Impeachment insanity

by Hans Izaak Kriek*

President Donald Trump calls the Democrats impeachment inquiry as a continuation of their ‘witch hunt’ against him. At the end of 2016 and early 2017 they already started to threaten with impeachments plans. They are still crying crocodile tears over the loss of the 2016 elections. Since then, the so called witch hunt against the democratic elected president begun. The main issue for the Democrats only is hatred and do nothing for the American people.

Nancy Pelosi leads charge on impeachment

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi claims President Trump’s behavior undermines the integrity of U.S. elections. The Democrats first of all accuse Donald Trump of abuse of power. The president is said to have delayed military aid to Ukraine ($ 250 million) to urge president Zelensky to start a corruption investigation against Joe Biden and his son Hunter. He was commissioned by the Ukrainian gas company Burisma in 2014 and according to the Trump team is said to have been guilty of corruption. There is no evidence of this.

Some of the Democrats want to extend the charge against Trump with other accusations. These range from personal gain during the presidency, violation of legislation on campaign financing, unlawful use of government funds for the construction of a wall along the border with Mexico to the unlawful grant of grace. Some commentators and lawyers warn Democrats to limit the charge to violate the law, abuse of power, persecution of political opponents and lying to the people.

How does Donald Trump react and how big is the chance that Donald Trump will have to clear out?

Bill Clinton survived an impeachment in 1998 because after the Lewinsky affair, the Senate did not agree with the findings of the House and acquitted the president.

The president denies all accusations. He speaks again of a witch hunt and political intimidation by the Democrats. He counts on the unconditional support of his Republican party members. Republicans have a majority in the Senate. If wants to dismiss the president, 20 Republicans must turn their back on him. The chance of this seems extremely small for the time being.

The already fierce battle between Republicans and Democrats is now expected to escalate further and to dominate next year’s presidential election campaign. Nancy Pelosi has always resisted an "impeachment" from Trump for fear that the procedure could possibly help him in a victim’s election. The latest polls indicated that 57% percent of the American people don’t want an impeachment.

Vice President Biden’s role in Ukraine

Joe Biden played a key role in U.S. diplomacy with Ukraine. He has said he made at least a dozen visits to Kyiv as vice president. At one point, the U.S. threatened to withhold a $1 billion loan guarantee unless Shokin was removed from office. Biden delivered the message directly to Ukrainian officials. “If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money,” he told them, according to an account of the conversation he gave at a 2018 conference. Shokin was ousted in March 2016, and the loan guarantee came through.

The U.S. push for Shokin’s dismissal wasn’t the vice president’s idea and filtered up from officials at the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv, according to a person with direct knowledge of the situation. The International Monetary Fund was also faulting Ukraine for a failure to tackle corruption, and demonstrators on the streets of Kyiv were calling for Shokin’s ouster.

Joe Biden has said that he’s never spoken with his son about his foreign business dealings. Hunter told the New Yorker earlier this year that they once touched on Ukraine obliquely. “Dad said, ‘I hope you know what you are doing,’ and I said, ‘I do.’”

In January 2017, Burisma issued a statement saying that “all legal proceedings and pending criminal allegations” against Zlochevsky and the company were closed and that it had agreed to make up any unpaid taxes if it was found deficient.

"Joe Biden and his son are corrupt, but the fake news doesn’t want to report because they’re Democrats," Trump said Monday. "If a Republican ever did what Joe Biden did, if a Republican ever said what Joe Biden said, they’d be getting the electric chair." He added: "Look at the double standards, you people ought to be ashamed of yourselves…You got a lot of crooked journalists, you’re crooked as hell."

The President of Ukraine, Zelensky declared the other day in a meeting with Trump, ‘nobody pressured me or pushed me’ to probe Biden.

Nancy Pelosi ’hurt our nation’ with formal impeachment push

The top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, congressman Doug Collins condemned House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, for her remarks that officially commenced a Trump impeachment inquiry. Democrats like Pelosi do not want to give President Trump a fair chance nor do they want to handle the relevant hearings in a responsible manner. "What Nancy Pelosi did yesterday was a disservice to the House," he said.

Republican senator Graham: “The fact that Pelosi would argue for impeachment before she read the transcript was released tells me that she ‘has lost control. “ The White House released a transcript of Trump’s July phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky showing he sought a review of Biden family dealing, but the document does not show Trump explicitly leveraging military aid as part of a quid pro quo, as Democrats have suggested in pressing forward with an impeachment probe. “Read the transcript. No rational person would conclude that the president noted states were threatening to cut off aid to Ukraine unless they did something against Joe Biden and his son,” said Graham.

The hatred of the Democrats never ends, Trump ‘mania’ takes over Capital Hill. The well-known philosopher Plato once said: “No one is more hated than he who speaks the truth.”

*International political commentator for European Business Review and editor-in-chief of Kriek Media