The Legend of Zeldin: Impeachment Time!

It's your Sunday Show Rundown!

We begin this week's Sunday show rundown with CNN's "State Of The Union," where Jake Tapper decided to spill a little tea at the top of the show before beginning his interview:

TAPPER: Over the past two weeks, you have heard damning allegations about the president and his administration from various government officials in the impeachment inquiry. To respond, we invited the top Republican leaders in the House and in the Senate, as well as the president's legal team and officials from the White House, to join us on the show today. They all declined our requests. But joining me now is one of the president's strongest supporters in the House of Representatives, Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin of New York's First Congressional District...

What a sterling introduction! Nothing says "thanks for joining us" like being introduced as the C-squad/consolation prize of Trump defenders while most of the main ones are still licking their wounds from the impeachment hearings last week. But Zeldin tried his best to parrot out the same "no demand, no pressure, no quid pro quo" or "no linkage" while trying to say the Ukrainians did not know about the aid being held until AFTER the infamous July 25 call. Tapper, however, quickly interjected to correct the record:

TAPPER: But I guess a couple points. One, it came out in testimony this week that the Ukrainians did know that the aid was on hold before the phone call. I don't know what Zelensky knew or didn't know, but the Ukrainian government did know. That's one. And, two, we already had Mick Mulvaney come out and say, in front of the cameras, that there was an explicit quid pro quo, that the aid was being held up until -- in part, one of the reasons that it was being held up was because President Trump wanted the Ukrainians to commit to an investigation into Ukraine in 2016. I mean, Mulvaney has already said that that was one of the reasons that the aid was held up.

This was not a great start for Zeldin and it did not get better for him. Tapper then asked a very succinct question that goes to the heart of the impeachment inquiry:

TAPPER: Is it OK with you -- forget the quid pro quo part of it for a second. Is it OK with you for an American president to ask a foreign country to investigate his political rivals? Is that acceptable?

Zeldin tried filibustering the same talking points already repeated by the Jordans, Turners and Stefaniks, but Tapper just sat back and gave the same look to this pee wee league Republican that a boss gives asking for a cover sheet on your TPS report.

 
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ZELDIN: So, I mean, you have -- I mean, you have Kenneth Vogel's reporting from January 2017 in Politico. I'm not sure of anything that you -- you might refute that -- that's in there. […] May 4, 2018, you have three Democratic senators who write a letter to the state prosecutor for Ukraine, asking for Ukraine to help dig up dirt against President Trump, working with special counsel Mueller.

TAPPER: No, to cooperate with -- to cooperate with a Justice Department investigation.

Tapper mercifully ends this interview by asking about Trump's interference with the Navy's decision to discipline a Navy SEAL who committed war crimes . Of course, it's not like this would lead to some big consequence regarding morality versus Trump ...

Once again it is the "never partisans," like Lt Col. Alex Vindman described himself, standing up for what is right while others either bootlick (Zeldin, Jim Jordan) or hide/try to profit from it ( hi, John Bolton! ). Here is the Zeldin interview:

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We conclude with the only Trump administration official to show themselves on a Sunday show, Kellyanne Conway. Be it her inability to resist a news camera or her lack of shame at blatant lying, Conway appeared on CBS's "Face The Nation" to play all her lies like a Rolling Stones concert!

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She played some new lies:

CONWAY: --I think the most important thing to note is not just does the country have an appetite for a billionaire who's going to throw that money around the way--

BRENNAN: Right.

CONWAY: --billionaire Trump never did.

(Could be because Trump is not really a billionaire, but let's go on...)

Some of the "hits":

CONWAY: --and what the report is. But we know what they didn't see this -- over twelve witnesses in two weeks of testimony and over thirty hours. They didn't hear anybody say when they were asked bribery? No. Extortion? No. Quid pro quo for the aid? No. Preconditions for a meeting? Did the President commit a crime? No, no, no every time. The closest they got to it was Sondland in his prepared remarks-- saying he thought there was a quid pro quo for a meeting.

BRENNAN: Right.

CONWAY: They had the meeting on September 22nd in-- in-- in New York. And also the aid went to Ukraine earlier than that. So they got their aid. They have got Javelins and cyber rifles. The Ukrainian policy under President Trump is better than it was previously and Ukraine has more aid.

And some re-mixes:

CONWAY: And I think that in the-- if there is a Senate trial, we'll be able to-- that will be more familiar to most Americans. This process is unfamiliar to them, where the President...can't even have-- there'll be witnesses. The President couldn't even have his own attorneys in there. And that's-- that's not very fair to the, quote, defendant. But I think defense will go on offense [...]

Conway sounds very confident, despite reports Trump is hiding in his bedroom filled with paranoia ! Keep going, Conway.

Thankfully, Conway was followed by Representative Jim Himes to call her out on the bullshit and other lies:

Himes says Nunes pushed "fantastical conspiracy theories" at impeachment hearings    youtu.be   

HIMES: Yeah. Case is an interesting way to put what Kellyanne Conway just did. I was keeping pretty close track, and I'm pretty sure that every single one of her assertions was inaccurate[.]

Jim Himes pulling the political equivalent of a Luke Skywalker in "The Last Jedi" seems like a perfect place to end!

amazing every word of what you just said was wrong    youtu.be   

Have a week!