Impeach Trump Y/N

Given the evidence already public, including the transcript of the call and Mulvaney's press conference where he basically said the aid was withheld for political gain, Trump's impeachment is about 98% certain. Given the record of Republican senators since 2016, including their defense of Trump's clear obstruction of justice, I'd say the odds are about 15 to 1 against Trump's removal from office. Even his censure over the Ukraine scandal is a very long shot.

I wish this weren't so, and new evidence could change the odds, but I can't see any other way to look at it right now. Viewed from a different angle, the Republicans are caught in this bad situation like fish in a net and they know it. They just hope they won't have to pay too high a price for it, but there will be a price to pay and they know that, too.

I Feel like a v strong safe space for all gop senators would have to be devised by the senate gop to make removal something they will ever fall back to. The safe space doesnt have to be a permission from dem/left side, it can be something the gop makes for itself and then promotes to its base tho. Something like distinguishing illegal acts by trump, but lining up hard for pence as the true uncompromised core of gop.

the whole thing would be so not credible, and hard to pull off, i think they’ll rather ride trump to whatever conclusion they can get without surrender.

catastrophizing me is a little nervous that if it gets even jankier theyll just go for trying to cancel or nullify an election. not really, but uh.

that 'safe space' scenario seems very very unlikely to me. Trump is sui generis and his knucklehead followers will never be so loyal to or charmed by Pence.

his knucklehead followers will never be so loyal to or charmed by Pence

otm. the GOP electoral strategy has become exclusively Trump-centered and relies entirely on the charisma he has for their base. Pence is an empty suit with evangelical/anti-abortion cred as his only national asset.

i do agree, and i don't see a way to make space into which the gop may retreat in order to accept removal. and also, i sometimes fear they do not see a space to afford a fair election at all.

i think the GOP senators will only seek that safe space if things get 1,000,000% dire for them and there's no way they can continue to defend Trump. Not saying that's impossible, but they have so far shown a willingness to go pretty damn far in standing up for him.

xpost Well, yeah, that's fair to assume. The GOP wins a fair number of elections largely because they work so tirelessly to handicap the system in their favor beforehand.

The only thing he could do to make them turn on him is lose them money

and also, i sometimes fear they do not see a space to afford a^n fair election at all.

welp, u right, ^clarified.

Q: And when you say that, this was the first time I heard that the security assistance—not just the White House meeting—was conditioned on the investigation, when you talk about conditioned, did you mean that if they didn’t do this, the investigations, they weren’t going to get that, the meeting and the military assistance?

A: That was my clear understanding, security assistance money would not come until the President [of Ukraine] committed to pursue the investigation.

Q: So if they don’t do this, they are not going to get that was your understanding?

A: Yes, sir.

Q: Are you aware that quid pro quo literally means this for that? A: I am.

JIM JORDAN: Are you aware that quid pro quo is now a good thing, and we are proud of our president for doing it?

yep

Here are some basic thoughts about what happened in this story, what matters and how to describe it.

The President used extortion to cheat in the 2020 presidential election. He used military aid dollars meant to aid an ally against his Russian patrons in order to force Ukraine to intervene in the 2020 elections, in order to remain in office by corrupt means.

There are various crimes that get committed along the way. But that is the core of it. The President is delegated vast powers to act in the national interest and he has vast discretion to determine what he or she believes the national interest is. But when he uses those powers for his own personal or financial gain they are illegitimate on their face, abuses of power and merit impeachment. The fact that he was doing so to sabotage a national election makes it vastly worse. And the fact that he was getting a foreign power to sabotage a US election makes it worse still. Any talk of “quid pro quos” and this and that minutiae is a distortion of what happened. Quid pro quos are simply exchanges of one thing for another. Presidents will ask for help on one bill in exchange for another. They’ll condition one kind of aid to a country on assistance on another foreign policy goal. In itself it means nothing. The crimes are bribery and extortion, the abuses of power are using presidential power for personal gain and the central offense against the state is the attempt to sabotage a national election, the event on which the legitimacy of the entire system rests.

