So far, anyway. I’m still hoping that some smart lawyer will find a way for some of these to be prosecutable. I’d start with the whole “emoluments” thing–I’d always imagined that there were clear limits on what a sitting POTUS could own, control, make money from, etc. but it turns out, no. He can own pretty much anything, and make a profit off of selling it (or in Trump’s case, renting it out by the night) to foreign governments and no one can do a damned thing about it. The latest one is “maintaining phone logs,” to which his answer apparently is “Who says I was supposed to keep records? Sue me,” which I’m hoping someone will, but I’m also still hoping for a pony this Christmas.
What other principles of Presidential behavior that you assumed were clearly spelled out in the law has Trump demonstrated to be toothless and meaningless in a practical sense? And in which order of clarity would you place them? (By the latter, an example of “not very clear” would be the whole “release his taxes” thing which was never actually a law, just a tradition. “Emoluments”, however, is in the Constitution, but apparantly was a total waste of ink.)
Right off the bat, I’d say the whole ‘being able to claim the election was stolen from him with zero evidence that it was and tons of evidence that it clearly wasn’t’ thing should be right up there at the top.
The point is, that he hasn’t “shown them to be toothless for POTUSes”, it’s that he’s shown them to be toothless if the majority of members of Congress want to let him get away with it. You can’t generalize from Trump’s example, because it really only applies to candidates who both want to abuse their prospective office, and have essentially unlimited support from their toadies.
Biden couldn’t pull half the shit Trump did, because at least a few Democrats would be willing to hold him to account. What will happen in the future is anyone’s guess.
But isn’t the idea that some things (like “emoluments”) are on the books already, and don’t require that the Congress ratify them (again)? If he fucks his daughter anally on TV and then discusses it in an interview, he’s going to jail, isn’t he, POTUS or not?
But as a serious answer to the OP’s question, I’d say “respecting subpeonas.” Resist them legally, okay. But once you’ve exhausted legal channels, you turn that shit over or appear where you’re supposed to, or you go directly to jail.
Sorry --should have specified that the daughter would be 12 years old and screaming “DADDY, NO!” the whole time.
What law is the whole “subpoenas” thing violating? Specifically, which part of it spells out what the penalties are and the standard for charging the violation?
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It seems pretty misogynistic or at least unfriendly to well actually almost every other poster. Rape fantasies are generally not condoned on the SDMB.
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