A New Year and predictions

Shannon Bohrer

(1/2020) "Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every New Year find you a better man" - Benjamin Franklin

Another year is over and a new year has begun, so we need to address our new year’s resolutions and make our predictions for the coming year. My resolutions last year included keeping a positive attitude all year and to only complain when it became necessary. I can’t say I was totally successful, but my intentions were good. I think I will stay with the same resolutions. When one grows older, some things take longer to accomplish.

This year I predict that the president will be impeached and that the impeachment trial will start in January. In fact before you read this he may have already been impeached. Since the impeachment trial is in the Senate and the Senators are the jurors, it is presumed that the president will be found not guilty. The republican senators have repeatedly demonstrated loyalty to party over country and they often use the president’s own words, defending him. They assert the "deep state" is responsible for the false and fake accusations against the president, and call the investigations a "hoax and witch hunt" as he often does. Of course, the ‘deep state’ also produces the ‘fake news.’

However, factual evidence of crimes does exist, that implicate the president. The crimes include cases of obstruction of justice, as outlined in the Mueller report. When Mueller was testifying to congress he was questioned by Rep. Ken Buck, "could you charge the president with a crime after he left office?" Without any hesitation Mueller replied: "Yes." When Rep. Buck repeated the question, adding the possible charge of obstruction of justice, Mueller again, without hesitation, said "Yes." The Mueller report is not ‘fake news.’

The president’s current situation is the accusation that he asked the president of a sovereign state (Ukraine) to investigate a potential political rival. Additionally it is alleged that the president held up military aid until the president of Ukraine announced that Ukraine was conducting the investigation. According to legal experts, if the facts are true the president would be guilty of bribery. The alleged offenses associated with Ukraine include additional obstruction of justice, for failure to cooperate with congresses investigation.

The president’s general defense in the investigation is that the military aid was delivered. In other words, ‘no harm no foul.’ Yes, it was released on September 11, two days after the whistle blower report was made public. While the timing could be coincidental, it does sound more like a clue. Another defense is that the president was interested in routing out corruption in Ukraine. However, in, May of this year the Department of Defense informed four congressional committees, that the Department "certified that the Government of Ukraine has taken substantial actions to make defense institutional reforms for the purposes of decreasing corruption [and] increasing accountability." The certification was conditional for release of the military aid to Ukraine, so why was the aid held?

Earlier this year, our own intelligence agencies briefed the senate intelligence committees, telling them it was Russia that interfered with our election, and for the purpose of supporting Trump. Yet the Republicans cite other evidence; however the evidence they cite is from a former disgraced Ukraine official who was replaced - because of his corrupt practices.

Dr. Fiona Hill, a top expert on Russia said in her congressional testimony that the: "fictional narrative [was] perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 presidential election because it plays into Vladimir Putin’s hand." And yet, the President and the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to insist, and maybe they really believe that it was Ukraine that interfered in our 2016 presidential election. Basically, we have some Republicans fostering a Russian ‘fictional narrative,’ that benefits President Putin.

It is common knowledge that our president likes President Putin; he has never said anything bad about him and often seems to even defer to him. Several months ago Russia was experiencing severe wild fires and our president said he was going to offer help to Putin, to fight the fires. I don’t know that the help was ever officially offered, but when California recently experienced wild fires, our president said he was going to reduce the federal aid needed to combat the fires.

When the president was in Helsinki in 2018 he held a private meeting with Putin. At a press conference, after the meeting, he was asked if he believed the U.S. Intelligence agencies findings that Russia interfered in our election. Trump answered: "I don’t see any reason why it would be." He said that Putin was, "extremely strong and powerful in his denial." Trump also added that was considering Putin’s offer of sending over "Russian government investigators to look into [the] Russian government meddling in the 2016"election. That sounds like something from the ‘Twilight Zone.’

Trump must have very strong reasons to believe Putin, or he is being blackmailed. The constant dissing of our intelligence communities, the FBI and our justice department are very strong clues. Has this "deep state" theory of events been pushed to take the pressure off Russia? Maybe Trump is not a billionaire; maybe he is financially indebted to Russia, maybe Putin holds his mortgages?

"It is the press, above all, which wages a positively fanatical and slanderous struggle, tearing down everything which can be regarded as a support of national independence, cultural elevation, and the economic independence of the nation." - Adolf Hitler

My prediction for this year is that "the truth will out." If Trump is acquitted in the senate, he will lose the election and blame the impeachment process. However, he will not escape the consequences of his actions. Either before he leaves office, or shortly thereafter, we will know the extent of our President’s corrupt practices. We will find out why he is beholding to Russia, we will find out that he has cheated on his taxes and he will face multiple criminal charges after he leaves office.

I also predict that he will still have a following; a fairly large segment of the voters will believe that he was set up by the ‘deep state.’ President Nixon still has followers, people still profess that the holocaust never occurred and people still believe that we will find ‘Big Foot.’ As a nation we will reunite, but it will take a long time.

Happy New Year