Eight Days In May–Rosenstein Did Wear a Wire and Discuss Using the 25th Amendment to Remove the President of the United States

 

I had written a slightly sarcastic post about how it was our civic duty as American citizens to rush out and read the latest book by a member of the Swamp, and how their families could probably use the money in the future when all appeal delays  have expired after criminal proceedings have been wrapped up, and then I read Byron York’s piece of this morning, and Powerline’s comment on the same, and saw the book in a whole new light.

I strenuously urge a reading of York’s discussion of the number of suspicions and speculations some of McCabe’s book confirms, such as:

“If it’s all true, that is, if revelations in an upcoming book by former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe are accurate. The bottom line on that is that, at least from what we know now, McCabe’s story seems consistent with information congressional investigators have been able to glean elsewhere.”

“It’s just like we thought all along,” said one House Republican upon hearing the news. “If McCabe’s account is true, it confirms what we thought, that Rod Rosenstein was serious when he talked about wearing a wire and invoking the 25th Amendment. Rosenstein should be under oath answering our questions. We need to know who was in the room and what was said.””

There  is a lot more in York’s piece, especially about Rosenstein who is, in my opinion, one of the most dangerous people in government today.

As John Hinderaker concluded on Powerline, “Someone should be doing hard time.”

Indeed.

Sincerely, Jim

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  1. DrewInWisconsin Member
    DrewInWisconsin
    @DrewInWisconsin

    Bob W (View Comment):

    Maybe they considered the 25 th because, even though it would have been harder to ultimately carry out, it would be easier to start than impeachment, needing only a handful of people to agree. But I still don’t know what purpose they thought that would serve.

    Straightforward from here . . .

    • #31
  2. DrewInWisconsin Member
    DrewInWisconsin
    @DrewInWisconsin

    Franco (View Comment):
    We have seen the awesome power of the media laid bare in the last few years. This is the real fight that’s going on. 

    The question I keep coming back to is, what can we do about it? How can we “fix” our media, or barring that, utterly destroy them?

    • #32
  3. Franco Member
    Franco
    @Franco

    DrewInWisconsin (View Comment):

    Franco (View Comment):
    We have seen the awesome power of the media laid bare in the last few years. This is the real fight that’s going on.

    The question I keep coming back to is, what can we do about it? How can we “fix” our media, or barring that, utterly destroy them?

    I think they have overstepped and made too many aware of how they themselves can be, and are being, manipulated. The rise of alternative media is a testament to that, and that’s where I get my news. I’m not boycotting the MSM, I’m avoiding it for my own mental health. I’m fully aware of what they are saying I just won’t allow it to dominate me. And I think that’s where a lot of people are, or are gravitating toward. They’ve lost a good deal of influence over prevailing beliefs and are now fighting over the existing audience that’s made up mostly of true believers. 

    If enough people simply don’t care what they think or say, they will continue to lose power.

    I do believe more awareness of the basic epistemology chain ( how do you ‘know’ that?) will help a lot. 

    But my pessimist side sees a steady drift toward a totalitarian dystopia – a hybrid of Orwell/Huxley/Idiocracy – where people are dumbed-down, put to sleep by entertainment and legal ‘medications’ and the population monitors ( self monitored – even better!) for wrongthink by social media. Anyone off the grid will be suspect, forensic crimes from the past prosecuted ( that’s a new one, I think) and every single transaction and association recorded for possible future prosecution should you become a threat. History will be rewritten ( even more than it is now). As much of a capitalist and appreciator of corporations I am, there’s a real downside to global multinationals dominating people’s thoughts and beliefs. (that’s why the media is so anti-religion, since it infringes on their territory)

    I wonder sometimes if biblical prophecies come from reports and understandings of fallen ancient civilizations.

    These predictions are simply coming from Wise men who see the inevitability and natural evolution of these civilizational forces. Like predicting what will happen to a drunk if he keeps drinking. He says the guy is going to lose his family, his job and his drivers license eventually, and lo and behold, 10 years later it comes true! Is that guy good at predicting-a prophet- or just wise and observant?

    Sorry to get so far off topic.

    • #33
  4. Postmodern Hoplite Coolidge
    Postmodern Hoplite
    @PostmodernHoplite

    DrewInWisconsin (View Comment):

    Bob W (View Comment):

    Maybe they considered the 25 th because, even though it would have been harder to ultimately carry out, it would be easier to start than impeachment, needing only a handful of people to agree. But I still don’t know what purpose they thought that would serve.

    Straightforward from here . . .

    Who is Sally Kohn, and why should I care what she thinks? (No disrespect intended here; I genuinely don’t know.)

    • #34
  5. DrewInWisconsin Member
    DrewInWisconsin
    @DrewInWisconsin

    Postmodern Hoplite (View Comment):

    DrewInWisconsin (View Comment):

    Bob W (View Comment):

    Maybe they considered the 25 th because, even though it would have been harder to ultimately carry out, it would be easier to start than impeachment, needing only a handful of people to agree. But I still don’t know what purpose they thought that would serve.

    Straightforward from here . . .

    Who is Sally Kohn, and why should I care what she thinks? (No disrespect intended here; I genuinely don’t know.)

