I've heard the Republicans claim that President Trump couldn't possibly have obstructed justice because there was none to obstruct as there was no evidence of collusion with Russia.
On the surface this makes sense, but I haven't heard anyone say that the lack of evidence could be the result of his obstruction.
But the Democrats are too filled with hatred towards him and it is so contrary to their platform that they would never admit that he succeeded at something.
Classic Catch-22
===> "Furthermore, the issue of whether or not to impeach Trump is much more complex than what you described."
No it is not. The standard is "High Crimes and Misdemeanors", which was meant by our Founding Fathers to be a very high hurdle. When you are considering an obstruction charge where there is no evidence of an underlying crime and no evidence that any information was withheld or destroyed, you are in extremely tenuous territory.
But it is indeed a Catch 22.
Despite the rather specious nature of the proposed charge, many rabid Dems in deep blue states want their Congressmen to impeach because they detest Trump. These Dems, in turn, are pushing for impeachment because they are afraid that they will have primary challenges if they do not.
Conversely, many Dems in swing states understand that their constituencies do not want impeachment and that voting for it could cost them their seats. Pelosi understands this too, including the risk that pulling this stunt will lose Dems the House majority, so she has been trying to steer away from it.
We shall see how this plays out. It will also be fun to watch the collection of whack jobs the Dems are running for President feed on each other during debate season. Stay tuned! š
I detest Trump and reject his entire philosophy, but I donāt want him impeached, I want him voted out by the those same people that voted for him, impeachment would only make him a martyr. Iām not particularly happy about whatās coming out of the Democratic Party these days, but we will se what happens as the field starts winnowing down.
I am a registered Republican is totally disgusted with Rump (sorry, flag. I just couldn't resist!).
I'm not sure I want to see him impeached because I don't think Pence will be any better - just more competent in pushing his agenda
I agree with 25. Vote this embarrassment out of office!
I hate politics, but I absolutely did vote for Donald Trump. I absolutely WILL vote for hm again. Just throwing that out there.
===> "I hate politics, but I absolutely did vote for Donald Trump. I absolutely WILL vote for hm again. Just throwing that out there."
Yup. I can't stand his personality, including his self adulation, not even a little. I even hate the way he speaks. Also, I sometimes wish Twitter just stopped working for him.
But with all that said, the guy is a bull dog when it comes to getting his agenda items accomplished and, with the exception of his horribly misguided stance on immigration, I like his agenda. So at this point anyone who wants the same things is stuck with him.
^Agenda items Build the wall and Mexico will pay for it Iām going to replace Obamacare with something much cheaper and better As soon as I am not under audit Iām going to release my tax returns We will have an infrastructure bill passed and start working on it in the first six months of MT presidency Iāll negotiate such a good deal with China youāll get tired of all the winnings We will have a peace treaty with N. Korea as soon as I meet with little rocket man Iāll negotiate a better deal with Iran in six months Lots of agenda items lol Bet if I try I can come up with more.
I read your post twice little @Fruitcup and I can't follow what you're talking about.
Several hundred former federal prosecutors have signed a letter saying that Trump would have been charged with obstruction of justice if he were anyone else besides the president. Trump tried to fire Mueller and he tried to cover up his actions. Turmp also encouraged his aids to not cooperate with Mueller.
It's pretty clear that Mueller is handing off his report to Congress as road map for impeachment-- but he doesn't want to get involved beyond that. How quaint it is for Mueller to file a 450 page report in the age of Twitter. How many of us on TUSCL have actually read the report? Probably zero. What percentage of the public has read the report? Probably 0.001%. What percentage of Congress has read the report? Probably 5%. That's why Mueller should come out and testify to counteract the obvious spin by Barr, who's proven to be a partisan hack.
I wrote earlier that impeachment is waste of time and bad strategy unless it can pass the Senate. Time to move on.
āHow many of us us on TUSCL has actually read the report ā.
Me. I read the entire report. Both volumes. Trump is basically INNOCENT! Im my mind, end of fucking story !
