Poor Impeachable Conald

Poor Conald. No one cares to watch his meeting with Turkish President Erdogan today.

Despite all his attempts to change the narrative, all the major networks, NBC, CBS, ABC & PBS will stop normal programming to show the impeachment hearings.

Who plans on calling in sick to watch the impeachment? It’s tempting after waiting all this time.

I’ll have to watch after the fact, unfortunately, but I do have an idea of what to expect. Trump and planet earth’s most unhinged attorney, Rudy Giuliani, will be exposed. They coluded to deny Ukraine President Erdogen a one-on-one meeting, and they dangled millions of dollars, US tax dollars, in aid to strong arm Zelensky into publicly announcing an investigation into the Bidens.

That will come from Bill Taylor, the first witness to be called.

I have to admit, I’m afraid to put too much hope on these proceedings; I was disillusioned with the Mueller report and his deposition. But there is hope that Democratic leaders have learned and adjusted accordingly.

There will be no 5-minute limits to questions. The witnesses will be questioned in fourty-five-minute blocks of time, which will allow them to tell their us their complete stories, uninterrupted.

Today we will see:

First to testify on Wednesday will be:

• William Taylor, Top diplomat to Ukraine,

• George Kent, State Department official,

And on Friday we’ll see:

• Marie Yovanovitch, former Ambassador to Ukraine

Friday we’ll see:

Marie Yovanovitch, former Ambassador to Ukraine, who testified during preliminary inquiries that she was lost her job on 45’s orders to the State Department.

This is next weeks lineup:

Tuesday morning: Jennifer Williams and Alexander Vindman

Tuesday afternoon: Kurt Volker and Tim Morrison

Wednesday morning: Gordon Sondland

Wednesday afternoon: Laura Cooper and David Hale

Thursday: Fiona Hill

At some point during these proceedings we’ll hear from the 15 witnesses who were questioned in the preliminary hearings.

They’ll tell us about:

• The July 25 call summary “shows no conditionality or evidence of pressure.”
• Zelensky and Trump “have both said there was no pressure on the call.”
• Ukraine “was not aware of the hold on US assistance” during the July 25 call.
• The hold on US aid was lifted on September 11, 2019, without an investigation into Biden.

Republicans have requested the following witnesses:

• Devon Archer, former board member of Burisma Holdings
• Hunter Biden, former board member of Burisma Holdings
• Alexandra Chalupa, former Democratic National Committee staffer
• David Hale, under secretary of State for political affairs
• Tim Morrison, former senior director for European and Russian affairs on the National Security Counsel
• Nellie Ohr, former contractor for Fusion GPS
• Kurt Volker, former U.S. special representative for Ukraine negotiations
• The whistleblower
• Anyone the whistleblower relied on to create the complaint

The whistleblower will not be called, and neither will the Bidens.

Three of the Republicans requests have been honored: Morrison (NSC), Volker (State Dept.) and Hale (State Dept.) All previously testified in closed sessions before the committees conducting the impeachment inquiry.

Sondland is to be questioned at some point as well.

Happy watching, fingers crossed.

Five things to watch for the first public impeachment hearing

Republicans want Hunter Biden and whistleblower to testify in public hearings

How lessons from the Mueller hearing will guide the impeachment hearings — PBS NewsHour

Trump holds news conference with Turkish president: Live updates