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bahytarek · 5 years

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Ben Tennyson - Ben 10,000 - Ben 10K

Hero of Heroes - Wielder of the Omnitrix

Ben has been through a lot growing up. It all might seem glamorous, and sometimes it looks like fun but the truth is that this life isn't all perfect.

He's had many victories throughout his life. He defeated Vilgax, destroyed Zs'Skayr, made peace with the Highbreed, saved Galvan Mark II from a psychotic vengeful Galvanic Mechamorph, prevented the Incursean Empire from taking over the Earth, made other realities and dimensions a safer place, and created the entire Universe twice.

This man never stops doing what he does best, being a true hero. He spends most of his time saving the universe or stopping some crook. However big or small the problem, Ben risks his life and jumps ahead to save the day. We saw that sometimes, Ben does get hurt, even if he got hurt as an alien. Ben risks his physical health without even considering how bad things could get because he believes that if he doesn't step in, things could get worse, and can you blame him? People depend on Ben on a daily basis, and the job just gets harder and harder on him the older he gets, never really getting a chance to relax. Notice how I said job.

Ben started this life since he was 10, and took it as a game up until Vilgax threatened his family and showed him the risks of being a hero. Ben has spent most of his childhood as an outcast and as a target for bullying, the Omnitrix made him feel like he was worth something, like he was a hero. After defeating Vilgax for the first time, Ben still goofed off but knew deep down that there will come a time where he'll have to get serious.

Zs'Skayr is a complete psycho, instead of beating the snot out of Ben like Vilgax, he hit him where it really hurt, mentally. Zs'Skayr possessed Gwen and threatened Ben by making her stand on the ledge of a building, willing to commit suicide by jumping off. The next time Zs'Skayr attacked Ben's family, Ben was over protective of Gwen and Grandpa Max, he was scarred by his last encounter with Zs'Skayr. Gwen took it as him being cocky and selfish but the opposite is true, and for a 10 year old, Ben was completely brave.

In Secrets of the Omnitrix, Ben believed that Gwen was killed and completely blames himself, wishing it was him instead, a feeling that no 10 year old should feel.

Ben eventually unlocks Feedback, an alien he feels strongly attached to. During this time, he became enemies with a corrupted Galvanic Mechamorph named Malware. Malware eventually destroyed the Conductoid's DNA within the Omnitrix, making Feedback unaccessible. Ben loses for the first time, and in his rage he straight up murders Malware. I assume it was after that incident Ben removed the Omnitrix for 4 years.

Enter Alien Force. Ben wears the Omnitrix again because he fears for his Grandfather's life. This choice wasn't easy because it shows that he enjoyed being normal, but as soon as someone needed his help, he didn't hesitate to slam it on his wrist. He eventually becomes close friends with former enemy Kevin E.Levin.

Ben matured a lot during the first two season of Alien Force when he had to deal with the fact that his beloved Grandfather "died" and that he was in the middle of a Galactic War. After it ended and Max was revealed to be ok Ben managed to be happy again in season 3. Yet once again, Gwen mistakes this as him being cocky and wreckless, and even though he was a little cocky, Ben was just truly happy for once, and felt like a true hero again. At the end of Alien Force, Ben blew up the Omnitrix to stop Vilgax, proving that it's not the watch that makes him a hero. Ben doesn't feel this way though, and proceeds to take the Ultimatrix from Albedo.

In Ultimate Alien, Ben is now famous, not only across the stars, but on Earth as well. He has to deal with fame and criticism at the age of 16 while still trying to pass in his classes and save the Universe everyday. To a kid, this is a lot of pressure. In the beginning Ben seemed fine with it, but at some point it just seemed exhausting. Above all of this, his relationship with Julie, his girlfriend at the time, was rocky. She wished that he was there more but how could he? He's constantly trying to keep the Universe safe, he hardly even gets a good night's rest, and she expects him to be available? Again, the other characters make it look like it's all Ben's fault but the truth is, Ben can't do anything about it, despite the fact that he could turn into aliens, he's only human!

Ben eventually fails to save the 5 aliens that trusted him and then has to deal with the fact that his once best friend Kevin, is once again evil. It's up to Ben to stop him, it has to be him wheither he likes it or not, and this obviously hurt him, but he has no choice but to stop him, even if it meant to go to the extreme if the situation required. Because deep down, it's his fault, or so he thinks. He believes that maybe if he defeated Aggregor himself, if he was strong enough, Kevin would be ok. In the end it all worked out, but at what cost? Ben considered killing his friend, this will forever haunt him. He even willingly "sacrificed himself" to free all the Ultimate Aliens that blamed him for their imprisonment inside of the Ultimatrix, not because he had too, but because he wanted to. Freeing these creatures to him were far more important than his own life. At the end of Ultimate Alien, Ben gets the Ascalon and can now recreate the universe in anyway he wishes, destroy all evil, but he doesn't, he just fixes everything. Ben isn't arrogant or misuses his powers. Even though Ben can now control Alien X (or eventually) he wouldn't do anything extreme because he has limits, he knows right from wrong.

In Omniverse, Ben has gone through a lot. Gwen and Kevin left him behind, his only two real friends that could ever understand him in a way. He eventually gets close to his new plumber partner Rook Blonko. At some point, Ben recreated the Universe after it was destroyed and is the only one that remembers it's destruction. Even though he did something so heroic, he was forced to stand trial in front of the entire Universe for it. Not only that, but because of this one moment, another villain, Servantis, makes a hit squad to kill Ben just because he believes that Ben is too powerful to be trusted. Servantis also reveals Kevin as a sleeper agent. Ben again would blame himself for Kevin's turn but was more optimistic about saving him this time. Instead of trying to kill him, he just wanted to leave, regroup, and come up with a plan (he didn't know of course that Kevin was secretly good).

Ben was also forced to leave his friends and family behind on Earth thanks to the Incursean invasion. He was forced to deal with Malware, the alien that killed Feedback and mentally scarred Ben for years. He learns that in most realities he becomes evil. He temporarily died right before giving his Omnitrix to another Ben, but instead of being saddened by the fact that he's dying at such a young age, he gives advise to the other Ben to become a hero, to protect this Universe from monsters like Vilgax. Ben as a person has gone through so much growing up, and we got to watch him become a true hero, a hero of heroes. He mentored a younger alternate version of himself, he taught Rook how to be a hero instead of just being a plumber, he taught Kevin the importance of friendship, he inspired Gwen to become Lucky Girl and pursue magic, he motivated Grandpa Max to become a plumber once more. Literally everyone that gets close to Ben will have some kind of heroic trait because Ben shows them what it means to fight for others, to be selfless, to truly become a hero.

Ben knows about the man he'll become in the future, he's well aware that things will get harder and that he'll be a hero for ever. The pressure of knowing that he'll have to fill those shoes eventually must put some pressure on him sometimes.

We now know that at the age of 20, Ben becomes more serious and more of a loner. The reasons why are unknown, and the possibilities are endless. Maybe he blames himself for the loss of his Grandfather's arm or maybe he couldn't handle the fact that he was forced to throw Kevin into the Null Void again. Whatever the reason, Ben decides that it's for the best to do what he does on his own. Due to his history of almost losing his loved ones, it's easy to understand that at some point something happened that made him quit having a team. He'd rather die than see the ones close to him get hurt, but with this solitude and loneliness, he eventually became angrier and less sociable. We also learn that with the help of his master control, Ben used XLR8 to patrol the entire planet on a daily basis to stop any kind of crime from happening.

