The Thriller
Well-Known Member
Seems like an odd time to be whining about The Times. I mean with a potential regional conflict in the Middle East and all.
He’s just so thought provoking!
The official "let's impeach Trump" thread
- Thread starter colton
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Seems like an odd time to be whining about The Times. I mean with a potential regional conflict in the Middle East and all.
He’s just so thought provoking!
Zombie
Well-Known Member
The Cool Kid's Philosophertm strikes again.
What a weird ****in standard by which to judge the validity of an accusation.
He is absolutely thought provoking in all the worst ways.
He should be making us question our morals, pride, willingness to take a stand, patriotism...
Red
Well-Known Member
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/09/17/best-evidence-obstruction-justice/
--To be clear, the president has no authority to tell a witness not to show up. The president has no absolute immunity to prevent ex-aides from testifying. And he really has no basis for instructing a private citizen who never served in the White House to obstruct an investigation. And that is what he did, according to Lewandowski.
--And so it goes. At this point the most glaring obstruction, the most comprehensible, is the president’s obstruction of impeachment hearings. If a president can prevent the House from formulating impeachment articles, then the president has literally no constitutional restraint on his conduct.
--To be clear, the president has no authority to tell a witness not to show up. The president has no absolute immunity to prevent ex-aides from testifying. And he really has no basis for instructing a private citizen who never served in the White House to obstruct an investigation. And that is what he did, according to Lewandowski.
--And so it goes. At this point the most glaring obstruction, the most comprehensible, is the president’s obstruction of impeachment hearings. If a president can prevent the House from formulating impeachment articles, then the president has literally no constitutional restraint on his conduct.
The Thriller
Well-Known Member
It’ll be interesting if norms like these have been permanently damaged by Trump. Or if the next few presidents will return to act like most presidents and don’t like... obstruct justice and abuse power like this.
And I’m old enough to remember when people claimed that having an inexperienced president like trump would enable congress to flex its muscles. They’re now more subservient than ever to the executive.
How’s Congress supposed to hold the executive accountable with one hand tied behind their backs?
Red
Well-Known Member
It's going to continue to be difficult for Democrats to win close elections for the Oval Office:
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-poli...icans-lose-popular-vote-win-electoral-college
Plus Republicans are doing a better job of gerrymandering, now with permission of the SCOTUS, and they are going strong on voter surpression. I think a Republican Senate and Presidency will see a continuation of Trump's "norms". And with Republicans packing the lower courts, reactionaries should do well in the culture wars, despite increasing diversity in demographics and social mores among the public. And that does not bode well for social harmony.
Red
Well-Known Member
Inside the Pelosi/Nadler impeachment schism:
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/18/pelosi-nadler-schism-impeachment-1501755
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/18/pelosi-nadler-schism-impeachment-1501755
During the Obama administration there was detainment when there was a prosecutable crime IN ADDITION to illegal entry into the country. Under Trump there is detainment and family separation for ALL PEOPLE who enter the country illegally.
That is a significant difference in policy and has resulted in a MASSIVE increase in the number of people detained and the number of families separated.
As well as some who enter it legally.
The Thriller
Well-Known Member
Bigot. You’re being so hateful of Republicans by posting this. Its amazing what the Lyin Libtards on this website are able to get away with. Smear Boy Scout Kavanaugh, question Great Leader, claim republicans are hypocrites. So bigoted and hateful.
You better watch out or I’ll post a stupid video of Ben Shapiro saying racist things!
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lauriandres
Well-Known Member
Silly question, why the prosecutors do not ask that data directly from the IRS? At least in Estonia and probably in EU too an ordinary person can view full audit including profits, dividends, salary etc for any registered company? Some basic data is free, but full audit etc (which might be a lot of A4 pages) costs only some euros.
For example:
https://ariregister.rik.ee/index?lang=eng
And type company name. For example, Philip Morris or Pipedrive.
Doesn't USA have anything like that?
LogGrad98
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That is definitely a stupid story.
Zombie
Well-Known Member
I'm trying to gauge how bad pancake thievery is on the dijon mustard to tan suit scale.
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The Thriller
Well-Known Member
Personally, Obama crapping on all past veterans by his latte salute ticks me off. By far the biggest scandal since the last time a lib president did something:
Red
Well-Known Member
He has found a good external enemy: California!! Oh wait, they're part of this country.
Trump administration exploring police crackdown on homeless people. And there are many in California, half the total for the US I've read. This seems to be aimed at his base, to rile up his base against Democratic-run cities. It also plays into the urban-rural division long present in our history. I give the bum credit for having a demagogue's instinct for what things will drive up anger among his followers. He's awfully good at what he does, divide Americans against themselves. Almost as if he were a Manchurian candidate and his mission was to do just that...
"Trump further griped about the presence of homeless people while speaking to reporters on Tuesday, saying they live in “our best highways, our best streets, our best entrances to buildings” where people “pay tremendous taxes”. Lucky people. Makes me want to shop for a nice highway underpass.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/sep/17/trump-police-crackdown-homeless-california
Neumann, an attorney with the East Bay Community Law Center, said the threats of a law enforcement crackdown were “consistent with the general approach of the administration – to cause as much pain and suffering as possible to people who are desperately seeking refuge”, adding: “They do it on the border, and now they are proposing to do it in the cities".
