I’m not sure how telling yourself that Orange Thanos is going to get whatever he wants no matter what is “prepping” for anything except preemptive surrender.
Nobody is saying that. Nice straw man you’ve got there.
Then if we agree, why are we arguing?
You would know.
This is the Pit, so I suspect that the thread hijack isn’t meaningful, but y’know that this is yet another thread that’s devolved into a continuous circle of “Trump will be able to do whatever he wants!” “No, he won’t – there are laws and the Constitution which he won’t be able to avoid!”
Actually, I think it’s he’ll try whatever he wants to. The sad thing is that there are people who will assist him on that. The safeguards that are supposed to be in place to prevent such a usurpation/consolidation of power in the United States recently don’t seem to be all that safe or to be doing that much guarding.
That’s not my position. My position is that he will try to get away with everything he can, and enough people in power agree with him and will help him that a lot of it will stick.
Consider that presidents are not supposed to make money from the government beyond their salary. Except that Trump has stayed at his own properties and charged the government for the boarding of his own secret service agents. And no one stopped him.
He has almost certainly gotten bribes in the form of quid pro quo from foreign countries. And no one stopped him.
He was impeached for his actions in the January 6th insurrection. And the Senate acquitted him.
If he does something illegal, he has to be accused and impeached… by what will be a republican house of representatives. And found guilty… by a republican senate.
If he decides that the department of homeland security should be allowed to oversee the issuance of birth certificates and California objects, then they have to bring suit against him. And while that suit wends its way through the courts, people will be affected
False. It is not necessary to impeach the president to stop them from violating the law. Every president in US history - INCLUDING Trump -has been shut down by the courts several times when they tried to do something unconstitutional.
No, while it works its way through the courts, his order will be stayed. Not that it would need staying, because there isn’t even any such thing as a Federal Registrar of Births nor does DHS have the lawful authorization to establish one, and he can’t just wish one into being, no matter how loud he yells or how many people he fires, because the president does not rule by decree.
Birth certificates in DC are issued by the DC Department of Health, not directly by the federal government.
Let us say that you are absolutely right that no nastiness on the part of Trump and his cohorts can possibly happen. Do you know what my consequences are? I am pleasantly surprised.
On the other hand, if I (and so many others) are right and a bunch of nasty shit goes down because of Trump and his cohorts, how does it effect you?
It seems to me that erring on the side of caution isn’t so bad under these very unusual circumstances.
I never said that Trump can’t do anything, but people seem less interested in talking about the things he can do (tariffs, reinstate the family separation policy, make life generally harder than it needs to be for LGBT people and minorities, etc.) than things he can’t do (put major cities under military government, mass deportations of legal immigrants, end birthright citizenship, arrest and/or execute Democratic politicians or civil servants, etc.).
I’ve stayed out of this debate till now because I don’t know enough about it. And I don’t intend to participate in any depth. However, a couple of thoughts:
As I understand it, there are numerous former constitutional democracies around the world that have become actual or de facto dictatorships, and most of them had a constitution and systems of laws that said this was impossible on paper. So just saying that on paper Trump can’t do this or that is not enough.
ISTM that what the US has going for it are:
- a far longer democratic tradition, leading to greater levels of “human” guardrails
- probably deeper levels of bureaucratic and legal guardrails
- greater distributed power due to the USA being a bunch of federated states with each state being it’s own power base to some extent.
But as to the first two points the pace at which Trump made inroads through such guardrails during his first term was disheartening. Did you honestly think he could have done some of the things he did, before he did them and got away with it?
I think the third point is the real issue. You have pointed out that time is not on Trump’s side and I agree. But it’s those who have learned from him and will come after that are the greater concern. Trump has shown a way that was previously believed impossible. This has not gone unnoticed by more competent but equally nasty people.
I’m sure in some dusty part of his lizard brain, his understanding of the tariffs concept says to him that China will have to cut him a personal check every time they want to import something, so it’s all profit. What I wouldn’t give for anyone within that administration to actually sit for an incisive interview with a non-pliant journalist and answer basic questions like “Explain for us how he thinks this works.”
I assume then something similar in Federal territories?
It doesn’t register people to vote or run the elections either, but here we are.
Just keep whistling past that graveyard.
Here we are what? My county/state ran the election and it went fine.
I think we’ll find red states well go along with whatever Trump asks them to do re citizenship. Of course blue states will not, and a case will eventually ensue.
I think Trump will claim brown people born in the US without proven citizens as parents should be considered the children of enemy combatants and thus denied citizenship. The Supreme Court will likely agree with him. No amendment needed, no laws needed.
I severely doubt that.
For some definitions of “fine.” Several states wanted to keep Trump off of their ballots because of – you know – the whole insurrection thing but the Federal courts said they couldn’t do that.
Guardrails seem to magically disappear where his nibs is concerned.
Disappear? Seems to me they appear every time he’s about to drive off the road!
Because Trump was never found guilty of the crime of insurrection. “Everybody knows he did it” does not exempt one from due process.