Ben no longer sees this as a game, it's his mission, it's the one thing he believes he's good for, being a hero. It's all anyone ever needed from him, it's all he thinks he needs to do. What's troubling how ever, is his loss of self. Ben got so comfortable with the idea of going hero all day 24/7, he no longer becomes Ben, because to him, Ben is just a weak human transformation. He no longer needs Ben, he's just the wielder of the Omnitrix, all that matters to him is being who people need him to be when he's needed, but not by being himself.

After the episode "Ben 10,000", Ben lightens up and begins to become the man he once was, one by one. In "Ken 10" he's happy, up untill he sees Kevin again, realising that he can't escape the mistakes of his past. This is when Ben reverts to his serious, more stubborn self, and pushes Ken, his son, aside to take Kevin down. Later when he sees Ken hurt, he loses his temper and demolishes Kevin as Waybig.

Four years later, we see that Kevin is better, angry, but better. Ben is still happily married with Kai (unlike Julie, Kai is also a hero, thus understanding the responsibilities and the pressure that Ben is under), Ken grew to be more of a hero, making his father proud, and Ben's life seems to be fine in a way.

Ben's life wasn't easy nor fun, but in the end, he has a group of loving family members and friends to support him when needed, and as long as they are by his side, he can learn to enjoy life and still be the hero the world needs him to be.

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acelookslikeahappyjalapeno · 5 years

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So, uh, I feel like making a timeline for Ace starting from Powerpuff Girls going all the way to Gorillaz because, well, I have no reason.

(This got way longer then I thought it would so read if you want to)

2002: The Powerpuff Girls movie, it shows the origin of the Powerpuff Girls.

This newspaper gives the date, Wednesday July 3, 2002 placing that year for when Ace is 17 and oh look! Our first mention of Gorillaz (and not the only reference to Gorillaz in the movie) If you get a higher quality photo of this then I did you can actually read the whole article about them going to do a show in Townsville’s music festival. I believe there’s a high quality picture on the Gorillaz wikia in Ace’s gallery. I don’t know when the Townsville music festival was but the news article mentions that tickets go on sale Saterday.

My guess is that the music festival is where the band and Ace first meet somehow.

It can be assumed that most of, if not all episodes of PPG takes place in 2002 seeing as the girls never move on from kindergarden, so that places all episodes with Ace here too. (Though in season two it is implied that a year has passed a few times. They are still in kindergarten though)

Later in the year, but with no clear place in the timeline, the comics show the Gangreen Gang singing in front of a crowd (Unfortunately I don’t have that comic yet) So this shows us Ace taking an interest in music.

Christmas rolls around in ‘Twas the Fight Before Christmas and we see Ace is on the nice list.

I feel like it’s safe to assume that Ace is 18 now, but I don’t know his Birthday.

2003: This is where the reboot of PPG SHOULD be taking place timeline wise, but that show has 2016 technology and is clearly set in 2016. Due to them not knowing how to keep any facts at all and repeatedly throwing it’s own continuity away I am deeming 2016 PPG as non-canon. There’s no where to put it that makes sense, 2003 doesn't work because setting, 2016 doesn't work due to age, how school works, time itself.

Nevertheless, The one instance in that show that Ace is there and it isn't a cameo he’s in a talent show, so even though I'm not counting this show in at all it’s interesting to note that.

2009: This is where things get complicated, so, in Fusion Fall, Buttercup loses her memory in a fight with Mojo Jojo and the Gangreen gang find her and start helping her. Ace is now 24-25 years old and looks like this.

Then, Buttercup now known as Belladonna and the Gangreen gang start a band together, we know Ace plays a Guitar because his idle animation has him do an air guitar movement.

Their band is super popular and many NPCs all over the game talk about loving them. This has caused the Gangreen Gang to stop committing crime.

Then an sentient alien planet named Fuse threatens to destroy the world. Dexter, from Dexter’s Laboratory accidentally sends someone to 2019 where the world is just straight up, irreparably destroyed, and all that’s left is a few people holding a failing resistance while nearly every Cartoon Network character is MIA and assumed dead.

So, the person sent to the future returns to the past with the tech that the future developed too late and they start using it in the past back in 2009 to turn the tide of war.

So back in the past Heroes and Villains have all teamed up. So what Fuse does is steal items from people to make fusion clones of them, and the tech from the future takes defeated fusions and imaginary energy (related to the imaginary friends from foster’s home for imaginary friends and is a counter weapon against Fuse) and makes a Nano, a tiny friendly copy of whoever the Fusion was a copy of.

Mojo Jojo has sent his underlings to search for Buttercup because literally everyone is worried sick and they are all desperate to find her. Someone finds her hanging out with Ace and she has all her memories back. But even though she has her memories back she doesn't go to see her family or help in the fight.

There is a Nano of Ace but you never get to see the Nano, the only evidence of the Nano is that Ace needs to give up a guitar string so Dexlabs can use it to improve the Nano.

Later, at Christmas, Chowder from Chowder shows up and has a bunch of Knishmas presents (yes, Knishmas) and they all got stolen. One was stolen by Ace who gives it back as soon as he’s questioned, and Buttercup gets mad at him. The present was for Grim from Grim Adventures. It’s food though so Grim is unable to eat it. There is no option to just give it back to Ace.

So that whole ordeal ends and Ace didn’t really participate in the fight at all but! He did make a Rock Band and that’s important because now him joining Gorillaz makes a lot more sense.

2018: Ace is 33-34 years old and joins Gorillaz, I think we all know how that goes. But now it’s not so out of left field because Ace was established as a musician and Gorillaz was established as being in the same universe. (and even going to Townsville)

Also I feel confident in saying the Ace is an actor can ALSO work in this because if I remember correctly in universe the Powerpuff Girls get a TV show based off of their exploits (They also get a ton of merch, and that’s part of the plot of an episode) and Ace seems the type to 100% play himself on the show.

Who better to play himself than himself? Dude just gives of a loves to act vibe every once in a while in the show. Plus he’s good at acting on the show because he’s experienced it for real. He’d probably give good tips to the kid actors playing the PPG, though the real ones would probably drop in once in a while to make sure Ace isn’t causing trouble or lying about details.

There's also an explaination for the merchandise of ppg villains showing up in Gorillaz. In the old CN bumper Anger Management Mojo Jojo mentions that merchandise of him was made without his permission.

#ace copular #i feel like i look crazy from how much i go into this but whatever

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claudinei-de-jesus · 3 years

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Have you ever heard of Dark Water? A thriller and horror film released in July 2005 by Buena Vista that was a real box office failure, grossing just under $50 million. If it were just that, it wouldn't be worth talking much about Dark Water, but something that happened 8 years later ended up changing the situation a little. Making the movie a little more…bizarre? Or could we say that reality has become frightening? We are talking about a crime that occurred in February 2013 that resulted in the death of a young Canadian girl in mysterious circumstances similar to what was shown in Dark Water.

But let's start there in 2005, with the movie. What it is? Dark Water is a remake of a Japanese horror film called Honogurai mizu no soko kara (2002). Dahlia has just split from her ex-husband and, amid all the bureaucracy and confusion over the divorce process, custody of her only child, Ceci, comes into play. Trying to live life as best as possible and not involve the child too much in the whole story, Dahlia decides to move into a small and humble apartment with the girl, who immediately seems to love the place, although it has some precarious conditions. The first strange thing that happens to Ceci is that she finds a lost doll in the middle of the hotel. Like most children, she tries to convince her mother to keep the doll, however, she forces the girl to deliver the toy to the person in charge of the building, who says he will keep the object to give it to its owner.

