Politics The Probe

I was referring to the witnesses the republicans requested, like the witness blower, Adam schiff, Devon Archer, Biden, Hunter Biden Alexandra Chalupa, Nellie Ohr, David Hale.. Lack of a Minority day etc...

Then again it is the Dem's House and they controlled all of it, in the fastest impeachment in history.

 

You do understand that even if the whole Hunter Biden thing was a legit case of corruption it doesn't change that what 45 did was illegal, right?
A blackmailer can go to jail even if the person they are blackmailing committed a crime because they too are committing a crime.

When that blackmailer is brought to trail, they can't use as defense they things the person they were blackmailing did as a defense.
Calling Hunter Biden or anyone else involved in that case would be doing just that.
The Democrats and their lawyers had the right, in fact the responsibility, not to call those people to the stand.

As to the whistle blower, you do understand how that works?
Deep Throat was the whistle blower on Watergate and no one knew he was for 20 years.
That is how it is supposed to work.
In trials where the police rely on CI's to get information on crime bosses or DA's rely on whistle blowers to bring in corporations that have been dumping toxic waste, we are not told their names to protect them.
The court protects them from repercussions, it is no different for Congress.

 

So if there was corruption from Biden in Ukraine, that is irrelevant? There is video of Joe Biden bragging about getting a prosecutor fired in Ukraine by withholding a billion dollars in aid. Sorry, that is about the wrong party so that is irrelevant to the President responsibility.

Audio recording of the DNC speaking with Artem Sytnyk (Ukrainian official) admitting to sabotage the Trump campaign, is irreverent? I guess the president is not responsible to help ensure a fair election in 2020.

Blackmail, I guess we would need to find one witness to testify to actual blackmail, as there was none who testified to that in the house.

The fact that every witness testified that there was no quid pro quo and the deepthroat here, the whistle-blower as you would, is based on his "opinion" and not something concrete like watergate, his credibility is not a matter for the House at all? Also deepthroat name was a mystery and not a known source for the impeachment hearing. It is not really a comparable example.

 

Yes, it is irrelevant to the case against 45.
I think I was pretty clear on that.
Nothing that happened in the Hunter Biden case can be brought up in the defense of 45.

There are more charges then the blackmail, I was using that as an example for the post.
Here are the actual charges since we seem to have a problem communicating.

This is going to be a long one so buckle up (and yes, a lot of it is copy pasta but I want to get the law right).
A) Federal campaign finance law prohibits a foreign national from directly or indirectly making a “contribution or donation of money or other thing of value” in connection with a U.S. election, and prohibits a person from soliciting, accepting or receiving such a contribution or donation from a foreign national.

(That’s all the law requires.
Whether or not Ukraine came through, whether or not the communications involved a quid pro quo,
His solicitation of a thing of value from the Ukrainian president in connection with a U.S. election could be a federal crime).

B)Honest services fraud occurs when a public official breaches his duty to act in the best interests of his constituents by performing an official act in exchange for personal gain.
The theory of the fraud is that members of the public have been defrauded or deprived of the honest services that they deserve from a government official.
In the criminal arena, federal statutes make it a crime to use the mail or wires, such as the telephone, for the purpose of depriving another of the intangible right of honest services (18 U.S.C. § 1346).
Congress has deemed honest services fraud to be serious enough to be punishable by up to 20 years in prison, a $250,000 fine, or both. Prosecutors frequently charge honest services fraud against corrupt public officeholders.

(Mr. Trump’s alleged misconduct came in the midst of an ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Russia invaded Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, and the resulting war has already claimed 13,000 lives.)

C) Under U.S. law, bribery of a foreign official is prohibited by the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), which prohibits U.S.-connected persons from engaging in certain corrupt acts with foreign government officials.
It carries both civil and criminal penalties.

(As described in testimony before the House’s impeachment inquiry, President Trump’s quid pro quo arrangement with Ukraine has many of the hallmarks of a classic FCPA case.)

D)The Hatch Act - It shall be unlawful for any person to intimidate, threaten, command, or coerce, or attempt to intimidate, threaten, command, or coerce, any employee of the Federal Government as defined in section 7322(1) of title 5, United States Code, to engage in, or not to engage in, any political activity, including, but not limited to, voting or refusing to vote for any candidate or measure in any election, making or refusing to make any political contribution, or working or refusing to work on behalf of any candidate.

E) And Finally, Contempt of Congress. This to me is the biggie. Every president, no matter which party has taken whatever power the president before them has managed to grab and stretched it out.
By blowing off anything Congress has asked, telling people not to testify and in general treating them like they don't matter Mr. Trump is setting a precedent for future presidents.
This sets up the possibility of a future strongman in the office.
We are slipping dangerously close to fascism if that happens.
I know that sounds like alarmist rhetoric but I'm sure the people in the Wiemar Republic didn't expect what happened either.

It's from a brief written by eight criminal attorneys.
Federal Criminal Offenses and the Impeachment of Donald J. Trump

 

I hugely disagree as I think the president can scope and see if there was a rigging of a prior election, and Biden involvement if any.

But to the actual charges (not the 5 you list):
1 - Obstruction of Congress - Sorry this is about the differences in power between the branches of government. Obstruction of Justice is about refusing a court order. There is no legal precedent saying that Congress has the power to demand executive branch to testify. The proper thing would be for the impeachment hearing to bring this issue to the courts. Look at the Washington Post they have an article about this, look at Obama who did similar for the Eric Holder issue. These instances with Obama would not qualify as impeachable nor should this.

