The sad, desperate and likely coerced hypocrisy of Lindsey Graham

Again, I know it doesn’t do any good to post here about Republican hypocrisy. I know that not one of my conservative readers will change his or her mind just because I’ve demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that Donald Trump, or one of his defenders in Congress, is a hypocrite. With that said, though, I can’t help but feel compelled to share the following quotes from South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee… I know it’s unlikely, but maybe just one person out there will read this post and be reminded that there was a time in the not too distant past when Republicans felt there was no greater crime than being a so-called “flip-flopper,” and changing one’s stance on issues.

Let’s start back in September, shortly after news about the whistleblower’s complaint broke. At that time, Graham was adamant with reporters that the Trump administration had not threatened to withhold security aid from Ukraine in order to get them to agree to open an investigation into Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. “If you’re looking for a circumstance where the president of the United States was threatening the Ukraine with cutting off aid unless they investigated his political opponent, you’d be very disappointed,” Graham said. “That does not exist.” So we started with a full-throated denial.

Then, two weeks ago, Axios quoted Graham as saying that he’d keep an open mind on impeachment, should evidence of such a quid pro quo exist. “If you could show me that… Trump actually was engaging in a quid pro quo, outside the phone call,” the Senator said, “that would be very disturbing.”

Now, though, with the confirmation that a quid pro quo did in fact exist, things seem to have taken a bit of a turn for our heroic, principled protagonist.

Gordon Sondland, Trump’s ambassador to the European Union, you see, offered a revised statement to the House Intelligence Committee a few days ago, in hopes, no doubt, of avoiding perjury charges. And, in it, he pretty much confirmed that he was doing a little light extortion on behalf of the President. You see, when he testified under oath in October, Sondland had said that he “never” thought there was any precondition placed on the American aid to Ukraine. When U.S. intelligence officials testified after Sondland, however, and mentioned to members of Congress that they had discussed these preconditions with the ambassador, his memory apparently started to improve. In his revised testimony, Sondland shared the following… “I said that resumption of the U.S. aid would likely not occur until Ukraine provided the public anticorruption statement that we had been discussing for many weeks.” So, not only was Sondland aware of the quid pro quo, but he was actually one of the people in the Trump administration who was laying it out for Ukrainian officials, and explaining what it was that they had to do if they wanted to receive the military aid appropriated by the U.S. Congress. And now, it would seem, he’s coming clean about it.

So, you might think, given his earlier comments, that this might be enough to get Graham motivated to at least agree to the necessity of an official inquiry, right? I mean, here we’ve got an actual member of the Trump administration saying under oath that that there was a quid pro quo, right? Well, apparently not… Graham, who earlier in this chain of events demanded that interview transcripts with witnesses be made public, is now saying that he refuses to even look at what witnesses like Sondland are saying. “I’m not going to read these transcripts,” he said yesterday. “The whole process is a joke.” [It would seem to me that someone who refused to read sworn testimony on the subject of national security would be disqualified from serving on the Senate Judiciary Committee, but what do I know.]

And, today, Graham’s decided to take it even further, saying that there couldn’t have been a quid pro quo, as Sondland has laid out, as Trump and company are “incapable” of pulling anything like this off. [When all else fails, fall back on the “Trump is too inept to attempt something like this” defense.]

But, wait, it gets even better. Graham is also suggesting that Sondland, who gave a $1 million donation to the Trump inaugural fund (in exchange for an ambassadorship), is actually a deep state operative working with the Democrats.

It pains me to say it, but I’m beginning to think that Graham, at the outset, may not have been acting in good faith when he said that he’d keep an open mind with regard to impeachment, if only evidence of a quid pro quo could be demonstrated. But maybe this is just what the new Lindsey Graham does, though. He did, after all, once call Donald Trump a “kook” who was “unfit for office”, before becoming his most vocal defender and the Senate. Why would a United States Senator behave in such a manner? I don’t imagine it’ll do us much good to speculate here. With that said, however, it would not surprise me one bit if, at some point in the future, we heard that he was being coerced to support Donald Trump at every turn, no matter what.

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12 Comments

  1. breaking news
    Posted November 6, 2019 at 11:17 pm | Permalink

    Barr declined Trump request to declare there was no wrongdoing in his July Ukraine call.

    First reported by The Washington Post, the White House asked Attorney General Barr to hold a news conference in the wake of the whistleblower’s report about a call between President Trump and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky to deny any criminal wrongdoing, but was rebuffed.

  2. Graham Cracker
    Posted November 6, 2019 at 11:20 pm | Permalink

    In early 2017, Graham was visited by a Russian who told him to start supporting Trump in all circumstances or else his porn viewing history would be released.

  3. iRobert
    Posted November 6, 2019 at 11:47 pm | Permalink

    I think Lindsay’s been looking for a little quid pro quo, if you know what I mean.

  4. iRobert
    Posted November 6, 2019 at 11:57 pm | Permalink

    I think there’s a sealed indictment with Lindsay Graham‘s name on it.

  5. John Brown
    Posted November 7, 2019 at 10:31 am | Permalink

    Pedophile kompromat is the only thing I can imagine that would make him turn himself inside out. He will die mysteriously just like Epstein was murdered by Barr’s Opus Dei gang. He’s still useful. When he no longer is, rip.

  6. iRobert
    Posted November 7, 2019 at 11:36 am | Permalink

    Question: How does a powerful interest keep many hundreds (or thousands) of public officials (elected or appointed), business executives, etc., walking in lock-step on certain critical issues, and in many instances against their sworn duties?

    Answer: You prepare sealed indictments on each and every one of them, notifying them of the existence and substance of these whenever their cooperation is required.

  7. Dave Morris
    Posted November 7, 2019 at 11:55 am | Permalink

    There is an MSNBC clip on this topic that is an interesting watch. Ari Melber makes an analogy to understand the action and the intent, and how they related to the crime we are dealing with. He could have improved it by using a bus rather than a car.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6xZqzjJCRc

    A good analogy for Lindsey and gang would be a group of deep sea crabbers on deck trying to untie the rope around Trump’s foot as the 3 ton crab trap is sinking, only to realize that they all have the rope tangled around them further up the line.

  8. dean pelleton
    Posted November 8, 2019 at 10:06 am | Permalink

    Booooo! Hype up, y’all

  9. iRobert
    Posted November 9, 2019 at 9:41 am | Permalink

    Graham hasn’t looked that drunk recently.

  10. iRobert
    Posted January 25, 2020 at 8:31 am | Permalink

    The drunk drama-Queen is at it again. Lindsay the lush is putting on another tantrum master-class. You Republicans out there must be so proud.

  11. Linda Sue Reynolds
    Posted February 4, 2020 at 7:25 pm | Permalink

    They have footage of Graham with a kid.

  12. Posted September 26, 2020 at 5:14 pm | Permalink

    Please help.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oKRpIMTzxLI

2 Trackbacks

  1. […] confirm the quid pro quo at the center of this scandal. And, when their testimony was made public, Sondland’s memory apparently started to improve. At this point, he asked to revise his testimony, adding that he not only knew about, but actually […]

  2. […] remember saying years ago that it looked as though Graham had been coerced into this abrupt turnaround of his, and, if Harding’s claims pan out, I guess we’ll […]

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