Like him or not, he tries to do everything he promises. Trump's actual big campaign promises were as follows:
Not where he wants it, but the building has started. And he has already wrangled trade concessions from Mexico. š
Did that to a large degree. š
Manufacturing jobs have materially increased. due in large part to corporate tax cuts. Nowhere close to historic levels, but it's a start. š
Did it to China in a big way and is now eyeballing Mexico. š
Check. š
Tried his heart out, but wasn't able to get it through the Senate. Did get the hated individual mandate killed and has expanded the use of association and short-term plans, so things are better than they were. š
Scrapped the old deal and is now putting the screws to them. They are trying to wait him out, but it's unclear if their economy will hold up long enough. š
Sadly, he has done that, though this is one promise I wish he would break. š
We all know about this one. Check. š
The gooner just likes to keep the pot stirred. That's why he posts this crap. He knows people will jum on it.
And I'm agreeing with Ran_dumb_ member. Let's move on !
Until the Democrats can show me ANYTHING that they stand for that is positive, my vote WILL GO TO TRUMP.
I absolutely LOVE the fact that someone is going to investigate the ABUSE of power against our 4 Amendment rights. Just like the Kraft case, if you are a goddamn policeman or THE FUCKING DIRECTOR OF THE GADDAMN FBI, we should be protected against their arrogance and abuse of power. I hope anyone who violated the 4 amendment goes down in big FUCKING FLAMES!
ā What percentage of Congress has read the report? Probably 5%. That's why Mueller should come out and testify to counteract the obvious spin by Barr, who's proven to be a partisan hack.ā
Geezāso Mueller should be forced to testify because Democrats in Congress are too fucking lazy to read his report? And are losing in the āspin battle?ā I donāt buy that. And heās not Congressās Impeachment investigator (even if he thought he was).
I would like to hear him testify about when he decided that there was no Russia collusion. If that happened early on, why did his investigation last two years?
Mueller will never testify. He is a chicken shit that is afraid of the questions that he will get. If anything, he will simply say, āit is in my reportā. That alone should put this shit to rest. In America, you and me and even Donald Trump is INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY. It is the prosecutorās duty to PROOVE GUILT. If he cannot prove guilt, then we as a citizen of the United States Of America are INNOCENT!!! If any ālawyerā does not understand that, then that lawyer is in the wrong profession. The āproof of innocentā is not the way our legal system is designed.
^ "I would like to hear him testify about when he decided that there was no Russia collusion. If that happened early on, why did his investigation last two years?"
If it didn't happen early he is completely incompetent. I've been saying it for over a year.
@Rick. Agreed
I've consistently said that he has TRIED harder than any President in decades to fulfill on his campaign platform.
He hasn't been completely successful, but he's been fighting hard unlike many others who had proven to be all talk.
So youāre saying democrats should admit trump was successful at obstructing the mueller investigation but they wonāt do it because their judgment is impaired by their hatred toward trump?
You might think given dems love for dictators, sleaze, and moral and cultural decay that theyād really admire if trump had cheated to win the 2016 election and then stonewalled the investigation so heād get away with it.
Idk. I canāt really see any way dems are going to save face on this. Plus durhamās Investigation could be a real knockout.
"Geezāso Mueller should be forced to testify because Democrats in Congress are too fucking lazy to read his report?"
Hardly anyone has read the report, Dem or Republican. I don't know what the rules are, whether a subpoena of Mueller would go to the courts. But Barr is an appointee of Trump and he's proven to be a partisan hack. So yeah -- I think having Mueller testify would be useful for everyone in the country. To counteract the obvious spin by Barr.
I doubt very much it would make a difference .
^^..in other words I doubt it would sway enough Republicans.
"But Barr is an appointee of Trump and he's proven to be a partisan hack."
Total BS. Yes, he's an appointee of Trump obviously, but he has done nothing partisan. Yes, he made a decision on the obstruction charge because Mueller was too chicken shit to do the job. Since his employee Mueller failed to do his job, it fell to Barr to make a decision. He did. Just because Democrats don't like his decision, which was apparently made with the concurrence of Rob Rosenstein who supervised the investigation for most of its duration, doesn't make it partisan.
Now the Dems want to claim he is partisan because he said Trump's campaign was "spied" on. They want to argue that covert surveillance by implanted confidential informants is not "spying"? Please, don't make me laugh. All he said was the Trump was spied upon, which at this point is an indisputable fact, and that he wants to make sure it was done legally--and the Dems have a problem with that?
Yeah, we need another kind of Republican President. One thatās more polite. One that Democrats would be happy with. Someone like President Romney or President McCain. Someone who would apologize all the time. Someone who wouldnāt demand that other nations treat us with respect. Someone who would gladly accept all immigrants. Someone who would ship the rest of our manufacturing jobs to China while they steal everything we have.