Well, so far, no biggie, Dahlia and Ceci start their new life, tidy up the house, try to live as if the outside world isn't trying to separate them, but things start to get bizarre when Dahlia notices a strange black liquid falling from the roof of your home, like gutters. Since, even after complaining so much about maintenance, the young mother can't get any help, she decides to investigate for herself. Dahlia goes upstairs to her apartment and sees that an entire house is flooded with strange black water. All the faucets and showers in the residence are completely open, even though no one seems to live there. Well, the janitor promises he'll take care of everything and doesn't give much explanation, which leaves the protagonist with a flea behind her ear. But things don't stop there, the phenomenon happens again and again, until once, Ceci asks her mother for a glass of water, and when Dahlia turns on the faucet, a tuft of hair enters the glass. Angry, the woman tries to get explanations, but lame excuses reappear, making the young woman even more restless and keep trying to find out what happens in that place.

Well, remember the little doll Ceci found? This is where she becomes special in the plot. Ceci manages to rescue the so dreamed little doll from her captivity before her mother decides to leave for good and the thing takes her to the roof of the building. When they notice the girl's absence, Dahlia and the caretaker begin a frantic search for the girl, since that doll will belong to a child who had also disappeared in that building. They find Ceci at the foot of a huge water tank, saying that the doll's owner is inside. Yes, my dears, after Dahlia goes upstairs to see what her daughter was talking about, she finds the decomposing body of the little girl who was missing, the owner of the toy. Not only that, it is discovered that the caretaker knew about the young woman's death and was covering up the facts.

I was about 10 years old when I first saw Dark Water. I confess that I was always a child in love with horror and thriller shows, however, I could never imagine what would happen a few years later. As mentioned before, a sinister event happened 8 years after the release of this film, a crime that, to this day, has no convincing explanation. Many believe that the possible perpetrator of the crime was inspired by the story of the movie Dark Water to commit this horrible crime. Others claim it was just a coincidence. And there are still those who dedicate the credits for the feat to a supernatural entity. Well, all we know is that the case was closed as “accidental drowning”, which is, in fact, quite doubtful. Is this a case where fiction inspired reality? I'll tell the story below and draw your own conclusions.

Elisa Lam was a young Canadian university student at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. She was just 22 years old when she decided to go on vacation to Los Angeles at the bizarre Cecil Hotel. The coincidences already start there, since the name of the little girl from Dark Water is Ceci. As if that wasn't enough, the Cecil Hotel is known for having been the scene of crimes and inhabited by serial killers. Not very good fame, right? An extra curiosity is that he was the inspiration for the fifth season of American Horror Story. But, let's get back to the story. On February 19th, something really strange was captured by the security cameras in the place. You can see Elisa hurrying into an elevator and pressing a few buttons on the dashboard. She looks out carefully, as if something or someone is chasing her, then goes back inside the elevator. She spent some time doing this, checking outside, going back into hiding, until she just walked out, kind of scared. This is the last record of the young woman and it greatly intrigued the authorities. Is Elisa being chased

The truth is that nobody knows, as there were no cameras that showed all the corridors. The young woman disappeared and was never seen again, which caused a great stir in the US and Canadian media. A real effort was made in hopes of finding the girl, who, unfortunately, was already dead since the day she disappeared. But… what about the body? How was it found? It turns out that, a while later, some guests started complaining about the water that was coming out of their taps. She looked a bit cloudy, with an inexplicable stench, something was just wrong. After a while (and piles of complaints), those responsible for maintaining the building went to the water tank, which was on the terrace, to see what was going on. They opened the heavy lid and there they found the young woman's body, which was already entering a state of decomposition. Yes, for a few days, the water with Elisa's remains was being channeled to all the apartments in the place.

The question that remained in the air was: What happened? The video released in the media drew a lot of attention. Elisa was behaving strangely inside an elevator also behaving strangely (since it didn't close while the young woman was inside). This could have been caused by a strong bipolar crisis, an illness from which Elisa suffered. This disorder can indeed cause hallucinations in severe cases, however, the young woman seemed to be in good health and had not had a crisis for months. Another thing that raises questions about the final report, “accidental drowning”, is the way in which the body was found. She was completely naked, with her belongings and clothes floating next to her in the water tank. The box had an extremely heavy lid, which made it almost impossible for her to have, by herself, opened, entered and closed the place. If she threw herself, how did she close? Another thing that caught our attention was that the doors to the terrace were always closed, as a security measure.

Well, the truth is that there are many theories that try to explain what happened to the young Elisa Lam, but the only thing that is certain is that this strange and bizarre coincidence with the movie Dark Water exists. You may not be aware of this, but in some parts of the world there are sects that desperately try to commit crimes inspired by other crimes or movies. Something really sick and macabre.

This story is the first of several that should appear during Halloween month. So if you like horror movies and series, keep an eye out. Many curiosities are to come! Você já ouviu falar em Dark Water? Um filme de suspense e horror lançado em julho de 2005 pela Buena Vista e que foi um verdadeiro fracasso de bilheteria, arrecadando pouco menos de 50 milhões de dólares. Se fosse só por isso, nem valeria a pena falar muito de Dark Water, mas algo que aconteceu 8 anos depois acabou mudando um pouco a situação. Deixando o filme um pouco mais… bizarro? Ou poderíamos dizer que a realidade ficou assustadora? Estamos falando de um crime ocorrido em fevereiro de 2013 que resultou na morte de uma jovem canadense em circunstâncias misteriosas e similares ao que foi mostrado em Dark Water.

Mas vamos começar lááá no ano de 2005, com o filme. Do que se trata? Dark Water é um remake de um filme de terror japonês chamado Honogurai mizu no soko kara (2002). Dahlia acabou de se separar de seu ex-marido e, em meio a toda a burocracia e confusão por causa do processo de divórcio, a guarda de sua única filha, Ceci, entra em jogo. Tentando levar a vida da melhor forma possível e não envolver muito a criança na história toda, Dahlia decide se mudar para um pequeno e humilde apartamento com a menina, que logo de cara parece adorar o local, embora ele tenha certas condições precárias. A primeira coisa estranha que acontece a Ceci, é ela encontrar uma boneca perdida no meio do hotel. Como boa parte das crianças, ela tenta convencer sua mãe a ficar com a boneca, no entanto, ela força a menina a entregar o brinquedo para o responsável pelo prédio, que diz que guardará o objeto para entrega-lo a sua dona.

Bom, até ai, nada demais, Dahlia e Ceci começam sua nova vida, arrumam a casa, tentam viver como se o mundo lá fora não estivesse tentando separa-las, mas as coisas começam a ficar bizarras quando Dahlia repara um estranho liquido negro caindo do teto de sua residência, como goteiras. Como, mesmo depois de tanto reclamar a manutenção, a jovem mãe não consegue ajuda, ela decide investigar por si mesma. Dahlia sobe até o andar superior ao seu apartamento e vê que uma casa inteira está inundada com uma estranha água negra. Todas as torneiras e chuveiros da residência estão completamente abertos, mesmo que ninguém pareça morar ali. Bom, o zelador promete que vai cuidar de tudo e não dá muitas explicações, o que deixa a protagonista com uma pulga atrás da orelha. Mas as coisas não param por ai, o fenômeno volta a acontecer repetidas vezes, até que, certa vez, Ceci pede para a mãe um copo de água e, quando Dahlia abre a torneira, um tufo de cabelo entra no copo. Revoltada a mulher tenta conseguir explicações, mas desculpas esfarrapadas voltam aparecer, fazendo com que a jovem fique ainda mais inquieta e continue tentando descobrir o que acontece naquele lugar.

