…there had been no whistleblower?

The Ukrainian President would have gone on CNN and announced the Ukrainian authorities were investigating the Bidens on “corruption charges”.

Even if nothing ever came of it, even if no such investigation were ever started, Joe Biden would have been immediately finished as a candidate. Even if the Ukrainians investigated Biden and found him totally innocent, he still would be finished as a candidate, because the exoneration might be months in coming, perhaps even after the election. That was the plan all along, wasn’t it Donald?.

And no matter what the outcome of the investigation was, or when it was completed, or how honest and fair it might have been, I have a feeling it would never have been released that it had been undertaken at the behest of Donald Trump. After all, if Trump’s suspicions had been legitimate, he could have directed AG Barr’s Justice Department to conduct the investigation–perfectly legal and above-board although no one would have believed it wasn’t a political hack job from the start.

No, the whole plan was for the news to suddenly pop up that a foreign ally, out of the blue, was investigating the leading Democratic candidate for President. Like I said, it wasn’t even necessary for the investigation to actually get underway, the damage to Biden would have been immediate and devastating.

No wonder the GOP is trying so desperately to out the whistleblower. Regardless of whether they win or lose the impeachment fight, they want this guy punished; if not by outright physical violent attack from some Deplorable goon, or by genteel career or character homicide, then by the threat of such which would hang over and pursue him for the rest of his life. And it would very effectively deter anyone else who might in the future take advantage of the whistleblower law to expose some other Republican treachery.

Again, let me point out, this is just the sort of crooked businessman gangster behavior one might expect from Trump. But the revelation to me has been how the whole Republican Party has come together as one (again, with a very few courageous and honorable exceptions) to become accessories after the fact to his crimes. Trump is one individual criminal, but his criminality is not due to his political ideology. There are Democratic crooks, too. But the Republican Party, and by extension, the entire Conservative movement, have shown themselves to be criminals as well. And this collective criminality is most definitely ideological. This is what they are willing to do to get a tax cut, shut down EPA, get rid of social welfare services and employee and consumer protections, privatize public institutions, stack the courts and plunder public lands. This is what they are willing to do to stop women from getting abortions–at least, poor women. You know rich girls will always have their freedom of choice if they ever find themselves In The Club.

If Trump gets away with this, these are the people who will be running our country and our lives. And I suspect that they will never give up that power without violence.