I’ve read this from people who watched Watergate and understand what they’re saying. But if there’s a difference, I think most people have already assumed the worst about Trump. The Bengazi and the e-mail hearings brought down Hillary Clinton, and so did Wiki-Leaks, but that’s because it was possible to bring her approval and favorability ratings down to begin with.
But Trump’s approval and favorability have hardly ever been above 50% and with the exception of a handful of times, his favorability/likeability/job approval ratings have been well below 50% and quite often even below 40%. He can’t go much lower.
Impeachment isn’t required, even when the president commits egregious acts. It’s optional. It’s a tool - a political tool, not a legal one. I think it’s risky to use it unless you know that there’s some political advantage to be gained by using it. There are other tools available to remove the president, like beating him in an election.
Actually, it was Powers’s idea…he wanted to play a more demanding role than he was getting. The producers were against it because he was making them tons of money already as a pretty boy.
For what it’s worth, I’ve never thought you were nuts. I think you’re tedious and self-righteous, and that your guy-in-the-lifeboat-screaming-“we’re-all-gonna-DROWN!” shtick is unhelpful at best, but I would not attribute any of your defects to mental illness.
“You know what I am? I’m your worst fuckin’ nightmare, man. I’m a Congressman with a subpoena, which means I got permission to kick your fuckin’ ass whenever I feel like it!”
You know, I might walk that back… Cooper is the only source for that “48 hours” quote and I can’t find it anywhere else (though I didn’t watch the 7 minutes of Nadler’s testimony, tbh.) I asked Cooper… and he has replied to me before… and if he does, I’ll let y’all know.
Does anyone have a read on how enforceable Congressional subpoenas and contempt charges are? If the executive branch decides not to prosecute the case, it seems like this is pretty toothless ultimately. This articleon the process leads me to believe that ultimately, Barr can do whatever he wants.
*
“Either house of Congress can vote to hold in contempt a witness who refuses to provide testimony or produce requested documents pursuant to a congressionally authorized subpoena. As set out in 2 U.S.C. § 194, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia has the “duty to bring the matter before the grand jury for its action.” Contempt of Congress, which is a federal misdemeanor, is punishable by a maximum $100,000 fine and a maximum one-year sentence in federal prison. But if the executive branch is not inclined to prosecute a contemnor (the contemnor is a person or entity who is guilty of contempt before a judicial or legislative body), Congress will have a difficult time implementing such a penalty. Congress can also file a lawsuit asking a judge to order the witness to provide the information, raising the additional possibility of imprisonment for contempt of court.”*
“Disputes between Congress and the president over the scope of executive privilege are better understood as political battles with legal underpinnings—not as pure legal battles to be decided in court. It remains to be seen how effective Congress’s constitutional tools will be, but it is a pretty safe bet that using these tools effectively will require time, energy and commitment. In short, each side will have to consider what it can reasonably get away with in the current political environment—even as each side uses the processes associated with the interbranch push-and-pull of executive privilege to shape that environment.”
If the ultimate arbiter is how much the Republican party is willing to see what “it can reasonably get way with” then we are in trouble.
Look, we have no idea who these officials are. The only one who we know by name who claims this is how it went down is Barr himself. He is also the one who claims that Mueller told him that it was not the DOJ regs that prevented him from charging Trump with obstruction of justice.
Both of these claims of what Mueller has said are in clear conflict with what is in the actual text of Mueller’s letter and the report, respectively. I choose to believe what Mueller actually put down in writing to what Barr claims he told him in person since Barr is now known not to be a credible source and Mueller is known to be very careful with what he chooses to say, certainly in writing and I would presume in person too.
(Actually, here is my conjecture for what Mueller told Barr in regards to the obstruction of justice claim: I think that Mueller did what he would have to do by his own logic; I think he basically told Barr that he can’t say either way whether he would have charged Trump with obstruction of justice if his interpretation of the DOJ regs had allowed him to. After all, if he tells Barr “Yes, I would have charged the President if not for the DOJ regs” then he is violating his own principle of not making a charge that the President is unable to defend in court. And, so I think Barr has parsed this as “It wasn’t the DOJ regs that prevented Mueller from charging the President with obstruction.” However, that is not the correct conclusion at all. The correct conclusion is exactly the conclusion one draws from the actual text of the Mueller report, which is that Mueller felt constrained to not render a prosecutorial judgement in regards to obstruction of justice unless that prosecutorial judgement was that Trump clearly did not commit the crime. And, the evidence prevented him from reaching that judgement. Whether or not Mueller would have charged / indicted the President if he felt he could is unclear, but what is crystal clear is that Mueller either reached the conclusion that the President committed the crime of obstruction or that he may have committed the crime of obstruction. The only thing that has been ruled out by the report is the possibility that Mueller believed that the President clearly did not commit obstruction.)
Maybe Mueller needs to come out with another open memo to Barr which reads in full. “No you goat felcher I wasn’t talking about the media I was talking about you. I clearly stated that it was you who misrepresented my report!”
Of course Barr would probably make a public statement interpreting that memo as calling for Clinton’s immediate incarceration. And Farnby who didn’t bother to read the memo will take that interpretation as the gospel truth.
But is it really that big a deal? Now, if he had made a misstatement on a Sunday morning talk show, and was corrected shortly there after, then we would have something.
Just got a notification on my phone that the “White House blasts Mueller report, says Trump can instruct advisors not to testify to Congress”. Apparently, the WH Counsel sent a letter arguing this to AG Barr.
So we’ve moved from “total exoneration” to “blasting” in, what…3 weeks?