Is that true -- only two thirds?
"Over two thirds of the witnesses Democrats allowed to be called in the House were called by Democrats."
I thought the Republicans are claiming that the Democratic committee chairs allowed them to question Democrat-called witnesses (or so the Democrats insist), but didn't allow any witnesses to be called by Republicans.
If "two thirds" is correct, the Republicans are misstating the facts. Which is it?
Agree:
"Is there really anyone who hasn't picked a favorite candidate by now? Is anyone actually be swayed based on how much time a person has spent in their state?"
Brooklyncowgirl nails it:
"I find it rather amusing that folks in Iowa might actually be swayed by the fact that a candidate isn’t campaigning in their state because he or she is in Washington actually doing their job."
I live in another "doesn't matter" state -- CA. As Brooklyncowgirl complains, the only time a Presidential candidate comes to CA is (1) to raise money; or (2) because his or her plane has engine trouble.
There are only a few swing states, and they don't include the most populous ones.
4
@Commenter
I’ve Lived in New York, New Jersey and now am domiciled in South Dakota.
New Jersey and South Dakota both have their primaries in June. New York sometimes matters, but the year I moved to New Jersey turned out to also be the year Bill Clinton was slugging it out with Jerry Brown in the New York Primary. As a big Jerry fan I considered going back to my old Brooklyn precinct and trying to vote but having a new job and a small child was unwilling to risk the time in jail if I got caught.
Of course none of those states matters one bit in the general election. It’s crazy but that’s the American way.
It is really more than annoying how the NYT keeps pushing the candidacy of Amy Klobuchar whose polling has been consistently in single digits.
At the same time they choose to say as little as possible about Pete Buttigieg whose polling numbers may have dropped a bit but are still pretty dang good.
When the NYT had the big interview with Buttigieg they spent an inordinate amount of time harping on his stint at McKinsey.
3
There is a presumption that showing up in a state helps a candidate, but I doubt that's true. Many pundits have said that Hillary Clinton should have spent more time in the swing states toward the end of the 2016 campaign. But I think voters in those states would have found her unappealing; she was better off staying out of those states.
1
As someone who has always lived in late primary states where by the time I get to vote it’s pretty much all over and we never get to see a presidential candidate unless they’re stopping by for a fundraiser or had engine trouble I find it rather amusing that folks in Iowa might actually be swayed by the fact that a candidate isn’t campaigning in their state because he or she is in Washington actually doing their job.
Our whole election system is ridiculous from the Iowa caucuses to the Electoral College which insures that unless you live in a handful of swing states your vote doesn’t matter. Oh and of course it’s obscenely expensive too. For what Bloomberg’s spending in California he could put every homeless person in LA up in a five star hotel for a year.
At any rate I really doubt that leaving the field to Biden and Buttigieg is going to cramp Sanders, Warren or Klobuchar’s style all that much. Absence makes the heart grow fonder or so they say. This should test that premise.
7
Andrew Yang will shock the world. Humanity First. Go Yang 2020.
5
The Senators elected to do a job in Washington are doing their job in Washington. I'd hope they would gain appreciation for doing that, especially contrasted to the Republicans who are just lining up in lockstep with McConnell and bloviating.
Sadly, this entire election circus goes on for far too long, gets ever longer, and has too many built-in flaws: how two small mostly white states still control the early narrative; how much time and money are wasted on the process that could be spent on building something with permanent good, like infrastructure or housing; how much attention is drawn away from important business of government, including purging this rancid president - the list goes on.
The news, if that was the case, would be if the senators were not present in DC. But they are. So concentrate on that, please: Democrats make a cogent case, Republicans make incoherent attitude. Let the action in Iowa and New Hampshire be. The campaign staffs will cover for the folks who are doing their job. The rest of us are enjoying the respite as we concentrate on our nation's future. Besides, if Trump is escapes conviction, I question whether he will even allow an election in November or will find some way to circumvent it in the supposed "national interest," i.e., perpetrat
5
@CP adds: the above comment was sent prematurely. The rest of the last sentence should be, "perpetrating a crisis as an excuse to do that" [suspend or cancel the election in November].
