Impeachment of Trump is all about lawyers, lawyers and more lawyers

If ever there was a perfect time to be a lawyer in Washington DC it's now. Lawyers, lawyers and more lawyers are queuing up to get involved in the Trump impeachment process. The bills are going to be phenominal. As Politico brilliantly reports today, there is now a mighty battle going on between the Democrats, led by Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff, Californian Democratic chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, who want to get on as rapidly as possible in gathering material for impeaching Trump, versus the White House which is doing its best to drag on the whole process by thinking up every conceivable legal loophole or lawyer-created justification for not handing over documents or making officials, particularly from the State Department, available to appear before Congress. Everyone who is anyone in this battle is getting "lawyered up", as the awful expression goes. There must be 100 lawyers already involved, each on huge hourly rates. Trump of course is surrounded by lawyers or legal counsel/advisers. But his favourite one seems to be Rudy Giuliani, described as his personal lawyer. Well we all remember what happened to Trump's previous "personal" lawyer, Michael Cohen, now a convicted felon. He was involved in the payment of $35,000 to porn star Stormy Daniels on Trump's behalf (allegedly) to keep her quiet about an alleged brief affair Trump had with the exotic lady. Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison for a range of offences including tax fraud and lying. And oh my goodness didn't he turn on his old master and dish out as much dirt as possible? So beware, Mr President, don't upset Giuliani. He must have enough inside knowledge of the Trump world to fill a football stadium. Anyway right now the former Mayor of New York and former failed presidential candidate is as loyal to Trump as a golden labrador. I say golden because I guess Giuliani is earning a fat fee for advising the president. Now Giuliani is under fire from the Democrats because they want him to hand over all kinds of fascinating material and he is being subpoenaed every time he opens his front door. So he has, of course, got himself lawyered up to make sure that every time he says NO to the Democrats he has reasonable legal grounds for saying so. You would have thought that, being a lawyer, he would be able to advise himself. But, just as Michael Cohen had his own lawyer, so Giuliani feels it's necessary to get a fancy legal chap at his side to protect him. Who pays for that, Giuliani or the White House or Trump perhaps? Pelosi and Schiff have lawyers at their beck and call, and Mike Pompeo, secretary of state who is increasigly under pressure to do things he doesn't want to do, such as allowing his senior officials to appear before Congress on Ukrainegate, is I'm sure also receiving daily advice from highly-paid lawyers to make sure he stays within the law and the constitution. Trump will need all the legal advice he can get if he is to prevent his impeachment. Slowing the whole process down with endless legal obstacles is probably quite a clever move. The Democrats don't want impeachment to be the only issue at stake when the presidential election campaign gets closer and closer to November 2020. They want it all nicely wrapped up well before then, preferably before Christmas. If, thanks to Trump lawyers, it's still dragging on well into next year, the Democrats will begin to rue the day they ever went for impeachment. If that's what happens then I guess all these Trump/Giuliani/Pompeo lawyers will have earned their lucrative fees.