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It’s a measure of how bad the #TreasonSummit was yesterday that so many GOPers-especially in the Senate criticized him, some more sharply than others. John McCain’s criticism was particularly sharp:

Others were less so. If anything Macro Rubio’s words were rather tepid relative to the reputation he built for himself as a hyper superhawk on Russia.

Notice that there’s no direct criticism of Trump here. Meanwhile our own Congressman Peter King here in the NY2 district expresses his sorrowful ‘disappointment’ in Trump’s treasonous performance.

Ok I guess Cheney thinks this makes King’s ‘strong disagreement’ even more notable. But it IS true-King as a member on the House Intelligence Committee that investigated Russia did a lot to shield the so-called ‘President.’ He ran a parallel investigation on Uranium One and in February he and his buddy Devin Nunes shutdown the Russia probe claiming there was no evidence of collusion-though they didn’t actually look for it-they didn’t speak to Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, or even George Papadopoulos whose conversations with the Russians about damaging emails on Clinton was the basis for the FBI opening the Russia investigation in the first place.

If King is disappointed ‘if not flabbergasted’ by Trump’s refusal to admit it was Russia what does King as a powerful member of the HIC intend to do about it? Note that in the GOP’s IC report shutting down the Russia probe they also denied a central finding of the intelligence community was that Russia interfered with the express purpose of electing Trump. So while King may be shocked by Trump’s denying the finding of the IC, he along with Nunes and friends did the same thing.

One pattern that emerged from GOP members yesterday was they were happy to express outrage, shock, dismay, disappointment, even astonishment over Trump’s horrendous performance but then they were like ‘But what do you want us to do about it?’

Uh, you guys run Congress that is empowered by the Constitution to provide oversight on the Executive. What can you do about it?! You are the only ones in this country who can actually do something right now. But will they? Will Peter King tell his fellow GOPers on the HIC to stop investigating the investigators and reopen the actual investigation of Russian interference and collusion? Yes Mueller is doing his thing but Congress too has its role. If King is serious he should call on that happening today.

Then there’s Jeff Flake who can always be counted on to be one of the few GOPers willing to regularly criticize the illegitimate ‘President’ by name. What is he willing to do? Is he even willing to vote for a formal censure of Trump’s shameful actions?

Flake by himself actually can force the Senate to do something.

But will he? The track record is not good. Meanwhile Mitch McConnell’s ‘break’ with Trump on the other hand isn’t even skin deep.

As James Fallows says now is the moment of truth for Republicans. 

“This Is the Moment of Truth for Republicans”

“The GOP can either defend the United States or serve the damaged and defective man who is now its president.”

It’s clear though that it will be the latter

But the GOP should stop kidding itself-there’s plenty they can do-they are the only ones with the power to check Trump right now.

At least one local Ohio GOPer did something.

Chuck Schumer put it very well yesterday. If anyone is going to check Trump it will have to be the GOP-Dems don’t have the numbers by themselves. While GOPers outrageously claim they don’t know what they can do Schumer who had a powerful public statement yesterday on Trump’s treason listed 4 things they can do. 

“Schumer later listed four ways that Republicans could back up their rhetorical criticism of Trump: strengthening Russian sanctions that Congress approved last year; seeking testimony from Trump advisers who traveled with Trump to the meeting; stopping any attempts to undercut special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation; and prodding Trump to ask for the extradition of 12 Russian nationals Mueller indicted on Friday for election interference.”

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) said that Schumer’s call for extradition of the indicted Russians “would be great” in theory but amounts to “wishful thinking” because “Putin’s not going to” agree.

“Much of what Sen. Schumer’s asking for, we’ve already done,” Cornyn said, pointing to last year’s sanctions bill.

Really-so you’ve heard taken testimony from the Trump advisers who travelled to the meeting with Trump? You’ve censured Trump for the shameful selling out of America to one of our greatest adversaries who just happened to rig the election for him.

Of course not, but Cornyn does answer the question-he and his GOP buddies aren’t going to do anything about Trump. For actual oversight and accountability we need a Democratic Congress.

