No. The President can fire any political appointee directly, without going through layers of upper management, if he wants. It is inherent in the concept of executive power, which is vested solely in the office of the President.
Past administrations have generally tried to avoid the appearance of impropriety by having departments write regulations and guidelines for internal appointees. But those regulations and guidelines are not binding on the President and it would be an uphill battle to argue that they are.
Then why did Nixon have to fire his AG twice to get the results he wanted? You even specifically in your response that he could order the AG to fire them, not that the President himself could fire them. Why bring that up if the President can fire them directly?
I mean, I was responding specifically to what you said, after all.
Because Archibald Cox was appointed by the Attorney General and Nixon wanted the AG to fire him in order to preserve the illusion of independence. Nixon also wanted to avoid a court battle about whether or not he had the authority to go around the AG to do so. It’s not a settled matter of law, but he almost certainly would have prevailed had Bork not stepped in to halt the massacre at DOJ.
I said that because that’s the typical way that presidents handle these things, for a variety of reasons. But we are in atypical times.
Part of the issue has to do with the chain of command. I believe in the military it is taught that you only obey the orders your direct superior, and that if you get any countervailing orders, you had better be sure your superior is OK with it. People in general follow this mindset even when not in the military, as they have less personal interaction with those who are many layers removed from their actual work. Thus, in order to get the Department of Justice to do anything, you have to give the orders to its leader, who then passes them on to his minions. Giving the orders directly to the minions can lead them saying “Ok, maybe, but I should check with my boss to see if that’s what he wants.” If Trump went on Twitter now and publicly fired Mueller but no one in the Justice Department had actually made that decision, the Justice Department would still keep him on the payroll, let him use office space, give him whatever authority he needed to do the job that the Justice Department hired him to do. The only way around that is to replace the head of the Justice Department. And until you get a hand-picked crony to pass the Senate, there’s a line of descent of people that automatically fill the the spot of the head of the Department, and they get increasingly career-bureaucrat-like, so you need to hope that one of them will do your bidding. Is there a single person in the Justice Department who would do Trump’s bidding in this affair?
Quite possibly the Solicitor General would. And Noel Francisco is apparently a big, BIG believer in things like executive privilege being able to shield everything. I think, but I’m not certain, that he is supposed to be very much a Trump partisan. Not that that’s a surprise, he is an appointee.
The real issue here is, the thicker-than-pig shit American voter, who has outsourced civic responsibility over the years, and whose metric of political success is his level of economic optimism. For years, the average American has held democratic norms and values and low regard. It just took a special kind of shithead like Donald Trump to make it all bubble up to the surface.
If you think Mueller is going to save American democracy, if you think Bernie Sanders is going to save American democracy, if you think a pathetic blue…ripple in November is going to save American democracy…think again.
That’s real good, Mr. Kansas law dog, 'cause law just don’t go around here. Savvy?
Look, scream in the dark if you wish, but the reality is that Trump and the right wing are basically shredding the rule of law to pieces, and more importantly the general public doesn’t really seem to care all that much as you do. And therein lies the problem. SDMB legal analysts and political pundits might care, but most do not.
I’m an astute observer of politics and history, and what is happening here now has happened in other failed democracies. The right wing machine is tearing this country into pieces, and nothing will be done about it until there is disaster first. You can shout at me and hope I go away, but the reality will stay. We’re fucked. Nothing can change that outcome.
Trump and the GOP thank you for your efforts in spreading despair and hopelessness among Democrats and liberals (and moderates and reasonable conservatives). If we all accept your conclusion, you’ll surely be proven correct. Some of us might prefer to try and force another outcome, however unlikely that may be, and the GOP is grateful for your attempt to sabotage our efforts.
He’s not trying to sabotage anyone’s efforts. He’s trying to make all predictions so that if one of them comes true, he can prance around and declare that he’s super smart. Hell, if he were trying to sabotage things, at least he’d have a goal beyond his own ego.
I ignore asahi because i have a personal rule that I disregard the opinions of anyone who uses the phrase “flyover country” unironically. Denigrating the vast middle of the country has always been a reliable inducator of intellectual laziness, and it’s especially troublesome now that we’re faced with a demagogue who rose to power by exploiting regional and class resentment.
Repetitious, maybe. Annoying, possibly. Like when the car alarm or smoke alarm go off and you can’t get to the button to silence them. But wrong? If so, show us. Show us how we’re NOT fucked. State your case.
Speaking of how screwed we are: the White House assault on DOJ/FBI has me seriously freaked out. Either (a) Trump and his congressional toadies are intentionally sabotaging the work of the DOJ by burying it under a mountain of bullshit – and in this post-truth era we’re in (another reason to curse Trump to the pits of hell forever) the sheer volume and noise is an indicator of truthiness; or (b) the DOJ corruptly worked to influence the last election.
Either of those scenarios is horrifying. Of course (a) is the true one but does that even matter? How do we recover from this? I’m not a huge fan of the FBI but we need a functional law enforcement agency.
So far. But HOW much time? In your lifetime? Your children’s?
And not “can it be done,” but “will it be done”? IOW will the Democrats get their shit together? So far, they can’t figure out how to play this. I can see another spoiler candidate like Bernie pulling votes. Again.
He doesn’t need to. WTF have we been describing in multiple threads on this board for over a year??
I think you underestimate the pervasiveness of the core of anger and ignorance that got thump elected. That’s not going away. I believe it’s growing. Leave asahi’s rants if they bother you and address that, please. Anyone? I fully expect thump to get re-elected in 2020.