Bom, se lembra da bonequinha que Ceci encontrou? É aqui que ela se torna especial na trama. Ceci consegue resgatar a tão sonhada bonequinha de seu cativeiro antes que sua mãe decida ir embora de vez e a coisa a leva até o terraço do prédio. Quando notam a ausência da pequena, Dahlia e o zelador começam uma busca frenética pela menina, uma vez que aquela boneca pertencerá a uma criança que também havia desaparecido naquele prédio. Eles encontram Ceci aos pés de uma enorme caixa d’água, dizendo que a dona da boneca está lá dentro. Pois é, meus caros, depois que Dahlia sobe para ver do que a filha estava falando, ela encontra o corpo em decomposição da menininha que estava desaparecida, dona do brinquedo. Não só isso, é descoberto que o zelador sabia sobre a morte da jovem e estava acobertando os fatos.

Eu tinha cerca de 10 anos quando vi Dark Water pela primeira vez. Confesso que sempre fui uma criança apaixonada pelos programas de terror e suspense, no entanto, eu nunca poderia imaginar o que aconteceria alguns anos após. Como já dito anteriormente, um fato sinistro aconteceu 8 anos depois do lançamento desse filme, um crime que, até hoje, não tem uma explicação convincente. Muitos acreditam que o possível autor do delito tenha se inspirado na história do filme Dark Water para cometer esse crime horrível. Outros alegam que foi apenas uma coincidência. E tem ainda quem dedique os créditos do feito a uma entidade sobrenatural. Bom, tudo que sabemos é que o caso foi encerrado como “afogamento acidental”, o que é, de fato, bem duvidoso. Seria esse um caso em que a ficção inspirou a realidade? Contarei a história a seguir e tirem suas conclusões vocês mesmos.

Elisa Lam era uma jovem universitária canadense, estudante da Universidade da Colúmbia Britânica, em Vancouver. Ela tinha apenas 22 anos quando decidiu ir passar as férias em Los Angeles, no bizarro Cecil Hotel. As coincidências já começam aí, uma vez que o nome da menininha de Dark Water é Ceci. Como se não bastasse, o Cecil Hotel é conhecido por já ter sido palco de crimes e habitado por assassinos em série. Uma fama não muito boa, né? Uma curiosidade extra é que ele foi a inspiração para a quinta temporada de American Horror Story. Mas, voltemos para a história. No dia 19 de fevereiro, uma coisa realmente estranha foi captada pelas câmeras de segurança do local. É possível ver Elisa entrando apressada em um elevador e apertando alguns botões no painel. Ela olha para fora cuidadosamente, como se algo ou alguém estivesse a perseguindo, logo depois, volta para dentro do elevador. Ela passa algum tempo fazendo isso, verificando do lado de fora, voltando a se esconder, até que simplesmente saí, meio assustada. Esse é o último registro que se tem da jovem e intrigou bastante as autoridades. Estaria Elisa sendo perseguida?

A verdade é que ninguém sabe, pois não haviam câmeras que mostrassem todos os corredores. A jovem desapareceu e nunca mais foi vista, o que causou uma grande comoção na mídia estadunidense e canadense. Um verdadeiro mutirão foi feito na esperança de encontrar a menina, que, infelizmente, já estava morta desde o dia de seu desaparecimento. Mas… e o corpo? Como foi encontrado? Acontece que, um tempo depois, alguns hospedes começaram a reclamar sobre a água que estava saindo de suas torneiras. Ela parecia meio turva, com um mal cheiro inexplicável, algo simplesmente estava errado. Depois de um tempo (e pilhas de reclamações), os responsáveis pela manutenção do prédio foram até a caixa d’água, que ficava no terraço, para verificar o que estava acontecendo. Eles abriram a pesada tampa e lá encontraram o corpo da jovem que, que já estava entrando em estado de decomposição. Sim, durante alguns dias, a água com os restos mortais de Elisa estava sendo canalizada para todos os apartamentos do local.

A pergunta que ficou no ar foi: O que aconteceu? O vídeo divulgado na mídia chamava muito a atenção. Elisa estava com um comportamento estranho dentro de um elevador também com um comportamento estranho (já que ele não se fechava enquanto a jovem estava lá dentro). Isso poderia ter sido causado por uma forte crise de bipolaridade, doença da qual Elisa sofria. Esse transtorno pode sim causar alucinações em casos graves, no entanto, a jovem parecia bem de saúde e não tinha uma crise havia meses. Outra coisa que levanta questionamentos sobre o laudo final, “afogamento acidental”, é a forma como o corpo foi encontrado. Ela estava completamente nua, com seus pertences e roupas flutuando junto a ela na caixa d’água. A caixa tinha uma tampa extremamente pesada, o que tornava quase impossível ela ter, sozinha, aberto, entrado e fechado o local. Se ela se jogou, como fechou? Outra coisa que chamou a atenção foi que as portas de acesso ao terraço ficavam sempre fechadas, como medida de segurança.

Bom, a verdade é que existem muitas teorias que tentam explicar o que aconteceu com a jovem Elisa Lam, mas a única coisa que se tem certeza é que essa estranha e bizarra coincidência com o filme Dark Water existe. Talvez você não tenha conhecimento disso, mas em alguns lugares do mundo existem seitas que tentam, desesperadamente, cometer crimes inspirados em outros crimes ou em filmes. Algo realmente doentio e macabro.

Essa matéria é a primeira de várias que devem aparecer durante o mês do Halloween. Por isso, se você gosta de filmes e séries de terror, fique de olho. Muitas curiosidades estão por vir! RIP Elisa Lam. A memory for eternity.

We will never forget you. RIP Elisa Lam. Uma memória para a eternidade.

Jamais iremos te esquecer.

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bountyofbeads · 4 years

Text

Lamar Alexander’s yes-he-did-it statement on Trump, annotated(See website for annotations.)

By Aaron Blake | Published January 31 at 9:16 AM EST ¦ Washington Post | Posted January 31, 2020 |

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) late Thursday night announced he’ll be a crucial vote against calling new witnesses or admitting new evidence in President Trump’s impeachment trial. With that decision, it appears Trump will not only be acquitted, but that former national security adviser John Bolton won’t be called to testify. The best Democrats can hope for is a 50-50 tie on witnesses, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. electing to break the tie. Few expect him to do so.

But in making his announcement, Alexander carved out a nuanced position: While the president’s lawyers have said he did nothing wrong, Alexander disagrees. In fact, he says Democratic House impeachment managers proved their case — that Trump withheld aid and a White House meeting for his desired investigations and that it was “inappropriate.” He said he just doesn’t think Trump’s actions are worthy of removal from office.

It’s a statement worth parsing, which is what we’ll do below via annotation. To see an annotation, click on the yellow, highlighted text.

“I worked with other senators to make sure that we have the right to ask for more documents and witnesses, but there is no need for more evidence to prove something that has already been proven and that does not meet the United States Constitution’s high bar for an impeachable offense.

“There is no need for more evidence to prove that the president asked Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and his son, Hunter; he said this on television on October 3, 2019, and during his July 25, 2019, telephone call with the president of Ukraine. There is no need for more evidence to conclude that the president withheld United States aid, at least in part, to pressure Ukraine to investigate the Bidens; the House managers have proved this with what they call a ‘mountain of overwhelming evidence.’ There is no need to consider further the frivolous second article of impeachment that would remove the president for asserting his constitutional prerogative to protect confidential conversations with his close advisers.

