US Politics Thread 2016-2020

[vienna]

Interesting take on the possibility of SCOTUS getting involved with the Trump Impeachment 2: The Constitution Strikes Back:


The Supreme Court Can, Should, and Will Stay Out of Impeachment --

https://www.nationalreview.com/corne...f-impeachment/





<O>

[Rockstar]

The headline might be a bit misleading. I think what the article is saying is that former officials are still subject to a Senate trial even if they have left office. I agree with that, there should be no such thing as a get out jail free card.

But a SCOTUS judge is very much involved in the impeachment as its the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court who presides over the Senate impeachment trial. The defendant is afforded the opportunity to have lawyers, present evidence and chance to defend himself. The Senate verdict is final without any chance of appeal.

[August]

Interesting...

FBI Arrests Antifa Leader John Sullivan in Utah After Storming US Capitol …Update: With FBI Affidavit

Antifa-Insurgence leader John Earl Sullivan is in custody after being arrested in Utah on Thursday.
As reported previously Antifa protester John Sullivan was caught on video posing as a Trump supporter during the rioting at the US Capitol last week.

Footage obtained by the Gateway Pundit from militant Black Lives Matter and Antifa activist John Sullivan’s Discord server shows the so-called “civil rights activist” reveling inside the U.S. Capitol on Jan 6 as he damaged federal property.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/202...KiMrxQMVruC2Mw

[gap]

Originally Posted by u crank

I google searched hillary Clinton says russians helped trump in 2016 and these articles were on the first page.

Ah, that's the ill-famed Russiagate. Even in Europe it was covered by newspapers and newscasts for months. Silly me for not thinking of it before.

A very complicated topic actually, we could discuss it forever, but I hope you will agree with me that that it is a controversial case, with several good points and several flaws on both sides.

According to Wikipedia:

The investigation was officially concluded on March 22, 2019. The report concluded that the Russian Internet Research Agency's social media campaign supported Trump's presidential candidacy while attacking Clinton's, and Russian intelligence hacked and released damaging material from the Clinton campaign and various Democratic Party organizations. The investigation "identified numerous links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign", and determined that the Trump campaign "expected it would benefit electorally" from Russian hacking efforts. However, ultimately "the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities". Mueller later said that the investigation's conclusion on Russian interference "deserves the attention of every American".

On potential obstruction of justice by President Trump, the investigation "does not conclude that the President committed a crime", as investigators would not indict a sitting president per an Office of Legal Counsel opinion. However, the investigation "also does not exonerate" Trump, finding both public and private actions "by the President that were capable of exerting undue influence over law enforcement investigations". Ten episodes of potential obstruction by the president were described. The report states that Congress can decide whether Trump obstructed justice, and has the authority to take action against him. Attorney General Barr and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who had authorized the Mueller probe, decided on March 24, 2019, that the evidence was insufficient to establish a finding that Trump committed obstruction of justice. Upon his resignation on May 29, 2019, Mueller stated that: "the Constitution requires a process other than the criminal justice system to formally accuse a sitting president of wrongdoing". In July 2019, Mueller testified to Congress that a president could be charged with obstruction of justice (or other crimes) after he left office.

Yes I know, it is just... Wikipedia, but I didn't want to quote any newspapers because of their tendency to side for one faction or the other.

From the above I get that the allegation by Democrats were not false; there actually were pro-Trump foreign interferences during the electoral campaign, and actions which could have obstructed the following investigations and finally the course of justice, even though it couldn't be proved that the President was guilty of them.

Not being guilty by law, doesn't mean being exempt from moral and political responsibility, but let's suppose for a moment that the whole case was just bull****, an Invention by Hilary Clinton and her associates to hamper their rival. Please answer the following question: what is worse, accusing a political candidate (by then the US president) and/or his campaign staff to have connived with a foreign power at brainwashing electors, or maintaining that hundreds of US officials involved in the electoral process, several Supreme Courts and the Congress itself, plotted in stealing votes from a candidate and in not giving course to his allegations?

After the Russiagate case became of public domain, many people including me started questioning Trump's rectitude and the fairness of certain propaganda methods, but never, not even for a moment, we doubted about the integrity of US institutions as a whole. Conversely, Trump's delirious assertions against the institutions of the country he is leading, have convinced billions of people worldwide that the USA are a banana republic of some sort, and that its democracy is only formal.

In am not an US Citizen and I am not in the position of saying what is anti-american and what not, but something is clear to me: with his line of conduct, President Trump is damaging the reputation of his own country, and he is jeopardizing the democracy all over the world. I might be biased, but I don't think the same can be said about Hilary Clinton.

