Only the Beginning in the Trump/Ukraine Scandal

Triggered by a whistle-blower complaint, all hell has broken loose over the past two weeks as President Trump's extortion of Ukraine President Zelensky was revealed. Trust me this is only the beginning. My guess is that in the coming weeks we will hear from two very senior officials. The first one being the bane of liberals, fired national security adviser and uber-hawk John Bolton. Recall that Bolton has already been publicly critical of Trump's North Korea policy. My guess is that his lawyers are already in discussion with House Intelligence Committee staffers.

The second figure will be Fiona Hill, who recently resigned from the National Security Council staff. There she ran the "Russia Desk" and earlier wrote a biography on Vladimir Putin entitled "Operative in the Kremlin" that was previously reviewed on these pages. (https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2019/07/my-amazon-review-of-fiona-hill-and.html) Bolton and Hill were in up to their eyeballs in Trump's dealings with both Russia and Ukraine. As they used to say in mob movies, they will sing arias before the congressional committees.

Their testimony will be important because if the House votes to impeach as it is likely to do, the Senate does not have to hold a trial. All it will take is 50 votes plus Vice President Mike Pence to acquit at the outset. Bolton, Hill and others will be necessary to make an air tight case that will force at least four Republican senators to vote with the Democrats to prevents an early acquittal.