“It was inappropriate for the president to ask a foreign leader to investigate his political opponent and to withhold United States aid to encourage that investigation. When elected officials inappropriately interfere with such investigations, it undermines the principle of equal justice under the law. But the Constitution does not give the Senate the power to remove the president from office and ban him from this year’s ballot simply for actions that are inappropriate.

“The question then is not whether the president did it, but whether the United States Senate or the American people should decide what to do about what he did. I believe that the Constitution provides that the people should make that decision in the presidential election that begins in Iowa on Monday.

“The Senate has spent nine long days considering this ‘mountain’ of evidence, the arguments of the House managers and the president’s lawyers, their answers to senators’ questions and the House record. Even if the House charges were true, they do not meet the Constitution’s ‘treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors’ standard for an impeachable offense.

“The framers believed that there should never, ever be a partisan impeachment. That is why the Constitution requires a 2/3 vote of the Senate for conviction. Yet not one House Republican voted for these articles. If this shallow, hurried and wholly partisan impeachment were to succeed, it would rip the country apart, pouring gasoline on the fire of cultural divisions that already exist. It would create the weapon of perpetual impeachment to be used against future presidents whenever the House of Representatives is of a different political party.

“Our founding documents provide for duly elected presidents who serve with ‘the consent of the governed,’ not at the pleasure of the United States Congress. Let the people decide.”

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The 7 MOST INTERESTING Q&As FROM THE SENATE IMPEACHMENT TRIAL

The Senate impeachment trial is in a new phase, as the senators spend two days asking President Trump’s legal team and the House impeachment managers questions in writing.

Below are a few of the most interesting exchanges from Wednesday and Thursday. This post will be continually updated.

1. DERSHOWITZ SAYS EVEN IF TRUMP WAS TRYING TO HELP HIS REELECTION BID, THAT’S OKAY

The first question Wednesday came from the all-important triumvirate of Sens. Mitt Romney (Utah), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Susan Collins (Maine) — the three most likely GOP votes for new witnesses. It was about what the senators should do if they deduce that Trump had both official and personal motives for his actions regarding Ukraine.

Deputy White House Counsel Patrick Philbin responded with a very broad assertion: that regardless of personal motives, as long as Trump had any official motive, “we think it follows even more clearly that cannot possibly be the basis for an impeachable offense.” Philbin argued that senators would then be put in the position of trying to deduce how much of a motive for a decision was personal vs. official.

Trump lawyer Alan Dershowitz later extended the argument in a remarkable way, saying that even a president trying to help his own reelection bid could be construed as working in the public interest.

“If a president does something which he believes will help him get elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment,” Dershowitz said.

Dershowitz’s comment was the most controversial of the day, with Democrats arguing that it opened the door to presidents doing basically anything they want for their own purposes.

You could also deduce from the question a possible off-ramp for Romney, Collins and Murkowski to vote to acquit Trump: the idea that he may have been trying to help himself, yes, but that he also had official, legitimate motivations.

2. MURKOWSKI WITH A KEY BOLTON QUESTION

As we approached the end of the Q&A session on Thursday night, the big looming question -- as it ever was -- was whether the Senate would vote for John Bolton to testify.

And one key vote asked an interesting question in that regard.

Murkowski, who would seem to be a must-have vote for Bolton’s testimony asked Trump’s defense team, "Why should this body not call in Ambassador Bolton?” And crucially, she included this statement in her question: “This dispute about material facts weighs in favor of calling additional witnesses with direct knowledge.”

Philbin responded that it would set a damaging precedent for the Senate to be forced to do investigative work that the House could do.

“It will do grave damage to this body to say that the proceedings in the House don’t have to really be complete, you don’t have to subpoena the witnesses that you think are necessary to prove your case, you don’t really have to put it all ll together before you bring the package here," Philbin said.

So Murkowski now sounds like a yes on having Bolton testify, and she seemed to at least be giving Trump’s team a chance to tell her why she shouldn’t vote that way.

Of course, she’s a necessary-but-not-sufficient vote. The bigger indicator Thursday night will be Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), who told CNN he’d announce his decision the conclusion of Thursday’s session. Alexander, who is retiring, was the fourth GOP senator to say he’d vote for the ability to call witnesses -- and Democrats need four GOP votes -- though he didn’t commit to specific witnesses at the time.

3. SEKULOW WON’T SAY WHO PAYS GIULIANI

Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) on Thursday gave both sides a swing at a question many have been asking: Who pays for Trump lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani’s travel and expenses? We know Trump doesn’t pay Giuliani, and some have suggested perhaps he’s monetizing his work for Trump by getting extra business from foreign clients.

Given the chance to address the issue, Trump’s legal team took a pass.

Appearing after lead House impeachment manager Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) addressed the issue, Jay Sekulow — who, like Giuliani, is a personal lawyer to Trump — declined to shed any light on how Giuliani’s travel and expenses are funded. Sekulow instead attacked Schiff and suggested this was a distraction.

Sekulow made a number of accusations about alleged corruption by Hunter Biden in Ukraine, and added, “You’re concerned about what Rudolph W. Giuliani, the president’s lawyer, was doing when he was over trying to determine what was going on in Ukraine?”

That was indeed the subject of the question. And Sekulow didn’t answer it.

But it’s not the first time Sekulow has failed to provide such an answer. Back in 2017, he said he didn’t even know who was paying him.

4. PHILBIN SAYS TRADING INFORMATION WITH FOREIGN ACTORS IS ALSO OKAY

Dershowitz was nabbing headlines for much of the day Wednesday for the way he broadened Trump’s defense. But Philbin near the end of Wednesday’s proceedings made another bold claim. He responded to a question from Sen. Christopher A. Coons (D-Del.) about whether Trump considers foreign interference illegal, and Philbin suggested he didn’t, necessarily.

“Mere information is not something that would violate the campaign finance laws,” Philbin said. “And if there is credible information, credible information of wrongdoing by someone who is running for a public office, it’s not campaign interference for credible information about wrongdoing to be brought to light.”

At the next break, Democratic senators responded in awe that a White House lawyer just suggested this. Receiving “a thing of value” in a campaign from foreign actors is illegal, and House managers brought it up quickly on the floor after that.

“I was stunned to hear that now, apparently, it’s okay for the president to get information from foreign governments in an election,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), one of the House managers. “That’s news to me.”

“We’ve witnessed over the course of the last few days and the long day today, a remarkable lowering of the bar to the point now where everything’s okay as long as the president believes it’s in his reelection interest,” Schiff said.

5. A KEY ADMISSION: GIULIANI WASN’T CONDUCTING FOREIGN POLICY

On Thursday, we got a rare bipartisan question — from Collins, Murkowski and Democratic Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) and Joe Manchin III (W.Va.). It was about whether Trump would prevent private citizens from conducting foreign policy, which is prohibited by the Logan Act.

The unnamed target of the question as obvious Giuliani. (I’ve written about Giuliani and the Logan Act before — albeit with respect to Venezuela.)

Philbin acknowledged the question appeared to be about Giuliani and clarified that “there was no conduct of foreign policy being carried out here by a private person.” He said sometimes presidents use confidants to serve as messengers with foreign governments, pointing to George Washington using Gouverneur Morris to talk to France. (Morris, for what it’s worth, did this prior to the Logan Act’s enactment in 1799.)

Schiff later seized on the answer. "They just undermined their entire argument” that these investigations were about rooting out corruption, he said. If that was the foreign policy goal, after all, and Giuliani was pushing for such investigations, how could he not be conducting foreign policy?