[Cybermat47]

Originally Posted by August

Interesting...

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/202...KiMrxQMVruC2Mw

You just have to look at the banner to see that that site is biased. Might as well point to a CNN article as ‘proof’ that Clinton isn’t corrupt.

If there are primary or reliable secondary sources about the story, then those would certainly be worth a look.

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Cybermat47

If there are primary or reliable secondary sources about the story, then those would certainly be worth a look.

What the hell? There's a freaking copy of the criminal complaint from the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia right in front of you. Read the damn thing.


Here I'll make it easier for you https://www.justice.gov/opa/page/file/1354781/download its the same criminal affidavit on the same antifa insurrectionist posing as a Trump supporter.

[Cybermat47]

Originally Posted by Rockstar

What the hell? There's a freaking copy of the criminal complaint from the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia right in front of you. Read the damn thing.

Anyone can type a document like that. If you can link me to somewhere that the document has actually been published by the US District Court of the District of Columbia, then that would be an infinitely more reliable and trustworthy source than a website that might as well have “we are biased” in its banner.

It’s like when communists post CIA reports about how the USSR was an extremely well fed country, I’m not going to trust it when the person providing the information is so obviously biased.

Do I find the story believable? Absolutely. Would I be surprised if it turned out to be true? Not at all. But biased news sources should be treated as what they are... biased.

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Cybermat47

Anyone can type a document like that. If you can link me to somewhere that the document has actually been published by the US District Court of the District of Columbia, then that would be an infinitely more reliable and trustworthy source than a website that might as well have “we are biased” in its banner.

It’s like when communists post CIA reports about how the USSR was an extremely well fed country, I’m not going to trust it when the person providing the information is so obviously biased.

Do I find the story believable? Absolutely. Would I be surprised if it turned out to be true? Not at all. But biased news sources should be treated as what they are... biased.

You going with its a CIA or Communist plot and conspiracy theory now?

[Cybermat47]

This is an actual primary source.

https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/u...states-capitol

Now that I’ve found evidence that wasn’t published by a blatantly biased new source, I can take it seriously.

Originally Posted by Rockstar

You going with the CIA and Communist plots now?

No, I’m talking about that CIA report that communists constantly point to and claim that it proves that ‘communism is totally cool and doesn’t kill millions through starvation’, and using it as an example of how biased sources shouldn’t be trusted.

You’d think that saying biased sources can’t be trusted wouldn’t result in a back-and-forth, but this is the US Politics Thread...

[Buddahaid]

Originally Posted by Cybermat47

This is an actual primary source.

https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/u...states-capitol

Now that I’ve found evidence that wasn’t published by a blatantly biased new source, I can take it seriously.



No, I’m talking about that CIA report that communists constantly point to and claim that it proves that ‘communism is totally cool and doesn’t kill millions through starvation’, and using it as an example of how biased sources shouldn’t be trusted.

You’d think that saying biased sources can’t be trusted wouldn’t result in a back-and-forth, but this is the US Politics Thread...

You do have a point, misunderstood, or not.

Biden's first plan. Keep people afloat and housed. Stimulus for small business and individuals with more money from somewhere. Not surprising but where does the money come from? This will bring the individual stimulus in line with Trumps $2000.00 but again, where is this wealth coming from?

[August]

Originally Posted by Cybermat47

Now that I’ve found evidence that wasn’t published by a blatantly biased new source, I can take it seriously.

Oh that is SUCH a relief that you take it seriously but yet I notice after the lamented back and forth that you have no comment on the actual subject.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by Buddahaid

You do have a point, misunderstood, or not.

Biden's first plan. Keep people afloat and housed. Stimulus for small business and individuals with more money from somewhere. Not surprising but where does the money come from? This will bring the individual stimulus in line with Trumps $2000.00 but again, where is this wealth coming from?

Who cares? Just turn that spigot wide open, we'll worry about it later.

Biden’s $1.9 trillion Covid relief plan calls for stimulus checks, unemployment support and more

[bstanko6]

Wow... antifa posing as Trump supporters?

Didn’t the Dems support their terrorist activities all year long? Hmmm... how many people did they kill... 47?

And now sleepy Joe “can’t make a clear sentence, but was fraudulently elected” Biden will be your president?

This is going to be comical!

[Buddahaid]

Right! What am I thinking I retire soon anyway....

[August]

The impeachment of freedom of speech

If Trump is found guilty, it will have terrible consequences for liberty of thought and speech.