    Just an MSNBC Talking Head. That tweet of hers went viral and became an easily mockable meme. So yeah, I’m just saying that in answer to what purpose they thought it would serve? Why, getting Hillary into the White House as was always meant to be . . . right? It’s so easy. You just remove the President, and the loser in the previous election gets to be president right? (That’s how dumb people think.)

    • #35
  6. Flicker Coolidge
    Flicker
    @Flicker

    Franco (View Comment):
    Protests from the right are ineffective, unfortunately because of the media.

    I remember the Million Man March, it was a generation ago, when AOC was a wee bit of a girl.  And having been there, I feel entitled to say that it accomplished little to nothing — it was feel-goods for a little while.  The reporting iirc was about size and numbers and who was counting, and who was the most experienced at counting, and what algorithm they used compared to the eye-balling of whichever network’s most experienced reporters.

    If you want a protest make it last for so long the media can’t ignore it, such as Occupy Wall Street; without the drum beating, garbage piling up, the rape and drug use and crapping on cars.

    20 million people, a million a week, in shifts so to speak, taking off time form work to do it.  One speaker at a time, speaking to news crews that may or may not assemble.  Demanding what; Rule of Law, Bill of Rights (and 10th Amendment?), and accountability and jail time for government lawbreakers.

    • #36
  7. DrewInWisconsin Member
    DrewInWisconsin
    @DrewInWisconsin

    We should be able to learn from the left how they were able to “fundamentally transform” our nation, and use those tactics to transform it back.

    • #37
  8. Flicker Coolidge
    Flicker
    @Flicker

    DrewInWisconsin (View Comment):

    We should be able to learn from the left how they were able to “fundamentally transform” our nation, and use those tactics to transform it back.

    I think those transformations were extra-legal, to put it nicely.  Interestingly, this Senate vote preceding the House vote, which is I suppose technically unconstitutional, was used to get 0bamacare through.  (As I understand it, the Senate bill was passed and then a previously-passed and unrelated House bill was gutted and replaced with the text of 0bamacare, keeping only its House Bill number.  Or the name was changed and then the two were reconciled privately in committee without either full house voting on the product.  I’d really like someone who knows to clarify that for me, thanks.)

    Nonetheless an odd coincidence.

    • #38
  9. Jim George Member
    Jim George
    @JimGeorge

    David Carroll (View Comment):

    Alan Dershowitz called the discussion an “attempt at a coup d’etat.” I think that is wrong. It was maybe plotting a coup d’etat, but attempt requires more than mere discussion.

    Democrats justify the discussion by saying that there was nothing wrong with the discussion because it landed on, “No.” Really?

    Let’s say there was a real concern that a president is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of the office.” The persons who must make that determination are the vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide.” (As far as I can tell, Congress has not passed a law designating some other body.) The Department of Justice has no role whatsoever in that determination. The Department of Justice has no authority to spend public money (e.g., the time used in research or discussion) on that subject whatsoever.

    By the way, the 25th Amendment would not work for the coup d’etat anyway. It is available only when the President is unable to discharge duties. The 25th Amendment further says, “Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives that no inability exists, he shall resume his duties….” Then the Vice President and the majority of the executive officers can object and then Congress may decide the President is unable by two thirds vote of both houses, otherwise the President continues in office.

    Bottom line: The DOJ has no role or authority in the process and had no business plotting (er, discussing) it.

    While I agree with your ultimate conclusion I must respectfully dissent from your position that this was not an attempt at a coup d’etat; before I wrote this, I viewed the entire Dershowitz interview from Tucker Carlson last night, and I also listened to the p;portion of the 60 Minutes interview in which McCabe personally outlined what they were trying to do; it sure sounded like it was far more than a chat over brandy in the Faculty Lounge as they were “counting votes” as to how many they could count on being on their side of the 25th Amendment question and actually talking about putting a wire on Rosenstein, who I will continue to say is the most dangerous snake in the Swamp until I run out of breath. These people were dead serious, not to mention complete failures as attorneys who should have known the simple basic legal point that, as you point out, that provision has absolutely no application to what they were planning. Also, in all the discussion about what Prof. Dershowitz said in that interview about an attempted coup, his powerful statement regarding the inapplicability of the 25th Amendment to this situation was very much worth watching, as he challenged all his colleagues on the far left to debate him on this topic.

    • #39
  10. Flicker Coolidge
    Flicker
    @Flicker

    Jim George (View Comment):

    While I agree with your ultimate conclusion I must respectfully dissent from your position that this was not an attempt at a coup d’etat; before I wrote this, I viewed the entire Dershowitz interview from Tucker Carlson last night, and I also listened to the p;portion of the 60 Minutes interview in which McCabe personally outlined what they were trying to do; it sure sounded like it was far more than a chat over brandy in the Faculty Lounge as they were “counting votes” as to how many they could count on being on their side of the 25th Amendment question and actually talking about putting a wire on Rosenstein, who I will continue to say is the most dangerous snake in the Swamp until I run out of breath. These people were dead serious, not to mention complete failures as attorneys who should have known the simple basic legal point that, as you point out, that provision has absolutely no application to what they were planning. Also, in all the discussion about what Prof. Dershowitz said in that interview about an attempted coup, his powerful statement regarding the inapplicability of the 25th Amendment to this situation was very much worth watching, as he challenged all his colleagues on the far left to debate him on this topic.

