Day 982: Trump brainstorms impeachment defense on golf course with lackey Lindsey Graham

No bigger hypocrite has been exposed over the past three years than Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).

When Trump was close to locking up the Republican nomination, Graham didn’t mince words about the danger of Trump.

However, since his election, Graham has been a vocal defender of virtually all things Trump. His about-face has been pronounced. For instance, He criticized Trump, using words like “kook,” in 2016. Yet a year later, he criticized people who called Trump a “kook.”

They now frequently play golf together, as they did Saturday at one of Trump’s properties.

With a whistleblower report triggering an impeachment inquiry, a panicked Trump is desperate for allies. Sycophant Graham is all but asking Trump which boots he’d like licked first.

Graham, ignoring corroboration of the whistleblower’s account via a partial transcript of Trump’s phone call with the Ukrainian president, is focused on moving the goalposts and tweeting lies.

Notwithstanding that “hearsay testimony” isn’t the only thing that is putting Trump in hot water, hearsay is frequently admissible in courts of law. On top of that, an impeachment inquiry has a very different standard than other infractions.

Graham previously tried a similar tactic on Twitter by focusing on quid pro quo. Except not only is quid pro quo not a requirement for impermissible self-dealing or corruption, the transcript itself does indicate quid pro quo. Immediately after the Ukrainian president mentioned purchasing American weapons, Trump asked for “a favor.” (Moreover, Trump previously held up needed aid to Ukraine for reasons that were unknown at the time. The aid eventually went through when bipartisan curiosity for the delay in Congress got too loud.)

When Bill Clinton was president, Graham was adamant that conduct, absent criminal liability, was the key for determining impeachment. Removal wasn’t about punishment, but rather about “cleansing the office.”

Graham’s whole parking ticket/hearsay testimony schtick of 2019 is blown away by his past words.

The real surprise shouldn’t be the abject hypocrisy. Rather it’s that Trump allowed Graham to play golf with him at all. In Washington, Graham acts as a permanent caddie more than a player.

982 days in, 480 to go

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