...We don’t even need to get into the other crimes involved, having a crooked lawyer taking over US foreign policy in a critical part of the world and sidelining professional diplomats. We just focus on the core thing. The President is given tremendous power to advance the national interest, see that the laws are enforced, preserve the national welfare. These aren’t powers that he owns personally. They are delegated for these ends. Your banker has great power to act on your behalf. They have no right to steal your money. A doctor has vast powers to cut your body, make decisions when you are unconscious. They no right to kill you or sell your organs or fondle you for their personal satisfaction. It’s all the same thing. Stop saying quid pro quo or getting lost in the details. The crimes are clear. Use language that accurately describes them.

The President is delegated vast powers to act in the national interest and he has vast discretion to determine what he or she believes the national interest is. But when he uses those powers for his own personal or financial gain they are illegitimate on their face, abuses of power...

This is precisely what the word "high" is meant to convey in the constitutional phrase "high crimes and misdemeanors", which means 'crimes made possible by a president's possession of the power of high office'; they are betrayals of the high responsibility and trust which must be placed in a president.

Brian Lehrer is hosting a THREE-HOUR call-in show on NPR today on impeachment: "America, Are We Ready?" Oh, go fuck yourself.

omg if they impeach him America will never be the same again, they should just let him stay president.

Ilxors, time to jam the phone lines with fake names

Mr. Jablome makes a valid point.

Remember the last a President was impeached by the House and acquitted by the Senate? We don't want to return to that hellscape.

Powerful. Watch Rep Collins squirm. pic.twitter.com/HjZ5nK4Vou

— Claude Taylor (@TrueFactsStated) December 4, 2019

She's good. Not enough of these witnesses are comfortable with calling out these reps on their nonsense. I think there were some missed opportunities in the previous hearings to make pointed comments about Jim Jordan and ignoring evidence.

Evidently Karlan was on the shortlist for Obama's last SC nomination, but he decided the more moderate Merrick Garland would have an easier Senate confirmation process.

sorry to all those who voted N

I haven’t been keeping up with the day to day stuff much, because I value my sanity, but was there really no legal mechanism available to compel the white house to release documents and make available witnesses that had been subpoenaed? I’m confused about that

There was, yes, but it involved a delay of a predicted eight months to move through the courts.

I wish the House had its own Praetorian Guard.

And, if Trump was willing to defy Congress to the degree he did, given his personality and M.O., there's no guarantee he would not have defied the courts. Alternatively, the political imperatives that drive most Federalist Society-approved federal judges may well have acquiesced to Trump's stonewalling upon some grounds of deference to the concerns of the Executive branch.

Can they impeach him again so he first to be double impeached or is that just going to play to his narcissism? I mean not like it's going to stop him acting like he owns the place and can do whatever he wants innit?

gold

https://queenseagle.com/all/2019/12/19/queens-man-impeached

I haven’t been keeping up with the day to day stuff much, because I value my sanity, but was there really no legal mechanism available to compel the white house to release documents and make available witnesses that had been subpoenaed? I’m confused about that

― k3vin k., Wednesday, December 18, 2019 10:32 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is the thing. there is, but it's convoluted. House dems don't want to risk public attention being diverted from impeachment while the subpoenas are sussed in in the courts. meanwhile, this stalling tactic has WORKED AMAZINGLY for the gop, in that it has allowed them to push the narrative that the impeachment effort has been 'along partisan lines,' as if their obstructive non-involvement somehow constitutes being left out of the conversation. That they're not being called out more loudly on this by mainstream news outlets is fucking sad and dumb.

so, what's she doin again?

More Senate Democrats call on Pelosi to send over the articles of impeachment against Trump, saying the party has little to gain from further delay. https://t.co/WwmByZfW3f

— Capital Journal (@WSJPolitics) January 8, 2020

if you ask me, the main reason for withholding the Articles of Impeachment from the Senate was to allow time for the public to absorb the idea that McConnell was abusing his power as Senate Majority Leader by rigging the rules under which the trial would take place and that the Democrats objected to this abuse. the slender hope was that public displeasure might lead McConnell to soften his position, but the more realistic hope was that it would alienate a few more 'moderate' voters from supporting the Republican party.

courageous mitt romney takes a stand, grabs a crisp ice water, then promptly sits back down:

Mr. Romney is one of a handful of Republicans who have said they would be open to a vote on whether to call witnesses, something the Democrats have been demanding. In his statement, Mr. Romney said he would not support efforts to hold a vote on whether to call witnesses until after opening arguments are complete, which, under the majority leader Senator Mitch McConnell’s plan could be next week.

