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Heather du Plessis-Allan: Democrats are losing the impeachment hearings

Author
Newstalk ZB,
Publish Date
Fri, 22 Nov 2019, 4:11PM

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Democrats are losing the impeachment hearings

Author
Newstalk ZB,
Publish Date
Fri, 22 Nov 2019, 4:11PM

Well you’d have to say the public impeachment hearings have been a waste of time, haven’t they?

Today’s the last day of two weeks of public hearings and what have you learnt that you didn’t already know?

The point of this was to prove that Trump did try to push Ukraine into investigating the Biden’s, or else it wouldn’t get aid money right?

But we already knew that.

We knew it because Trump released a phone transcript weeks ago that made it clear that is what was going on. And these hearings haven’t really added much to that.

I’m guessing the Democrats pushed ahead with these hearings in the hope that it would either convince enough swing voters to change their position on Trump, or swing enough Republican senators to abandon their support of Trump.

So let’s deal with that.

Was there enough evidence to change the mind of a swing voter? Probably not. Not when you consider the quality of your two star witnesses.

One is EU ambassador Gordon Sondland.

This is a guy who at first told impeachment hearings that he couldn’t’ remember if there had been a quid pro quo conversation.

And then he changed his mind and said, oh now he could remember.

Now is that credible?

It could look to you like a guy who suddenly remembered because everyone else’s testimony refreshed his memory.

Or it could look like a guy who didn’t want to be the odd man out with a different story.

Is there enough to change the minds of Republican senators?

Again, doesn’t look like it, none of the evidence was surprising enough and even the collective weight of the evidence hardly seems enough to tip the balance.

And the Republicans seem at least at this stage to be holding firm and this is crucial because unless the Republican senators are prepared to cut their guy loose, the whole thing was pointless.

Because it’s the senate that votes to remove a president and the senate is Republican controlled.

And you know what’s ironic?

Yesterday, Bernie Sanders warned the Democrats. He said if they are ‘consumed’ by President Trump they will lose the election.

Well how would you describe two weeks of hearings about Trump that ultimately change nothing?  How about ‘consumed’?

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