Brendan O'Neill
13th January 2021

Donald Trump has once again made history in a way he would rather not have. He has become the first president in the history of the American republic to be impeached twice. The House of Representatives has voted to impeach him for ‘incitement of insurrection’. He will now be put on trial by the Senate. If he is found guilty – not impossible, given how many Republican representatives and senators have been making pro-impeachment noises – he will be turfed out of office at the very end of his presidency and barred from ever standing for political office again.
Who could be against this? Trump, as most of the media, the social-media oligarchies and politicians of all persuasions have been insisting incessantly since the breaching of the Capitol last week, is the new Hitler. The Capitol riot was the Reichstag Fire / the Beer Hall Putsch / Kristallnacht 2.0 – pick your favourite Holocaust metaphor – and Trump is responsible for it. The protesters were insurrectionists – worse, they were terrorists – and Trump was the spiritual and operational instigator of their terrorism. That’s the narrative we have been suffocated with for a week now. The Capitol breach was the 9/11 of our times, serious journalists madly claim, and Trump was its Osama bin Laden. People have actually said this.

In such a moment of hysteria – and we really have reached hysteria now – it can be difficult to call for calm and reflection. But that is what we must do before things go too far. The truth is that this impeachment of Trump is deeply problematic. It is an indictment not just of a president who has done many gravely questionable things in recent weeks, but also of freedom of speech; of the right of everyone – whether president or plebeian – to express him or herself plainly and passionately. Trump is essentially on trial for making heated political comments, for pushing an ideological line – that the 2020 election was ‘fraudulent’ – that many people find offensive. If he is found guilty, he will be found guilty of expressing himself in a way that the political elite considers problematic. Everyone needs to stop, breathe, and consider the impact this would have on the already frail culture of freedom.

It doesn’t matter whether you are pro-Trump or anti-Trump. It doesn’t matter whether you agree or disagree with his claims that the election was stolen from him (spiked has strongly critiqued the ‘fraudulent election’ guff from the very beginning, arguing that it was a shrill American version of the British chattering classes’ four-year effort to overturn the vote for Brexit here at home). No, this is bigger than that now. This is about what we are allowed to think and say. This is about the space that exists for strong, passionate and, yes, sometimes crazy political speech and commentary. This is about ensuring that nobody – not even Bad Orange Man – can be branded guilty and permanently expelled from political life for expressing views and agitating for political action.

Because here’s the thing: there is no proof that Trump incited violence. There is no proof that he plotted or instigated an insurrection. In the speeches and comments that have been quoted in the court of the liberal media – which has already found him guilty of being a 21st-century Nazi – Trump pushes his nonsense about the election being stolen, using political phraseology like ‘fight back’ and ‘be strong’, and expresses support for marching to the Capitol. He did not call for a riot; he did not call for anyone to enter the Capitol Building; he did not say anything about insurrection. As Alan Dershowitz has said, all of Trump’s comments fall under the protections of the First Amendment. It was legitimate political speech – whether you liked it or loathed it – not a cry for the use of imminent violence.

This matters because freedom of speech matters. Nobody has a right to incite violence; even the wonderfully liberal First Amendment, as made clear by numerous Supreme Court decisions, does not protect words that openly call for imminent violent behaviour. But everyone must have the right to argue their political case as colourfully and furiously as they like, and to call for protests and resistance. This is the stuff of politics. It always has been. If Trump is found guilty of incitement for speaking in relatively normal political language – even if he did so on a theme, election theft, that most people consider barmy – then the broader culture of speech will suffer. And if he is found guilty on the basis of how other people chose to interpret his words, then a core principle of freedom of speech – the right of politicians, artists and activists to express themselves without having to account for the behaviour of their viewers or listeners – could be lost, or at least denigrated.‘Incitement of insurrection.’ These words have meaning. They exaggerate what occurred at the Capitol – it was an opportunistic if repugnant criminal incursion, not a planned coup – and they depict rowdy political speech of the kind that Trump delivered in recent days as inevitably provoking violent behaviour. It is this that mustn’t stand. The liberty and lifeblood of politics are at risk if we criminalise more and more forms of political speech. There is hysteria in the air. You can see it in the overblown talk of coups and fascism and ‘the new 9/11’. There is a culture of vengeance too, glimpsed in the woke elites’ drawing up of blacklists of Trump employees and their desire to brand any agitating Trump supporter as a ‘domestic terrorist’. When hysteria descends, stupid things are done. This impeachment is one of those things.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/0...dom-of-speech/