Trump allegedly requests foreign election interference

[Agema]

Just like the argument with Agema, where it came down to a single question of whether Trump approached Ukraine or vice versa, I really only need you to consider one question and all the nitpicking ceases to be important.

We all know Trump approached Zelenskyy first, via his personal lawyer Giuliani in May 2019.

There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever supporting the notion that Zelenskyy was looking to investigate the 2016 US election or Burisma on his own account. None at all. And - given the rejection of Giuliani in May and his evident concern of being seen to interfere with US elections - there is also evidence against this supposition.

Whereas the evidence on the other side is plentiful. Trump wanted the Ukraine to run these investigations. Trump had asked other countries to investigate things for him. Giuliani wanted a meeting with Zelenskyy over these investigations. The given reports show Trump and the State Dept. were pressurising Zelenskyy, and State Dept. officials actively encouraged Zelenskyy to ensure he did mention them to Trump.

Therefore the existing balance of evidence is clearly pointing at Trump as the source of this mess.

 

[tstorm823]

Cute, if predictable deflection. I actually debated how to open it because I figured the odds were good that you'd try something to the tune of "oh, thank you for describing your own arguments as misleading", but I'd hoped you were more mature than to try that. And nitpicking? Really? You're implying that, in pointing out how the claims you're making do not withstand scrutiny, I am being excessively concerned with insignificant details?

I don't think you're excessively concerned with insignificant details. I think you're excessively concerned with out-arguing me, and if that requires honing in on insignificant details, you're not shy to go that route. Point being, I don't think you're giving any big picture consideration to my suggestions here. I don't think you are giving any consideration to what is true. The truth is irrelevant to you, winning the argument is the point, as evidenced by your repeated need to tie me to arguments I haven't made.

Which is to say you're asking if I think that there was illicit coordination between the Democrats, media and the whistleblower for the purpose of exaggerating the impact of the whistleblower report. No. I think that's a conclusion people reached by trying to salvage the Federalist's initial story about the process being manipulated to get the complaint through.

Like this. This isn't an real argument you're making. This is "well I know that I can point out inaccuracies in that story, so as long as I keep trying to tie tstorm to that specific article, I win, and nothing else matters." Nevermind that I never suggested the original whistleblowing was illegal. Nevermind that I moved on to the IG IC statement when you presented it to me and left that Federalist conjecture behind. You just keep hanging onto that one little victory and tune out everything else.

We all know Trump approached Zelenskyy first, via his personal lawyer Giuliani in May 2019.

Prove this. Make your case. Don't keep expecting me to hold this debate up while you say things like this as though they are gospel and any doubt of them is sacrilege. The first known contact between the two presidents was in April. We have an anonymous source familiar with the call claiming Trump asked Zelenskyy to work with Giuliani on corruption in that call. But we also have reports that Zelenskyy had been actively pursuing a meeting with Trump since he was elected, and Trump pushed him off consistently, which means telling him to work with Giuliani could have basically been blowing him off, saying "I don't want to meet with you, here's a subordinate to play with". I don't have any strong evidence about which side started pushing for all of this, nor which got the Biden issue involved, but I doubt you do either, so if you're going to say things like "We all know it" then you're gonna have to back it up. Either that, or wait a couple weeks for the dust to settle. There are certainly more revelations coming.

 

[Asita]

Cute, if predictable deflection. I actually debated how to open it because I figured the odds were good that you'd try something to the tune of "oh, thank you for describing your own arguments as misleading", but I'd hoped you were more mature than to try that. And nitpicking? Really? You're implying that, in pointing out how the claims you're making do not withstand scrutiny, I am being excessively concerned with insignificant details?

I don't think you're excessively concerned with insignificant details. I think you're excessively concerned with out-arguing me, and if that requires honing in on insignificant details, you're not shy to go that route. Point being, I don't think you're giving any big picture consideration to my suggestions here. I don't think you are giving any consideration to what is true. The truth is irrelevant to you, winning the argument is the point, as evidenced by your repeated need to tie me to arguments I haven't made.

