January 1, Democrats See John Bolton as Star Witness in Impeachment

This Day in History | 1950

Earl Lloyd becomes first black player in the NBA

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Good Morning Middle Americans,

Former National Security Advisor and UN Ambassador John Bolton never seemed like a good fit for the Trump administration.  Bolton, being one of the original neocons and everything. Now,  Bolton could be key in determining the president’s future under impeachment. Remember, Bolton’s exit from the White House was pretty turbulent.  No one thinks Bolton would sell the president out, even though they didn’t exactly get a long. 

Also today, if Nancy Pelosi was hoping impeachment would damage the president’s approval ratings, she was wrong.  And at least according to one new poll, Trump is gaining ground on Joe Biden.  Twitter will soon a be a safe space for people who don’t want to be bombarded with political ads.  And finally today, new claims from New York’s famous former medical examiner Michael Baden say disgraced billionaire Jeffrey Epstein may have been killed, instead of committing suicide as the current NYC medical examiner says.  Read all about it. 

– Fraser Dixon

John Bolton May Testify in House Impeachment Probe

(The Daily Mail) – John Bolton will testify in Donald Trump’s impeachment inquiry next week as Democrats will look for the former national security adviser to burn the president in his deposition.

Bolton is scheduled to testify on next Thursday, the DailyMail.com confirmed.

He was reported to be frustrated with efforts by Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani to run a shadow foreign policy with the Ukraine and called the former mayor ‘a hand grenade who’s going to blow everyone up.’

Also testifying next week will be National Security Council legal adviser John Eisenberg and his deputy Michael Ellis. They are scheduled for Monday. The testimony was first reported by The New York Times.

Find out more about John Bolton’s role as a potential witness here

Poll: Biden’s Edge Over Trump Wanes

(Morning Consult) – Joe Biden’s pitch for the Democratic presidential nomination has rested in no small part on the idea that he’s the most electable candidate — that he’ll beat President Donald Trump “like a drum” if given the chance. But polling shows that argument is weakening.

The former vice president leads Trump by 5 percentage points, 41 percent to 36 percent, among 1,997 registered voters in a new Morning Consult/Politico poll testing the hypothetical Election Day matchup — roughly half the 11-point advantage he enjoyed in a June survey conducted ahead of the Democratic Party’s first debates. Both surveys have a 2-point margin of error.

See the poll results here

Twitter Ending All Political Ads

(CBS News) – Twitter is halting all political advertisements across its social media platform starting late next month, founder and CEO Jack Dorsey announced Wednesday.

“Political message reach should be earned, not bought,” Dorsey said in a series of tweets.

“A political message earns reach when people decide to follow an account or retweet. Paying for reach removes that decision, forcing highly optimized and targeted political messages on people. We believe this decision should not be compromised by money,” he said.

Learn more about Twitter’s decision here

Fmr. NYC Medical Examiner: Jeffrey Epstein’s Autopsy More Consistent with Homicide than Suicide

(Fox News) – The body of disgraced money man and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, who was found dead in his Manhattan federal prison cell in August, bore telltale signs of homicide despite an official ruling that he killed himself, a pioneering forensic pathologist revealed to “Fox & Friends” in an exclusive interview Wednesday.

The bombshell claim by Dr. Michael Baden, a former New York City medical examiner who has worked on high-profile cases during a five-decade medical career, is certain to reignite suspicions that surfaced immediately after Epstein, who was awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges involving underage girls, was discovered dead in his cell on Aug. 10. Baden, who was hired by Epstein’s brother and observed the autopsy, told Fox News its findings are more consistent with homicidal strangulation than suicidal hanging. He noted that the 66-year-old Epstein had two fractures on the left and right sides of his larynx, specifically the thyroid cartilage or Adam’s apple, as well as one fracture on the left hyoid bone above the Adam’s apple, Baden told Fox News.

Read more about Jeffrey Epstein’s death here