When Rudy Giuliani dated a woman after his most recent divorce, they watched Godfather I and II together on their first date. That makes perfect sense because Rudy loves gangsters. It’s pretty clear that he wants to be one, he just doesn’t have the brains. He convinced Donald Trump that the two of them could do a great muscle job on Ukraine and keep him in office. Now that Joe Biden is in the White House, the dirt is coming out about that particular debacle. Washington Post:
Among the accounts emerging from Ukrainian officials is a July 2019 phone call between Giuliani and Andriy Yermak, formerly one of Zelensky’s top aides and now his chief of staff. Yermak said the conversation was the first direct contact between Giuliani and the Zelensky administration and, until now, was only discussed in general terms.
Long story short, Giuliani wanted Zelensky to “play ball” and co-sign on all his absurd allegations about interference in the 2016 election and Hunter Biden’s allegedly crooked dealings with Burisma. The government refused to do so. But Rudy is not somebody who takes no for an answer easily. He decided that the Zelensky regime was filled with “enemies” of Trump and so Yermak asked to have a meeting with him in order to clear the air. And who should be there? None other than Lev Parnas.
“In Madrid, Rudy was like a confident mobster, with a smirk and a smile,” Parnas said in an interview. “He was like, ‘We don’t care, you need this more than we do.’ ”
Yermak, however, said that Giuliani did not pressure him in Madrid and that Burisma was mentioned only briefly.
In the meantime, the Ukrainians found out from American news reports that $250 million in U.S. military aid had been put on hold.
Members of Zelensky’s team contemplated giving Giuliani and Trump what they desired, and considered having Zelensky announce the investigations during a planned interview with CNN. Some advisers objected strongly, however, and the announcement was canceled.
“Can you imagine what would have been the reaction one second after that interview?” said Oleksandr Danyliuk, the former head of Zelensky’s security council. “Zelensky would be looked upon as a toy, as a soft toy — not as a president. Nobody would have respected him.”
Some Zelensky aides now say it was a mistake to open channels with Giuliani. But Ukraine’s rebuff of the demands, said [advisor Igor] Novikov, was a victory in keeping the country out of U.S. affairs.
“Without our actions to push back,” he asserted, “the U.S. presidential race would have been very different.”
There’s no question about that. If Ukraine had done what they were asked and if Trump didn’t thoroughly botch up the COVID-19 issue, he would have very probably won reelection and America as we know it would be going or gone. Democracy dodged the bullet this time, but with not much room to spare. We need to keep that in mind.
I keep seeing people saying “if Trump hadn’t done XXX, he would have been reelected.” But every one of these contentions is actually saying “if Trump weren’t Trump, he would have been reelected.” Because he an’t help being who he is and doing the things he does.
Ukraine. First country to “say” something. The first shoe. Wonder who is next.
It’s all moot really – even if they were handed the evidence in letters of gold on stone tablets, they’d still vote to let him slide.
They aren’t concerned about witnesses, evidenceor anything else – it’s just ‘Don’t let them dems do anything’
This was the narrowest escape from despotism we have experienced since 1812, and we are not yet rid of the viable threat. There is much work to be done before the U.S. is on the firm ground of democracy. Never give in, never give up on beating back the tRumpublican mob.
I mean really How low can Trump supporters bury the bar for Trump tp stumble over. How shamefull can you get