Which is to say you're asking if I think that there was illicit coordination between the Democrats, media and the whistleblower for the purpose of exaggerating the impact of the whistleblower report. No. I think that's a conclusion people reached by trying to salvage the Federalist's initial story about the process being manipulated to get the complaint through.

Like this. This isn't an real argument you're making. This is "well I know that I can point out inaccuracies in that story, so as long as I keep trying to tie tstorm to that specific article, I win, and nothing else matters." Nevermind that I never suggested the original whistleblowing was illegal. Nevermind that I moved on to the IG IC statement when you presented it to me and left that Federalist conjecture behind. You just keep hanging onto that one little victory and tune out everything else.

Setting aside for a moment that the first paragraph is pure bulverism (for goodness sake, you don't even stop at "you're wrong", you go so far as to say that "the truth is irrelevant to you"), the accusation by necessity applies at least as much to you as it does to me. Point of fact, the subsequent paragraph would actually provide circumstantial evidence in support of that conclusion.

I'm not "hanging onto that little victory and tuning out everything else". I'm saying that the thrust of your argument is in implying conspiracy between the whistleblower, democrats, and the media, which you've been relatively transparent about. I'm saying that that is an ill supported accusation. And I'm saying that the principle reason people believe it is because the Federalist's article implied exactly that. Whether or not they subsequently acknowledged the shoddy reporting of that article it was still a conclusion they'd taken hook line and sinker and, as such, prejudiced them towards interpreting data to favor the explanation that there was coordination between the whistleblower, democrats, and the media. That's simple human nature; we're insanely prone to confirmation bias, so early spin tends to stick spectacularly well.

And my saying as much is little more than me explaining why I find fault in the conclusion you've been pushing. If I just said "no", you'd either ask for elaboration or assume I could not supply it, so it behooved me to explain my reasoning. In essence, that's me answering the underlying question you put to me.

 

[tstorm823]

That's simple human nature; we're insanely prone to confirmation bias, so early spin tends to stick spectacularly well.

Consider the argument I've been making.

Then read your sentence quoted here 5 times.

Then reconsider the argument I've been making.

Then read your sentence back another 5 times.

Yes, early spin tends to stick, which is exactly why people would prepare to land that initial spin ahead of time and get upset when the White House releases the record of the conversation before the whistleblower report. Agema won't even entertain the idea that maybe the Ukrainians were instigating these events. That would go against the initial spin. I didn't initially consider that Trump might be the passive role here, it was days later when I reconsidered my understanding of events. I'm I'm pretty certain I am the only person around here reconsidering anything. I am the one fighting against confirmation bias here.

 

[Asita]

That's simple human nature; we're insanely prone to confirmation bias, so early spin tends to stick spectacularly well.

Consider the argument I've been making.

Then read your sentence quoted here 5 times.

Then reconsider the argument I've been making.

Then read your sentence back another 5 times.

To reuse a quote I invoked before: "Apothecary, heal thyself".

Agema won't even entertain the idea that maybe the Ukrainians were instigating these events. That would go against the initial spin. I didn't initially consider that Trump might be the passive role here, it was days later when I reconsidered my understanding of events. I'm I'm pretty certain I am the only person around here reconsidering anything. I am the one fighting against confirmation bias here.

Please. How you've argued your position may have changed from "so you'd prefer not to know if the Vice President had held foreign aid hostage to benefit his son's business" to "but what if Ukraine approached Trump" and then to "there was a coordinated effort to make sure this complaint would stick", but a change in the angle from which you argue does not necessarily entail an appreciable change in the position you are arguing. And the arguments in this case are all attempting to make the same point that Trump did nothing wrong (either via an innocuous - if not necessary - call, being passive (which is utterly irrelevant and a questionable assertion at best), or that there's a conspiracy against him) and that - via the implication that is the necessary consequence of those positions - the investigation is consequentially without adequate foundation. Or do you mean to say that all of these things were non sequitur?

