It appears to me that Nancy Pelosi is gradually revealing a strategy about how to remove Mr. Trump. It gives me a glimmer of hope. It appears to me that she is TROLLING Mr. Trump, while simultaneously leveraging the cynical self-interest of the GOP Senate to our collective advantage.
The Constitution does not specify WHEN the articles of impeachment passed yesterday must be conveyed to the Senate. It can happen today, next month, next year, or next Congress. The outrageous partisanship of the Senate GOP, led by Mr. McConnell and Mr. Graham, is more than ample justification to wait until the Senate shows some willingness to even go through the motions of the Senate trial demanded by the Constitution.
Meanwhile, Mr. Trump has said multiple times — and the White House has affirmed multiple times — that Mr. Trump is eager to “tell his side” in the Senate. He foreshadows what he means in his increasingly unhinged rants at campaign events like we saw last night. Mr. McConnell and Mr. Graham know full well that such an appearance would be disastrous for his Senate GOP defenders. Each time Mr. Trump opens his mouth, he drives more and more voters away from him — and from GOP Senators who pretend to support him.
Each day, week, and month that Mr. McConnell delays the Senate trial through his intransigence is another day, week, and month that Ms. Pelosi, Mr. Schiff, Mr. Nadler, and others can twist the knives, set the hooks, and rub salt in the wounds.
Nancy Pelosi has read Donald Trump like a book. She has identified and is now exploiting his Achilles Heel — his pathological inability to tolerate even the slightest criticism. Each day that goes by ratchets up Mr. Trump’s dangerously insane behavior. Each notch makes the immoral complicity of his Senate defenders more and more impossible to hide. Each week, additional evidence of criminal and treasonous behavior emerges — and not just criminal behavior of Donald Trump.
Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Schiff sent a clear message to their Senate counterparts when they published the phone logs showing frequent and close phone contact between Mr. Nunes and both Rudy Giuliani and indicted money-launderer Lev Parnas — calls made during the investigation. Unfolding this very week is new evidence that Mr. Parnas was paid — and neglected to disclose to prosecutors — ONE MILLION DOLLARS from none other than Dmitri Firtash. Mr. Firtash is the Russia oligarch directly tied to Russian organized crime. He is also the hand-picked henchman of Vladimir Putin. It is becoming increasingly clear that Donald Trump was NOT the client of Rudy Giuliani, pro bono or otherwise. Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Parnas were and are working for Vladimir Putin. Similar evidence tying Mr. McConnell, Mr. Graham, and other Senate GOP leaders to Russian organized crime and Vladimir Putin would be devastating.
Nancy Pelosi is, to quote a famous phrase from the Watergate era, letting Donald Trump “twist slowly, twist slowly in the wind”.
