Thread by @bansisharma

1. Farce

It's not that Democrats couldn't prove their case, it's that they couldn't even articulate their case. They don't need witnesses, they need a shrink. If you cannot even articulate a crime that you think President Trump committed, no witness can rescue your case for you.

2. Then they tried to grab on to a lifeline that "you don't need a crime to impeach a president, because it is a political process, not a legal one." Then they jumped on Alan Dershowitz's throat for saying that it doesn't have to be a crime, but it at least has to be crime-like.

3. The simple, indisputable, black and white fact is that a president can be impeached for only three things:

a) Treason
b) Bribery
c) High Crimes and Misdemeanors

They didn't charge him with (a) or (b). They charged him with (c).

4. So tell us again how a president, or anyone for that matter, can commit "high crimes and misdemeanors" without committing a crime, or without even committing a crime-like act.

5. Okay, it's not a legal but a political process, but that only means you don't have to prove guilt in a court of law, but instead in the Senate and the court of public opinion. But prove guilt you must. And you still have to charge the president of a crime he can be guilty of.

6. Charging him of "obstruction of Congress" as a crime is laughable on its face, because the president contested Congressional subpoenas on Constitutional grounds and asked that courts resolve it. You can't obstruct justice by going to court. It's ridiculous to even say so.

7. The second charge is about "abuse of power" because the president asked Ukraine to look into Burisma/Bidens corruption case for ONLY personal political benefit. Quid pro quo is a red herring (that's why they dropped it, having considered it), because it is immaterial.

8. Nobody in their right mind is arguing, not even Democrats' own attorney, that the Burisma/Bidens corruption case is of no public interest. It is of public interest. And thereby, by definition, it cannot ONLY benefit the president politically, although it might also do so.

9. A president doing something that obviously serves a public purpose, in addition to whatever else it might do politically for the president, can never be an abuse of power. So case dismissed.

10. Case dismissed because, as an analogy, the person whose murder Democrats have been arguing, just walked into the court in person. At that point, the case has to be dismissed, no matter how many witnesses you have been clamoring for. There is no murder (analogically).

The End