UPDATE: As SE Hinton would put it that was then-late July, 2018-and this is now-June 2, 2019. The Dems have been in for six months and it’s not at all clear we’re getting the actual oversight and accountability we expected. No it’s certainly not true the Dems have done nothing-they’ve put out requests for documents and interviews, done subpoenas, held Coverup AG Barr in contempt in the House Judiciary in May-while Barr spoke somewhat dismissively of this in a public event he clearly didn’t want a another contempt vote on House Intel and agreed to give Schiff and Friends a lot more of the underlying counterintelligence and foreign intelligence evidence for the Trump-Russia investigation. 

FN: Tina Nguyen argues Schiff proved the utility of being an asshole and wonders if Pelosi is taking notes. 

I don’t know if I’d put it that way-Schiff;’s demands were reasonable though he rightly played a tough hand-but point well taken in general. The Dems did have some important recent victories in the fight for Trump’s financial records.

Still having said all this the Speaker is still talking about investigations not impeachment which really does rankle as we still have had just one public hearing in the last 29 months. When exactly are the public hearings going to build the case Pelosi keeps alluding to going to start?

It’s certainly not true to say the Democrats are doing nothing but are they doing enough especially seeing as the Russia House still has yet to hand over a single document and is ordering all present and past aides not to testify?

It’s arguable that they’re still in the mode of normal oversight despite what they’ve said regarding a Constitutional crisis.

Another narrative you hear is that the Democrats can’t impeach once the primary begins in earnest-they can’t do it in 2020, they basically have to stop before December of this year. If that’s truly they’re thinking it’s an outrage and PACE Alan Litchman the poll analyst who correctly predicted Trump’s ‘win’ they are likely in the road for defeat. 

On the one hand I think that’s actually terrible politics-even though the correct frame for this decision should be principle not politics. I’ve said-you can check earlier chapters-for two years the Democrats ought to drag things out and impeach 11 days before the election just like the Comey letter-in terms of politics that could be the optimal outcome-impeach him and defeat him. 

And run against the McConnell Senate for not convicting him. Force McConnell to hold this trial and vote to acquit someone who has committed so many impeachable offenses.

But if this is the Dem’s game-if they really are going to shut down impeachment talk-even investigations?-once you hit political season then it’s as I’ve feared all along.

Indeed, there basically are two interpretations of Pelosi’s position here.

1. She really is opposed to impeachment no matter what Trump does-ie she is yet another who Trump bragged wouldn’t hold him accountable even if he shot someone in the middle of 5th Avenue. If this is the case perhaps she can explain to us why she thinks the Founders gave Congress impeachment powers at all.

I guess it’s only for Democratic Presidents.

If the Democrats will refuse to impeach in 2020-which is when they should do it-then it’s as I suspected-Pelosi is a Mother as she says and she’s treating us like her kids-sure you can go to DisneyWorld but just not yet. Then by the end of this year it will be ‘Sorry I’d love to go to DisneyWorld but it’s too late now-we have primaries. Let’s impeach him at the ballot box.’

2. OTOH maybe she fully understands and realizes she may well have to impeach but is just building the argument that she did it with only the greatest reluctance. If that’s true then she really is playing 11 dimensional chess as her performance as a terminal impeachment phobe is so believable even we in her base are worried that she really means it.

So is she playing 11 dimensional chess-or does she really believe he ‘wants to be impeached?’

Even if she is playing 11 dimensional chess she needs to hurry up seeing as public hearings haven’t even begun in earnest.

At the end of the day Sarah Kendizor gets it right:

The next 15 months aren’t going to be about passing House bills that will be tabled-the Dems will and should do it but it’s not going to dominate the news-nor should it really.

But I have to say that throughout much of the first six months the Democrats have not been so different than the GOP-they also do a lot more talking than acting-though they do take some action-a decent amount though not sufficient.

But on most days you hear the Dems talking about how bad Trump is while like the GOP before them demurring from actually taken action.

Meanwhile the Impeachment Train keeps growing.

Very good way of putting it. What’s the use in winning the WH in 2020 only to find it’s been burned to the ground?

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