On the left coast the hearings started at 6am, so I got to see a little before I went to work.
Bill Taylor was, if you'll pardon the expression, unimpeachable. One of the things that is really impressive about many of the people in the State Department and foreign service are the copious notes they take. Unlike politicians, they relish having a paper trail to refresh their memories. Taking contemporaneous notes also appears to make people more 'present', if they feel they are taking notes for posterity. Taylor and Kent were in the foreign service to serve the United States, not the Democrats or Republicans. I think their integrity was difficult to besmirch.
The additional revelation from Taylor's aide who witnessed Sondland's phone call to Trump in Kiev on June 26th, and heard the President say "Investigation" over the phone. Afterward Sondland told the aide that Trump cared more about the investigation into the Bidens than he did about the Ukrainians. So there will be a new deposition and (I would assume) testimony from Taylor's aide.
One talking head pointed out that if Trump had told the Ukrainians he wanted a $1,000,000 kickback before he would release their aid, people would see that as an open and shut case of bribery. But you can argue that what Trump wanted was worth far more than a million dollars. Donald Trump will be inundated by lawsuits on the first day he leaves office. A four year reprieve in the form of a second term is worth far more than a million dollars. This is, at heart, a simple case of bribery, which is specified as an impeachable offense under the Constitution.
The question becomes: How many Earl Landgrebes are left in the GOP? Congressman
Earl Landgrebe was an ardent Nixon supporter, famous for a quote he made during the Watergate hearings:
Don't confuse me with the facts. Today I saw several Earls in the Peanut Gallery. I think we really won't know the impact of the hearing until people have had a chance to digest everything.
