The impeachment trial is back underway, but most observers (and some of the participants) are still focused on the weekend’s blockbuster from the NYT: “President Trump told his national security adviser in August that he wanted to continue freezing $391 million in security assistance to Ukraine until officials there helped with investigations into Democrats including the Bidens, according to an unpublished manuscript by the former adviser, John R. Bolton.” This is known, in the business, as the quid pro quo I told you so. While this bombshell is the biggest to land yet, it follows a familiar (manu)script. From witnesses, to documents, to tape recordings, to plain common sense, every bit of evidence points in the same direction. The truth was already obvious, now it might be inescapable.

+ 5 takeaways on Trump and Ukraine from John Bolton’s book.

+ Surprise! Trump is denying the claims in Bolton’s book. In the end, he’ll be saying, “Everyone in the world except for me is lying” even though he lies every time he speaks. GOP Senators should think long and hard about whether they want be the last person forever soiling their reputations to be part of a human shield built to defend America’s most prolific con artist. Mitt Romney told reporters Monday that “he thinks it is ‘increasingly likely’ that more Republican senators will support hearing testimony from Bolton.” Meanwhile, after today’s trial lunchbreak, GOP Senator Kevin Cramer explained, “The Bolton thing is just a new wrinkle, but not really overly concerning to anyone.” In another era, there’d be a group of Republican Senators on the way to the Oval Office to help the president pack up his belongings. Here’s the latest from WaPo and CNN.

+ “By what possible metric can the U.S. Senate flatter itself that it remains the world’s greatest deliberative body? Certainly not by the quality of the deliberation that takes place there. Any grade-school class that meets as a group during circle time to decide what the students want for a snack does more genuine deliberation than does the Senate.” The Atlantic: The Utter Ridiculousness of the U.S. Senate.