It appears the Republicans thought the Democrats were bluffing in regard to an impeachment trial. Kevin McCarthy, the GOP minority leader in the House, was caught completely off guard when questioned about the transcript of the ill-fated phone call Trump had with Ukrainian President Zelensky. He tripped over his own words in stumbling to come up with the meaning of "though" in Trump's request to the Ukrainian president to look into a long debunked theory that one of the country's "wealthy people" has the DNC server, which was hacked into in 2016 by Russia.
McCarthy appeared oblivious to the enormity of these allegations, continuing to dismiss them while having his own doubts. This is the case across the board as Republicans scramble to pull Trump from the grave he dug for himself. The only problem is that Trump wants to drag them all in with him.
It didn't take him long to throw both Mike Pence and Bill Barr under the bus, implicating them in the deals between the US and Ukraine to implicate Joe Biden in a scandal they imagine to be far worse than the one they find themselves in. Mayor Rudy hasn't helped matters any with all the names he has tossed around on news talk shows. This led House committee chairmen to subpoena Giuliani to turn over all the documents he claims to have, citing his numerous television appearances.
Rather than build a defense team for what promises to be a very nasty impeachment hearing, Trump has taken to twitter and the airwaves to vent his outrage at the subpoena requests, calling for Adam Schiff's head, who he identifies as the leader of this Democratic cabal plotting a coup against his administration.
The absurdity of these attacks only serves to amplify how clueless Trump is. For that matter, so to his administration, which sought to cover up the notorious July 25 phone call, many of whom having denied even being on hand, like Mike Pompeo, who has since been ratted out.
It's pretty clear that a lot of low level officials in Trump's administration are appalled by what is going on given that the whistleblower compiled his report from numerous complaints. Who knows, maybe even some higher level officials have had their fill of Trump's heavy-handed tactics and are leaking information. Whatever the case, this is a sinking ship. For the first time in his 33 months as president, Trump appears to be genuinely worried he is in big trouble.
To some degree Trump is a victim of his own administration. He is surrounded by a slough of Machiavellian characters all planting insane ideas into his head. Former homeland security adviser, Tom Bossert, said as much in regard to Giuliani, who is the one who keeps pushing the phony conspiracy theory that Ukraine broke into the DNC server, and not Russia. The far more nefarious one is Stephen Miller, who is desperately looking for any angle to bring down potential rivals. I seriously doubt Trump had any idea Hunter Biden served on Burisma until Miller or someone else in his administration told him.
Whereas Nixon appeared to have relative control of his operatives, Trump appears to be led by his operatives in directions he doesn't fully comprehend. As the story of the whistleblower broke, Trump was taken completely off guard and has been scrambling ever since to regain his footing. You can imagine the fire and fury in the White House right now. It must be white hot, as Trump does not like being made a fool, and that is exactly what he appears to be at this point.
I'm sure the Republicans will eventually form a counter strategy, but the situation is looking very bleak at the moment. Trump better start looking for better lawyers. Rudy is certainly doing him no favors at all.
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