Discussion: Kavanaugh Won't Answer 'Hypothetical' On Whether President Can Be Subpoenaed

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Kavanaugh Won't Answer 'Hypothetical' On Whether President Can Be Subpoenaed Back to article
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that’s just not a correct impression of my views.”

Perhaps if we had access to all of your documents, we’d have a more accurate impression of your views.

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I’d like to follow this but it’s really cumbersome this way. Senator asks a question, Kavanuts responds, TPM puts up blurb. Repeat. It’s going to be a long twelve hours.

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I think he meant Hypoethical.

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The truth…

Stop this scam…call the senators…1.844.778.3056

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Here’s what 90% of your fellow Americans believe
No one is above the law
Especially Presidents
They , according to he constitution do not become Deitys upon election although some have lead Twittler to believe it is so

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It’s not a correct impression? Really?

From the news story:

A 1999 magazine article about the roundtable was part of thousands of pages of documents that Kavanaugh has provided to the Senate Judiciary Committee as part of the confirmation process.

“But maybe Nixon was wrongly decided — heresy though it is to say so. Nixon took away the power of the president to control information in the executive branch by holding that the courts had power and jurisdiction to order the president to disclose information in response to a subpoena sought by a subordinate executive branch official. That was a huge step with implications to this day that most people do not appreciate sufficiently…Maybe the tension of the time led to an erroneous decision,” Kavanaugh said in a transcript of the discussion that was published in the January-February 1999 issue of the Washington Lawyer.

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Worse than a Sarah Huckabee Sanders non answer

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“I know there was a news story about that, and that’s just not a correct impression of my views.”

Would you tell us what your views actually are then?

“I’m not going to respond to a hypothetical.”

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But he said he had an “open mind” on the question of whether presidents can be sued.

That’s interesting. Current Supreme Court precedent says a president can be sued for acts committed before he or she became president. (Clinton v. Jones).

Is Kavanaugh saying he is open to revisiting that issue and immunizing presidents from civil suits?

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How about a shooting in broad daylight on Fifth Avenue, sir?

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The Democratic senators should take him through every word of that transcript and ask him what if anything gives an “incorrect impression.”

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KQED is carrying the hearings live during my morning commute, which may not be the very best thing for my safety as a driver.

Kavanaugh’s answer to Feinstein about whether Nixon was correctly decided raised a huge red flag for me. He tried very hard to appear that he was saying yes, it was, but he very carefully and artfully constrained his answer to be in the context of the special counsel law as it existed at the time, which of course no longer exists.

Seems to me that he deliberately prepared the ground for him to announce, when the balloon goes up, that gosh golly gee, but the circumstances this time are different from the way things were back then. What a surprise, who would have thunk it?

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Lindsey Graham set Kavanaugh up to brag about what a wonderful citizen he is (has served meals at homeless shelters, etc). That is to be expected. But Graham included the Parkland victim’s father in his introductory questioning - because, of course, Kavanaugh shunning that father yesterday made the national news. Kavanaugh still can’t bring himself to go there or express any sympathy for that man or victims of school shootings. That tells you what kind of man he is.

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We DO have a huge impression of his volunteer work. They (and he) are working hard to make him seem sympathetic. Ick.

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Whether or not a president can be subpoenaed is NOT a hypothetical question, but a direct question of law. He should be pressed on that point.

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During Feinstein’s questioning Kavanaugh was quoted saying automatic guns were acceptable under the concept of the automatic guns had ‘broad usage.’ Feinstein argued that they weren’t ‘used’ which shows the limit of her intelligence. One could easily argue that the guns are being used for protection. However, how can one accept the ludicrous argument that legality is dependent on ‘broad usage,’ Didn’t prohibition pass constitutional muster, aren’t there scores of millions of people who have smoked marijuana, yet it’s illegal. For heaven’s sake, how many people people use there car for speeding. Correct me if I’m wrong that Kavanaugh used the argument that broad usage is a legitimate standard for law.

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Roberts, et al, has ignored precedent many times: http://www.pfaw.org/report/the-roberts-court-conservatives-efforts-to-override-precedent/
Prepare to se Roe v Wade overturned, along with a few other legal reversals that were just a right-winger’s wet dream until the Russians put Trump in power.

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Simple Things That All Americans Understand:

  • No person is above the law in this country.

  • No person accused of a crime gets to appoint the judge who will try the case.

  • Merrick Garland was railroaded.

  • The GOP is hiding Kavanaugh’s record, and hell bent on ramming through his confirmation.

  • Only a gutless jackass refuses the outstretched hand of a father who lost his child.

And if Kavanaugh thinks indictment and criminal trial – by a Congressionally authorized Independent Council appointed by the president’s own DOJ – would be an “undue burden” on a sitting president, then he must reject the entire notion of impeachment as written in the US Constitution.

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I agree with what you said, except the first sentence, it is wrong.
Many Americans do not understand, will not understand or refuse to understand.

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