Though let's look at that particular claim that Agema is being closedminded, shall we?

We all know Trump approached Zelenskyy first, via his personal lawyer Giuliani in May 2019.

Prove this. Make your case. Don't keep expecting me to hold this debate up while you say things like this as though they are gospel and any doubt of them is sacrilege. The first known contact between the two presidents was in April. We have an anonymous source familiar with the call claiming Trump asked Zelenskyy to work with Giuliani on corruption in that call. But we also have reports that Zelenskyy had been actively pursuing a meeting with Trump since he was elected, and Trump pushed him off consistently, which means telling him to work with Giuliani could have basically been blowing him off, saying "I don't want to meet with you, here's a subordinate to play with". I don't have any strong evidence about which side started pushing for all of this, nor which got the Biden issue involved, but I doubt you do either, so if you're going to say things like "We all know it" then you're gonna have to back it up. Either that, or wait a couple weeks for the dust to settle. There are certainly more revelations coming.

May 9, 2019, Giuliani tells the New York Times that he will travel to the Ukraine to push for inquiries into the origins of the Russia investigation and the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory, "because that information will be very, very helpful to my client and may turn out to help my government". Giuliani had previously explicitly championed the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory unprompted in a Fox News interview on April 7. Furthermore, by his own accounts, he'd been explicitly investigating that conspiracy theory since January 2019, during which time he'd spoken with both Lutsenko and Shokin. This is corroborated by Lev Parnas, who claims to have been part of the Lutsenko meetings and arranged the Shokin call.

Giuliani supposedly first 'got wind of' the Biden allegations sometime last year, and since then he has allegedly "met with Ukrainians to, as Giuliani puts it, try to gather evidence that would help his client". So we've got pretty solid evidence that Giuliani reaching out to the Ukraine since at least January about investigations into one of Trump's political rivals. That rather neatly indicates that Giuliani's efforts to dig up that dirt predate Zelenskyy (who was elected April 21).

 

[tstorm823]

May 9, 2019, Giuliani tells the New York Times that he will travel to the Ukraine to push for inquiries into the origins of the Russia investigation and the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory, "because that information will be very, very helpful to my client and may turn out to help my government". Giuliani had previously explicitly championed the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory unprompted in a Fox News interview on April 7. Furthermore, by his own accounts, he'd been explicitly investigating that conspiracy theory since January 2019, during which time he'd spoken with both Lutsenko and Shokin. This is corroborated by Lev Parnas, who claims to have been part of the Lutsenko meetings and arranged the Shokin call.

Giuliani supposedly first 'got wind of' the Biden allegations sometime last year, and since then he has allegedly "met with Ukrainians to, as Giuliani puts it, try to gather evidence that would help his client". So we've got pretty solid evidence that Giuliani reaching out to the Ukraine since at least January about investigations into one of Trump's political rivals. That rather neatly indicates that Giuliani's efforts to dig up that dirt predate Zelenskyy (who was elected April 21).

But you don't have solid evidence of that. You're reading into it that way because Giuliani is the one we have public statements of. But we've had suggestions that Ukrainians were trying to get information to the Trump Administration since summer 2018. And one suggestion that they settled for Giuliani after a United States Attorney turned the info down. Predating Zelenskyy doesn't mean Ukrainians didn't start the exchange. Nor does it mean that Trump continued it after the Ukrainian election. We're told that Zelenskyy and Trump discussed investigating corruption in the congratulatory call to Zelenskyy in April, and he told Zelenskyy to talk to Giuliani about it. We don't know who brought it up then.

Like, you're acting as though because Giuliani announced he was going to Ukraine for that purpose, that means he decided he was just going to fly to Ukraine and invite himself into the president's office. I know ridiculous things aren't out of the question for this administration, but that's utterly ridiculous. People don't just pop in on foreign heads of state. Meetings are arranged for. And Giuliani is not the more important party here, you don't know that he wasn't invited. You just don't know that.

 

[Silvanus]

[ We don't know who brought it up then.

