They Wrote the Book

Former Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham (above) and former Trump national security aide Fiona Hill have put out books on how their former boss tried to subvert democracy.  Grisham, who was introduced to most Americans for the first time through her promotional interviews for her book - mainly because she was the only White House press secretary who never held a briefing, mainly because Trump acted as his own press secretary at the time - says she regrets serving in that position and enabling Trump's worst impulses, adding that his close associates and family members, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner, became power-hungry.  Also, she worries of what a second Trump term would look like.

"I want to just warn people that once he takes office if he were to win, he doesn't have to worry about reelection anymore," Grisham said. "He will be about revenge. There will be some pretty draconian policies that go on."

Meanwhile,  Hill (above) calls Trump a person with a fragile ego who demands and usually gets total fealty and eyes the Presidency as a lifetime possession through which to assume total control over the country as Putin has done in Russia.   Hill also added that Vladimir Putin took power in Russia much the same way as Trump did - winning power through democratic means after his country suffered a severe recession.  Funny, that's also how Adolf Hitler took power in Germany in 1933.

These books - and several other Trump tell-all books that are likely to come out shortly - are not going to be read by Trump supporters.  They are not meant to be.  The people who need to read these books are those who care about keeping America from devolving into a fascist dictatorship where women are denied basic reproductive rights and have the affairs managed by their husbands or fathers, people of color are prevented from voting, workers are paid starvation wages, teaching critical race theory is banned even in higher education, demonstrators against reactionary policies are handled by police the same way demonstrators in Washington protesting George Floyd's murder were handled by law enforcement in Washington to clear a path for Trump to hold up a Bible in front of a church, political opponents are jailed on bogus charges of sedition, and storm troopers goose-step down Pennsylvania Avenue.

And books get burned, or at least censored - namely books like Grisham's and Hill's.

Expect me to devote more space on this blog to doing what Grisham and Hill are doing with their books - warning people of the hell we will go through if the 45th President of the United States becomes the 47th President of the United Sates as well.  And don't expect him to go quietly on January 20, 2029 if he is elected to a second term because he will already have figured out how to serve as President-for-Life.  Only dire warnings like these can spur people of good will to prevent this nightmare dystopia from happening.

Up The Hill

Fiona Hill (below) was certainly impressive in her testimony on how American national security was diverted to help Trump with domestic politics and how it should never have been allowed to happen, and she was just as impressive in withstanding attacks on her loyalty to the United States just because she was born and raised in England.  She was especially forceful in refuting the bogus charge that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 presidential election to help Hillary Clinton, a charge that Trump has embraced.  She and her fellow witnesses also made it clear that Joe Biden and his son did nothing wrong regarding business with Ukraine. 

"The Russians’ interests are frankly to de-legitimatize our entire presidency," she told House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff.  "The goal of the Russians [in 2016] was really to put whoever became the president - by trying to tip their hands on one side of the scale - under a cloud."

And yet, none of this matters one iota.

Voters who want to hear more about what the government is going to do about them and their own concerns have pretty much stopped caring about the impeachment inquiry, assuming they ever did.  Or, as I said at the start of the month, meh.  Not only has interest in the inquiry waned, so has interest in impeachment.  Independents have turned against it, and voters in swing states have followed suit.  Democrats are suddenly in danger of losing the 2020 presidential election for going after Trump. 

Trump voters simply believe that their guy did nothing wrong.  They do, however, believe that the Bidens did something wrong, which is why they'll be pleased to know that the Republican Senate is launching an investigation of them.  And the Republicans in Congress have paid no heed to Dr. Hill's insistence that the story about Ukrainian meddling in the 2016 election is a fake - they're looking into it in hopes of finding something.  Because why should anyone listen to Dr. Hill - "That Limey bitch, what does she know?"

Maybe Adam Schiff should ask what the naming Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, Devin Nunes, knows.  It seems he went to Vienna to meet a now-discredited Ukrainian prosecutor to dig up dirt on the Bidens, even though he's supposed to be an impartial as ranking member of the House intelligence Committee. Lev Parnas, the recently indicted Soviet-born American who was working with Rudolph Giuliani to push the story of corruption in Ukraine caused in part by Democrats, is ready and willing to tell everyone about it.

But hey, if no one cares, because the economy is doing so damn well . . .

The House Intelligence Committee hearings are over, and so, quite frankly is any hope of getting enough people concerned about Trump's actions to ensure his defeat in the 2020 election.  To sum up: Legally, the impeachment hearings have been a success for the Democrats.  Politically, they have been a flop.

Of Heaven's Gate proportions.