Thank you.
2
The Dems are doing there patriotic duty to remove this corrupt and pollution supporting Trump from office. They need to be where they are. I live in southern Delaware and now that Trump has deregulated the clean water act of 1974 the horrible coal mine state of Pennsylvania will be sending polluted water from the coal mines down to us and into our water supplies. Lock him up and his GOP leaders as they are destroying our air and water every day.
8
Republican Senators are also doing their duty to prevent Democrats from allowing only a prosecution and not a defense as Democrats did in the House. Over two thirds of the witnesses Democrats allowed to be called in the House were called by Democrats.
1
Easy solution: if you want to spend all your time campaigning, then resign. Otherwise, your first priority is the job you currently hold.
12
Pelosi is responsible for this unfortunate timing, which just so happens to benefit the two moderate front runners and harms the two anti-establishment front runners. Pure coincidence, of course.
10
Stuck?
The taxpayers have been deprived of representation while they have been “unstuck” barnstorming the country.
Convenient isn’t it for moderates.
5
I Can see this hurting Amy's recent mo and Warren too. Bernies fans are too hardcore to let if affect them and Bennett ummm....
It seems like a waste of time for democratic senators to be sitting in the senate chambers knowing what the outcome will be : a free ride for trump because the republican majority has made up their minds to stonewall the impeachment, call no witnesses so no new information will be submitted to bolster the House impeachment of trump.
What a sad spectacle and a total waste of time. Nothing “historic” about it except the fact that the Constitution can be thrashed by a republican majority.
5
Three questions:
1. Who is this Bennet guy?
2. Is there really anyone who hasn't picked a favorite candidate by now? Is anyone actually be swayed based on how much time a person has spent in their state?
3. Milk ?!?!?
7
I can’t help but think that Nancy Pelosi timed her release of the articles of impeachment to the senate with ulterior parallel motives. I do not like to think this and I do not want to think of us, but I do think this, and for the reasons summed up in the title of this article. Brinksmanship at its finest, or perhaps it’s dirtiest, depending on how you look at it…
9
@WGM - May I suggest that if you "do not like to think this", then stop thinking about it.
1
Really? People can’t seem to make up their minds?
Make America Think Harder.
6
This is exactly why Trump claimed that that the delay in the Senate "trial" was planned as a gift to Biden. It's nice to see the Times agrees with Trump for once.
10
I am not so sure this process is going to be good for Biden. I don’t like to be reminded of any of these people—Trump, Biden, Clinton, etc.—getting cozy little million dollar jobs for their kids, based on their “social” connections. I understand it’s all legal and everybody agrees Joe Biden is not a corrupt person. He clearly did nothing disqualifying. But it’s an establishment world that I resent. Somehow the Democrats seem awfully tone deaf to this kind of thing.
I am also concerned for Hunter Biden as a human being. This is someone who had early childhood trauma and mental health issues in adulthood. He doesn’t deserve to have the fountain of vitriol directed toward him. No wonder his dad is so protective. I think the situation is more unpredictable than folks realize.
It means doing the job they were elected to do.
It's not like grade school, where you fake a note to get out when you want.
1
"“Wouldn’t it be nice to put the tweets behind us?” Mr. Buttigieg said."
I agree, Pete. Commit with fellow Democratic candidates to disallow and never use Twitter for official executive-branch business and save emergency alerts for EAS—if not during the campaign then certainly starting at inauguration.
Twitter is a privately-owned (somehow-)megacorp that exempts the loser from its ToS—ANY other site that so harbors racists would be rightly considered radioactive and job-risking to even VISIT. "We accepted their, of course, completely voluntary resignation because their values are not in line with our company's commitments to tolerance and diversity", yenno.
I see this article as preemptive discounting of a Buttigieg win in Iowa. In fact, he has been working hard there and is genuinely popular from the look of his town halls.
2
I know that journalists are somehow invested in the “Klobuchar has a shot” story line, but she really does not.
