Better late than never. And, lets face it Bigg Bob, there is a lot of "never" going around lately. Anyway, back to the article:
What's interesting is that Sundance has been writing about these rules changes since January, when they happened. He's cited them many times, as being critical to the Pelosi plan to impeach Trunmp.
And now here we are, the Pelosi impeachment plan is being put into action. Here's the most interesting details from the article:
Back to this two-week break. While the technical reason for the recess is to celebrate the Jewish holidays of Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah, it is now obvious the sequence of events has been constructed specifically toward these impeachment efforts.It seems unlikely to me that we'll be getting to the actual impeachment vote in October, as Sundance's timetable suggests. Why wouldn't the Democrats in the House want to drag this out for a few months? Every day they keep the impeachment drama cooking in the House is another day that the Trump-hating media get to speak in deep tones about the seriousness of the charges against Trump.There are 31 House districts currently held by Democrats which President Trump won in 2016; Pelosi is giving those members an opportunity to make their impeachment case to their constituents now, but failure to support the effort is likely not optional for all except a few of the most tenuously vulnerable. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and Majority Whip James Clyburn will assemble enough votes for impeachment.
While those house members are explaining to their constituents, back in DC the committee work on the articles will collate. On Friday afternoon, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings, and Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel, issued a subpoena demanding a slew of Ukraine-related documents from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo by Oct. 4th. The committees also scheduled depositions with five State Department officials between Oct. 2 and Oct. 10.
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From recent events we can see the framework of Schiff compiling Trump-Ukraine articles and Nadler compiling Trump-Russia articles. Trump-Ukraine via Schiff will likely focus on a corruption angle; Trump-Russia via Nadler will likely focus on an obstruction angle.
How many articles of impeachment are finally assembled is unknown, but it is possible to see the background construct as described above. Unlike historic examples of committee impeachment assembly, and in combination with the lack of an initiation vote, Pelosi’s earlier House Rule changes now appear intentionally designed to block republicans during the article assembly process. The minority will have no voice. This is quite a design.
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Once the articles are drawn up, Schiff and Nadler will vote to approve them out of committee. Democrats control the majority so the articles will easily pass out of committee. Then the articles must come before a full house vote. The current two-week recess is the period where Pelosi has instructed her team to return to their districts and sell the reasoning and purpose for the upcoming vote. Speaker Pelosi will hold that vote.
It is more than likely the vote will pass through the House on party lines. Once Pelosi achieves a vote of passage on any single article President Trump is considered impeached.
Wouldn't delivering the charges to the Senate near Christmas be the ideal? The House gets three full months of toying with them, and dumps them into Mitch McConnell's lap as a Christmas present. But that's not Sundance's take, he's expecting things to move much faster:
Speaker Pelosi has to give the media some reference point to say the republicans were included in the process, so she will likely have mid to late October destined for the committee chairs to have committee debate on their pre-assembled articles. This will give the impression of minority participation, but it will be for optics only. Democrats are keen optical strategists and narrative engineers; and as you know they coordinate all endeavors with their media allies. The narrative assembly and usefulness by media to drive a tactical national political message will hit heavily in this mid/late October time-frame. This will allow the executive suites (media) to capture/stir-up maximum public interest and make the most money therein.
There will likely be more articles other than just “obstruction of justice” (Muh Rusia) and “corruption of office” (Muh Ukraine), but those two are easily visible. Emoluments may also play a role.
The articles of impeachment will then be voted out of each committee; and after a significant dramatic pause for maximum political value, Speaker Pelosi will present days of House debate on them.
His view of the final step in the house is funny in it's specificity. Yea, one imagines new sets, new show names: "The Impeachment of Donald Trump" graphics, new theme muusic. I hadn't considered all that, but Sundance does:
The media will construct television sets to broadcast the house impeachment debates, and the Democrat candidates will use this time to spotlight their angelic policies and anti-corruption agenda. Big Dollar Democrats will bring in their activist groups from around the nation to celebrate the impeachment of President Trump.Then, once Pelosi is certain the maximum political benefit has been achieved, she will announce the date for the Full House Vote on Articles of Impeachment. We can be certain the date will be filled with maximum drama and made-for-tv effect complete with Speaker Pelosi bringing back the big gavel for a grand presentation and a full house vote.
It's interesting to think about this picture. This was from Pelosi's provocative march through the assembled Tea Party protesters at the capital, an act of supreme arrogance and provocation. Pelosi and her caucus were clearly trying to get some reaction out of the assembled right-wing protesters. They failed, but then they lied about it. I believe it was Andrew Breitbart who offered $10,000 to anyone who could produce video of a protester spitting on St. John Lewis. And, of course, no one could.
But it's a great picture to illustrate this story with. Because it captures Pelosi in all her horrible, cheating, arrogance, lying and trying to provoke an "incident".