Y’all, Jared Kushner finally did something.  His crowning achievement is this —

Jared Kushner and other senior Trump administration officials are planning to set up web cameras to live-stream construction of President Trump’s border wall, going against objections from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and senior U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, according to four people familiar with the White House proposal.

I kinda suspect it’s to give Republicans something to watch during the impeachment hearings.  I have some in-laws who we see once a year but I keep up with their kids on Facebook.  One of the rabid Trump supporters posted this morning.

I know this woman. She could not define “conservative” if her life depended on it. I think this is the Republican mega-message because all of her friends lamented that they were missing their daytime teevee dramas and so they are not watching it either.

But, if they can watch the wall get built – little problem in that it will never be finished – they can say that Trump is fulfilling his promise.  I am sure that Customs and the Army Corp of Engineers only oppose this because they are the deep state, right?

Look we already have a 24 hour a day Trump infomercial – and Sean Hannity runs it.

Deval Patrick, former Massachusetts governor and current co-chairman of Bain Capital (yes, that Bain capital), announced today is candidacy for Vice President of the United States.  Yes, I said VP.  Patrick knows that he has zero chance of being nominated president, especially at this late stage.  He’s positioning himself, in my opinion, to be the go to person for the VP slot.  He has all the qualifications, and would be the perfect running mate for Biden (and others, but especially Biden).  Think about it – Biden has the best chance of beating His Orangeness, but he’ll undoubtedly be a one-term president.  Therefore he’ll need a Veep who can take on the 2024 mantel.  That could very well be Patrick.  He’s experienced, worked closely with President Obama, and is well liked among Democrats and New Englanders.  He’s the perfect presidential candidate – for 2024.  I think that’s the play, but others believe that Patrick will try to take New Hampshire and go head to head with Biden in South Carolina.  That approach virtually guarantees a win in SC for Warren by splitting the African American vote between Biden (who’s very popular there) and Patrick.  That’s unwise, and I believe Patrick knows that.

I like Patrick in the mix, which makes the whole thing very interesting.  Biden/Patrick?  I like it.  A lot.

Syrian people? Not so much.

One of the lies Trump and his sycophants repeat ad nauseam is that simply because of him, the economy is “booming” and growing like “never before in US history”.  That’s complete bullshit of course, and NO economic performance number supports Trump’s boasting.   Trump’s greatest accomplishment has been fortunate to have followed Barack Obama who bucked huge political obstruction to kick start the economy by pumping billions into rebuilding industries and extending unemployment benefits to out of work Americans.  Anyone who has studied Economics 101 knows that a key tool for bringing an economy out of a downturn is INCREASING government spending to get people back to work.  Obama fought the Repubs tooth and nail, and succeeded.  Trump is the beneficiary of that courage, as our economy is simply on the same trend line established by Obama policy.  In fact, Trump is trailing behind some measures established by Obama because of his idiotic trade war.

Here are a few examples:

US GDP Growth

S&P 500

Job Growth

Remember when Trump promised 6% GDP growth?  To bring coal back? To increase manufacturing jobs?  None of those promises have been kept.  None.  Essentially, the economy has continued its up and to the right trend more in spite of Trump rather that because of Trump.

Even though it’s denied by Trumpists, truth does matter.  And the truth is that the economy left by Obama is strong enough to so far resist Trump’s destructive infestation of the White House.

I’m fighting off a case of caught-on-an-airliner-wintertime-creeping-crud, so spent most of the day consuming bourbon and lemon and watching the impeachment hearing.  I’m actually glad I did.  Some takeaways:

1. My faith in loyal, non-partisan, professional career public servants was restored.  Ambassador Taylor and Secretary Kent were pitch perfect.  They showed deep knowledge and experience, took no sides, resisted efforts by both sides to do that, and simply stated cold hard facts.  With impeccable credentials and reputations, their testimony was powerful and, pardon the pun, unimpeachable.  It was refreshing to witness that.
2. Ambassador Taylor dropped a bombshell of new evidence testifying that since his testimony, it has been reported to him that one of his staff overhear a cell phone conversation between Sondland and Trump (in a Kiev restaurant, no less) where Sondland told Trump that Zelensky was going to play ball.
3. Schiff did a reasonably good job laying out the case.  He has said that his goal is to get all the major news in during the first hour, and he did that, taking into account frivolous interruptions from the other side.
4. The Republicans have nothing.  NOTHING; zip, nada, zilch, zero.  Nunes and Jordan, the Trump’s chief ass lickers, only repeated the same threadbare tropes, and it seemed their ONLY strategy was to confuse.  It was pitiful, and he even floated one those ridiculous conspiracy theories that the Ukrainians were “out to get Trump”.
5. The Republicans demanded their be a vote on subpoenaing the Whistleblower, even though that’s against Federal law.  They also wailed about how the Whistleblower “started all this” and should be forced to appear.
6. We know how this is going to go…Schiff could show  body cam footage of Trump clubbing a person to death on fifth avenue and Nunedan would say “What? That happens every day.”  The only thing that will swing this is getting a secret ballot in the Senate when it comes to the vote so Republican senators would do their goddam jobs without paying a price.

Oh, and one last detail. One of the best moments of the day was after one of Jordan’s diatribe’s about “the most important witness” not being produced, Peter Welch, Dem from Vermont retorted, “I’d be glad to have the person who started it all come in and testify. President Trump is welcome to take a seat right there.”  Have a look:

I’ll be following along again tomorrow.  Should be interesting.  It’s certainly historic.

Impeachment hearings start in a few minutes.  It *almost* froze here last night, meaning it’s colder than a witches’s teat in a brass bra to native south Texans who live here because snow is pretty for only one day but after that it’s frozen mud. It snows here once every 10 years or so and it’s gone after one day, which is perfect.

Today will be spent in my jammies and favorite housecoat watching the teevee.  I’ll be here if something big breaks but feel free to comment on anything you hear.

If Devin Nunes says “nude Donald Trump” one more time, angels will descend from heaven and sing the Hallelujah Chorus over California’s 22nd Congressional District.

AFTERNOON UPDATE:  Okay, here’s my question.  The reason that Bill Taylor and George Kent are hearsay witnesses is because the primary witnesses are refusing to testify.  If Pompeo ever gets the cajones that Hillary Clinton has, he can march his sweet patootie to the hearing room, get sworn in, and answer questions for 11 hours. Republicans can’t have it both ways.

They also can’t whine about not getting to question the whistleblower when we don’t get to question Rudy Giuliani. Besides, everything the whistleblower said was admitted to by Donald Trump.

Jim Jordan is what Republicans think a smart person sounds like.  First off, smart people rarely screech. They also rarely laugh out loud when they lose an argument, thinking smugly that they won.