Trump’s legal team has indeed oscillated between arguing Giuliani was acting as Trump’s personal lawyer and that he was furthering official foreign policy goals — depending upon which role has better suited its arguments.

6. TRUMP’S TEAM IS UNAWARE OF ANY EARLY TRUMP CONCERNS ABOUT BIDENS IN UKRAINE

Another interesting exchange Wednesday — perhaps not coincidentally — also began with a question from Collins and Murkowski.

They asked Trump’s legal defense team whether they had any indication Trump was concerned about the Bidens’ actions in Ukraine before former vice president Joe Biden became a candidate for president. Trump’s lawyers had nothing.

“It wasn’t thoroughly pursued in the record,” Philbin said. “So I can’t point to something in the record that shows President Trump at an earlier time mentioning specifically something related to Joe or Hunter Biden.”

Dershowitz added later that even if Trump wasn’t previously interested in the issue, it would be okay. He said that if someone is running “and he has a corrupt son, the fact that he’s announced his candidacy is a very good reason for upping the interest. If he wasn’t running for president, he’s a has-been.”

There has been plenty of evidence that Trump’s interest in corruption is very specific and self-serving; the only two investigations in Ukraine he has called for, for instance, involve his own pet political causes. The answer Collins and Murkowski elicited drove that home.

If we’re reading the tea leaves again here, it also suggests Collins and Murkowski might be skeptical of the argument that Trump wasn’t looking out only for himself with his actions.

7. MANCHIN’S SCORCHING QUESTION FOR DERSHOWITZ

One of the most likely potential crossover votes on the Democratic side is Manchin, who comes from very pro-Trump West Virginia. But Manchin took his turn Wednesday to offer a question of Trump’s legal team that oozed with sarcasm.

After noting the legal consensus that the Constitution’s “high crimes and misdemeanors” clause doesn’t require statutory crimes for removal of a president and that this was the case dating back to English common law, he then turned his focus on Dershowitz.

“Even Mr. Dershowitz said in 1998 that an impeachable offense, quote, certainly doesn’t have to be a crime, end quote,” Manchin wrote, before asking Dershowitz: “What has happened in the past 22 years to change the original intent of the Framers and the historic meaning of the term high crimes and misdemeanors?”

Rather than dwell upon Manchin’s shot, Dershowitz just addressed his own personal evolution on the subject.

“What happened since 1998 is that I studied more, did more research, read more documents and, like any academic, altered my views,” Dershowitz said. “That’s what happens. That’s what professors ought to do.”

The question by itself was something. That it came from Manchin was something more.

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4 TAKEAWAYS FROM THE FINAL DAY OF QUESTIONS IN TRUMP’S IMPEACHMENT TRIAL

You’re reading an edition of The 5-Minute Fix impeachment newsletter. Get it in your inbox throughout this trial.

Senators spent Thursday asking questions in President Trump’s impeachment trial, and that was apparently enough for two key Republican senators to come down on how they’ll vote Friday on whether to extend the trial by calling witnesses including former national security adviser John Bolton.

BELOW are the takeaways from the day.

1. DEMOCRATS ALMOST CERTAINLY AREN’T GETTING THE FOUR REPUBLICANS THEY NEED TO CALL WITNESSES

The biggest news of the day came at the end of the trial’s question-and-answer session, at nearly 11 p.m. There are only four potential swing votes, and one of them, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), said he won’t vote to call witnesses.

Alexander’s justification: He thinks Trump did what he’s accused of doing, but that doesn’t warrant removal from office.

Another swing vote, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), said Thursday she would vote for witnesses. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) said he would “like to hear from Bolton.” That leaves Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who says she’s “going to reflect … and read my notes” and will announce her decision Friday morning.

At this point, it’s possible the Senate is faced with a 50-50 split on whether to call witnesses, one vote shy of a decision. This is uncharted territory for the Senate, and for the Constitution.

It also likely means that after nearly two weeks of arguments and plenty of news outside the courtroom bolstering their case — like that Bolton has written in a book draft that Trump did directly tie Ukraine’s aid to the announcement of investigations — Democrats didn’t sway enough senators to call witnesses.

2. ALL EYES ARE ON JOHN ROBERTS

So what if there is a tie in Friday’s vote for witnesses? Could the chief justice break it by casting the deciding vote? That debate has been bubbling over the course of the Senate trial among academics and pundits. Now it will boil.

For example, law scholar Frank Bowman argued in SCOTUSblog earlier this month that Roberts can cast the tie-breaking vote in this case. He’s the presiding officer of the Senate, and when the vice president performs that function in regular Senate business, they cast a vote.

But there’s not consensus on that. Some legal scholars agree with Senate Republicans that a 50-50 vote simply means the motion failed. It’s not even clear who will get to decide whether Roberts gets to decide: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Roberts in his role as presiding official, or the Senate parliamentarian? Could the Senate vote on whether to allow Roberts to cast a tie vote?

So far Roberts has been deferential to the Senate and reluctant to drag himself — and his court — into such a partisan fight.

3. TRUMP’S DEFENSE STILL HASN’T ANSWERED KEY QUESTIONS ABOUT HIS INTENT

When did Trump first pause the military aid to Ukraine? And when did he start talking to Ukraine about investigations into the Biden family?

Those are two key questions Republican senators asked of Trump’s defense on Wednesday, and Trump’s lawyers had no answer. White House Deputy Counsel Patrick Philbin acknowledged that there is no evidence of Trump having talked with Ukrainian officials about the Bidens before Joe Biden entered the 2020 race.

Understanding when Trump paused the aid and when he first became concerned about the actions of Biden and the former vice president’s son Hunter in Ukraine would go a long way in proving or disproving Democrats’ case that the president abused his power.

After having a day to think about how to address these questions to key votes on witnesses, they didn’t have any new answers.

4. RAND PAUL'S ATTEMPT TO PUBLICLY OUT THE WHISTLEBLOWER

This week, Trump’s legal team evolved their defense of the president in the direction of: “So what if he did do it?” As they did, some Trump allies escalated their efforts to undermine House Democrats’ case in ways other than directly disputing the evidence.

On Wednesday, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) sent a question to the desk of the chief justice, who did not read it out loud. On Thursday, Paul tried again, and again Roberts refused. In the question, Paul mentioned a name that some media outlets have reported is the alleged whistleblower. We know what was in it, because Paul left the trial after his question was batted down and read it in full to a room of reporters.

Eventually, another Republican senator’s question of whether Schiff’s staff engaged with the whistleblower before he filed his complaint was read aloud. Schiff angrily called it a “smear.” (Schiff’s committee did get a heads-up about the existence of a whistleblower complaint before it got filed, but there is no evidence Schiff was working in concert with the whistleblower. Schiff has repeatedly said he has not met the whistleblower.)

“Members of this body used to care about the protection of whistleblower identities,” Schiff said. “They didn’t used to gratuitously attack members of committee staff, but now they do. … I think it’s disgraceful. Whistleblowers are a unique and vital resource for the intelligence community.”

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Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow really doesn’t want to talk about who’s paying Rudy Giuliani

For all of the focus on corruption and foreign influence that lingers around the Senate’s impeachment trial of President Trump, there’s a significant potentially overlapping question that remains unanswered: Who’s paying Rudolph W. Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney?

In October, Giuliani told The Washington Post that he wasn’t being paid by the president.

“My other clients are paying me for the work I do for them,” Giuliani said. “Nobody is paying me for a single thing I’m doing for Donald J. Trump.”

