Hope you made it through Thanksgiving unscathed by familial politics.

You may be dreading the remainder of the holidays because you suspect talk of impeachment is inevitable. Despite knowing the charges are meritless, the scope is "wafer thin," and the Democrats' underlying motives are politically motivated, it's sometimes hard to keep the facts in order and emotions in check when your interlocutor is a family member. Don't be the one to storm off, only to wish later that you'd remembered some key fact.

The problem is that so many compelling, competing arguments have been made against impeachment, it's hard to keep them straight. So here they are. It's not an unabridged list, but the meat is all there. If you have more, add them in the comments and I'll update. And Merry Christmas, happy holidays, season's greetings!

Nine Reasons The Impeachment Of President Donald J. Trump Is Malarkey

1. Doesn't Meet Nadler's Own 3 Standards from 2018

As Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jerry Nadler outlined three necessary standards for impeaching a president...just last year. This is not old cherry-picked stuff from the Clinton hearings.

• "Number one, has the President committed impeachable offenses?" Not on the evidence, as attested to by every witness in the House Intelligence Committee. Three of the four Judiciary Committee witnesses claim that Trump's tweets, phone calls, and claims of executive privilege rise to the impeachment standard. Surprise: they were all called by the Democrats, and their partisanship has been documented. Further, they brought no new evidence. None were party to the Zelensky call, and despite what pundits wish, the July 25 call is what this case rests on. And that was put to bed during the Schiff-led hearings. The quid pro quo established there was not pay-to-play, but--and tenuously at best--an Oval Office visit for an announcement of an investigation. None of which happened, and certainly not rising to the standard even if both had occurred.
• "Number two, do those offenses rise to the gravity that's worth putting the country through the trauma of an impeachment proceeding?" A phone call between two presidents elected to root out corruption? Wherein they discussed military aid and corruption Democrats and an oligarch had sought to suppress? If anything, the call should be celebrated. Oh--and when you hear someone say, "Trump was investigating an opponent," reply thusly: "I didn't know Joe Biden was making $80K/month working for Burisma. I thought that was Hunter, who is not running for president."
  The only thing is...Joe Biden WAS paid by Burisma. $900,000 for "lobbying, as reported by CD Media in early October, and confirmed yesterday by Gateway Pundit.
• "And number three...you have to be able to think at the beginning of the impeachment process that the evidence is so clear, of offenses so grave, that once you've laid out all the evidence a good fraction of the opposition, voters will reluctantly admit to themselves they had to do it. Otherwise, you have a partisan impeachment which will tear the country apart." Voter sentiment has moved since the impeachment began, but not in favor. Fox News recently admitted that a poll showing that a majority favored impeachment was misleading and grossly overstated support.

2. Doesn't Meet Pelosi's Standard from 2019: MUST BE BIPARTISAN

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the woman who announced the House would impeach yesterday, stated in March of this year that impeachment must be "compelling and overwhelmingly bipartisan." In fact, she said the same thing last year as well. The problem: not one House Republican voted for the impeachment inquiry. Further, two Democrats voted against it.
That's right: support to impeach is purely partisan, whereas opposition to impeachment is bipartisan.

3. The CIA "Whistleblower" Was Not A Firsthand Witness = Hearsay

Lest we forget, Eric Ciaramella wasn't on the call. The CIA conveniently changed their standards to what constitutes a whistleblower to include secondhand accounts--i.e., hearsay--days before or after it received the complaint.
The basis for the complaint that led to impeachment is bogus.

4. Ukrainian President Zelensky Has Said Repeatedly And Recently "No Pressure"

As recently as four days ago, Zelensky reiterated that there was no pressure applied by Trump, and no quid pro quo. Color it all you want, that's from an actual witness, a principal one at that: the guy who answered the call.

5. Thinnest Evidentiary Impeachment Ever

Wallis Simpson said, "You can never be too rich or too thin." He never met Angelina Jolie or this impeachment. The evidence upon which it stands--a brief phone call--caused law professor and impeachment expert Jonathan Turley pointed out in the Judiciary hearings that "narrow, fast impeachments have failed," and that the body of evidence against Trump is "wafer thin."
Bear in mind, Turley is not a fan of the president, and did not vote for him. He stood for truth yesterday, one of the few principled people in the room. His reward? Vicious attacks from his own party.

