump “abused his power, betrayed our national security and corrupted our elections, all for personal gain.” The anti-Trump media gleefully reported this, never asking for evidence to back these charges—because they know that NO EVIDENCE to prove these false allegations exists! It is now expected that articles of impeachment will be drafted by the end of the week.
THE SCHIFF REPORT
The sudden lurch from the Robert Mueller investigation of “Russian meddling” and “Trump collusion with Russia”, to charges that Trump abused his power in dealing with Ukraine, occurred following recognition that Mueller could produce no evidence of any crimes committed by the president, despite spending nearly two years and millions of dollars, and employing brutal prosecutorial powers against several key Trump supporters, on charges unrelated to his mandate to investigate the circumstances of Trump’s victory. His written report, which was released on April 18, and his appearance before the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees on July 17, were profoundly disappointing to those engaged in the regime change coup against Trump, as he produced no “smoking gun,” and appeared unable to defend the allegations he did make.
Less than a month later, on August 12, a complaint was filed by a “whistle blower” with the Intelligence Community Inspector General, charging that the President committed crimes in his dealings with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski. It was subsequently learned that the “whistle blower”—who is a part of the John Brennan-Susan Rice-Obama intelligence network at the center of the coup plot against Trump—had previously presented his case to Schiff’s office. This was a violation of protocol, but Schiff never reported this, initially even lying about it. In the face of Mueller’s failure to provide the means to remove Trump, Schiff immediately used the fake whistle blower’s charges to hold new hearings designed to produce a report which could be used to draft articles of impeachment.
The report cites the following offenses:
- Abuse of power—the President pressured Ukraine to accuse Biden and his son of corruption, to aid his 2020 campaign by knocking out a rival. This is supposedly a “bribe”, and has been interpreted by Pelosi, et.al., as a demand that Ukraine “interfere” in the 2020 election;
- Doing this “placed his own personal political interests above the national interests of the United States.” Pelosi and others assert that this puts Ukraine in danger, as it is “on the front lines” in a deepening confrontation with an aggressive Russia, which they insist “invaded Ukraine”;
- While thus endangering U.S. security, he tried to conceal what he did from the Congress.
These charges are then piled on top of the disproven allegations of Trump collusion with Putin in 2016, to claim that, after accepting Russia’s help to win then, he is now looking for Ukraine’s aid to win the 2020 election. In response to evidence presented by Trump and his Republican supporters of Ukraine’s role in opposing him in 2016 on behalf of Hillary Clinton, they default to the discredited Mueller report on Russian interference. For example, Intelligence committee operative Fiona Hill told the Schiff committee that charges of Ukraine’s role in 2016 are “a fictional narrative that has been perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves,” that is, Trump and his allies are still working for Putin!” When asked for proof, they claim that the intelligence community concluded that Russia meddled, so it must be true.
WHY THE RUSH?
There is more than enough real evidence regarding Ukraine’s role against Trump in 2016, and to discredit the charges that he was bullying and threatening Ukraine for his personal gain, to insure that a fair trial in the Senate will acquit him of the charges now being drafted. But there is more at stake than just the defense of Trump against such bogus and absurd calumnies. The real issue is that his opponents have a reason why they have launched a series of farcical charges against him, and that is that he has threatened to overturn their entire global strategic game, based on the assertion of U.S. unilateral power, in which the U.S. is playing the role of the enforcer for British imperial geopolitics.
A few significant examples make this general case:
1. Trump continues to move against the “endless wars” launched by those out to remove him. His coordination with Putin and Erdogan in Syria is succeeding in reducing the threat from jihadist terrorists, which had been aided materially and otherwise by Anglo-American intelligence operations, while allowing the reassertion of Syria sovereignty over its territory. His used his surprise Thanksgiving Day trip to Afghanistan to push for a further reduction of troops there, and working on a ceasefire with the Taliban to end 18 years of war. His actions in Syria and Afghanistan have been attacked by the pro-war, “Military-Industrial-Complex” in both parties, which requires such wars as the justification of their role as the unilateral enforcer of the globalist “free trade” policies, which are under attack worldwide.
2. His continued insistence on achieving peaceful cooperation with Russia is the real issue behind the playing of the “Ukraine card” by his enemies. As we have reported, those “consummate professionals” from the diplomatic and intelligence community who testified against him in Schiff’s hearings, are part of the network which ran the February 2014 Maidan coup in Ukraine, which deepened the destruction of that country which began with their deployment of the International Monetary Fund there after the fall of Communism in 1991. Their purported “concerns” over Ukraine’s security and welfare are belied by their ultimate aim, which is to use Ukraine as a staging ground for a war with Russia. Zelenski’s recent phone call with Putin, and preparations for a meeting with the Normandy Four, create the possibility of ending the conflict in eastern Ukraine. This prospect is threatened by the insinuation by Schiff’s team that Zelenski is submitting to blackmail by Trump. Further evidence of this point is that Trump’s call for bringing Russia back into the “G8” was met with the expected hostility from the Russo-phobic imperial clan at the recent London NATO conference.
3. While the regime changers are stoking the fires of chaos in Hong Kong, Trump continues to pursue a trade deal with China and his “good friend” Xi Jinping, insisting that Xi work on a peaceful solution there, without interference. His approach to China coincides with his overall rejection of World Trade Organization free trade policies, which he correctly points out have done significant harm to U.S. manufacturing and trade, while making the less-developed nations slave-labor workshops for global corporations.
4. It is not insignificant that Pelosi delivered her backing to impeachment following her trip to the COP25 summit. Directly contradicting Trump, who officially pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Accord in October, Pelosi, speaking for a small delegation of Congressional climate hawks, stated that, “By coming here we wanted to say to everyone, we’re still in.”
In this, as in the other examples above, the regime change crew is contesting Trump’s constitutional right, as the duly-elected President, to make policy. On all of these issues, there is a disagreement over the future direction of the U.S.—will the nation continue the tradition, most recently of the Bushes, Hillary Clinton and Obama, of being the muscle behind a City of London/Wall Street increasingly-dysfunctional, decaying global order, or will the U.S. function as a sovereign state, recognizing the sovereignty of others, as Trump has stressed, but pursuing interests which benefit the American people? As he correctly points out, he was elected by the American people to pursue a course of breaking from the geopolitical/neoliberal policies of his predecessors. Unable to defeat him at the ballot box, they are attempting to use impeachment to overturn the expressed will of the American people.
Finally, there is the matter of the soon-to-be-released reports on the corruption of the U.S. intelligence agencies under Obama, which collaborated with the highest levels of British intelligence in organizing the coup against Trump. Barr, Durham and their investigators have visited Italy, Ukraine and London, and are focused on the collaboration of operatives there, such as “ex” MI6 agent Christopher Steele, with Obama officials such as Brennan, Clapper, and top FBI personnel such as Comey, McCabe and Peter Strzok. Schiff and his controllers fear that, once the Horowitz report and the Barr-Durham investigation into the real collusion of the anti-Trump forces is documented, their game is over.
The rush to get articles of impeachment completed before the Christmas recess, is ultimately drive by this fear, leading to a desperate, hysterical attempt to hide the truth. Polls show that a growing number of Americans have become skeptical of the impeachment drive, with 4 to 6 % drops in those backing impeachment, while Trump’s approval rating is rising. With no Democratic candidate offering a program to rally the support needed to defeat Trump next November—all are allying with the Congress in the drive for impeachment—having the Senate vote to remove Trump is the only obvious road for the party to take back the White House. Thus, they are willing to unleash chaos in the U.S., rather than deal with the fact that the era of the old paradigm, defined by geopolitics and corrupt central bankers, is coming to an end.