You know the latest testimony to come out of the leaky “closed-door” impeachment hearings is a dud by how aggressively the New York Times is trying to prop it up.
The Times was the first to report Monday on the prepared remarks by National Security Council official Alexander Vindman, whose Aaron Sorkin-esque speech is expected to include a lot of cheesy things about being a “patriot” with a “sacred duty” and an “honor.”
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The Times reported Vindman was on the midsummer call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, wherein Trump asked his counterpart to look into allegations of corruption, including any that might implicate former vice president Joe Biden.
“I did not think it was proper to demand that a foreign government investigate a U.S. citizen, and I was worried about the implications for the U.S. government’s support of Ukraine,” Vindman is expected to say. “I realized that if Ukraine pursued an investigation into the Bidens and Burisma it would likely be interpreted as a partisan play which would undoubtedly result in Ukraine losing the bipartisan support it has thus far maintained.”
Here, again, just as Ambassador William Taylor before him, is another career government employee whose job is essentially to make sure that the United States bleeds money abroad with no questions asked, no strings attached. The second there’s a holdup on the hundreds of millions of dollars expected to flow outside of the country every year to corrupt foreign governments, people such as Vindman spring into action.
What on earth are you doing, Mr. President?! Don’t you know this is how things are done around here?!
Vindman is also expected to say, in earnest, “I am a patriot and it is my sacred duty and honor to advance and defend our country irrespective of party or politics.”
Gag.
The Times helped Vindman ham it up by referring to him in its report as “a decorated Iraq war veteran” and noting that he “received a Purple Heart after being wounded in Iraq by a roadside bomb.” Because of that, the Times noted, Vindman “could be a more difficult witness to dismiss than his civilian counterparts.”
What exactly does Vindman’s service in Iraq have to do with his policy dispute with Trump as it relates to Ukraine? Military service doesn’t guarantee anyone immunity from criticism. Otherwise, the late Republican Arizona Sen. John McCain would have been president and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg could actually get one black voter to like him.
Vindman, I’m sure, had sincere concerns about what he heard on the phone call between Trump and Ukraine (which interfered in the 2016 election to hurt the Trump campaign), but that’s no different from the “concerns” former FBI Director James Comey had when he decided to leak a bunch of information to a reporter and then lie about it to Congress. Vindman hasn’t lied or leaked, but the dispute is the same: He doesn’t like the way Trump operates as president because it’s not how other presidents operated.
Vindman’s testimony isn’t strong. He admits in it that his decision is political when he says that “an investigation into the Bidens and Burisma … would likely be interpreted as a partisan play …”
It’s his right to feel that way and it’s his right to complain. So what? Only the president dictates international relations, even if Vindman is a “patriot” and “a decorated Iraq war veteran” with “a Purple Heart after being wounded.”