Since Giuliani isn’t an administration official, he doesn’t need to reveal that information publicly — so he doesn’t. After his associates Igor Fruman and Lev Parnas were arrested that same month, Giuliani admitted that he’d received $500,000 from the pair for his work representing them, money that originally came from a personal injury attorney on Long Island. (After his arrest, Parnas was accused by federal prosecutors of failing to report a separate $1 million payment he’d received from a lawyer working for an oligarch named Dmitry Firtash.)

As the Senate powered through a second day of questions from senators during the impeachment trial on Thursday, a group of Democratic senators — Jack Reed (R.I.), Tammy Duckworth (Ill.) and Kamala D. Harris (Calif.) — decided to pose the question of Giuliani’s income to the House impeachment managers and Trump’s legal team.

“It has been reported,” the question read, “that President Trump does not pay Rudy Giuliani, his personal attorney, for his services. Can you explain who has paid for Rudy Giuliani’s legal fees, international travel and other expenses in his capacity as president?”

Lead House impeachment manager Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) went first, taking the opportunity to criticize the president and Giuliani. He, of course, didn’t know the answer to the question.

“I don’t know who’s directly paying the freight for it, but I can tell you the whole country is paying the freight for it,” Schiff said. “Because there are leaders around the world who are watching this, and they’re saying: ‘The American presidency is open for business. This president wants our help. And if we help him, he will be grateful.’ Is that the kind of message we want to send the rest of the world?”

Then it was Trump attorney Jay Sekulow’s turn. He started talking before he even got to the microphone, he was so indignant. Or so he’d have us believe.

“Came out of the manager’s mouth: open for business,” Sekulow said, as soon as the mic started picking him up. “I’ll tell you who was open for business. You want to know who was open for business? When the vice president of the United States was charged by the then-president of the United States with developing policies to avoid and assist in removing corruption from Ukraine — and his son was on the board of a company that was under investigation for Ukraine. And you’re concerned about what Rudy Giuliani, the president’s lawyer, was doing when he was over trying to determine what was going on in Ukraine?”

What Sekulow’s doing here is obvious. He’s spinning, in the classic sense, redirecting the question away from Trump’s attorney and back to former vice president Joe Biden.

The case presented by Trump’s legal team, remember, is that Biden’s push to oust then-Ukraine prosecutor general Viktor Shokin was a function of his seeking to defend a company called Burisma Holdings, for which his son Hunter Biden worked. As has been documented repeatedly, Burisma wasn’t under active investigation at the time that Biden targeted Shokin. In fact, Shokin’s failure to act on Burisma may have been one of the reasons that the U.S. government and its allies broadly sought his ouster.

But here we are talking about Biden instead of Giuliani, just as Sekulow would wish. His indignant tagline about wanting to know what Giuliani was up to has an unchanging answer: Yes, it would be nice to know more details about Giuliani’s work.

“And by the way,” Sekulow continued, spinning in a different direction, “it’s a little bit interesting to me — and my colleague, the deputy White House counsel referred to this — it’s a little bit ironic to me that you’re going to be questioning conversations with foreign governments about investigations when three of you, three members of the Senate — Senator Menendez, Senator Leahy and Senator Durbin — sent a letter that read something quickly like this. These were — they wrote the letter to the prosecutor general of Ukraine.”

He then quoted from that May 2018 letter, implying that it was the same sort of quid pro quo of which Trump stands accused: a demand for an investigation into Trump with a buried threat. Others have made the same case before; early in the impeachment inquiry it was a short-lived talking point in the conservative media before it was repeatedly shown to be a straw man.

In other words, this is well-worn ground, but it is worth once again explaining why.

The letter was a response to a New York Times article in which it was reported that Ukraine was balking at aiding the investigation into Russian interference by then-special counsel Robert S. Mueller III out of fear that doing so would irritate Trump. The senators aimed to encourage Ukraine to continue to participate in the Mueller probe. Mueller’s final report, incidentally, indicated that his investigation was hampered by “limits on its ability to access relevant evidence” given that witnesses and documents were held overseas.

It’s not really clear how this letter was even meant to bolster Sekulow’s case. The senators’ incomes are a matter of public record. Their advocacy on Mueller’s behalf was similarly public. The Mueller probe was an official function of the government. Yes, one focus of that probe was Trump’s campaign, but Trump wasn’t the only focus of Mueller’s work.

Giuliani, on the other hand, was poking around on the president’s behalf, seeking information that might impugn a possible 2020 Democratic nominee. He did so outside the public eye, on the dime of unidentified sponsors. He did so with the private blessing of the president and was bolstered by the president’s private advocacy of his investigation.

The two are not equivalent in any sense. Sekulow seems to have raised it mostly because it had just been discussed by another lawyer on his team and therefore was something he could seize on as part of the performative outrage in his speech.

“And you’re asking about whether foreign investigations are appropriate?” Sekulow concluded after discussing the letter. “I think it answers itself.”

It does. Which is why Sekulow was unable to offer another, better answer.

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"They will have sacrificed their own oaths to protect their own electoral prospects, and the country and the Constitution will have been saddled with a terrible precedent. The Senate will have told Trump that, indeed, he can do whatever he wants."

George Conway: Don’t let the defense fool you. This impeachment is all about corruption.

By George T. Conway III | Published

January 30 at 6:24 PM EST | Washington Post | Posted Jan 31, 2020 |

George T. Conway III is a lawyer in New York and an adviser to the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump super PAC.

The president’s lawyers this week floated their catch-all impeachment defense, one tailor-made for President Trump. It is, in essence, that a narcissistic president can do no wrong.

Like most of the president’s arguments, it’s erroneous. But no argument could have presented the issue more starkly to Republican senators: Will they follow their oaths to defend the Constitution and to do impartial justice? Or will they once again show fealty to Trump personally, thereby accepting his conflation of his personal interests with those of the nation?

The Trump lawyers’ challenge to the Senate began with their answer to the very first question from senators. Republican Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Mitt Romney (Utah) asked: What if the president had a mixed motive — if he thought he was acting both “in pursuit of a personal political advantage” and in “promotion of national interests”? Deputy White House Counsel Patrick Philbin responded without caveat. That “cannot possibly be the basis for an impeachable offense,” he said.

Leave it to Alan Dershowitz to drive the point home with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. If “a president does something which he believes will get himself elected in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment,” Dershowitz contended.

For a president psychologically incapable of distinguishing between his own personal interests and the nation’s, that amounts to the ultimate get-out-of-impeachment-free card. Trump already believes that “I have an Article II” — Article II of the Constitution — “where I have the right to do whatever I want as president.” This self-described very stable genius, he of “I alone can fix it,” is convinced that his reelection, achieved by whatever means necessary, serves the interests of the country. In short, anything goes.

But the argument is a lie. It’s another example of how Trump corrupts all around him. Following the lead of the political aides and allies who came before them, during the past two weeks it has been the lawyers who have debased themselves. Defying their own obligations of candor to the tribunals before which they appear, they’ve lied to and misled the court of impeachment about the House proceedings and underlying facts, peddled conspiracy theories about the Russia investigation, and of course about Ukraine and the Bidens.

Their legal position is likewise false. It’s just not true that good motives, when mixed with bad ones, compel acquittal under the law. If a politician takes a bribe to do what he thinks would have been best for the public anyway, he still goes to jail. If he’s president, under a Constitution that refers to impeachment specifically for “bribery,” as well other “high crimes and misdemeanors,” he should still be removed.