On Monday, Mr. Romney said he supported Mr. McConnell’s proposed rules.

also, it's kind of a sad lol that on the morning of the president's impeachment trial, there's pretty much nothing to say because the results have all been foreseen for months

We're all going to die?

i wd rather be skinned alive than listen to the imminent McConnell speech

bad news. shockingly, there aren't enough GOP 'moderates' to force testimony from bolton, giuliani, mulvaney, etc

McConnell counts enough votes to defeat any Democratic changes to the trial rules.

Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said in a news conference that he would demand that the Senate subpoena both witnesses and documents for the trial — including any records of President Trump’s call with the leader of Ukraine, and any records relating to the White House decision to withhold military aid from Ukraine.

But his Republican counterpart, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, has said he counted 53 votes in favor of his rules, suggesting that any Democratic plan to change them would probably fail.

man, no one is ever going to find out if this Trump guy did crimes

They should impeach him.

Announcing his vote count ahead of time is McConnell's attempt to save his less enthusiastic senators from having to cast that vote or have it pinned to their shirt come November. In terms of elective politics, voting on a rules change is rarely a live issue with the public, but the Democrats are playing a weak hand and the issue of witnesses is simple enough to encapsulate in a sound bite that it is the one tactic that might register in their favor among low-info voters.

what do you mean it's a weak hand

Trump very clearly committed crimes. The GOP is very clearly trying to cover this up by any means necessary.

one thing democrats utterly failed to do: put the focus on the handful of republican senators who are facing tough re-elections in november. the last 3 weeks should have been all about putting them in the spotlight - gardner, mcsally, tillis, fucking susan collins, ernst, etc. the headlines after the vote, if as expected it leads to no new evidence can be admitted despite how obviously wrong that is, should be about those specific senators failing the country. everyone who lives in those states should remember what they did.

xp

it's a weak hand in that democrats don't have the votes. they need at least a few republican senators - i don't know, say, gardner, mcsally, tillis, fucking susan collins, ernst, etc - to get past 50 votes for admitting obviously relevant new evidence and subpoenaing people who could obviously provide more firsthand information.

and since those handful of republican senators are just as scummy as the rest of the party, they deserve to be held especially accountable for what they did (or didn't do, in this case)

you're just jealous that scum rises to the top

dammn yooooou pierre delectoooooo!

This is the way the 'States end
Not with a yam but a turtle

turtles are people too, my friend. Yertle the Turtle, for example, was very unfairly maligned, and would have had a wonderful kingdom if that short-sighted and ungrateful Mack hadn't undermined him.

pierre, i don't remember who you are, but i humbly request that everything you say be typed with an outrageous french accent

Just had a flashback to when everyone (well, not everyone) was saying that Trump would be a mere stress test and that democracy would undoubtedly come out on top thanks to the Founding Fathers' unmatched foresight.

I don't know, maybe it is still early but I think a strong case can be made that the system *has* worked, or at least has so far. Things could have been so much worse. After asshole was elected, I seriously brainstormed all options, including moving to another country, to escape his policies. Now, are things great? No, but I'm not sure the country and its laws are significantly worse than they've ever been, and they are certainly much better than they've been at their worst. I think everything just seems so dramatic because Trump himself is a horrible person, an embarrassment, a tragedy. But if he were replaced by a "normal" Republican, I'm not sure how much anything would be different. McConnell's assholery, for example, stretches back way before Trump's election, and him stealing that Supreme Court seat remains more audacious and destructive than anything Trump has done or been able to do, imo. I think just about everything else Trump has done is reversible, save all the federal judges, and they would have been pushed through by any GOP president.

In some ways I think a Trump second term would or at least could be a relief. He'd be a lame duck, which would (at least in theory) make him even *less* effective than he's been, with a clear end in sight. As always the big exception is the Supreme Court, but we've already seen what a disaster that can be even with Obama as president.

Trump has appointed something like 200 judges so far. It's not just the supreme court.

For this and countless other reasons four more years would be a catastrophe.