TWGB: No, I Mean, Everybody is in the Loop

This second video shows indicted Rudy Giuliani associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman with President Trump and RNC chief Ronna McDaniel at Mar a Lago in April 2018. Trump and Parnas take pics. McDaniels hugs Fruman and says she's glad he is attending. https://t.co/ty87AAWTI1

— Yamiche Alcindor (@Yamiche) January 30, 2020

"In the loop" is such a funny term. In the part of my brain that is perpetually five years old, I think "Froot Loops" when I think about loops. When I think of people being "out of the loop" politically, I think about George H. W. Bush. He didn't actually seem to really be out of the loop. Regarding the Ukrainian shakedown, Ambassador Gordon Sondland (who is still! after all this! Ambassador to the EU! Which is kind of amazeballs, right?) said "Everyone was in the loop." And friends--

That shit just keeps seeming truer and truer. It seems like a lot of (Republican) people should know better about all of this stuff, well and truly including US Senators who just recently decided they really did not want to see new documents, and they really, really, did not want to hear from more people, regarding the impeachment (which is forever) and the removal (which will happen by law or by entropy) of President Trump from the White House.

After all, some of the folks who cast votes this Friday to hear no more evil, see no more evil, and try like hell to say no more about it, were right there when the Obama Administration tried to leverage out Ukraine's dodgy prosecutor, Viktor Shokin. Those senators still were paying attention when Trump held up that aid, like Senator Portman. Senator Ron Johnson is in this loop. Lev Parnas claims that Trump's over-eager Renfield Senator Lindsey Graham is very in the loop, and that a letter was delivered to Graham from Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, looking for sanctions against Ukraine officials. There are US Senators who have been well-briefed that the CrowdStrike theory that Trump wanted investigated was also a lie.



The folks in the US Senate knew a lot, but if they wanted to know any more they had only to ask. But since they already basically admitted that Trump honestly was shaking down Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy like the poor man was a chocolate cake tree and it was time for desert, for reasons that had nothing to do with advancing US interests and probably everything to do with advancing Trump's interests, and more embarrassing info comes out all the time that Trump is, really, really, really, obstructing more info seeing the light of day, like OMB docs that would show Trump's involvement in the holding up of the aid, it now behooves us to ask ourselves, "Holy fuck, is it money?"

Because that could be a big chunk. You know, RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel seems so happy in the video linked above to see Igor Fruman that one can't help but be reminded that Fruman and Parnas were funneling so much money into the coffers of Republicans. This was the RNC Chair, after all, who didn't mind Michael Cohen, Steve Wynn, and Elliot Broidy being on the finance committee for the party. Jeez. Wonder what ever happened to those guys, right?

So, when, just on the eve of the terrible decision on the part of the Senate Republicans to fail to do due diligence with respects to just what happened with the president and how he handles this country's foreign policy and uses his office to serve his own political needs, it turns out that the White House Counsel (a taxpayer-funded job) who is acting as Trump's impeachment lawyer, was also a material fact witness (in the loop) and also lied about things he knew well and good were lies during his performance? And we are hearing about this from former Trump NSA Bolton, whom they neglected to subpoena? (Ah well, those lawyers of Trump's do get around.)

Are they saying they don't need to know the details, or are they scared as fuck about the details coming out, because they know more people (Republicans) are implicated and in serious legal jeopardy? That it reflects back extremely poorly on the party as a whole? (And is the holding up of Bolton's book by the White House claiming "classified information" a form of cover-up, witness-tampering, or both? And isn't it weird that the guy who would be doing that, John Eisenberg, is also the guy who put the Zelenskyy transcript on the extra-secret server in the first place? Weird how these classification issues do come up.)

I think the House has a very good basis to try subpoenaing the folks the Senate failed to. I think there is no good reason, not having been removed with one trial, that the President shouldn't be considered open to another round of impeachment hearings in the House. And after all the noise about the Senate wanting the testimony of Hunter Biden, I think it might be time the House considers also the role of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, who are White House Officials who also happen to benefit from their offices and from nepotism.

It could be very interesting. Given how everything is connected. And how many people are looped together.