It’s also not true that “abuse of power” is not impeachable, or that a statutory crime is necessary for impeachment. And it’s not true, as Dershowitz argued Wednesday, that the Framers’ rejection of “maladministration” as a basis for impeachment means that abuse of power isn’t impeachable. The Framers rejected the word “maladministration” because it covered mistakes and incompetence, not because it also could mean abuse of power. In fact, they swapped “high crimes and misdemeanors” into the final document precisely because it does cover such abuse.

It couldn’t be any other way, if you think about it for even a moment. Trump’s lawyers are right that if a president does what he honestly thinks is simultaneously in his personal electoral and the national interests, that’s not impeachable, in the following sense: If a president cuts taxes because he thinks it will get him reelected and it will create jobs, that’s fine. That’s ordinary electoral politics.

But if he cuts taxes because he has an agreement with a major backer that, in exchange for tax cuts, the backer will fund a huge super PAC to support his reelection, that’s impeachable — because that’s a corrupt quid pro quo for his personal benefit. So, too, if a president conditions another official act — releasing security assistance to a foreign country — on a requirement that the foreign country smear the president’s political opponent. That’s not politics; that’s corruption.

And corruption, for all the Trump lawyers’ attempt to muddy the waters with tortured interpretations of the Constitution, is what this impeachment is all about. Trump acted with corrupt intent to damage a political opponent. Testimony from former national security adviser John Bolton seems certain to underscore that point.

Which is precisely why Republican senators seem so desperate not to hear it and so willing to entertain a false reading of the Constitution that would effectively render the impeachment clause a nullity. Should they do that, they will have sacrificed their own oaths to protect their own electoral prospects, and the country and the Constitution will have been saddled with a terrible precedent. The Senate will have told Trump that, indeed, he can do whatever he wants.

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"Insisting that Congress should tolerate a president who uses his office to pressure a vulnerable foreign government to harass the president’s political rivals — this is a last-resort argument. But it is the only one the Trump team has left."

TRUMP’S LAWYERS ONLY HAVE SELF-DEFEATING ARGUMENTS ON THE BOLTON BOMBSHELL

By Stephen Stromberg | Published Jan 28 at 7:04 PM EST | Washington Post | Posted January 31, 2020 |

President Trump’s apparently stunned legal team on Monday ignored the latest fatal evidence against their client: the report that President Trump told his former national security adviser John Bolton that military aid to Ukraine was conditioned explicitly on the country agreeing to conduct investigations of Trump’s domestic political rivals. With Republican senators sending signals that they want to see Bolton testify, the Trump camp’s silence could not continue another day. But how to defend the indefensible?

Self-defeatingly, it turns out.

On Tuesday, Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow said the Bolton account stemmed from “an unpublished manuscript” — that is, the book Bolton is writing about his time in the Trump administration, a draft copy of which the New York Times said contains the former national security adviser’s revelations. “Maybe some reporters have an idea of maybe what it says,” Sekulow declared, implying that Times journalists cannot be trusted to properly represent the manuscript’s contents. “If you want to call that evidence — I don’t know what you’d call that — I’d call it inadmissible,” he said. Impeachment, he concluded, “is not a game of leaks and unsourced manuscripts.”

Sekulow’s more comprehensible objection — that some mysterious, unpublished manuscript the Times says it has seen is not admissible evidence at an impeachment trial — is worse for the president. If the Times cannot be trusted or if a draft manuscript is insufficient evidence of presidential wrongdoing, senators can and should get their own live account from Bolton and question the former Trump aide by simply calling him to testify. He could at that time address the administration’s attempts to deny his story. There is only one reason to refuse to call Bolton: to avoid gathering relevant eyewitness evidence. In other words, Sekulow made Democrats’ case that senators should call Bolton before them to get his story in person.

Perhaps anticipating that the Trump team could not sensibly rebut the Bolton allegations or prevent his testimony, Sekulow and his colleagues repeatedly argued on Tuesday that, even if the Bolton account is true, the president still should not be removed from office, because doing so would “lower the bar” for impeachment. In fact, Sekulow would place the bar so high that even extreme abuses of presidential power would go unchecked. The Bolton account bolsters the already strong case that Trump used the leverage of his office to pressure a foreign government to attack one of his political rivals. This may not technically be a crime. (Though one can make a case it is bribery, the Democrats have played down that claim.) But there is no doubt the president betrayed his oath, the nation to which he promised to serve and the Congress that entrusted him to aid Ukraine, an American ally at war, with funds lawmakers designated for the purpose.

Insisting that Congress should tolerate a president who uses his office to pressure a vulnerable foreign government to harass the president’s political rivals — this is a last-resort argument. But it is the only one the Trump team has left.

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Trump’s mixed-motive defense is a lousy argument dressed up in plausible legalese

By Harry Littman | Published January 29 at 8:49 PM EST | Washington Post | Posted January 31, 2020 |

The White House lawyers’ answer to the very first question in Wednesday’s Senate trial of President Trump may have removed in some key senators’ minds the need for witnesses and offered a new justification for acquittal.

The question was this: What happens if the president “had more than one motive for his alleged conduct, such as the pursuit of personal political advantage, rooting out corruption and the promotion of national interests?”

And it came from three Republicans senators — Susan Collins of Maine, Mitt Romney of Utah and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — who are perhaps the three lawmakers most inclined vote to hear from further witnesses in the case.

That meant that everyone in the chamber moved a little bit forward in their seats as one of president’s lawyers stood to answer the query. And what an answer it was. White House lawyer Patrick Philbin, the most adept and sophisticated of Trump’s advocates, was ready for the gopher pitch.

Said Philbin: If the president had such a mixed motive — part “the public interest, but also some personal interest” — then it “cannot possibly be the basis for an impeachable offense.”

Elected officials, he said, will always “have in mind how their conduct, how their decisions, their policy decisions will affect the next election.” Thus, he argued, removing a president for a mixed motive would put all presidents on the chopping block for many everyday decisions.

It was a key moment: If it’s really true that a mixed motive can’t be the basis for removal, then the senators need only conclude that Trump had, somewhere in his mind, some public interest, perhaps ferreting out corruption generally or forcing other countries to share in the costs of NATO, to justify a vote for acquittal.

Collins and Co. could, by extension, argue that no amount of evidence from the John Boltons and Mick Mulvaneys of the world could alter the supposition that Trump had at least one appropriate motive somewhere in the many chambers of his mind.

Indeed, at one point, Philbin argued that it would be enough if the president might have had such a motive to clear the way for acquittal.

It requires only brief reflection to see that the position is akin to insulating from any constitutional remedy the most vile and abusive presidential conduct. For it will routinely be the case that a president, even in the middle of some desperate or foolish act of law breaking, might also have some more benign motive somewhere in mind.

This kind of squishy thinking would not fly in a real court.

In criminal law, as a general matter, the prosecution need prove only that the defendant commits a proscribed act with a specified mental state. So, for example, murder in the first degree means causing the death of another person with intent to cause the death, or, in the more arcane language of the penal code, with the “conscious object to cause such a result.” It is legally irrelevant if the defendant also believed that the death of the person would result in some good in the world.

But we are not in a court of law. The Senate is a court of politics. And perhaps in the political crucible of an impeachment trial, the president’s lawyers could reasonably argue that other more benign motives excuse the more malign one, and so the Senate should be softer in its judgment. But that is a far cry from Philbin’s submission that a mixed motive means the conduct is not impeachable in the first place.

If Republican senators are persuaded by the mixed-motive argument and use it as a basis for voting against witnesses, they will have been hoodwinked, and perhaps willingly.

But the country, which overwhelmingly wants to hear from former national security adviser John Bolton and other witnesses, will have been cheated of its right to know by another lousy argument dressed up in plausible legalese.

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