Ok, alright. I don't see the relevance of who brought it up first, because if a quid pro quo arrangement was made in a meeting organised by someone else, that's still exactly as shady and unethical. But, lets presume for now that Zelenskyy was the driving force behind this talk of investigation.


...why do you think Zelenskyy is so invested in investigating Burisma and Hunter Biden? Why is his administration then communicating this to Biden's father's political opponents?

 

[Agema]

Prove this. Make your case. Don't keep expecting me to hold this debate up while you say things like this as though they are gospel and any doubt of them is sacrilege. The first known contact between the two presidents was in April. We have an anonymous source familiar with the call claiming Trump asked Zelenskyy to work with Giuliani on corruption in that call. But we also have reports that Zelenskyy had been actively pursuing a meeting with Trump since he was elected, and Trump pushed him off consistently, which means telling him to work with Giuliani could have basically been blowing him off, saying "I don't want to meet with you, here's a subordinate to play with". I don't have any strong evidence about which side started pushing for all of this, nor which got the Biden issue involved, but I doubt you do either, so if you're going to say things like "We all know it" then you're gonna have to back it up. Either that, or wait a couple weeks for the dust to settle. There are certainly more revelations coming.

Okay, so an anonymous source says Trump asked Zelenskyy to discuss corruption with Giulini in an April call. But Giuliani was specifically looking at the 2016 election and Burisma, had been for months, even years. Ergo, the obvious most likely conclusion is that that is what Trump is asking of Zelenskyy.

There's plenty of corruption in Ukraine. It is known to have a significant issue with oligarchs operating frequently operating outside the law, for instance, or that ~10% of the government budget disappears into the pockets of corrupt officials. Given this, why on Earth is Trump only focused on the alleged (likely untrue) corruption of his US political opponents? This again reinforces the notion of what Trump's real concern is.

Why is Trump delegating any sort of official state business through his personal attorney? Surely Trump should be offering assistance from official channels: the State Dept or (for assistance with crime) maybe the Justice Dept. There ar dozens of appropriate minions to fob Zelenskyy off on. It is at best irregular and inappropriate to run government business through a private flunky, and at worst suggests deliberately side-stepping proper government channels. Plus, it is clear what that private minion has been must busy on in Ukraine.

I can certainly get that Zelenskyy wants to speak to Trump: he wants good ties with the USA, is a major recipient of US aid (delayed twice by the executive because reasons), and the USA is a major plank in pressurising Russia to minimise aggression against Ukraine. I certainly think Trump appears to be snubbing and cold-shouldering Zelenskyy - it is a major plank of my argument. But what suddenly motivates Trump to change tack and speak to Zelenskyy? When Trump finally hears that Zelenskyy will start the investigations Trump wants. So we see the same thread come through again.

All of this ties together so incredibly clearly and neatly. If you want to argue "proven", it's not proven. But it is, by a very substantial degree, the picture of events that makes the most sense according to available evidence, and far more compelling than your excessively imaginative hypothesising.

 

[Agema]

But you don't have solid evidence of that. You're reading into it that way because Giuliani is the one we have public statements of. But we've had suggestions that Ukrainians were trying to get information to the Trump Administration since summer 2018. And one suggestion that they settled for Giuliani after a United States Attorney turned the info down. Predating Zelenskyy doesn't mean Ukrainians didn't start the exchange.

This is all misdirection.

A Ukrainian prosecutor approaches the USA - and that is NOT the same as "Ukraine": there is no guarantee this prosecutor is doing so at the official behest of the Ukrainian government, and besides, it's the previous regime before Zelenskyy so it does not follow there would be continuation of policy. And one way or another, by the time Zelenskyy take office, there is evidently no active case anyway.

The question, gloriously simple, is whether Trump attempted to get Zelenskyy to investigate matters of personal benefit to Trump. It is just smoke and mirrors to start going into what other actors were up to in 2018.

 

[tstorm823]

The question, gloriously simple, is whether Trump attempted to get Zelenskyy to investigate matters of personal benefit to Trump. It is just smoke and mirrors to start going into what other actors were up to in 2018.

