If you have not yet read my original Questions for “Tracy” piece, you may want to begin there. After that article published, Tracy actually did respond with some answers. I’d like to thank Tracy for doing so. I do appreciate her willingness to engage, and to do so in a generally civil and respectful manner. It’s not easy for someone to be a lone dissenter in a group, and Tracy has definitely been that. I respect her courage in doing so, even if I don’t respect most of the substance (or lack thereof) that she argues. For whatever reason, she continues to join us here at TNB and I still hold out hope that someday we can talk some sense into her. 🙂
That said, as I stated in the original article, this is not intended to be specifically directed only to Tracy, as a person, but rather, I intend for this to be directed to “Tracy”, as a representation of those who still support Trump.
Below are the questions that a put forth to Tracy during a previous discussion and she had avoided answering them. She has since provided some answers and I present them here, with my responses. I do this to demonstrate what the current narrative is that the Trump supporters are following and how it’s all part of the Bubble of Bullshit.
Without further ado:
1 Why don’t the Republicans want to hold an actual trial, with witness testimony and full document disclosures?
Tracy: I answered this – some do and some don’t. Personally, I believe Trump’s call was fine, nothing wrong. Why do we need witnesses to something that was fine? We have the transcript, we have money being released to Ukraine…. nothing illegal.
Me: You seem to have missed the entire point of the question. Again, I ask you to reread the article that this question is based on, The Republicans Have the Democrats Right Where They Want Them, and really think about it.
Whether you think the phone call “was fine” and you shouldn’t need to call witnesses for something that “was fine” has nothing to do with the question. If you and the Republicans and Trump really, honestly believe that there is nothing to the Dems case, and that Trump’s own people can testify in such a way that would demonstrate that, once and for all, then it would absolutely be in Trump’s and the GOP’s interest to present that information and prove to the world, once and for all, what the Dems are up to. They can totally expose and destroy them…IF what you say is true. So, again, why would they not want to do this?
As for your feeling that the phone call “was fine, nothing wrong”, “we have the transcript, we have the money being released to Ukraine….nothing illegal” nonsense. First, the phone call has only a small part to play in all of this. You keep saying that you believe the phone call was fine as if that should be the end of it. That’s ridiculous. The phone call was just the final straw for the whistleblower…it was the event that caused him/her to say, “enough is enough, I’ve a duty to draw attention to this.” It’s what started the ball rolling in actually looking at all of the events and activities that Trump and his cronies were embroiled in with Ukraine.
Witness after witness laid out all of the details that gave that phone call context. It’s asinine to look at the phone call alone and claim “it’s fine” and simply move on. You keep saying that we have the transcript. No, we don’t. We have someone’s version of the summary of the transcript. There is sworn testimony that states there are important parts missing from that transcript.
The actual transcript was mysteriously hidden away in a hidey hole that is intended for the most sensitive of items with national security implications.
Everyone agrees that this transcript did not warrant that type of hiding. Why was it hidden, Tracy?
It was hidden because even those closest to Trump immediately saw the problems in this “perfect phone call”. They knew how damaging it would be in full context with everything else they knew was going on. So they hid it away.
The money that was finally released to Ukraine was only released after the whole scheme was exposed. You can’t possible be so naive and gullible to believe that is coincidence.
As far as “nothing illegal”, that’s yet to be determined. Bribery is certainly illegal. Obstruction is illegal. I would also contend that using your own personal lawyer, who was not confirmed by the Senate, to conduct official diplomatic negotiations, is unconstitutional, and thus, illegal.
2 If Trump is legitimately concerned about corruption in Ukraine, is it appropriate for the President to be using his own personal attorney to investigate it and to be involved in diplomatic dealings? Does that not even give you the slightest bit of pause?
Tracy: I really don’t know how I feel about this yet, how is it wrong for him to go to Ukraine to gather information? I can see why he is being attacked for it, there are many powerful people involved, with family working for Ukraine companies. I would recommend you watch Glen Beck’s Ukraine series (3 parts) he has posted on YouTube.
Me: It is not wrong for him to go to Ukraine to “gather information”. It is wrong, and unconstitutional, for him to be conducting diplomatic actions, and requiring actual diplomats to go through him for all dealings with Ukraine.
