Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com,

Someone in Impeachmentville is not paying attention. Of course, diverting the rubes is exactly the point of the latest CIA operation to negate the 2016 election. Has nobody noticed that there is treaty between Ukraine and the USA, signed at Kiev in 1998 and ratified by the US Senate in 2000. It’s an agreement on “Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters.” Here, read the cover letter for yourself:

What part of the following do Nancy Pelosi and the news media not understand?

The Treaty is self-executing. It provides for a broad range of cooperation in criminal matters. Mutual assistance available under the Treaty includes: taking of testimony or statements of persons; providing documents, records, and articles of evidence; serving documents; locating or identifying persons; transferring persons in custody for testimony or other purposes; executing requests for searches and seizures; assisting in proceedings related to restraint, confiscation, forfeiture of assets, restitution, and collection of fines; and any other form of assistance not prohibited by the laws of the requested state… ([etc].

How does this not permit Mr. Trump asking the president of Ukraine for “assistance” in criminal matters arising out of “collusion with Russia,” as specified within the scope of Robert Mueller’s special prosecutor activities? For instance, the matter of CrowdStrike. The cybersecurity firm was co-founded by Russian ex-pat Dmitri Alperovitch, who also happens to be a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, an anti-Russian think tank funded by Ukrainian billionaire, Viktor Pinchuk, who donated at least $25 million to the Clinton Foundation before the 2016 election. Crowdstrike was the company that “examined” the supposedly hacked DNC servers, while somebody in the Obama administration prevented the FBI from ever seeing them. Does this sound a little like part of the origin story of RussiaGate? Is that not exactly the potential criminal matter that the current attorney general, Mr. Barr, is officially investigating?

Perhaps, under the year 2000 treaty, Mr. Trump was within his rights to ask the new President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, for assistance on that. And also, the question of former vice-president Joe Biden’s levering US aid to Ukraine in his demand to fire the prosecutor investigating the company, Burisma Holdings, that just happened to hire his son, Hunter, to a $64,000-a-month seat on the board of directors, not long after the younger Mr. Biden was kicked out of the US Navy reserve for cocaine use — what a sterling fellow!

The foregoing ought to be self-evident. Speaking of failures to pay attention, Director of National Security (DNI) Joseph McGuire testified in Rep. Adam Schiff’s House Intel Committee last Thursday that the “Whistleblower” and his or her allies in the Intelligence Community who fomented the latest crisis “acted in good faith.” Admiral McGuire omitted to mention that the IC’s Whistleblower complaint rules were surreptitiously changed sometime around August 2019 to allow second-hand hearsay in Urgent Matter” complaints, where formerly it had been prohibited. The change was only posted on an IC website on Sept 24. Did Admiral McGuire not get the memo on that? Was he out of the loop? After all, he is merely in charge of the entirety of US Intelligence operations. Who kept him in the dark?

Now there is yet another new “bombshell” out of the CBS 60-Minutes show (reported by Scott Pelley) alleging that the “Whistleblower” had been placed under federal protection due to “threats” made against him or her. We’re to infer that the “Whistleblower” is in a safe space— perhaps hiding out in the CIA’s Diversity and Inclusion offices, with some teddy bears, crayons, and chips ahoy to keep the heebie-jeebies away. Only, one of the “Whistleblower’s” own lawyers, Mark S. Zaid released a letter today saying that the 60-Minutes report was “not accurate and misinterpreted the contents of our [earlier] letter.” Mr. Zaid added in a tweet that CBS was “literally making stuff up.”

Well, let CBS and the “Whistleblower’s” pro bono lawyers slug that one out in some safe space. More to the point, how long do you suppose the charade of protecting the “Whistleblower’s” identity will go on? If impeachment moves to a trial in the senate, Mr. Trump will enjoy the right of being faced by his accuser. But I don’t think we will have to wait that long. Rep. Schiff (D-CA) has already declared that this person will be called into a closed session of his committee. The chance is about zero that his or her identify will remain unknown. By and by, the “whistleblower’s” confederates in the CIA will also become known and the perfidy of this latest CIA operation in the ongoing coup will be understood.

UkraineGate is the equivalent of Fort Sumter in Civil War 2.0. Charges have been flying and tempers flaring for three years now, much as they did between 1858 and 1861. Once again, what seems to be at stake is the integrity of the Union. As in the previous enactment, one side is dangerously deluded, and that is liable to lead to its destruction.