Impeachment Thread: Trump retaliating at anyone who wasn't willing to commit criminal obstruction
- Thread starter fried-chicken
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She lost her primary bid in 2010 (2012?) and then ran as an independent because she couldn't stand losing. She's never won a majority vote, she relies on 3rd party candidates to help her get a plurality.
She couldn't stand losing??!?
Primaries are notorious for low voter turnout. After losing the GOP primary, she decided to run as a write-in candidate---and won. Her opponent appears to be the one who couldn't stand losing. He contested her election for a month and a half all the way to the Alaskan Supreme Court.
FWIW, she entered the Senate as a Republican and six years later, she won reelection as a Republican. She beat her 2010 opponent again (this time he ran as a Libertarian.)
https://www.justsecurity.org/67863/...ts-reveal-extent-of-pentagons-legal-concerns/
“Clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold.”
This is what Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), told Elaine McCusker, the acting Pentagon comptroller, in an Aug. 30 email, which has only been made available in redacted form until now. It is one of many documents the Trump administration is trying to keep from the public, despite congressional oversight efforts and court orders in Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation
I keep seeing the chuds mad about process but no one is defending substance of accusations. The facts get clearer every day. Trump instructed the funds to be held until Biden investigation was announced on CNN and only released them 2 days after the whistleblower report news broke and he was busted.
"But the democrats..." is not justification.
“Clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold.”
This is what Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), told Elaine McCusker, the acting Pentagon comptroller, in an Aug. 30 email, which has only been made available in redacted form until now. It is one of many documents the Trump administration is trying to keep from the public, despite congressional oversight efforts and court orders in Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation
I keep seeing the chuds mad about process but no one is defending substance of accusations. The facts get clearer every day. Trump instructed the funds to be held until Biden investigation was announced on CNN and only released them 2 days after the whistleblower report news broke and he was busted.
"But the democrats..." is not justification.
The Democrats should have focused more on the what and not on the why. Trump withholding aid is a fact and is indisputable. Why he did it is pure speculation. They could have just said that he wasn't doing his job and had an open-shut case for impeachment.
The why most certainly matters. All presidents will do things from a negotiation standpoint, including foreign aid. That in and of itself is not likely impeachable. What makes it impeachable is if he was doing it out of his own personal interest, and not the country's interest.
It will never be proven though. Congress should have maintained more oversight about these kinds of things for years so that when this came up it didnt appear to be political. The president is a public servant tasked with a job, but now he has so much discretion on what to do that we've lost any serious level of oversight. We shouldnt have to rely on having an opposing party being in power to see a president be removed.
It only appears to be political to people who want it to be political. It is pretty obvious what happened. And you are right, it likely wont be proven but we also have the leader of the Senate flat out saying he isn't interested in a real trial, so that isn't on the House oversight, that is on the Senate not doing their jobs.
That's my point. If this was a Democrat led Senate Trump would probably be at serious risk of being removed. We still would probably never know why trump withheld the aid, but he'd be out. It would have been a much clearer process if expectations of the president hadn't been muddied up so much.
I don't know why it would have been clearer, it seems pretty clear as it is to me. Regardless, you can certainly make an argument about executive power, but in this situation I don't see how that really applies. Withholding aid or making foreign policy out of personal interest and not the country's interest isn't something any one agrees the president should be allowed to do. Where we are now is just whether one party will hold their own accountable, but that has nothing to do with the expectations of the president IMO.
Congress allocates funds and the president disperses them, or at least that is how it was designed to work. The president now has the authority to withhold, delay, or make determinations on how the funds are spent. Wouldn't it have been a simpler and more effective argument to make if congress hadn't already given the president so much leeway?
They could have and should have made this an issue of congressional vs executive authority, but instead it is based on politics. Trump basically just took this one step further than his predecessors (allegedly), but it's only when political gain is a factor that a president needs to be held to account? Seems pretty short sighted to me.
You can make that argument and I don't necessarily disagree with you, but it is about that in a lot of ways. He is being impeached for abuse of power, which is due to his withholding funds, or at least threatening to. How is that not exactly what you are describing? I think you are looking at the wrong side when you talk about it being political. Only one leader has said they aren't interested in a fair process, and it wasnt from the Democratic side.
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My point is that somehow "abuse of power" is only an issue when it comes to politics, when it should be a matter of civics. The threshold for abuse of power should be whether or not the president is doing something beyond his constitutional power, not whether it hurts the opposing party.
Im not really sure what you mean. Impeachment, abuse of power, etc, is a matter civics every bit as much as it is of politics. Unless you are just saying you don't think Trump did anything wrong, in which case we simply disagree on that.
