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Donald Trump Presidency discussion thread III

Quin_Dub

This thread is for the continuing discussion of Donald Trumps's presidency in the US and any related matters.

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everlast75

I agree with most of what you say, except that DJT "thinks" he CAN fire Mueller (see SHS press conference" and this seems to be why Dems are trying to rush legislation though to protect Mueller) and secondly, people need to stop thinking that because something appears to be "political suicide" that DJT won't do it. Timer and time again he has proven that he will and there seems to be no ramifications.
Even if there are this time, ala Saturday night massacre, the alternative of doing nothing could be worse.
All options are on the table for him and he is unstable enough to do any one of them

Peregrinus

everlast75 wrote: »

Trump sent a tweet urging people to watch Hannity tonight at 9.

On that show diGenova urged Sessions to fire RR and calls Comey a "dirty cop".

Politically it would be safer for DJT to fire RR as opposed to Comey so the groundwork is being done by Fox for him

Trump can't fire Mueller directly; as matters stand, only Rosenstein can fire him (and he can only do that for good cause). So firing Rosenstein isn't an alternative to firing Mueller; it's a step in a plan to bring about the firing of Mueller. The idea would be that Rosenstein's replacement would fire Mueller.

But this can't be taken for granted. Rosenstein is Deputy Attorney General; if he's fired (or resigns, or dies, or whatever) federal law prescribes an "order of succession" of other officials who would act in his post until a replacement appointment was made. Those who would act include the Solicitor General, or failing him the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, or failing him the Assistant Attorney General for National Security, and so on down the food chain. It's not at all clear that any of these people would be willing to fire Mueller (for the same reason that Rosenstein is unwilling; there is no good cause). So Trump might have to fire a succession of officials before someone willing to fire Mueller was acting in Rosenstein's place. That's exactly what Richard Nixon had to do in order to get his Special Prosecutor fired, and in fact it's what he did, but the political cost was so high that support for his presidency never recovered. And we know how it ended for Nixon. Even Trump knows how it ended.

The alternative for Trump is not to rely on any Acting Deputy Attorney General to fire Mueller, but to rush through a the appointment of a new Deputy Attorney General. But that's not so easily done; the Deputy Attorney General is one of the appointments that has to be confirmed by the Senate, which takes time. More to the point, with John McCain out of action the Republicans only have a 50-49 position in the Senate; it only takes one Republican senator to find this strategy repulsive for it to fail. Plus, it's a racing certainty that in any confirmation hearings the nominee would be asked by at least one senator to give a commitment not to fire Mueller, or to commit to the view that he doesn't believe Mueller to be guilty of anything which would justify his firing, which would make it very difficult for him to fire Mueller after being confirmed.

If you believe all you read in the twittersphere - and you probably shouldn't - Trump has already decided on at least two occasions to bring about the firing of Mueller, and each time he has been dissuaded by his staff from following through, because of the difficulty of bringing it about, the enormous political cost involved, and the very real risk that the attempt would fail.

everlast75

Trump sent a tweet urging people to watch Hannity tonight at 9.

On that show diGenova urged Sessions to fire RR and calls Comey a "dirty cop".

Politically it would be safer for DJT to fire RR as opposed to Comey so the groundwork is being done by Fox for him

Pelvis

Lest we forget Podesta's emails were leaked by wikileaks within 30 minutes of the Hollywood access tape being made public.

Could be big if they could tie the trump campaign to that leak.

Water John

Great to see Kate Bolduan back on State of America. Very quirky take on things.

Mumha

derb12 wrote: »

Really? That seems like pretty trivial grounds for approval of a raid on a lawyers offices (highly unusual) and the presidents attorney at that (unheard of).
I guess we won't know for another while yet but I assume there must have been something relating to manaforts conspiracy charges or money laundering.
I would think as well that mueller must be considering how justice can be served if he is shut down, so he is separating some tangential aspects of the investigation into state level law enforcement resources (not pardonable by trump).

I did say it was part of the reason for the raid, not the only reason.

The significance is that Cohen may have paid people off to bury the tape, which would be another campaign violation. So not so trivial. If they can get Cohen on a number of criminal violations, they will attempt to flip him, and as the fixer for Trump, that would be massive.

Mumha

https://twitter.com/krassenstein/status/984148002406354950

aloyisious

Terry wrote: »

Duh!
It's obviously the Deep State, which is run by secret president Hillary Clinton, and her VP Michael Obama (Michelle is really a man, and if you didn't know that, then you're definitely what people would call a "libtard" (something I am not calling you). How do you not know this? It's been covered by citizen reporters.).

There's proof of this on wikileaks. Just ignore the altered metadata. That's more deep state stuff designed to throw you off the scent.

It's also the deep state assigned people in the Mueller investigation. People who definitely are not members of the Republican party, and none of whom were assigned by the Trump administration, or endorsed by the Trump administration.

PRESIDENT TRUMP IS A STABLE GENIUS!
Just look at his recent tweets in the picture below.