I mean, Trump is too rude, too confrontational. Plus, that hair style !
Apparently speaking the truth is partisan, at least it seems that way to the libtards.
^ We already know that:
(1) There was no collusion, which was the whole point of the investigation in the first place; and (2) Trump did not withhold or destroy evidence.
What else do we need to know? That he acted like a buffoon at times? I have no doubt. That he lashed out in frustration, mostly publicly? We know - it was public. That he considered firing Mueller? What a shock given that he already knew that this whole thing was a circus act without any legitimate basis, even if we did not at the time.
More important is that he ultimately fully cooperated with the investigation. He provided a shit ton of information and denied no request, even waiving executive privilege in several instances.
So of course Republicans are not swayed, nor is anyone who is applying any critical thinking to this, including many Independents. I for one would be very swayed if there was evidence of collusion or a cover-up because either would be intolerable for a sitting President. But he is being accused of neither.
@Dugan: "That he considered firing Mueller? "
Nice choice of words. According to the Mueller report, Trump asked McGhan directly to fire Meuller on two occasions. McGhan refused. Later Trump asked McGahn to cover up the fact that he was instructed to fire Mueller.
Do you really think Barr's spin covered this sort of detail? That's why I'm in favor of hearing directly from Mueller. The general public is not going to buy a copy of the Mueller report and read all 450 pages.
^Why? So we can wallow for several more months in each of Trump's angry moments in an attempt to gin up more hyperbolic drama and press clippings?
Barr's supposed "spin' is irrelevant. At the end of the day, Trump did not impede the investigation.
The fact is that if Trump truly wanted to fire Meuller he could have. For example, Trump could have fired Meuller over McGhan's objections. Or Trump could have fired McGhan and then ordered his replacement to fire Mueller. He also could have refused to cooperate in providing documents and allowing witnesses to testify. But in the end he did none of those things.
Critical thinking Randumb - it works wonders. š
Keep in mind too the backdrop. Trump already knew that the accusation was baseless. He also had to sit there while Meuller went far beyond his mandate in what was clearly politically motivated circus act. Yet he ultimately stayed his hand and let the whole fiasco play out.
Again, there's a signed letter of several hundred ex-federal prosecutors, who've read the report, and who think Trump's behavior does amount to obstruction of justice. They carry somewhat more weight than someone on the internet who's devoted his life to paying strippers for sex.
I haven't read the report. But my gut feeling is that we should move on.
Sphincter
^^ I posted a pic on my profile in your honor
And? The DOJ currently employees 9,500 lawyers. Care to guess how many former federal prosecutors are floating around in private practice and retirements? Easily tens of thousands. Many only do short stints to get the street cred before moving on. So the fact that they found 450 willing to add an electronic signature to a politically motivate document is not exactly earth-shattering. After all, they don't actually have to prosecute it, so it's just a signature on a letter.
The real needle to thread is impeachment would be seen as slimy politics and not play well with moderates. So it's not politically smart to actually impeach. The fact is the American people don't care as much about Russian interfere as they do other issues. So it's not really worth pursuing until post election.
I wonder how many saw it but didn't sign it. I'll bet it's a lot higher number.
Do you ever apply any critical thinking to anything you read Randumb?
I am beginning to think that I am the only person here that actually read that entire report. Trump is INNOCENT. Why listen to a bunch of bullshit artists about the report. Just read the fucking thing.
^ Actually we donāt KNOW anything at all, we have simply devolved into two or three groups and canāt find anything to agree on as a baseline. @Mark yes I want the president of our country to reach out and be the president of all, not some national version of our worst impulses, I miss the time of not feeling outraged every day, Iād like to feel like the president wants us to do well even if we disagree, you seem to see enemies everywhere, I believe we do better when we collaborate
I personally see Trumps behavior as that of a spoiled, angry, petulant man, bordering on insanity. You need to have some kind of problem to walk around angry all of the time.
^^^^^^^^^ who is 2bits?
The scenario you described is not reality. Furthermore, the issue of whether or not to impeach Trump is much more complex than what you described.
Not only does Mueller's report preclude Trump from exoneration, but even Mueller himself seems to want Congress to take responsibility on impeachment proceedings. One big problem is timing, with an election coming up next year.
You've been posting a lot of political stuff lately. I think you're having a meltdown.