Sorry, I will not be giving Glenn Beck any more of my time. He has wasted and abused any credibility that I ever had in him. I have faith in our intelligence services and they all say there is nothing to the Ukranian conspiracy theories. In fact, many of Trump’s own people have advised him over and over that there is nothing to them.
3 Where did he invoke “executive privilege”? And when does executive privilege apply?
Tracy: I don’t think he has formally said that he is invoking privilege, just warning he may. So the house can subpoena and then go to court to enforce it, correct? Why would he not want them to testify? Because he did nothing wrong, why should he just hand over his staff for questions for nothing?
Me: Why? Because he can prove that the Dems are only out to get him and expose them for what they are.
Wouldn’t that be best if he could? Wouldn’t it be best for the American people to know, once and for all, what the truth is?
Sure, there will always be people who won’t accept it, but right now, over half the American people do not believe Trump. Don’t you think that’s a problem? Shouldn’t he want to do everything possible to change that? Even if he could convince all but the most partisan Trump haters, wouldn’t that be good for Trump, for the GOP, for the country? How can you say that would be “for nothing”? That would be huge. That would do a great service to our divided Republic. In fact, I can’t think of much of anything that would be better for us at this time.
Besides all that, do you think that Trump can just prevent anyone and everyone in his administration from honoring a subpoena from Congress? Do you think he should be able to? How do you think that would work? Wouldn’t that mean that the President of the United States is untouchable, unaccountable, and above the law? Think about it…he can’t be indicted (bullshit, but another issue) and now, he can’t even be impeached because you’ve taken away the ability of Congress to investigate the President. Sorry, but that makes no sense whatsoever, and certainly not what the Founders had in mind or what is intended by the Constitution.
4 Please, Tracy, tell us how “The inquiry only made a mockery of the impeachment process”.
Tracy: Well, there is first of all a fake whistleblower who said that Trump was abusing his office on that call and then Schiff read it out as a fake call as a joke? It was nothing like what the actual call said. The whistleblower was probably working with Schiff (or his staff) who didn’t know who the whistle blower was but somehow was going to keep his identity secret even though he didn’t know who he was…. Then Trump released the call and we saw it was a normal call, nothing wrong with what Trump said. We were going to hear from the whistleblower but then we weren’t.
We had the auditions in the underground bunker and particular testimony was released to paint a narrative. There is still testimony that was not released. Then when Schiff got the witnesses that he wanted he had public hearings and shut out anyone that the GOP wanted that could shed some background info on the call and we heard from a bunch of people telling us that they presumed that there was quid pro quo but nothing illegal was witnessed.
Then we got to Nadler’s committee and Schiff releases PHONE RECORDS of private citizen for what purpose? I am trying to imagine how you would react if Nunes released phone records of pro impeachment journalists, committee members…amazing it was just accepted as normal. ATT just forked them over? I have questions about that still.
THEN we get the partisan vote for, bi partisan vote against an impeachment that had no crimes and the cheering happy Democrats stuck it to Trump! Nancy tried to shush them but she just looked ridiculous. Now she is not sending them over until she is assured the trial will be fair? LMAO! She has nerve I give her that. Democrats realizing that their impeachment is seen as a sham now wanting to go back and put some more articles in, maybe they can find something else to impeach him over. How silly is this? She was rushing to get it done because Trump was a danger then she kept them and didn’t send them over and is looking for more.
What a joke.
Me: Let’s begin with the “fake whistleblower”. Ugh.
This is highly disturbing and exceptionally ignorant. There was absolutely nothing fake about this whistleblower. He/she went through all of the proper whistleblowing channels and submitted an actual, official, whistleblower report according to whistleblower laws.
Can you not see and understand why it’s important to enable whistleblowers to speak out and to protect their identities?
To the substance of the whistleblower report, the IG in charge of handling such reports took it seriously, as he should, and conducted an investigation in order to determine the credibility of the report. He determined not only that it was credible, but also that it was of such urgency that it met the requirements for immediate notification to the House Intelligence Committee.
The IG corroborated the information provided by the whistleblower with multiple other people with firsthand knowledge. Witness after witness then further corroborated and provided extremely detailed context to the phone call in sworn testimony.