The question, gloriously simple, is whether the person was in possession of stolen goods. It is just smoke and mirrors to start going into whether they stole it personally or purchased it at a pawn shop.

 

[Agema]

The question, gloriously simple, is whether the person was in possession of stolen goods. It is just smoke and mirrors to start going into whether they stole it personally or purchased it at a pawn shop.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here, but whatever it was your comment doesn't work even a tenth as well as you think it does to make that point.

 

[tstorm823]

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here, but whatever it was your comment doesn't work even a tenth as well as you think it does to make that point.

You know exactly the point I'm trying to make. It matters what other actors were up to because if Zelenskyy was offering the investigations into Biden rather than being asked for them, it eliminates criminal intent.

 

[Agema]

You know exactly the point I'm trying to make. It matters what other actors were up to because if Zelenskyy was offering the investigations into Biden rather than being asked for them, it eliminates criminal intent.

But the strongest evidence is that he was put under pressure to offer them by US policy. That's what it suggests when he won't entertain investigations in May, but changes his mind after 2 months of snubs, cold shouldering, hostile PR, and of course upon receiving explicit advice from the US State Dept.

Why is the State Dept. wanting him to tell Giuliani / Trump? Why do they want him to make a public statement? Why does Trump only agree to speak to him in the first place if it's assured he offers Trump investigations? Why does Trump specifically ask Zelenskyy for the "favor" of these investigations if Zelenskyy has already promised them?

The most credible answer to all these questions is because that is the intent of the Trump administration, not the Zelenskyy administration.

 

[Asita]

May 9, 2019, Giuliani tells the New York Times that he will travel to the Ukraine to push for inquiries into the origins of the Russia investigation and the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory, "because that information will be very, very helpful to my client and may turn out to help my government". Giuliani had previously explicitly championed the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory unprompted in a Fox News interview on April 7. Furthermore, by his own accounts, he'd been explicitly investigating that conspiracy theory since January 2019, during which time he'd spoken with both Lutsenko and Shokin. This is corroborated by Lev Parnas, who claims to have been part of the Lutsenko meetings and arranged the Shokin call.

Giuliani supposedly first 'got wind of' the Biden allegations sometime last year, and since then he has allegedly "met with Ukrainians to, as Giuliani puts it, try to gather evidence that would help his client". So we've got pretty solid evidence that Giuliani reaching out to the Ukraine since at least January about investigations into one of Trump's political rivals. That rather neatly indicates that Giuliani's efforts to dig up that dirt predate Zelenskyy (who was elected April 21).

But you don't have solid evidence of that. You're reading into it that way because Giuliani is the one we have public statements of. But we've had suggestions that Ukrainians were trying to get information to the Trump Administration since summer 2018. And one suggestion that they settled for Giuliani after a United States Attorney turned the info down. Predating Zelenskyy doesn't mean Ukrainians didn't start the exchange. Nor does it mean that Trump continued it after the Ukrainian election. We're told that Zelenskyy and Trump discussed investigating corruption in the congratulatory call to Zelenskyy in April, and he told Zelenskyy to talk to Giuliani about it. We don't know who brought it up then.

Like, you're acting as though because Giuliani announced he was going to Ukraine for that purpose, that means he decided he was just going to fly to Ukraine and invite himself into the president's office. I know ridiculous things aren't out of the question for this administration, but that's utterly ridiculous. People don't just pop in on foreign heads of state. Meetings are arranged for. And Giuliani is not the more important party here, you don't know that he wasn't invited. You just don't know that.

I don't have solid evidence of what now? Because I sure hope you aren't trying to argue that the evidence is deficient that Giuliani was digging for dirt on the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory well before Zelenskyy entered the picture. That's pretty uncontroversial. That Trump et al were pushing Ukraine? No, what I cited doesn't definitively prove that on its own, but it provides circumstantial evidence in support of it. Coupled with other evidence, however, the evidence becomes pretty overwhelming pretty quickly.

