(UPDATED) Trump's Ridiculous Impeachment Defense Suffers Two New Blows

SAUL LOEB/ AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Let us pause, however briefly, as the impeachment inquiry juggernat rumbles on, to consider the word scum.  Donald Trump has used that epithet freely in the past, but he outdid himself in a recent twofer tweet as the walls continued to close in on him: "The Never Trumper Republicans, though on respirators with not many left, are in certain ways worse and more dangerous for our Country than the Do Nothing Democrats.  Watch out for them, they are human scum!" 

To be more precise, this epithet-filled outburst came after Trump called the impeachment inquiry a "lynching" with racially-laden sledgehammer subtlety and a courageous William Taylor, one of nine administration officials to defy the president, demolished the remaining tatters of his Ukraine scandal defense for House investigators in describing in visceral terms the extortionate plot to extract a pledge from Volodymyr Zelensky to publicly announce an investigation into Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, in return for the release of nearly $400 million in desperately needed military aid to fight Russian aggression that already had taken 13,000 Ukrainian lives. 

Which was followed by a plan to tie Hunter Biden to a plan to help a corrupt Romanian business executive that encountered stiff headwinds when it was discovered Trump personal lawyer and fixer Rudy Giuliani was involved in the same plan (oops!), the feds blew the door off a safe of one of Giuliani's mobbed-up henchmen, a Republican flash mob approved by Trump disrupted an impeachment hearing, more judges ruled for impeachment investigators in affirmations of the constitutional separation of powers, and there were further signs that Trump's once solid Vichy Republican congressional support is fraying. 

Or as one Republican close to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell put it, "This is shaping up to be a very dark moment for the Trump White House.  It's getting to be a harder choice for more people.  Whether that's enough for enough senators to take decisive action . . . every single move has been in the wrong direction" for Trump. 

But back to the word scum.    

While Trump occasionally has used that epithet in the past, it is notable that scum is a favorite of the authoritarian he most admires -- Vladimir Putin, whose successful efforts to backdoor Trump into the presidency in 2016 were a mere prelude to his behind-the-scenes manipulations in the Ukraine scandal in service of getting him reelected by hook or by crook in 2020.  Scum was a favorite of Hitler and Stalin, as well. 

The president's victories have been few and far between.  His triumphant announcement of the suicide of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as a U.S. special operations force closed in on him based on the work of intelligence agencies he has long derided was characterized by dramatic embellishments of what actually happened, misrepresentations of his wretched Mideast record, false comparisons with the death of Osama bin Laden, and sullied by his insinuation that the 9/11 attacks might not have happened had Washington heeded the advice of then-citizen Trump and admission that he had informed his good buddy Putin but not congressional leaders.  And it does not mitigate his abandonment of the Kurds, which has given ISIS a new lease on life, al-Baghdadi or not. 

Trump had been pretty much going it alone in fighting the impeachment inquiry  -- "the worst hoax in the history of our country," as he puts it -- but the belated realization that his defense isn't passing constitutional muster in the courts and that his threats and profanities can't match congressional subpoenas, has provoked a mad scramble to bring aboard legal heavyweights to rearrange the deck chairs around the Chosen One, whom lest we forget is no more tenacious or nasty when his survival is at stake. 

That impeachment defense has evolved through Trump's very own version of Elisabeth Kubler Ross's Five Stages of Grief:

DENIAL: I'm too busy playing golf. 

ANGER: See scum reference. 

BARGAINING: There was no quid pro quo.

DEPRESSION: Why does everybody hate me? 

ACCEPTANCE: Meet my new lawyers. 

That defense, which has been based on attacks on process in the absence of anything substantial to counter the mounting evidence gathered by during impeachment hearings, suffered two setbacks on Monday. 

House Democrats said they will forgo using the courts to try to compel testimony from witnesses Trump has told not to testify and will instead use the lack of cooperation to bolster their case that he has abused his office and obstructed Congress's constitutional right to investigate him.  Then on Thursday, the House will vote to formalize procedures for the next phase of the impeachment inquiry to "ensure transparency and provide a clear path forward," as House Rules Committee Chairman Jim McGovern put it. 

Psychiatrist Kubler Ross postulated her five stages for terminally ill patients and their loved ones.  A month after Nancy Pelosi announced the impeachment inquiry, the Trump presidency is on life support.  A Senate resolution prepared by Lindsey Graham condemning the inquiry as "illegitimate" had to be watered down before 46 Republicans signed it.  Seven did not, and we can hope the presidency also is terminal.