Category: Video

New clip of young Lindsey Graham talking about impeachment confirms his hypocrisy knows no bounds

Posted on by Walter Einenkel

Republican hypocrisy knows no bounds. It is hard to write this in new ways every few minutes, but it is the job of any honest person to acknowledge it. With Donald Trump’s impeachment trial playing out in the Senate and a Republican Party now actively colluding to cover up his crimes, old videos of very visible Republicans and Trump allies contradicting their current positions have started springing up.

Sen. Lindsey Graham is one of the more obvious examples because his 180-degree turnabout on executive powers, the abuse of those powers, and the subject of impeachment is arguably the most transparent example of how craven the Republican Party has become in its amoral quest for power. 

Dating back to Jan. 23, 1999, the clip below shows a younger Sen. Graham speaking at a press conference and basking in that camera limelight he so clearly desired and now requires.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM: The law allows a different disposition if the offender comes before the court: “yes I’m guilty and I’m sorry and I throw myself on the mercy of the court.”  The sentence is usually different in a case like that versus someone who takes the legal system to the bitter end, and uses every twist and turn, and every gimmick, to try and beat the charges, for lack of a better word. So I’m going to argue that proportionality is something we need to consider, but is something that the defendant usually has to earn. And when you have someone who has flouted the law at every turn, then usually the sanctions are much more severe.

This was Sen. Graham’s attempt to dismiss the fact that the Republican Party’s “high crime” against then president Bill Clinton was that he obstructed justice in order to hide and lie about an extramarital affair he was having. The “proportionality” being brought to his mouth was the fact that none of it seemed very high crime-like, and Graham wanted to angle for the idea that Clinton’s lack of remorse showed an elitism and a belief he was above the law.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump has arguably committed high crimes not only every day that he has been president, but every day since he began running for president.

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Kellyanne Conway’s husband on Senate Republicans: ‘What are they afraid of?’

Posted on by Walter Einenkel

Conservative lawyer and husband of truly awful person Kellyanne Conway continues to work to the left of his wife in the public sphere. Known for attacking the current administration, the one his wife works vociferously for, Conway was on CNN earlier Wednesday to discuss the first day of the U.S. Senate’s impeachment trial and investigation into the corruptions of Donald Trump. The most glaring corruption right now is Speaker Mitch McConnell’s transparent directive to use the Senate impeachment trial as a way to help Donald Trump cover up and pave over his crimes.

CNN host Jake Tapper, speaking with Conway, asked for his impressions of the first day of the Senate trial, and Conway started by saying that Trump’s lawyers were “outclassed,” underprepared, and “lying.” Calling their performance “distressing,” Conway explained that while that was bad enough, the more pressing disappointment was Republican senators.

CONWAY: The second is the Party-line votes on witnesses, the Party-line votes on witnesses. This is a trial. This is a trial where they should want to hear the evidence. If everyone is so sure, if they’re so sure that the evidence will exonerate President Trump then, yeah, let’s hear from John Bolton. We should hear from Pompeo. We should hear from Mulvaney.

Conway goes on to explain that yes, none of this makes sense.

CONWAY: Absolutely. They have no justification not to. I mean, when you get to a trial, you’re entitled to issue trial subpoenas. And even before that, even in a criminal case, you’re entitled to issue pre-trial discovery—both sides—even if evidence has been heard before a grand jury. You know, the United States against Nixon, a famous case that dealt with executive privilege back in 1974, involved pre-trial discovery where the defendants had already been indicted.

Tapper brings up the statements of Mitch McConnell who has said this trial should exist with no witnesses or much of anything. Conway points out that the Senate has the power and the “obligation” to try to get to the bottom of these criminal complaints against the president.

CONWAY: That’s what this is. That’s what a trial is for, and their job is to hear the evidence. Hear all of it. Not some of it, or none of it—which seems to be the way they are going.

Tapper, having now exhausted all avenues of discussion here, since the issue is clear, asks Conway again: what’s the deal with these Republicans?

CONWAY: What are they afraid of? They must be afraid of something. That's the thing that I find most disturbing about it, is they don't want to hear the evidence because they know the truth. They know he's guilty. And they don’t want to hear the evidence because they don’t want the American people to see the evidence.

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Lindsey Graham’s 2020 opponent releases impeachment statement using Lindsey Graham’s own exact quote

Posted on by Walter Einenkel

Jaime Harrison is running for Senate as a Democratic candidate hoping to unseat incumbent Lindsey Graham. Sen. Graham, like Sen. Mitch McConnell and the rest of the Republican Party stoolie squad, have fallen into line under the single-most transparently corrupt president in any of our lifetimes. As one of the big proponents of impeaching then President Bill Clinton, back in 1998, Sen. Graham has come under fire over the past year for how starkly contradictory his public statements today when compared to those from 1998. Harrison justifiably has decided to use Graham’s words against him, tweeting out from his personal account, Harrison posted a video, with “Official Impeachment Statement:” as the header. 

In the video we see Harrison speaking to the camera, reading a statement from a paper in his hands.

HARRISON: For the good of the nation, I think, it would serve us all well if we thought about this one idea. After we’re all dead and gone,

It is here, on the second sentence, that we can hear Sen. Graham’s wilting southern accent come up behind Harrison’s, as it is revealed to be Sen. Lindsey Graham’s statement on impeachment, from Dec. 22, 1998, to reporters somewhere underneath the Senate’s chambers.

GRAHAM: [continued] do you have something to present history that will withstand scrutiny, where everybody had a chance to have their say, in a reasonable way, in a focused way, so that history would judge us based on the facts, and based on a meaningful hearing not just on the political moment.

The image fades back to Harrison reading the end of Graham’s words.

HARRISON: [continued] And if we think about that, it’s very important to me that we leave behind a legacy that meets the model of American justice.

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It may be hard to believe but before Donald Trump there were many Republicans, like Sen. Graham, who used a patina of eloquence in order to drive home their bleak and cynical world views. Now that this mask has been ripped free and the soul of the Republican Party has been revealed to be the monstrous faces of bigotry and greed, it is hard to connect the senator from South Carolina, who spoke so eloquently about impeaching then president Bill Clinton for his extramarital affair, with the senator from South Carolina who has said in no uncertain terms that he will not even pretend to participate in an impartial trial concerning the abuses of power in the Executive Branch of government.

SemDem has been covering a lot of Harrison’s moves in his trip toward the Senate, and you can learn a lot more about Harrison’s chances and stances here.