I know you won't respond because you are pretending to have me on ignore, but good Lord how are you incapable of understanding that Senate republicans have openly admitted to colluding with Trump refusing to give him a fair trial, do it's pointless to push the articles of impeachment from the House to the Senate.
McConnell had publicly admitted to violating his oath to be a fair and impartial juror.
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My parents are both die-hard dems and absolutely hate trump, but both of them have turned on Congress now. "Why was it so important to impeach him so quickly but then just sit on it?". If two people who both caucused for Bernie sanders think this was a political sham, I can only imagine what moderates think about it.
i wonder what the dems are thinking. i heard the house dems might try and add more articles of impeachment. that will just draw this out longer. i think they would be smart to hand it over to the senate and hope they dont conduct their own long drawn out trial. the longer this goes on, the better trump looks and the worse they look. not to mention mitch will have the ability to hold most of the 2020 candidates in dc without being able to campaign. its not very smart.
She's going to hold onto them until after super Tuesday when the nominee is basically decided. In the meantime there will be lots of chatter about other things they are "looking into" but eventually will just rely on the press to paint the picture. They'll say that everything new they have found falls under the abuse of power article but want the senate to look into the new allegations just to be sure that it is thoroughly investigated.
This is, of course, yet another lie from crazy, the guy who thinks the earth is 6,000 years old.
You have issues with reality.
Do you even know why the house of representatives is holding the articles back?
Yes, because Pelosi doesnt feel like it will be a fair trial, which of course it won't be. That being said, the house had every opportunity in the word to make this an open and shut case but they rushed through it just so that they could claim that trump was impeached. Bolton already said he would testify if the court directed him to. That should be a pretty easy task to undertake. Even if they think the court battle would go on for months at least it would look like they were trying.
The house has to name house managers before it can be sent. They want to know the structure of the trial before they name the managers that will be arguing it. The Senate won't set any rules officially so the house won't name managers.
The Democrats are worried that the Senate trial will be as partisan, worthless, and predetermined as theirs was.
How do they set the rules if they dont have a formal notification? Pelosi has to name her prosecutors, who then present the articles to the senate which then sets the rules.
But enlighten me. Does Pelosi just make a phone call to McConnell and say "hey, we want you to vote on getting rid of the president so tell me how it will work?" Or does she follow precedent and the constitution and have congress name their prosecutors who deliver the charges to the senate?
Kinda seems like under your scenario she should have asked the Senate to set their rules before bringing the charges to the floor for a vote to begin with.
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/...-impeachment-articles-to-the-senate-next-week
Pelosi set to send impeachment articles to the Senate next week
grab your popcorn, this is about to get good!
Pelosi set to send impeachment articles to the Senate next week
grab your popcorn, this is about to get good!
So a Republican candidate for congress was working with Rudy and Lev Parnas, and tracking Ambassador Yovanavitch in the Ukraine. From the leaked texts with him and Parnas, sounds an awful lot like they were planning on assassinating her or kidnapping her, or something crazy.
https://www.courant.com/politics/hc...0200114-l6xbb3wfcnavzeag74ua2gvhey-story.html
https://www.courant.com/politics/hc...0200114-l6xbb3wfcnavzeag74ua2gvhey-story.html
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Yes, because the Senate will have just as crooked a trial as the House had and impeachment. just in the opposite direction.
Opening statements were pretty good.
Democrats know that the republicans won't even pretend to run a fair impeachment so they have decided to use this opportunity to brand republicans as covering up Trump's obvious abuse of power.
It's exactly what I thought was going to happen. Should help in swing states.
Democrats know that the republicans won't even pretend to run a fair impeachment so they have decided to use this opportunity to brand republicans as covering up Trump's obvious abuse of power.
It's exactly what I thought was going to happen. Should help in swing states.
You would hope so. If Republicans have essentially decided a president can't be held accountable for his actions, no telling what another 4 years would look like. Would need to change his title to King Trump at that point.
You'll notice that republicans will spend their time trying to get you to be mad at democrats vs. defending Trump.
They know there is no defense for what he did so they want to attack the process vs defend Trump.
They know there is no defense for what he did so they want to attack the process vs defend Trump.
That's pretty hyperbolic. Why is it out of the realm of possibility that republicans take into consideration that essentially no defense was allowed in the house and see it as a partisan move?
We are told that the whistleblower should not testify because motivation shouldnt be a factor, correct? If that's true then trumps motivation should be stricken from consideration and only his actions should be part of the record. I mean, if we're going to be completely objective then trumps actions really didnt lead to a crime of any kind. If we are going to take motivation into account then we should consider the motivations of all parties involved, which includes the whistle blower, joe biden, and the state dept so we have a balanced approach from which to form a judgment.