2 - Abuse of Power - this comes down to intent completely. Originally this charge was bribery but the witnesses did not pan out for it, so this was the consolation variant. This is really a pathetic variant as they wished to remove the criminal accusation from it, to avoid the necessity of the whitleblower to come forward and his political views and other biases coming to question.

All of these are a weak impeachment case, as I mentioned the republican witnessses which you say are irrelvent did not get involved. This was a single party case, which has never happened in our history. Which leads to the possibility of strongman and blocking future presidents for any case you desire. I know this sounds like alarmist rhetoric but I won't get in to Nazi nonsense, as that is just insanity.

edited to add - Actually I am done with the dialogue once we went to the Weimar Republic,

 

I think it's funny that Republicans and trump supporters argue that impeachment will set a precedent for impeaching everyone. Sure, if the next president commits treason and high crimes and misdemeanors, then they will be impeached. The difference will be that some of the Democrats will not try to cover up crimes committed by a Democrat president.

 

Re point one. The constitution allows for Congress to impeach and remove the president. Pretty sure that would cover the ability to compel testimony. Considering that it is again, in the constitution and that the judge presiding over the trial would be the chief justice of the supreme court of the united states.
Re point 2. Days of testimony and the actual transcript illustrate intent. Please stop dragging out this dead horse. It's cruel to the horse. If trump wanted to clear himself, maybe he should have gone under oath and explained himself. Maybe he should have let several key witnesses testify under oath. Because the ones who actually did testify under oath all talked about quid pro quo.
As far as political biases, trump accuses everyone he does not like of having political biases. Any chance he might be biased? He claims people he picked for office are biased against him. Can being stupid be added to the list of impeachment charges?

 

It is Chief Justice Roberts who presides over the Senate trial, per the Constitution, but the Senate’s own Rules of Procedure and Practice that specify that it is the “presiding officer” who “shall direct all forms of the proceedings..."

It remains to be seen how much Roberts will assert his role of presiding officer or how much he will defer to McConnell to run a sham trial.

Senate rules also explicitly grant “any member of the Senate” the right to object to issues about the process and only a simple majority is needed to support an objection.

From the latest Senate Rules of Procedure and Practice (established for the Senate trial of Clinton)

VII. ...the Presiding Officer on the trial shall direct all the forms of proceedings while the Senate is sitting for the purpose of trying an impeachment, and all forms during the trial not otherwise specially provided for. And the Presiding Officer on the trial may rule on all questions of evidence including, but not limited to, questions of relevancy, materiality, and redundancy of evidence and incidental questions, which ruling shall stand as the judgment of the Senate, unless some Member of the Senate shall ask that a formal vote be taken thereon, in which case it shall be submitted to the Senate for decision without debate; or he may at his option, in the first instance, submit any such question to a vote of the Members of the Senate. Upon all such questions the vote shall be taken in accordance with the Standing Rules of the Senate.​

Reportedly McConnell does not yet have 51 votes (out of 53 Republicans) to openly and blatantly shill for Trump by restricting evidence and testimony as opposed to a process "without prejudice" as the Constitution intended.

Holdouts presumably include Mitt Romney, Susan Collins and one or two others who won't vote to "convict" in the end but may not support a sham process that McConnell envisions. There will be alot of arm twisting over the next few weeks.

 

They are also missing two Republican Senators who were kicked out after being brought up on felony charges, so there is that.

 

And make it so they can't dismiss them in the next few days when everyone isn't paying attention.

 

The first poll taken after the House impeachment vote, Morning Consult, found that 51 percent of voters approving of impeachment and removal from office and 42 percent disapprove. Equally important and by a much wider margin, 54% of voters want the Senate to call officials Trump blocked from testifying in the House (Pompeo, Mulvaney, Bolton) while 27 percent dont.

Most Voters Want Senate to Call More Witnesses for Trump’s Impeachment Trial

This strengthens Pelosi's position to force McConnell to produce the "Senate Rules of Procedure and Practice" for the Senate trial before she formally submits the Articles of Impeachment.

McConnell is unlikely to cave on this issue but Pelosi has nothing to lose by continuing to press her advantage while Congress is in recess and knowing that a few Republican senators in swing states may pay the price if McConnell continues to act as part of Trump's defense team.

This also caught my attention and would really stir things up....if Pelosi were to ask that the Senate rules require that the vote to convict be by secret ballot. Speculation is that many Senate Republicans would vote to convict if there ass was protected by secret ballot.

How Pelosi Might Remove Trump By Secret Ballot

This will never happen but Pelosi should keep stirring the pot by putting it out there.

 

Man, that is playing dirty...



It is about time.

I just don't know how it will look, or the political implications, if they hold a bunch of impeachment votes over and over.

 

A truly breathtaking post today by Dr. Heather Cox Richardson on FB re the deep dark vistas of 45* and his crew (long read, but worth it)
View: https://www.facebook.com/241446929332714/posts/2116122628531792/?d=n

 

Ex-Bush Aides Share Theory About Pelosi Delaying Donald Trump’s Senate Trial | HuffPost

This is why we can't have nice things, and how the media tempers the events when they actually happen. If people now expect Trump will be unhinged, it will let him deflect to blaming Pelosi for playing politics.

If the media hadn't reported it, and just let it happen, it would have had a bigger impact. Although the base who would be watching the STU want him to attack Democrats anyways.

But, yes, there is no way that I see why Pelosi would send over the articles of impeachment in time for the SOTU to be a triumphant claim of exoneration for Trump. They have already given him too much to talk about.