Schiff never met the whistleblower and there is no evidence otherwise. The Dems did not “work with the whistleblower” and there is no evidence otherwise. The whistleblower was concerned and reached out to the intelligence committee for guidance, and they instructed him on the proper procedures to submit an official whistleblower report through the proper channels, which he/she did. There is no evidence otherwise.
When Trump “released” the call (which, again, was not an actual transcript…you do understand that by now, right?), on the contrary to the statement that “we saw it was a normal call, nothing wrong with what Trump said”, we saw the opposite. He stated outright that he wanted Zelensky to do us a favor and investigate the Bidens and the 2016 election.
Based on the whistleblower report that was investigated and corroborated by the IG, and the many witnesses who testified under oath to give the call context, there was plenty there to be extremely concerned about.
Can you even acknowledge that if Trump actually did what is being charged that it would be extremely dangerous for our country? Do you comprehend the ramifications of a President doing such a thing? The damage it can do to our relationships with all of our allies? The potential for extortion that could put a President in if a nefarious foreign entity could prove the wrongdoing of Trump and they held that against him to get special “favors”? Let alone the actual manipulation of the election that is supposedly what he was after.
There are many consequences to the actions that he is accused of. Can you see that?
Assuming you can…based on all of the information that we had from the records and testimony that the Dems were able to obtain, there was definitely enough there to justify any rational person to think there may definitely be a problem.
Now, maybe there was nothing to it, and with further documents and witnesses, we might be able to clear it all up in Trump’s favor. But the problem was, Trump, himself, blocked that from happening.
The consequences of the actions of a President who did these things are so dire, that it’s imperative that we get it cleared up one way or the other. Can you not see that?
Do you really believe that this is a case where we should just accept Trump’s word for it that he did nothing wrong? Because that is essentially what you are doing. You are taking the word of a known habitual liar (you do agree he’s a habitual liar, right?) over that of many, many witnesses willing to testify under oath.
With such dire consequences for the nation, that seems very foolish to me.
As for the way Schiff operated the inquiry in the Intelligence Committee, the way you described is typical Trumpist nonsense.
Underground bunker? Really?
It is absolutely routine to hold some initial testimony behind closed doors. They didn’t lock out the Republicans and do this is secrecy. In fact, Republicans from 3 different committees were welcome to sit in on the testimony. Schiff even invited Trump and his attorneys to participate.
As for any “leaking of a narrative”, that was done on both sides, probably even more so on the GOP side, which is where you got your ludicrous “underground bunker” narrative. All designed to de-legitimatize the process for people like you and the other people still stuck in the Bubble of Bullshit.
The witnesses that the GOP wanted to put forth during the inquiry could shed no light on what Trump was alleged to have done…the only reason they were asking for them was to further the narrative of the wrongdoings of Biden and his son. If Joe or Hunter Biden had done anything wrong, there are proper channels of investigation to determine that.
The whole intent of Trump asking Zelensky to announce an investigation of the Bidens was to put a cloud over Joe’s head that Trump could hammer on during his campaign. He was not even interested in an actual investigation, just the announcement of one. That was made clear in the testimony from the witnesses.
The games that Nunes and Jordan and the other Republicans were playing in wanting to call the Bidens as witnesses and explore their “wrongdoings” were only intended to serve the same purpose as Zelensky making the announcement of the investigation…simply to give the impression that the Bidens were corrupt and possibly criminal. The Republicans wanted to further that narrative and make a circus out of the hearings in the process. The Bidens had nothing to add in being able to testify to the actual actions and words of Trump. Schiff knew that…and every rational person observing the whole situation knew that.
The phone records that Schiff legally obtained were pertinent to the investigation. And, lo and behold, we learned that Nunes, the ranking member of the GOP on the Intelligence Committee was in communication with some of the main players in the whole Trump Ukraine scheme.
Interesting? Apparently not to Tracy.
He may very well have been involved in the entire scheme to pressure Ukraine into doing Trump some favors for his personal and political benefit. Yet, you’re not concerned about that at all? He didn’t disclose such communications. Didn’t recuse himself. Didn’t explain the communications. Nothing to worry about, huh?
Amazing that you just accept that as normal.