For instance, we have Volker's text that he "heard from White House - assuming President Z convinces trump he will investigate / 'get to the bottom of what happened' in 2016, we will nail down date for visit to Washington". We have Zelenskyy himself saying that he "will look into the situation, specifically to the company that you mentioned in this issue". We have Zelenskyy's advisor (Serhiy Leshchenko) claiming that Trump was willing to have a phone conversation with Zelensky only on the precondition that they discuss the possibility of investigating the Biden family. We have several National Security advisors warning the National Security Council that Trump was trying to pressure the Ukraine for political purposes. We have the Trump administration drafting a statement they wanted Zelenskyy to read publicly saying that Ukraine would commit to investigating the Bidens. We have present-mind statements from multiple staffers to the effect of "I think it's crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign"...There's a lot of evidence pointing to this same conclusion it collectively paints a pretty damning picture.

And "suggestions"? You mean the exclusive memos Solomon claims to have from Lutsenko? The same duo who just a few months ago made claims about the US Ambassador to the Ukraine (including, among other things, that she had given the Ukraine a "do not prosecute" list) that the State Department repudiated as "an outright fabrication"? Solomon, the same journalist whose coworkers criticize him for having a "facts be damned" approach to his stories and who has consequently earned a reputation of bending the truth to conjure phantom scandals, such as Uranium One, his attempt to tie Reid to Abramoff to make it sound like a Reid was making under the table deals, and the time he tried to imply shady dealings in the sale of John Edwards home? And Lutsenko, the same source who "has been widely criticized in the Ukraine for politicizing criminal scandals and using his tenure as Prosecutor General to protect corrupt Ukrainian officials"? You'll forgive me if I'm more than a little skeptical of this story and its source.

 

[tstorm823]

Why do they want him to make a public statement?

So that the White House visit is good PR for both sides instead of just Zelenskyy.

Why does Trump only agree to speak to him in the first place if it's assured he offers Trump investigations?

That never happened.

Why does Trump specifically ask Zelenskyy for the "favor" of these investigations if Zelenskyy has already promised them?

Because zelenskyy was selling Burisma/corruption stuff and Trump explicitly asked for 2016 election information.

The most credible answer to all these questions is because that is the intent of the Trump administration, not the Zelenskyy administration.

Or those answers above. Super simple answers, in fact.

 

[Agema]

So that the White House visit is good PR for both sides instead of just Zelenskyy.

Yeah, but you just need a statement of great relations, mutual love and respect. Why a statement explicitly mentioning the investigations? That they are to be mentioned in the statement is clear from the Volker texts and testimony:

Sondland: "Do we still want Ze to give us an unequivocal draft with 2016 and Boresma [sic]?"
Volker: "That's the clear message so far"

But from Volker's testimony, Zelenskyy and team don't want to mention investigations in the statement.

That never happened.

It's absolutely implicit from the Volker texts that access to Trump is dependent on promising investigations:

"Good. ... Most impt is for Zelensky to say he will help investigation"

And as Asita has already mentioned above: "heard from White House - assuming President Z convinces trump he will investigate / 'get to the bottom of what happened' in 2016, we will nail down date for visit to Washington"

In support of this notion is the whistleblower, lots of the officials he has spoken to, the ambassador to Ukraine (Taylor), etc. All of them are under the impression Ukraine is being squeezed. Taylor thinks this pressure goes as far as the aid, and it has been reported that's also what Sondland told a Republican Senator:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-administration-used-potential-meeting-to-pressure-ukraine-on-biden-texts-indicate-11570205661

Because zelenskyy was selling Burisma/corruption stuff and Trump explicitly asked for 2016 election information.

If someone is already offering you something, you don't need to ask them for a "favor", do you? They're not going to any trouble for you, there's no favour to be asked for. Nor - and you keep refusing to address this point - does it explain why all the evidence that the USA is constantly pushing Ukraine: again, they don't need to if Zelenskyy has walked up and offered it entirely of his own free will.

