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Of Impeachment and Accountability
Never Trump Republicans and their Democratic co-conspirators have another trick up their sleeves. Knowing that they probably do not have the votes to convict and remove the President in the Senate, they are desperately searching for a way to pull it off and they think they’ve found it: A secret vote and/or a generous reading of the two-thirds rule.
Pushed by people like lobbyist Juleanna Glover (formerly of the Bush 43 Administration and Bill Kristol acolyte), Laurence Tribe and former Sen. Jeff Flake, the operating theory is that if Senators were freed from accountability to their voters there would be 30 to 35 Republicans in the Senate ready to vote “yes” on conviction.
The other pipe dream is that the Constitution only demands a two-thirds majority of the Senators present. For every Senator that refuses to attend it brings that two-thirds number lower. But staying away is the same as a yes vote.
Jim Geraghty points out at National Review, “If Trump really is an unconstitutional menace who is abusing the power of the presidency for his personal interests, stopping him ought to be worth losing a Senate seat. And if this action isn’t worth losing a Senate seat over, then it’s hard to see how it is worth removing a president.”
A secret ballot after secret proceedings in the House sounds like a recipe for disaster. How do you think the public would react?
Published in Politics
Of note, I would far rather talk about C.J. Box’s exceptional Joe Pickett series that I wrote a post about instead of Trump and Impeachment.
Yes, but when essentially the same questionable asertion is repeated ( or not withdrawn) after being rebutted, the matter of a “mistake” becomes decidedly less excusable. And at some point, a matter of crediility justifiably spills over into new assertions.
Fair enough. However, please give me an example.
Let me give an example of my own. For a long time, I believed that Trump had made fun of a disabled reporter. Heck, I had seen the picture with my own two eyes. However, then a fellow Ricochetti shared a three or so minute presentation that dissected the incident and Trump’s statement. I wasn’t fully convinced by the presentation but I could not hold to my former belief, and since then, I omitted that example from my litany of concerns about Trump. I also acknowledged that I could have been wrong in that thread.
You mean he was Adam Schiff for an earlier generation?
Look, people high up in the American government knew he was right. And they kept their mouths shut. Why? Because they were afraid to let the Soviets know we had broken their code. (The British often let some very bad things happen after they cracked Enigma, too.)
McCarthy was no different than many of his colleagues, or for that matter, many operating in the Congress today. But casting him as a villain the way you do shows how much you’re willing to perpetuate the leftist narrative. This truth has been out there for almost a quarter century but it keeps getting wrapped in the lie and presented their way.
I can imagine an exception to the 22nd Amendment due to the Democrat’s attempted coup and overthrow of the 2016 election with a sham impeachment.
Properly identifying what the term of art “country first” now means: real, actual Constitution last. The FBI, the DOJ, and the Democrat Party, with their TruCon lapdogs, must not be allowed to be above the law and no “law” must be allowed to subvert the Constitution.
This hatred is really ugly. And, no, it cannot possibly be limited to the proxy, the avatar “Trump.” It must project through to the real problem, the American voters who dare to vote wrongly with real effect, generating real change you do not like.
I think the one thing that both Anti Trump and Pro Trump Republicans have in common is that they both believe they are putting America First. It would be beneficial if both groups accepted the good faith of the other. “Country First” has little value as a differentiator — it is mostly used to insult ones opponents.
I can’t and there is no need to have one. Trump is doing well as far as the economy, regulations and judicial appointments are concerned but he is not indispensable.
Please name one member of the Supreme Court who would not vote to remove Trump as President after two terms if Trump were elected in 2020 and 2024. Please name one Judge of the Circuit Court of Appeals. Please name one Federal District Judge. Please name one Federal Magistrate. Just one.
The answer is that not one of the 1,000 or so Federal Judges would agree with such an absurd argument.
Country First means Constitution First, and rejection of the Trump Cult of Personality.
I assure you, it does not. However anyone, but whoever is the President, would have been prosecuted 11 times over for the 11 Obstructions of Justice outlined in Volume II of the Mueller Report. The only thing stopping Trump’s prosecution is that he holds the office of the Presidency. That will end under the 22nd Amendment.
In the movie “Robocop” the criminal “Dick Jones” was discovered to be the Operating Officer of the the corporation which controlled Robocop. When Jones was summarily fired by the Chairman of the Board, he no longer had protection from Robocop.
Agreed. But the tiresome invocation of the invective “NeverTrump” becomes a bit tiresome.
After FDR, the American people agreed that there needed to be a term limit for Presidents, hence the 22nd Amendment.
I was reliably informed by all the right-thinking people in late 2016 that only banana republics prosecute defeated politicians.
Also, you are aware that both the State of New York taxing authorities and the Federal Government taxing authorities already have Donald Trump’s tax returns, aren’t you? And have never found a reason to prosecute him?
No Presidential Candidate before Trump had ever encouraged his followers to “Lock Her Up.” Trump will reap that whirlwind.
Right now Trump has immunity while holding the term of President. That ends under the 22nd Amendment no later than Noon on January 20, 2025. (Hopefully that will end at Noon on January 20, 2021.)
He’s been filing taxes since (at least) the 1970s. Unless you think this alleged fraud only started in the last three years, what’s your point?
Names of these innocent people he destroyed?
So go ahead and do so. No one’s stopping you.
I welcome you going over to that post.
More TDS. You and Schiff need an intervention. You need an TDSectomy.
McSchiff?
Is there a Trump Adoration Syndrome?
Re: Trump’s taxes.
The ship of state is the only ship that leaks from the top. If there were really anything in Trump’s tax returns that indicated criminal acts then the IRS and the NY Revenue Office would be leaking like a sieve. This is another “I don’t have any proof but I know in my heart Trump is guilty” moment. It’s an article of faith, not reason.
Torches and pitchforks.
Fifty six comments later Drew wins a prize for being the first to address the OP.
Gary, that statement will never be true until the Clintons are first brought to justice.
I did when you posted it.
I don’t think that’s true. There were people in the U.S. who were wanting to prosecute W Bush for war crimes.