14
If voters in the primary are still being swayed by what is being said in person by candidates I have to question their ability to do much better at selection than throwing a dart. This is not the 1800s where about the only chance you had to know where a candidate stood was from personal appearances which were far and few between.
With TV, radio, the papers, and social media there is no reason that voters do not have a complete picture of each candidate. The only thing that might change is if they decide that they have to change a position on something and then it will be instantly known through all of the other communication methods.
8
@DC you forgot to mention that candidates now have websites that explain all of their major policy positions in detail.
1
I can comfortably predict that at least three of these people have absolutely no chance whatsoever of winning the nomination, much less the presidency.
Their duty as senators is to the country at this crucial time. So I would suggest buckling down and focusing on the task at hand.
15
I would hope that it might feel gratifying to know that they are doing what they were elected and being paid to do.
34
@Mark C McDonald
Exactly correct. Want to campaign full time? Fine, resign your current office.
One of the many insane things about our political process is that for 2 years leading up to a Presidential election we have elected representatives spending their time seeking another position instead of doing their current job.
9
@Mark C McDonald be forced to engage in a farce of a trial that was forced on them by a partisan House? I can think of a million things that would be more productive, including campaigning to be the nominee to take on Trump.
@kfs
Wrong. If they bolt for the door, they're abrogating their responsibilities as senators. Whether you believe this trial is a farce or not, it's still a trial and requires their full attention.
1
Wow. I fully understand the perspective that candidates are unable to campaign while being present at the Impeachment trial.
But the unbelievable “missing the point” by this article is one of the reasons we’re having an impeachment trial at all.
To use the term “stuck” is overwhelming - as if these candidates are stuck in traffic - by an annoying circumstance that is minor relative to where they want to be.
What is on trial is not just a president - but our system of rule of law- where evidence matters, impartial juries matter, where checks and balances on our governmental tri-part system matters.
McConnell and Graham have already stated in public that they will not be impartial and will actually be working with the White House during this trial.
Imagine you are victim of a crime, and rather than a trial where the impartial jury weighs the evidence to determine if the defendant is guilty, more than half the jury sits at the defendant’s table.
This is more important. Because if we lose rule-of-law and checks and balances, the election may not matter - as why on earth would Trump leave office even if elected out?
This article is not only focusing on the trees rather than the forest, it’s only looking at one leaf, while our forest is being chopped down one norm, one law, one check, at a time.
33
@Other everything you have stated has been repeated ad nauseam and I’m sure can be found in no less than half of the impeachment-related articles and op eds currently on the front page, if I could bring myself to click on them.
We’re all fully aware the country is well on it’s way to becoming the next North Korea, save for the actions of these few brave and patriotic democrats.
/sarcasm
I’m grateful for this article and its efforts to place this trial in the greater context of what’s happening politically on 2020.
Since there is zero chance Trump is being removed from office at the conclusion of this trial, some of us would like to look beyond the “falling sky” right now, to the November elections where Trump might actually be defeated. Who will be on the ticket against him, which undoubtedly is affected by performances in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina, and the campaigning leading up to those primaries, seems much more the forest than this trial of which the conclusion is clearly foregone.
@kfs
Wrong again. You focus on November. The senators have a job to do.
1
@BothSides
Great, as do journalists. Reporting on the implications beyond this trial and D.C., is clearly part of that job, so I am glad this article was written and published, even if folks like ‘Other’ want to condemn it.
Those candidates who are doing their jobs, can only blame House Democrats for this lull in their campaigning. Voters should ask which front runners for the nomination are not encumbered by the Senate trial. Maybe high ranking Democrats and the DNC have decided that some of the candidates are to be favored and some should have roadblocks in their quest for the Presidency. They did it to Sanders in 2016. Biden of course, doesn’t have to waste his time listening to members of the House drone on and on about how terrible Trump is.
6
As of late a lot of what is done on the campaign trail is attack each other. Perhaps is will better the primaries if they just put their plans out there.
3
Stuck at the trial? Isn’t this part of what they were elected Senators, to do?
31