On the other hand, extortion is where a vulnerable individual is required to pay or do something they do not want to pay or do. The classic example is requiring a payment from a shopkeeper to keep a business safe from vandalism. If a woman needs a loan to replace her car and the bank executive says he will only give her the loan if she sleeps with him, this is also extortion. Extortion does not have to be successful to be a crime. Many people are in prison for attempted murder or attempted whatever.

The last example is analogous to the Ukrainian extortion. Ukraine desperately needed the arms aid to protect itself from Russian aggression. But instead of providing the assistance authorized by Congress, Trump held up the delivery so that he could extort the Ukrainian president to make up a bogus investigation of Biden and his son. This is extortion, not quid pro quo, and we should use the correct word — extortion.

We know that Trump was not interested in general corruption because the company on which Hunter Biden was a board member was explicitly named in the now infamous phone call. However, the name of the company was deleted from the transcript Trump released. Likewise, Rudy Giuliani was on Fox News waving around papers and his cell phone saying he had dirt on Joe Biden. He did not say he had evidence of general corruption. The evidence from the testimony of multiple individuals confirms that Trump was engaged in extortion of a vulnerable government to get personal benefits. This is illegal under U.S. law and likely to be the first article of impeachment (the charge for the trial in the Senate).

A likely second likely article of impeachment is obstruction of justice and objection of Congress. Trump has publicly ordered people to ignore lawful subpoenas to testify and ignored lawful subpoenas for documents in legal proceedings. There is no question that obstruction has occurred. It is in plain sight.

A third prospect has emerged with Roger Stone. There are indications that Trump’s under oath written testimony to the Mueller inquiry may not be in line with evidence found in the prosecution of Stone. Trump may have been more involved with or had knowledge of the stolen Democratic e-mails that he denied. If that pans out it means that Trump committed perjury. Clinton was impeached for perjury in denying having sex with a woman. Here we have possible lies under oath of a more serious nature.

So to recap reality, we have extortion and obstruction of justice as clearly indicated by the available evidence. We might also have perjury, but that remains to be seen. What we do not have is a simple quid pro quo. What we have is extortion and Democrats and the media need to name it as such.

Norman Hoffmann

Waynesville