President Trump: The NEW one and only politics thread

Trump is being impeached over a Ukraine shakedown scheme, not 'policy'

Tom Nichols really takes Trump's Republican supporters in the Senate to the woodshed here. Worth a look. I just wish the Trumpists would read it.



"The “policy dispute” defense rests on the obvious truth that under Article II of the Constitution, the president of the United States has the right to set foreign policy. Subject to the restrictions of federal law, the Constitution and the power of the purse that is reserved for Congress in Article I, the president can choose to bring us closer to some countries, give the cold shoulder to others, and negotiate treaties and other international agreements as he or she chooses.

None of that is at issue in this impeachment. What Trump did was to state one policy in public — that is, the policy his subordinates and the executive departments of the United States were expected to follow — and then to run a second policy, a plot concocted in secret and executed by an unaccountable circle of conspirators.

This scheme (it is too misleading even to call it a “policy”) was a rogue operation against Ukraine’s new president, Volodymyr Zelensky, conducted by Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani and a squad of shady characters, none of whom were answerable to anyone but Trump himself. (One wonders how Sen. Lee’s constitutionalism squares with foreign operations being conducted by the likes of Giuliani and Lev Parnas, out of sight of pesky members of Congress and their annoying questions.)"

"Trump and his apologists are playing a double game here, arguing that the president has the right to set policy, and then picking and choosing which policy civil servants and appointees were supposed to follow. This allows them to recast the objections of people like Ambassador to Ukraine William Taylor, National Security Council officials Fiona Hill and Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, as well as former national security adviser John Bolton, as insubordination or disloyalty. In reality, there was no way that anyone in the government could have served both the official U.S. policy and Trump's hidden objectives at the same time, and we should be grateful that so many of them chose the Constitution over Trump.

In effect, the president’s defenders are arguing that whatever a president does — legal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional — is “policy” and therefore obligates every member of the government to follow it without question.

This is madness. If the outcome of this Senate trial is to accept that every act committed by a president is “policy,” we might as well delete impeachment from the Constitution and remove every last vestige of congressional oversight and control. We will instead have to accept that for his or her entire term of office, a president of the United States may engage in any misconduct he or she chooses so long as it is called a “policy.”

 

The defense team keeps saying removal would overturn the election. Why haven’t the House managers yet argued that Pence would take over and the GOP would retain the Presidency? They make it sound like Pelosi will be put in charge.

 

3:10 to Duma.

 

Schiff just slaughtered the defense’s argument. He said the DOJ is in court down the street arguing that the Congress can’t enforce subpoenas through the court. The judge asked if they can’t do that, what remedy does the Congress have? The DOJ said “impeachment.” The entire chamber laughed.

“You can’t make this stuff up!”

 

I disagree. The argument should be: We're not overturning the election. We're doing our jobs. Yes, he was elected. But after becoming POTUS, he committed these crimes, and it is our constitutional duty to impeach him — for the good of the country. Overturn an election? That's on him, not us.

 

Gigantic waste of time from the beginning. The Senate will never vote to convict and all this did was allow Trump to continue playing the martyr card and inflame/solidify his base. Dems need to put all their time an energy to defeating Trump at the ballot box. They can start by getting squarely behind the only candidate who can beat Trump, and that's Bloomberg.

 

But the point is, it doesn’t overturn the election.

 

Putin overturned the election.

 

But Trump forced their hand
They had to do it
Pelosi never wanted to
Bloomberg is 77
Like Biden and Sanders, anyone who’s an octogenarian during his first term is a nonstarter

 

Yeah, that will fix our system of government. Elect another billionaire President, this time one who bought the election with his own money. I'm sure all the Dems will cheerfully fall in line for that.

 

There is no evidence Bloomberg is any stronger against Trump than either Biden or Sanders. I mean, no national poll shows it. I think Bloomberg is a serious candidate, but really, what does he offer that Biden doesn't besides unlimited funds to spend on himself?

 

Bolton to speak in public Feb. 17. At Duke. He better come up with some spicy stuff or the Cameron Crazies will be on his ass.