The very first thing Trump, Barr, Pompeo and others will do is to continue with what they’ve been doing: draining the federal bureaucracy of civic-minded civil servants. You wanna work for Trump’s CIA? Wanna work for Trump’s FBI, DoJ, or DoD? Show them you want to be there. Show loyalty. I don’t mean he can necessarily drive all of the millions of individual employees out, just the influential ones - the ones who supervise the rest. They’ll change the culture.
And once you break that culture of public service and replace it with fealty, corruption, and quid pro quo, it’s broken for a long time.
The title of the thread taken literally would be a comparison between acquittal and removal from office, the answer of which is obviously he couldn’t commit after removal. The OP talks about the entire impeachment process.
It seems fairly obvious to me that going through this process will lead the apparatus of government to try to avoid similarity in malfeasance in the future. They’ll have learned a bit about the flaws in their communications system, weeded out even more of the people who might blow the whistle. The rank and file, if not Trump, will have learned how better to cover up their misdeeds during this pressure test.
I’m amazed at how optimistic others on this board seem to be by giving the second two responses - that it won’t get worse, or that his administration will simply repeat more of the same level of corruption. I think they will be less likely to do the same thing again- now they’ve tested for leaks and gotten some practice in they will be more bold and blatant.
I don’t see anything in the Constitution about not being impeached twice for the same offense - maybe the Dems will have another go at it if and when Bolton’s book comes out.
In answer to the OP, no change in anyone’s behavior - not Trump, not the Dems, not nobody.
It feels self-evident that some Republican governor will get the National Guard (and hey, why not some militia members) out to “protect” voting places from in-person “voter fraud.”
I think I’ve been proven correct on this one. The orange one is going ape. Way beyond what he’s done in the past. His evil nature has been given free rein.
Could you elaborate on these “new crimes”? The only recent scandal I’ve read about has been the firing of impeachment witnesses. As discussed in other threads here, this may be reprehensible but it’s completely legal.
Of course it’s all legal. There is nothing illegal about Trump using his office to give relief to his political friends and punish his political enemies. But, he an McConnel have day jobs, they’re supposed to be governing.
I voted more likely and was proven right. This business with the Roger Stone sentencing shows how corrupt both him and Barr are. I don’t see what difference the sentence would have made, the fucker is going to be pardoned anyway.
I voted more likely as well because Trump is a petty vindictive son of a bitch and Republicans don’t have the integrity to do anything about it because Trump is giving them their way.
You might be able to try something on Barr, although it would be a stretch to say the least.
Cite. If you want to condemn Trump based on facts not in evidence, feel free of course.
That’s actually up to Congress - not just the Democrats. So it appears that it is the Dems who are now to be constrained in their more excitable moments.
Those statements could be technically true, if, for example, Trump made a phone call (or directed one of his underlings to do so) to Barr or someone else at DOJ before he tweeted. And receiving word about the president’s strongly-held wishes, possibly second- or third-hand, doesn’t technically qualify as “consulting with the White House,” does it?
It may have filtered down from one of his caporegimes, but there is no way in hell that Trump wasn’t the prime mover for this shitshow.
I don’t think you need to parse Kerri Kupec’s words to that degree. Trump Admin spokespeople have blatantly made things up enough times with no consequence that you can completely disregard what they say. The most convincing evidence we have of Barr and Trump’s role in this is the timeline.