They did. The IRS refused.
Not sure. Probably not quite that easily... but the key is that people want to view Trump's individual tax statements, not just the Trump Corporation ones. And individual returns are generally protected under privacy laws. Except that there's a law saying that the appropriate congressional committee can request and MUST RECEIVE the tax information for anyone they want to investigate. The IRS is currently violating that law by refusing to turn over Trump's tax returns, which is why they are resorting to trying to get the info a different way.
The Thriller
Well-Known Member
Income taxes weren’t always private. In fact, early on in the 1920s and 1930s they were public. It was believed (and perhaps correctly) that if they were made public it would discourage tax fraud. Perhaps this is a debate that needs to be made? Should federal income taxes be private? What are the arguments for and against?
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/13/opinion/sunday/taxes-public.html
This is crazy. Something extremely odd, dangerous, abusive, and possibly corrupt is going on here by the acting DNI and possibly his superior (Trump? Is there anyone else?). Some quotes from the article, with a few sentences bolded by me:
From https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...schiff-whistleblower-takes-dangerous-new-turn
"The latest development: The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has informed Schiff, the California Democrat and chairman of the Intelligence Committee, that he will not forward a whistleblower’s complaint to the committee, as required by law.
Yet the legal rationale for refusing to do this appears specious — and raises further questions as to why this is happening at all.
This all started when Schiff announced that the Inspector General at the ODNI had alerted him to a whistleblower’s complaint that had been submitted to him. Schiff noted that the IG assessed the complaint as “credible.”
But as Schiff noted, the acting Director of National Intelligence, Joseph Maguire, has not forwarded the complaint to the Intelligence Committee.
There is a process for whistleblowers in such situations, one that has been established by federal law. A whistleblower must first submit a complaint to the IG, who determines whether it’s an “urgent concern” and “credible.” If so, the DNI “shall” forward the complaint to the congressional intelligence committees.
The idea here is that this process allows a member of the intelligence community to raise concerns about potential lawbreaking or other abuses with Congress, so it can exercise oversight over those abuses, while ensuring that classified information remains protected. This is done via the independent inspector general at first, insulating the whistleblower against agency-head retaliation, which is also provided for in the statute.
In this case, Schiff announced, the inspector general notified the committee that this whistleblower’s complaint did constitute an urgent concern and is credible — yet Maguire still hadn’t forwarded the complaint and relevant associated materials to the committee.
So Schiff called on the DNI to forward the materials, and if he failed to do that, to appear before Congress on Thursday.
Now Maguire has sent a new letter to Schiff once again refusing to forward the complaint.
...
“The inspector general makes the decision as to whether it’s an urgent concern or not,” [Margaret] Taylor said. “Under the statute as written, the Director of National Intelligence doesn’t have the discretion to not act or get a second opinion. He just has to forward it to the intelligence committees.”
...
Over the weekend, Schiff told CBS News that he’d been informed by Maguire that he was not forwarding the complaint because he is “being instructed not to” by someone “above” him, a “higher authority.” "
From https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...schiff-whistleblower-takes-dangerous-new-turn
"The latest development: The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has informed Schiff, the California Democrat and chairman of the Intelligence Committee, that he will not forward a whistleblower’s complaint to the committee, as required by law.
Yet the legal rationale for refusing to do this appears specious — and raises further questions as to why this is happening at all.
This all started when Schiff announced that the Inspector General at the ODNI had alerted him to a whistleblower’s complaint that had been submitted to him. Schiff noted that the IG assessed the complaint as “credible.”
But as Schiff noted, the acting Director of National Intelligence, Joseph Maguire, has not forwarded the complaint to the Intelligence Committee.
There is a process for whistleblowers in such situations, one that has been established by federal law. A whistleblower must first submit a complaint to the IG, who determines whether it’s an “urgent concern” and “credible.” If so, the DNI “shall” forward the complaint to the congressional intelligence committees.
The idea here is that this process allows a member of the intelligence community to raise concerns about potential lawbreaking or other abuses with Congress, so it can exercise oversight over those abuses, while ensuring that classified information remains protected. This is done via the independent inspector general at first, insulating the whistleblower against agency-head retaliation, which is also provided for in the statute.
In this case, Schiff announced, the inspector general notified the committee that this whistleblower’s complaint did constitute an urgent concern and is credible — yet Maguire still hadn’t forwarded the complaint and relevant associated materials to the committee.
So Schiff called on the DNI to forward the materials, and if he failed to do that, to appear before Congress on Thursday.
Now Maguire has sent a new letter to Schiff once again refusing to forward the complaint.
...
“The inspector general makes the decision as to whether it’s an urgent concern or not,” [Margaret] Taylor said. “Under the statute as written, the Director of National Intelligence doesn’t have the discretion to not act or get a second opinion. He just has to forward it to the intelligence committees.”
...
Over the weekend, Schiff told CBS News that he’d been informed by Maguire that he was not forwarding the complaint because he is “being instructed not to” by someone “above” him, a “higher authority.” "