So, now we come to your comments about the “partisan vote” for impeachment. Yes, it was certainly partisan. But can’t we also say it was every bit as partisan on the Republicans’ part for all voting against it? You can’t have it both ways. Just claiming that it was the Dems being partisan doesn’t fly. The cowardly Republicans have been in lock-step with Trump for 3 years. It’s pathetic. And partisan. So please stop with the faux concern about bi-partisanship. That’s bullshit.
What Pelosi is doing now with the articles of impeachment was precipitated by the actions of McConnell and of Graham.
The Majority Leader and the Chairman of the Senate Judicial Committee publicly stated that they would not be impartial in a trial and in fact, may not really hold a trial at all.
They publicly stated that the entire trial proceedings would be determined by Trump and his lawyers, that they would follow his lead. This kind of thing is unprecedented.
They publicly stated effectively that they would not abide by their Constitutional oaths. That is the very real scenario Pelosi is faced with. Under those absurd circumstances, she is doing whatever she can to protect the impeachment process and not allow the impeached individual the ability to determine how to effectively dismiss the entire thing.
Hate Pelosi all you want, but that is the factual reality of the situation. We have the video to prove it.
No joke.
5 Do you think it’s appropriate for McConnell to be working hand in hand with Trump in creating a strategy for the trial?
Tracy: I do, but then again I think the impeachment that the House is sending over is an embarrassment for them. I have heard them talking about making it a trial that will really destroy the Democrats (and probably some GOP which is why I don’t see it happening) and their lawlessness with money laundering and stealing from US taxpayers money given as foreign aid. And I have seen some say just a quick dismissal because the articles really don’t deserve much more than that. I am ok with either way they go, but I lean towards a quick dismissal because Trump did nothing wrong.
Me: Wait, you do think it’s appropriate for the Majority Leader of the Senate, who will be leading the impeachment trial and acting as a juror, to work directly with the President, the defendant in the trial, to determine the strategy of how to keep Trump from being convicted? Surely, you can’t be serious with that. In no fair understanding of the Constitution and separation of powers and oaths of impartiality can one make that claim. It’s ludicrous on its face.
You are just fine with a quick dismissal because “Trump did nothing wrong”.
Based on all of the evidence so far presented under oath, that’s really an absurd statement.
Your entire basis for that belief can be nothing more than your belief in Trump’s own word. There is nothing else. As it stands right now, all of the evidence points overwhelmingly to Trump’s guilt and his obstruction. The only thing that can further clear it up would be for him to stop blocking so many people from testifying and by releasing all of the documents that he is hiding. I believe that any rational, clear-thinking, intellectually honest person (in other words, anyone not stuck in the BoB) can clearly understand the reason he won’t allow that.
Tracy: Now you have my answers.
Me: Yes, and these answers make me weep for our Republic. As completely unfounded as they are, I am afraid that they actually do represent the beliefs of most of your fellow Trump supporters. And that’s very worrisome.
Tracy: As far as the rest of the article, I don’t consider myself an average Trump supporter. I was just like yall here, and when he was elected I had to consider what I thought was true. All the conventional wisdom was wrong. I didn’t vote for Trump, but when he beat Hillary I was sooooo happy. I was just resigned to her being president and praying we would survive it. So I look back on my NeverTrump days as actually the reasonable position with what we knew. But now with what I know, I consider the reasonable position to support Trump. He has been better than I thought he would, his judges are reshaping the judiciary for decades, and we will be happy for that.
Me: You may not consider yourself an “average Trump supporter”…or a full-on Trumpist, and you may have once been a NeverTrumper, but you are now, indeed, a Trumper, Tracy.
You have done nothing but make excuses for him, defend the indefensible, argue verbatim the Trumpist talking points and false narratives, and fallen for all of the bullshit. You are, indeed, stuck deep in the Bubble of Bullshit.
I actually have some sympathy, because you are allowing yourself to be completely manipulated and to be made to look a fool.
Nothing that Trump has done makes me more angry than that.
He has exploited good people, including members of my own family and friends. People who had very real and legitimate concerns about the direction of our Republic. People who trusted in who they believed were honest, leading conservative voices. People who are now simply lost in this massive Bubble of Bullshit.
People like you, Tracy.
If nothing else, please tune out all of those people you have placed your trust in for information just for a little bit and take some time to really think things through and try to hear what I’m saying.
The future of our Republic is too important not to.
