NPR is reporting —

President Trump’s defense team is expected to maintain Monday, the second day of its arguments in the Senate impeachment trial, that the president was legally justified in freezing military assistance to Ukraine and that the case against Trump presented by Democrats does not clear the bar of an impeachable offense.

Okay, so he didn’t do it, then maybe he did it even though he lied about it, now he did it but he was legally justified to do it, and as a finale, Republicans will want to give him the medal of freedom for doing it.

And then there’s this stumbling block — Lev Parnas’s attorney says there more tapes.

So now if Republicans block witnesses it’s a prima facia case for cover-up.

This morning, while on a Tweet Tsunami …

How do you know Trump is lying?  His fingers are dancing on his phone.

Take a look here from October of last year.

Democratic investigators have requested testimony from former national security adviser John Bolton in their expanding impeachment probe of President Trump, reaching into the upper echelons of the White House as they prepared to move ahead Thursday with a pivotal vote setting out the next stages of the inquiry.

Maybe instead of tweeting, someone would teach him to Google.

He’s on a tweet coaster this morning.

John Bolton’s tell-all book was leaked yesterday (at least the part about Trump’s extortion of Ukraine) by someone, likely WH staff, and it says exactly what you think it does.  How did the WH get a copy? A transcript of the book had been provided to the WH on December 30, to review for classified information.  According to the NY Times, Bolton confirms that Trump told him personally that he was going to withhold military aid to Ukraine until Zelensky announced investigations of Joe Biden and his son Hunter.   The account apparently runs dozens of pages, describing not only Trump’s role, but also Giuliani, Mulvaney, Pompeo, and others describes events around Trump’s extortion plan from the Spring of 2019 up until his departure in September.  Of course, Trump lied via Twitter last night that he didn’t discuss Ukraine with Bolton.  Right. Trump NEVER talked about his Ukraine plan with his national security advisor.  That’s believable.

This should ratchet up pressure to allow witnesses in the impeachment trial, but it won’t and you can bet that Cornyn and Cruz will lead the way off the cliff.

The impeachment trial has adjourned for the weekend after only two hours.  Impossible to listen to for more than 2 or 3 minutes at a time, Trump’s lawyers alternated between yelling “Nuh Uh!” and lying.  In the face of a mountain of evidence, they kept repeating that Trump did nothing wrong without actually refuting any of the charges or said evidence.  It’s going to be a long 22 hours left.  The lies will be neck-deep by then.

Y’all, I just heard the tape of Trump saying to get rid of Marie Yovanovitch.

Get rid of her!” a voice appearing to belong to Trump says on the recording, according to ABC News, which on Friday first reported its existence.

“Get her out tomorrow. I don’t care. Get her out tomorrow. Take her out. OK? Do it.”