 

[Agema]

Of course, we can also now add in other testimonies.

Ex-ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovich had little to say about the main impeachment issue, but seems to confirm that she was removed on the basis of inaccurate gossip, probably also connected to the Giuliani / Trump investigation axis by way of being seen in a bad light by Giuliani's Ukrainian contacts.

Ex-official Fiona Hill supplied some interesting comments. John Bolton told Fiona Hill she needed to report Giuliani to the National Security Council over his back channels to pressurise Ukraine; on the way colourfully describing Giuliani's activities as a "drug deal" and that Giuliani was a "hand grenade who's going to blow everyone up". She also appears to confirm that Giuliani was acting outside the oversight of the State Dept., and that there was a campaign to pressurise Ukraine including Giuliani, Sondland, and importantly the White House Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney.

A senior State Dept. official, George Kent, is not so dramatic, but stated that Trump's attitude towards Ukraine was dictated by Giuliani, not State Dep. officials. Furthermore that it was believed Giuliani's sources were dubious and discredited, also concurring that Marie Yovanovich's removal was shady.

Ambassador to the EU Sondland will soon be up to make an appearance, as will Michael McKinley, a senior aide to Mike Pompeo who recently resigned. Sondland was a Trump appointee having been a major supporter in his election, so where his testimony will go could be hard to predict - he may decide he's in trouble and put Trump in trouble or could act to protect Trump. Already, it has been suggested the "no quid pro quo" text came directly from Trump to Sondland, and that Sondland is going to say he doesn't know whether it was true. There is suspicion that McKinley may have resigned out of principle having been involved - or asked to be involved - in activities he disapproved of.

 

[Agema]

Boom! Thank you Mr. Sondland.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/17/gordon-sondland-testimony-trump-giuliani-ukraine

The White House has predictably now changed the tack of its defence:

"Asked if the administration had offered Ukraine a "quid pro quo", the White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, replied: "We do that all the time with foreign policy ? I have news for everybody. Get over it. There is going to be political influence in foreign policy. Elections have consequences."

"Mulvaney?s comments appeared to reflect a change in White House tactics. The administration is no longer denying there was a political trade-off in relations with Kyiv, after multiple officials have testified that there was."

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

Boom! Thank you Mr. Sondland.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/17/gordon-sondland-testimony-trump-giuliani-ukraine

The White House has predictably now changed the tack of its defence:

"Asked if the administration had offered Ukraine a "quid pro quo", the White House chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, replied: "We do that all the time with foreign policy ? I have news for everybody. Get over it. There is going to be political influence in foreign policy. Elections have consequences."

"Mulvaney?s comments appeared to reflect a change in White House tactics. The administration is no longer denying there was a political trade-off in relations with Kyiv, after multiple officials have testified that there was."

TOTALLY can't wait for the Cult and the Defenders to immediately change their tune from "THERE WAS NO REQUEST FOR INTERFERENCE, HOW DARE YOU STATE THAT WITH YOUR EVIDENCE AND PROOF?!" to "This was never about interference. Of course there was. Everyone does it. Obama probably did it. Why aren't we talking about when Obama did it?!"

 

[Agema]

TOTALLY can't wait for the Cult and the Defenders to immediately change their tune from "THERE WAS NO REQUEST FOR INTERFERENCE, HOW DARE YOU STATE THAT WITH YOUR EVIDENCE AND PROOF?!" to "This was never about interference. Of course there was. Everyone does it. Obama probably did it. Why aren't we talking about when Obama did it?!"

It's obvious that foreign policy involves quid pro quos. Frankly, a great deal of human interaction is quid pro quo, even implicit. Your friendships are essentially based in an unspoken quid pro quo, even if it's just mutual enjoyment of each others' company.

Foreign policy is likewise partially dictated by domestic gain. Leaders do policy that they hope improves their electoral chances, for sure, although there is the idea that it should also be beneficial for the nation. But to sacrifice sound foreign policy and invite corruption as it is increasingly evident Trump has done... that's just rotten.