One may wonder, why exactly is this impeachment moving so fast? Committee members given 24 hours to read 300 page reports, witnesses announced two days before appearing, the Judiciary and Intelligence hearings separated by a mere weekend...it almost feels as if they're trying to get it out of the way so they to appease the Squad. The truth of the matter is simpler: when Trump released the call transcript, Pelosi discovered it wasn't as juicy as promised. From that point, the Dems were forced to call off the dogs and lose face, or proceed--despite not having a case--and get it out of the way quickly. They chose the latter.

The only other angle is that they needed something BIG to distract the public from what they fear in the IG report. Don't believe me? As soon as the IG report release date was announced, Nadler announced that the second day of Judiciary hearings would fall...on the same day. Though many experts suspect the IG report (helmed by Obama appointee will be a dud, it's certainly not going to help Democrats. Perhaps to soften the Durham report release, they'll claim Trump colluded with aliens.

6. Multiple Pledges To Impeach Before Whistleblower Before Sept. 24 Announcement (Or Just Because)

Impeachment was always going to happen, regardless of evidence. It was plain as day from many well-known mouth on the left. Rep. Maxine Waters was the first and perhaps loudest. "I have been calling for and talking about impeachment of this president since his inauguration," she states in Essence Magazine. Rep. Al Green claimed that Trump had to be impeached, "or he'll get reelected."

"16 Democrats voted to move forward on impeachment," Rep. Jim Jordan pointed out in Judiciary hearings, "before September 24th...before July 25th."

Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and the squad were for impeachment until it fizzled after Trump released the transcript. National Review reported that AOC moved on quickly but displayed considerable gall by saying that impeachment was "boring," that she "was over it," and that it distracted from “social and economic and racial justice in the United States of America.”

Did you know that?

7. Schiff's Blatant Overreach: Phone Records

Did Adam Schiff take notes from his CIA friends? If so, he's a quick study. As reported widely yesterday, Schiff managed to wrangle phone records from AT&T. Not those of government employees, but private citizens and reporters. This move, like many made by the disesteemed congressman, shows the deep cynicism at the heart of these proceedings.

8. Jim Jordan's Four Points Hold Fast

Rep. Jim Jordan has grown into a lion of the House during Trump's first term. He has shown a laser focus on the facts and a clarity of vision that some of his younger colleagues have seized on, such as Reps. Matt Gaetz, Elise Stefanik, and John Ratcliffe. His enduring points:

• We have the transcript, no quid pro quo.
• Trump and Zelensky both said "no pressure."
• The Ukrainians were unaware aid had been delayed at the time of the phone call.
• Ukrainians never started, promised to start, or announced an investigation into Burisma.

9. Deeply Dishonest Leadership

Nancy Pelosi can't even rely on facts to make Trump sound bad anymore. She has to take quotes entirely out of context to smear him. Yesterday, to dress up her bogus cause, she claimed he thinks he's a king, and can do anything. The original quote, as reported here, made it clear that he was saying he could do anything as it related to a specific case, in this instance, firing Robert Mueller (which he of course did not do).

The Senate trial awaits. So too do the Horowitz and Durham reports. It remains to be seen whether the Democratic Party will be destroyed! as many on Twitter predict, or if the trial is as loud and meatless as the House committee hearings. Regardless, Trump has thus far survived this hasty, poorly aimed kill shot.

The people who constructed the soft coup are not stupid. They didn't rise to their positions of power by luck. Steve Bannon, who has run the insightful War Room: Impeachment podcast/radio show since the impeachment inquiry was announced, openly admires Pelosi's work, saying she is "actually quite brilliant," and "a master at political warfare."

She is. The deeper point is that she, Joe Biden (still the frontrunner for the Democratic 2020 candidates), former nominee Hillary Clinton, former senator and presidential candidate John Kerry, former President Bill Clinton, and impeachment quarterback Adam Schiff have some things in common: they are running scared. Tied variously to Ukraine corruption through their children (Hunter Biden and Paul Pelosi, Jr.), or to convicted pedophile Dem mega-donors (Ed Buck to Adam Schiff and Ted Lieu, Jeffrey Epstein to the Clintons).

That IS the Democratic Party dating back to 1992. Almost three decades of corruption, perversion, and selling out America. That's why this is a disorganized mess: panic rarely begets results.

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