Please fix the headline. Blatantly illegal maneuver does not equate to a “legal loophole”.
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OT:
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Bolton will testify and call in an airstrike during hour three.
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John Bolton will testify. He resisted the criminal Ukraine scheme and wants to clear himself and shiv Guiliani and Trump (and maybe Pompeo).
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Holy crap. He sure got knocked down to his actual small size.
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I didn’t read the article, but I thought enough republicans wouldn’t support the nomination.
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I really don’t understand why anyone would want Cuccinelli, he’s already been shown to be incompetent and hateful…though Trump having him at DHS may make sense, since that’s what his version of DHS is. The world will be a better place if Cuccinelli never has any kind of power again.
As for Bolton…I think he’ll ask for a subpoena to get around the legal qualms of ignoring the administration, and he will lean more heavily on executive privilege in not answering some questions (i.e. direct conversations with Trump). Since Trump left him out of the loop on the Ukraine deal, he should be able to testify about that without too much worry, and he has a lot of incentive to go up and tell the story, especially after his underlings have laid it all out. I’ve always said Bolton is a patriot (despite his poor policy stances), and I don’t think he will put Trump or the Republican party in front of telling the truth about something he knows should not have happened.
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While the cesspool continues to fill at an even more alarming rate.
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The second half of your sentence is why Trump wants him.
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Trump only considers loopholes because he’s incapable of doing things legally and no one who is above the law is willing to work for him.
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He is a shoo-in, and beloved on the right
I think it was Taylor’s testimony where he said he was told by someone at NSC (either Bolton or someone at Bolton’s behest) to send a cable to Pompeo with Taylor’s concerns. That sounded to me that like a shot across the bow to Pompeo. If Pompeo ignores it (which he seemingly did), it creates a paper trail directly to him that paints him in with the rest of the malefactors engaged in the scheme.
Knowing that Pompeo wouldn’t act on it, it seemed like a big FU from Bolton.
ETA: From the recent TPM article on Dems asking Bolton to testify:
It seems he wanted to make sure everyone was getting smeared in the mess.
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I hope they do challenge it; heaven knows that they were quick enough to go to court and get the interim appointments that Obama made struck down, and this is after presidents had been making interim appointments for decades. What makes it any more valid for Trump to use “acting” appointments to get around Senate confirmation just because the position is described as “acting” rather than “interim”?
However, the real answer to this is for Congress to tighten up the law so as not to permit this kind of runaround. And yeah, I know: “snowball’s chance in hell of getting out of Mitch McConell’s senate.”
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Sounds like we may have to start impeaching judges once we get a decent president and a functioning Senate again.
This is not quite true. He wasn’t weeping. He was “screaming, crying, and whimpering.”
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To be honest, I wouldn’t mind if Trump shenanigans basically open up a giant loophole in the FVRA. I still remember how the GOP/McConnell used the Senate to deny Obama bipartisan and qualified candidates, just because. The next Dem administration will need to staff up quickly and not get bogged down in Senate slow-rolling of candidates.
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And when bipartisan opposition to Cuccinelli put his prospects of leading USCIS in danger, Trump created an entirely new “first assistant” role and gave it to the right-winger. Cuccinelli’s first day filling in atop the agency was also his first ever day in federal government.
And of course, this piece of shit will be installed as the “acting” DHS Secretary.
There really needs to ba a lawsuit challenging Trump’s use of “acting” Dept Secretaries to evade the Senate’s advice and consent role. It’s yet another area where Trump makes a mockery of the Separation of Powers and the Constitution.
Only the best people
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