    Can you provide a link to the Dershowitz interview?

    • #40
  11. Jim George Member
    Jim George
    @JimGeorge

    Flicker (View Comment):
    Can you provide a link to the Dershowitz interview?

    https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/02/15/alan_dershowitz_using_25th_amendment_to_oust_trump_is_clearly_an_attempt_at_a_coup_detat.html

    • #41
  12. Western Chauvinist Member
    Western Chauvinist
    @WesternChauvinist

    Jim George (View Comment):

    Flicker (View Comment):
    Can you provide a link to the Dershowitz interview?

    https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/02/15/alan_dershowitz_using_25th_amendment_to_oust_trump_is_clearly_an_attempt_at_a_coup_detat.html

    Yeah, there ya’ go. That radical Trumpkin Dershowitz calling it a coup d’etat. 

    • #42
  13. Quietpi Member
    Quietpi
    @Quietpi

    David Carroll (View Comment):

    Bob W (View Comment):

    Maybe they considered the 25 th because, even though it would have been harder to ultimately carry out, it would be easier to start than impeachment, needing only a handful of people to agree. But I still don’t know what purpose they thought that would serve.

    Perhaps, but ultimately, it requires 2/3 of both houses of Congress to override the President saying he (or she) is able to continue. Not so easy in a hostile takeover.

    Thankfully, we’re talking in the hypothetical, at least for now.  In that light, I’m not so sure.  The Dems in both houses are blocks.  The Never Trump Republicans can probably be taken at their word, particularly since even holding that position requires a squishy view of the Constitution at the start.  How many Trump supporters, especially the nominal ones, would decide that it was time to end the battle, and get on with running the country (to ground, but I digress)?

    • #43
  14. CarolJoy, Above Top Secret Coolidge
    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret
    @CarolJoy

    Flicker (View Comment):

    It’s a coup. It’s arguable, but I argue it was — and still is — a coup. The problem is that it was a soft coup, not done by the experts at the CIA, but by the FBI, and they stumbled and struggled and tried one thing after the next, and then got exposed, and now with the coup still on, still underway in many quarters, it’s going on under the nose of the public, so PR and propaganda are as much apart as are the back-room framing and spying and impending court room displays (in the House). There’s one way that this might not definitively be a coup, and that’s the time frame, but coups can take a long time to plan and organize, as I said, this coup started at the same time they started planning it just about.

    FWIW:

    Coup: 1- a blow, shock; shock of a blow, engagement or combat. 2- a fall, upset, overturn. 5- coup d’état, [which is what we mean] a sudden and decisive stroke of state policy; spec. a sudden and great change in government carried out violently or illegally by the ruling power.

    It’s still an illegal removal of a head of state by the government, and to in effect overturn the election.

    But this one is not over yet. The build-up and trials and stumbles we’re seeing now, is nothing other than the accidental revelation of the existence of and the back-scene workings of an illegal removal of a head of state by government actors, many of whom are top-level foreign agents and nationals.

    However, the backdrop of public acceptance of the soft coup was brought about by the CIA. Anyone who thinks the CIA is not behind at least 75% of what we see on TV, or hear on the radio, or read in the newspapers really needs to remember Operation Mockingbird. An think about what that Operation currently means for all of us.

    • #44
  15. Flicker Coolidge
    Flicker
    @Flicker

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):
    However, the backdrop of public acceptance of the soft coup was brought about by the CIA. Anyone who thinks the CIA is not behind at least 75% of what we see on TV, or hear on the radio, or read in the newspapers really needs to remember Operation Mockingbird. An think about what that Operation currently means for all of us.

    The mind boggles at the thought that 75% of what we hear and think about comes from a few dozen people with mad-dictator passions at the CIA.  It smacks of 18th century French or Russian intrigues, in which only the courtiers have a cue what’s going on and only the few are the movers and shakers, and the  people outside are like cattle to be moved around pacified and eaten.  Nonetheless, Roger Simon’s “The only Way to Save the FBI IS to Expose It” and then Robert Spencer’s warning on AOC “Stop Laughing: Yes, the Green New Deal is Stupid and Evil, But It’s Coming“, and maybe finish off with an aperitif of John Hawkins’ “Fifteen Devastating Quotes That Show How Dangerous Social Media Has Become to Society“, all on PJMedia today.

    • #45
  16. Postmodern Hoplite Coolidge
    Postmodern Hoplite
    @PostmodernHoplite

    DrewInWisconsin (View Comment):

    We should be able to learn from the left how they were able to “fundamentally transform” our nation, and use those tactics to transform it back.

    Perhaps this comment has already been made; to accomplish this will require replicating the “Long March through the Academy.” We need to figure out how to get teachers into the colleges who will shift the prevailing world view away from the Progressive and back to the Conservative.

    (BTW – I am trying to find such a college-level teaching position myself; so far, no luck, but I’ll keep plugging away.)

    • #46
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