The Ukraine Scandal, which has led finally to the impeachment move against President Donald Trump, with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi terming it “bribery”, a specific impeachment charge contained in the Constitution, may help or hurt Joe Biden’s Presidential candidacy.
It seems clear that Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s younger son, was not engaged in any corruption, and neither was his father, but of course, subject to potential revelations in the future.
If there is a real scandal, then Biden’s potential to be the Democratic Presidential nominee and have a chance to win the Presidency, will be harmed. It also becomes another burden, no matter what else is going on, for Biden to have to answer questions and deal with this for the next year if he gains the nomination.
But also, Biden could be harmed by just the image of illegality, and it could weaken the case that he is the best person to challenge Donald Trump.
The next few months will tell the story if Joe Biden is unable to overcome the attempt by Trump to damage his candidacy.
And with two more moderates suddenly entering the Presidential race belatedly–former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick–Biden will certainly have more competition in the caucuses and primaries beginning in just the next two and a half months.
THE SITUATION ROOM, OCTOBER 2039: Or, What the U.S. Military Will Be Doing in a Climate Crisis Future, by Michael T. Klare
[… Fade-In: “The observance of the 100th anniversary of the beginning of World War II this past September 1, 2039, was put on hold all over the world, as there were more immediately pressing matters at hand….. .”
[Fade to real-time satellite view of the United States on a monitor in the Situation Room.]
The Situation Room, October 2039: the president and vice president, senior generals and admirals, key cabinet members, and other top national security officers huddle around computer screens as aides speak to key officials across the country. Some screens are focused on Hurricane Monica, continuing its catastrophic path through the Carolinas and Virginia; others are following Hurricane Nicholas, now pummeling Florida and Georgia, while Hurricane Ophelia lurks behind it in the eastern Caribbean.
On another bank of screens, officials are watching horrifying scenes from Los Angeles and San Diego, where millions of people are under mandatory evacuation orders with essentially nowhere to go because of a maelstrom of raging wildfires. Other large blazes are burning out of control in Northern California and Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington State. The National Guard has been called out across much of the West, while hundreds of thousands of active-duty troops are being deployed in the disaster zones to assist in relief operations and firefighting.
With governors and lawmakers from the affected states begging for help, the president has instructed the senior military leadership to provide still more soldiers and sailors for yet more disaster relief. Unfortunately, the generals and admirals are having a hard time complying, since most of their key bases on the East and West Coasts are also under assault from storms, floods, and wildfires. Many have already been evacuated. Naval Station Norfolk, the nation’s largest naval base, for example, took a devastating hit from Monica and lies under several feet of water, rendering it inoperable. Camp Pendleton in California, a major Marine Corps facility, is once again in flames, its personnel either being evacuated or fully engaged in firefighting. Other key bases have been similarly disabled, their personnel scattered to relocation sites in the interior of the country.
Foreign threats, while not ignored in this time of domestic crisis, have lost the overriding concern they enjoyed throughout the 2020s when China and Russia were still considered major foes. By the mid-2030s, however, both of those countries were similarly preoccupied with multiple climate-related perils of their own — recurring wildfires and crop failures in Russia, severe water scarcity, staggering heat waves, and perpetually flooded coastal cities in China — and so were far less inclined to spend vast sums on sophisticated weapons systems or to engage in provocative adventures abroad. Like the United States, these countries are committing their military forces ever more frequently to disaster relief at home.
As for America’s allies in Europe: well, the days of trans-Atlantic cooperation have long since disappeared as extreme climate effects have become the main concern of most European states. To the extent that they still possess military forces, these, too, are now almost entirely devoted to flood relief, firefighting, and keeping out the masses of climate refugees fleeing perpetual heat and famine in Asia and Africa.
And so, in the Situation Room, the overriding question for U.S. security officials in 2039 boils down to this: How can we best defend the nation against the mounting threat of climate catastrophe?
The Situation Room 2039, Part 2; Or, The Unacknowledged Peril and The Situation Room 2039 and Part 3; Or, Threats to the Home Front and Clusters of Extreme Events, are available at http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/176629/.
Roger Stone was found guilty on all counts.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/roger-stone-guilty-trump_n_5dcc42f8e4b03a7e0293cda8
Trump committed witness intimidation in real time this morning. Yet another impeachable offense.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/yovanovitch-trump-tweets-impeachment_n_5dcec228e4b0d2e79f8bc361
The Ukraine Racket Involved Two Quid Pro Quos
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/11/15/the-ukraine-racket-involved-two-quid-pro-quos/