We’re at a point where you should just straight-up ignore or view with deep skepticism anything the House Democrats dole out regarding this unofficial impeachment push. We’re still haggling over this July phone call President Trump had with Ukrainian leaders, where allegations of quid pro quo were lobbed. Trump supposedly threatened to withhold aid if Ukraine didn’t open an investigation into Hunter Biden’s position at an energy company for which he holds zero experience in this line of work. This impeachment push is being carried out in total secrecy. That could change today, but I’m not going to believe a single thing Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), chair of the House Intelligence Committee, says. He’s been out to get the president since this Trump-Russia collusion myth was the flavor the week. And he’s an alleged serial leaker, which makes this move on the Ukraine business entertaining. We all know why he wants to keep this process under lock and key. The public hearings on Russian collusion blew thousands of holes through the narrative; think Bonnie and Clyde’s bullet-riddled corpses and that’s what happened to that effort. It embarrassed the party. Now, we have to trust what they release to us and for a party stricken with Trump Derangement Syndrome—I’m never going to believe what these clowns say. The liberal media is a different story. They’re quasi-operatives for the Democratic National Committee in many ways.
NYT reports that Vindman, who likely leaked secret information to the anti-Trump whistleblower, tried and failed to alter WH call records to fit his Ukraine narrative.
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) October 30, 2019
Now we know who whined to the whistleblower about security protocols for WH records. https://t.co/LPgpnC3JcR
Why we need interview transcripts: NYT, citing 'three people familiar,' said Vindman testified rough transcript 'omitted crucial words and phrases' from Trump-Zelensky call. Later said 'phrases do not fundamentally change lawmakers’ understanding of call.'https://t.co/UKfEgs73PG
— Byron York (@ByronYork) October 30, 2019
So, we have this ten-hour deposition of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who reportedly listened in on the call and had his Ukrainian heritage used against him (via NBC News):
Top Democrats at the deposition of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, said his testimony Tuesday was “extremely disturbing” and praised him for appearing despite attacks from the White House.
The closed-door deposition before House impeachment investigators lasted more than 10 hours.
Once it concluded, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., told reporters that he hopes Vindman's example of patriotism "will be emulated by others."
Schiff said that he was "deeply appalled" by attacks made against Vindman on Fox News Tuesday night.
"The suggestion that because he's of Ukrainian origin, that he has some dual royalty...this purple heart recipient deserved better than that scandalous attack," Schiff said.
The New York Times has more:
Lt. Col. Alexander S. Vindman, the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council, told House impeachment investigators on Tuesday that the White House transcript of a July call between President Trump and Ukraine’s president omitted crucial words and phrases, and that his attempts to include them failed, according to three people familiar with the testimony.
The omissions, Colonel Vindman said, included Mr. Trump’s assertion that there were recordings of former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. discussing Ukraine corruption, and an explicit mention by Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, of Burisma Holdings, the energy company whose board employed Mr. Biden’s son Hunter.
Colonel Vindman, who appeared on Capitol Hill wearing his dark blue Army dress uniform and military ribbons, told House impeachment investigators that he tried to change the reconstructed transcript made by the White House staff to reflect the omissions. But while some of his edits appeared to have been successful, he said, those two corrections were not made.
Colonel Vindman did not testify to a motive behind the White House editing process. But his testimony is likely to drive investigators to ask further questions about how officials handled the call, including changes to the transcript and the decision to put it into the White House’s most classified computer system — and whether those moves were meant to conceal the conversation’s most controversial aspects.
Okay, first, attacking Vindman is not the best line of attack. Vindman thinks there’s a tie-in between the Ukraine aid and a corruption probe into the Biden family. Okay, so what? Sorry, the president has a lot of enemies in Washington D.C. They’re unhinged. They’re biased. The anti-Trump deep state is at work here and I do not trust anything, especially when the transcripts of the interview aren’t released. Second, this is rich. Republicans are out of line for attacking Vindman, but Democrats can call anyone who questions Russian collusion a Kremlin operative? The Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley Strassel took a hatchet to this double standard.
“We are also now told that it is not right to question patriotism of Vindman, just cuz [sic] he was born in Ukraine,” she tweeted. “Fine But it would have been nice if they'd had that position back when they were questioning loyalty of scores of Americans during the Russia collusion hoax.”
1) The double standards on the left (and in the media) have become breathtaking to behold. Take Vindman. We are told his military service gives him extra credibility. OK. But this comes a mere week after the same people lambasted Army Major Tulsi Gabbard as a Russian asset.
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) October 30, 2019
2) And it certainly never stopped the same people from excoriating John Kelly or Jim Mattis or HR McMaster. And let's not even go into their biased coverage or claims against Michael Flynn.
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) October 30, 2019
3) We are also now told that it is not right to question patriotism of Vindman, just cuz he was born in Ukraine. Fine. But it wud have been nice if they'd had that position back when they were questioning loyalty of scores of Americans during the Russia collusion hoax.
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) October 30, 2019
4) It's enough to give you whiplash.
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) October 30, 2019
Recently Hillary Clinton and her scummy underlings smeared a 2020 Democratic nominee, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), by declaring, without evidence, that she was plotting a third-party run with the help of the Kremlin. That’s insane. That’s slander. And yet, it was tolerated because that’s how unspooled the Left has become. Even Rolling Stone, a magazine that got a face full of buckshot for peddling a story about a rape that didn’t happen at the University of Virginia which led to it being sued for libel, knows how this Trump-Russia collusion nonsense has broken the party. Everyone and anyone who doesn’t agree or refuses to hop into the bandwagon, or straight up remains skeptical, is Russian scum.
In 2012, having the opinion that Russia was a threat was seen as anachronistic. The GOP was mocked. And yet four years later the Democrats have undergone a Russophobic facelift after getting their throats slit by the Trump campaign. Now, Russians are everywhere and anyone who doubts collusion could be an operative. That line of insane, cocaine-addled thought and the smears against the collusion skeptic crowd is fine, but attacking Vindman is off-limits. That’s not how this works. Strassel said this is some hardcore “whiplash” regarding narratives. You have to pick one. In fact, Vindman’s attacks are a direct result of the Democrats’ affinity to bash anyone skeptical of Russian collusion, so they opened the door. They etched the rules in stone so please shut the hell up. It doesn’t get any more political than this. It’s going to e nasty. Democrats want to boot Trump and we’ll see the lengths to which they’ll go to achieve that end. Republicans, you better buckle up; drink a protein shake, and prepare for an all-out war. It’s coming.
In the meantime, keep taking notes on the Left’s schizophrenia regarding foreign influence. It’s bound to change again soon.
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