Mike Pence is a Blubbering Idiot on Ukraine

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by: Colorado Pols

You’re not getting away from this one, Mike

Vice President Mike Pence perhaps still holds out hope that something will prevent President Trump from completing his term in office and allow Pence to at least sit behind the Resolute Desk for a few days. Pence has been trying to lay low amid the latest scandals enveloping the White House, but he apparently hasn’t been spending that time practicing his answers to questions about Ukraine.

As the Washington Post reports, Pence needs some new talking points. STAT!:

…when pressed Wednesday on what he knew and when he knew it, Pence was extremely evasive — and conspicuously so.

Pence has previously said that his meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in early September included no talk about investigating the Bidens, but that they did discuss the broader concept of “corruption.” A whistleblower has also alleged that Trump canceled Pence’s planned trip to Zelensky’s May inauguration and sent Energy Secretary Rick Perry instead — one of several indications that high-level meetings have been withheld for leverage.

So with that as the backdrop, NBC News’s Vaughn Hillyard did yeoman’s work Wednesday pressing Pence on the matter. But Pence declined to directly answer many of the questions he was asked. Most notably, he repeatedly declined to say whether he we even aware of Trump’s interest in getting Ukraine to investigate former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden. [Pols emphasis]

Biden? Hmmm…the name sounds vaguely familiar. No, no, I don’t know anybody named “Biden.”

Pence didn’t limit his gibberish to his NBC News interview. As CNN reports:

Vice President Mike Pence is defending President Donald Trump for asking the Ukrainian president to investigate Joe Biden — even when faced with his past comments on foreign interference in US politics.

In Iowa on Wednesday, CNN’s Randi Kaye asked Pence if he stood by his comments during the 2016 election that foreign governments “cannot participate” in the US political process.

“Well, I do,” Pence replied. “I think that’s why President Trump is so concerned about a foreign interference in our election in Ukraine.” [Pols emphasis]

Speaking of pretending to be concerned about foreign interference in American elections, this is what Pence said back in 2016: “This is basic stuff. Foreign donors, and certainly foreign governments, cannot participate in the American political process.”

D’oh!

…this defense makes zero sense. Like, none. It’s totally clear that Trump was asking Zelensky for help in digging up dirt on the leading Democratic candidate in the 2020 presidential race. He was not simply telling Zelensky that “our country had been through a lot, and then had a question about foreign interference in our 2016 election” as Pence described it. That is simply not accurate. [Pols emphasis]

Cillizza suggests that Pence remains a loyal soldier to Trump because he’ll need the Big Orange Guy to support his eventual campaign for President, but that seems like an odd bargain. By the time 2024 rolls around, Trump’s endorsement probably won’t be worth squat.

6 thoughts on “Mike Pence is a Blubbering Idiot on Ukraine”

Conserv. Head Banger says:

October 10, 2019 at 12:53 pm

Poor Pence. Senate Intelligence Committee released another bipartisan report in the past few days fully documenting that Russia used social media to heavily influence the 2016 election in favor of Trump.

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1. MichaelBowman says:
  
  October 10, 2019 at 1:24 pm
  
  You have to admit, for a guy that wasn't going to be re-elected as Indiana governor he did get pretty close to the gold ring. Count your blessings, Mike, you could have spent the last three years as a soybean industry spokesman railing against the very policies you promote on behalf of POTUS each and every day.
  
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  1. Diogenesdemar says:
    
    October 10, 2019 at 3:17 pm
    
    Which just goes to prove that, if there is a god, they have a wicked sense of humor . . .
    
    . . . either that, or absolutely no concern for the human inhabitants of this planet whatsoever.
    
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JohnInDenver says:

October 10, 2019 at 3:27 pm

WAPO uses some different terms, but drags Pence into the Ukraine situation very clearly. Mike Pence knew exactly what he was doing

Pence’s aides are also now claiming that, when Pence told Zelensky the problem was that Ukraine needed to investigate “corruption,” he didn’t understand that this was code for smearing Biden.

But as Jonathan Chait points out, this is wildly implausible, because it’s overwhelmingly likely Pence already understood how this code worked — that the call for investigating “corruption” was cover for a demand to smear Biden. After all, it had been public for months that Trump wanted Ukraine to investigate Biden, and there’s no way Pence believes that Trump actually cares about “corruption.”

The bigger point here is that of course Pence perfectly understood the role of his own actions in this whole plot.

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DaftPunk says:

October 10, 2019 at 4:58 pm

Mike Pence is a blubbering idiot. FULL STOP.

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kwtree says:

October 10, 2019 at 5:23 pm

Mike Pence is a smooth talker at the level of Cory Gardner. Pence had 10 years in live talk radio before ever running for office.

But, like Gardner, Pence can say many words very rapidly – but also like Gardner, the words often have little relationship to objective reality, and he has no awareness of hypocrisy or self-contradiction.

For example, from his 5/23/97 radio show):

“I mean, is adultery no longer a big deal in Indiana and in America? I’d just love to know your thoughts because I for one believe that the seventh commandment contained in the Ten Commandments is still a big deal,” Pence said. “I maintain that other than promises that we make of fidelity in our faith, the promises that we make to our spouses and to our children, the promises that we make in churches and in synagogues and marriage ceremonies around this, it's the most important promise you'll ever make. And holding people accountable to those promises and holding people accountable to respecting the promises that other people make, I, to me, what could possibly be a bigger deal than that in this country?

Have to wonder how Pence is holding Donald Trump “accountable”, and how he reconciles sucking up to an infamously adulterous running mate.

The point is that Mike Pence is a competent communicator; but in this case, as most others, he has zero talent for telling the truth.

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