Trump chose not to think it through.
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One of the things that struck me about Sessions comments (besides the obvious) was that he referred to âour church friendsâ- rhetorically drawing the listener into an âusâ that excludes âour church friendsâ. Sort of an âhaters gonna hate, preachers gonna preach, *you and me * ainât bothered â message.
The evangelicals have stood by trump and the GOP through an awful lot of flagrantly unchristian behavior, so Iâm not convinced but a little hopeful that we might be seeing the start of a break.
It up to the rest of us to keep up the noise, though
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Yes
Heâs has contradicted himself in the past over Manafortâs campaign involvement (I think the latest lie happened a week ago.)
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No, Ford did not pardon Nixon for future crimes. He pardoned him for any crimes he may have committed in the past for a given period (I think it was about 4 years). It was a pre-emptive pardon in that Nixon was pardoned before any prosecution took place for those past crimes. That pardon also conveniently terminated the investigations into Nixon before they could turn up any evidence of the Nixon campaign interfering with the Vietnam peace talks.
My understanding of the NY state situation is that a civil action is all that is permitted by law. All the juicy stuff (eg. jailable) wrt the foundation are federal crimes. But ny state is laying a pretty sweet roadmap for the IRS and FEC to follow and will likely embarass them into action. Also if trump is dumb enough to fight the NY state civil action instead of just writing a 2.8 mil check and putting it behind him, who knows what criminal stuff discovery might turn up?
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This is a heartening reminder that T-Rump is a careless schmuck whoâs inattention to facts and details will figure large in his demise. His cocky, snarky scofflaw attitude puts a big target on his back. If I were Mueller, Iâd be relishing the thought of seeing his corpulent ass perp-walked into Levenworth.
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I edited my previous post
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Sez Trump, âpardon WHO?â
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This.
The only people who can stop a rabid dog in the WH are judges and Congress.
Congress can act in hours, but may choose to do nothing. The GOP wonât act because their oligarch donors prefer a weakened or dismantled state, and many of them are willing to sacrifice anything to remain members of the pampered political class. (The alternative is to be cast back down into the devil-take-the-hindmost civilian jungle that theyâve been building at the behest of their masters. I think we can all understand why they donât find that to be an appealing alternative.)
The Judiciary can act, and as a group that is predominantly sane b/c very educated, are likely to want to, but they move incredibly slowly. Trump and Putin hope to accomplish their smash-and-grab so quickly that the Judiciary has lost its power before it is able to respond.
This is a race between Trumpâs no-holds-barred public campaign against the rule of law, vs the agonizingly slow work of painstakingly prosecuting Trumpâs network of co-conspirators and allies-of-convenience from the bottom up.
Two more years of Trump will be ruinous to our justice system and the other core functions of a rule-of-law nation, to say nothing of the consequences to our national security, economy, and diplomatic relations. During that whole time, those same vital organs will be under continued and energized attack from billionaire Libertarians who seek to destroy the any check on their power, a Republican Party that feels it is fighting for its life (and refuses to admit that it has already been killed from within by corrupt money), and the emboldened Russian state.
Enron is perhaps a useful case study. It took 4 years from the time when Enronâs troubles were becoming obvious to the public until Lay & Schilling went to trial. Four years is a presidential term, and that case presented none of the many novel and problematic features of our current predicament: the malefactors had no control over the machinery of justice and were not regarded as special individuals who might be beyond the reach of the law, were not aided by hostile foreign powers who could refuse to cooperate with law enforcement, and the scope was limited to 2 companies: Enron & Arthur Andersen. From what I can tell, Muellerâs strategy w/r/t Trump is just like the strategy used against Enron, which was itself based on the strategy used against American organized crime: start at the bottom and flip low-level actors to support indictments against their bosses, recursively until you get to the top. If Mueller takes down any of Trumpâs inner circle before the electorate takes down Trump, I think it will set some speed records.
If he fails to take down Trump, there may not be enough healthy systems left to recover, and something else will step in to assert power. Probably the very rich and corporations, whom many Americans fail to recognize as enemies of a fair and just society.
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Difference being is that Pence will become president whether the Donald resigns or is impeached. There is no reason for him to pardon the Donald.
Again, a thousand times, why hasnât Anonymous hacked into the IRSâs Commodore 64 computer system and made the Donaldâs tax returns public?
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I donât deny that there might be political and other repercussions for the President if he uses the pardon power in a frivolous way. But I seriously doubt that this would make the pardon itself invalid. Sure he can be impeached. But does that mean that after a successful impeachment, e.g., Mr. Manafort can be tried despite of the pardon? It does not seem likely.
There is a good reason why there is so much gray area in this matter. No previous President has ever abused his pardon power in a way which made it necessary to clarify the limits of his power. Sure, there have been some questionable pardons which were clearly motivated by less than pure reasons, but none have reached the level of absurdity the current President might feel obliged to employ. We shall see whether Trump is willing to stretch the pardon power to its limits. Should be interesting to see what will happen thenâŚ
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So ⌠itâs likely youâve read this ⌠but itâs not precisely true.
Whatâs true is that the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination is exactly that â a privilege against self-incrimination: it protects you from having to put yourself in legal jeopardy through your own forced testimony.
Now, to the extent that something else â a pardon, say â removes the possibility of legal jeopardy for something you did, then, to that extent, the Fifth Amendment privilege does not apply.
In simple terms: if you are pardoned for some act X, then you can be called to testify about X. You can still refuse to testify about X, but the Fifth Amendment no longer protects you and you run the risk of being found in contempt of court if you refuse to testify.
And you can also be called to testify about some other act Y which the pardon did not reach; and in this case you can again refuse on account of your Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.
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No.
Which pardons have come closest, in your estimation?
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This child honestly believes that the law should reflect his personal judgement on everything.
Sorry Dotard. America is great without you.
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Would someone give this asshole some porn to keep him busy for a couple of hours and to get him to STFU.
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âThe bearer of this letter has acted under my orders and for the good of the State. Trumpâ
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Arenât you familiar with his âExecutive Timeâ yet?
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Precisely. Why the hell hasnât Drumpfâs tax return been leaked? Itâll be loaded with criminal dealing and irregular accounting entries. Anonymous could do it right before the midterms and help Dems take control of Congress. If Dems take over and truly stand up to Drumpf, itâd go a long way in preserving our republic.
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I thought executive time was when he was pooping and tweeting, which are basically the same for him.
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âDidnât know Manafort was the head of the Mob,â Trump said.
No, you are.
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