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Dear Shadow Minister,

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You wrote :

1. « My assertion is that the democrats were calling for Trump's impeachment from the day he won the election and that ever since obtaining a majority in the congress have engaged in a series of fishing expeditions »

I suspect that that’s because some of his opponents – not just among the Democrats, but perhaps a few Republicans as well – had an intimate knowledge of Donald Trump as a person, as well as his business methods and track record.

If, for example, Shadow Minister, you happened to know that somebody was a felon and a shyster (though I’m not suggesting that that is the case of Donald Trump), I could understand any reaction you might have to the election of that person as President of the United States.

Knowing that the person in question was probably up to no good, it would be only natural for you to be constantly on the alert, waiting for his first false move. Perhaps that was the case of some of the members of Congress in their attitude towards Donald Trump.

That said, closely surveying every move of the President of the United States and keeping an eye open for possible (if not probable) misdemeanours is by no means reprehensible. Quite the contrary. It is precisely the role of the congress whose duty it is to instigate the impeachment process as stipulated in the constitution as part of the mechanism of checks and balances established by the founding fathers.

2. « Given the Republican senate majority, the only chance of removing Trump was to convince a significant number of republicans to vote against him, as the flimsy evidence was unlikely to do so, Pelosi and Schiff then attempted to use the process to smear Trump »

If, indeed, the evidence was “flimsy” as you suggest, it was probably due to Trump forbidding his staff, assistants, advisers, and other key witnesses from testifying, in addition to refusing to release relevant documents and testifying himself.

Best to await the final outcome before drawing any conclusions.

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SR, I see you congratulate yourself for using Snopes and supposedly destroying my suggestion Trump's IQ of 145. Snopes made no claim of any level of his IQ. His ability is the reason for his success and no Democrat comes near his ability or achievement. He has two degrees in business, but degrees do not define ability, his achievements in the field define his ability. Is He a successful business man is the point which demonstrates ability?

Banjo,

To a large extend I don't disagree with you. I don't believe that Trump is a good person and I would not have voted for him (moot point). However, I also could not stomach voting for Hillary Clinton either.

That the democrats have been out to impeach him from his election is no secret and has painted the congressional impeachment process as more a vendetta than constitutional duty. That the impeachment was rushed though ignoring any procedural fairness or laws of evidence and did not garner a single republican vote essentially sunk any last chance in the senate.

The concept of privileged information is the basis upon which a defendant's lawyer cannot be subpoenaed to testify against him. That Trump is using the justice system to block those close to him testifying makes the democrats charge of obstruction farcical.

If the democrats had followed normal procedures and challenged the subpoenas through the courts they would not be in the quandary they find themselves today where the excrement they have been flinging has largely stuck to them.

http://www.com/conservativepoliticstoday/videos/2321892657916557/?t=556
base of a speech in Congress.

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Dear Shadow Minister,

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You wrote :

« If the democrats had followed normal procedures and challenged the subpoenas through the courts, they would not be in the quandary they find themselves today … »
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What their strategy was is anybody’s guess. Future developments may shed some light on it.

What we do know is that Senate Minority Leader, Chuck Schumer, sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell dated December 15, 2019 calling for at least four witnesses to testify in the Senate impeachment trial – including : acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, former national security adviser John Bolton, senior adviser to the acting White House chief of staff Robert Blair and Office of Management and Budget official Michael Duffey. Here is the full text of the letter :

http://edition.cnn.com/2019/12/15/politics/schumer-impeachment-trial-letter/index.html
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We shall just have to wait and see what the result of that will be.

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Banjo,

The senate trial is entirely up to the majority leader. I would imagine that if he were to call witnesses he would also include Joe and Hunter Biden, Adam Schiff, the whistleblower etc.

Noting that the majority democrats excluded republican witnesses and republicans from the secret hearings, I don't see any moral authority from the democrats for the senate to compromise.