Anyway, that's an AH type reply, so I'll probably be banned, but I was amused writing it.

So Don think's it's a good idea to help the Russian aluminum industry around the same time he's put sanctions on China's to help protect the US industry.

derb12

Mumha wrote: »

NYT are reporting that part of the FBI raid on Cohen was to seek records related to the "Access Hollywood" tape.

Really? That seems like pretty trivial grounds for approval of a raid on a lawyers offices (highly unusual) and the presidents attorney at that (unheard of).
I guess we won't know for another while yet but I assume there must have been something relating to manaforts conspiracy charges or money laundering.
I would think as well that mueller must be considering how justice can be served if he is shut down, so he is separating some tangential aspects of the investigation into state level law enforcement resources (not pardonable by trump).

Mumha

NYT are reporting that part of the FBI raid on Cohen was to seek records related to the "Access Hollywood" tape.

Mumha

Quin_Dub wrote: »

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding but in terms of Nehlen I thought he'd only managed to get on to the GOP Primary panel and if Ryan is standing down someone else can now stand against Nehlen in a GOP Primary.

Or has the timing of all of this meant that Nehlen now moves forward unopposed as the GOP candidate??

If he is the official candidate , that's incredible , the GOP themselves think he's far to out there..

IIRC, the deadline is something like June 6th, so there is time to get in but the question is how many candidates of stature are going to put their names forward in what is increasingly looking like a major loss for the republicans, in the House.

Water John

Even this, simply lying to help your sister obtain finance, gets you barred for 10 years. Cohen should indeed be worried.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/courts/high-court/solicitor-struck-off-by-high-court-over-false-information-to-bank-1.3458412

Terry

Water John wrote: »

Who is 'they', who want to take down Trump???

Duh!
It's obviously the Deep State, which is run by secret president Hillary Clinton, and her VP Michael Obama (Michelle is really a man, and if you didn't know that, then you're definitely what people would call a "libtard" (something I am not calling you). How do you not know this? It's been covered by citizen reporters.).

There's proof of this on wikileaks. Just ignore the altered metadata. That's more deep state stuff designed to throw you off the scent.

It's also the deep state assigned people in the Mueller investigation. People who definitely are not members of the Republican party, and none of whom were assigned by the Trump administration, or endorsed by the Trump administration.

PRESIDENT TRUMP IS A STABLE GENIUS!
Just look at his recent tweets in the picture below.

Anyway, that's an AH type reply, so I'll probably be banned, but I was amused writing it.

Hande hoche!

Speaking of Ryan, seeing as he is leaving in November, wouldn't put it past him to try to get through some welfare "reform". Putting his energies into that rather than say infrastructure.

Thargor

B0jangles wrote: »

Ryan himself was a childhood beneficiary of the kind of programs he is so keen to destroy.

Something else he has in common with Ayn Rand then...

Manic Moran

Mumha wrote: »

If you want to ban the word being used, that's your prerogative as a mod, however as "constitutionalist" as Scalia was, he was still open to be convinced by other arguments (in fact Scalia believed that assault rifles/weapons of war were not protected by the 2nd Amendment). Gorsuch shows no such openness or collegiality.

Even if I were a mod on this sub forum, I wouldn’t ban the word, I merely question its use.

I don’t recall any such ruling from Scalia. I also cannot find anything he may have said outside the courtroom to support such an opinion. I have noticed that people commonly misinterpret Scalia’s comment in the Heller opinion about not itself undermining other extant laws as actively supporting them, but that is not what the ruling said.

As a newbie, Gorsuch has already written a scathing dissent from California about the right to bear arms outside the home.

The dissent was written by Thomas, (joined by Gorsuch) as was the one two months ago which was even more scathing. Thomas isn’t exactly wrong either. There is a split in the circuit courts, with multiple courts holding that there is a right to bear arms outside the home, and multiple holding that they do not. The Supreme Court is supposed to resolve circuit court splits, over half the States explicitly asked the Supreme Court to rule on it, and I believe Thomas is correct in that the court’s refusal to do so is caused by the subject matter. Most court-watchers will agree that SCOTUS needs to take up the subject again whether the judges want to or not.

If your point of “nutjobness” is that Gorsuch believes that 2A exists outside the home, it is hardly an outlier position. Even his home State’s Constitution States “The right of no person to keep and bear arms in defense of his home, person and property, or in aid of the civil power when thereto legally summoned, shall be called in question“ does not limit protection of “person” to “home”. The Tenth Circuit, covering Colorado, has not been asked directly to rule upon the issue, but in Bonidy vs USPS noted that even though it was not necessary to actually pass judgement on the question in the case, it considered it likely that 2A applied outside the home. I mean, is the 7th Circuit filled with nutjobs because thy said 2A applies outside the home and struck down the last total ban on concealed weapons in the country?

He wrote more seperate opinions in his first year than Kagan did in her first two years, including dissenting against an Arkansas law that the SC struck down banning same sex couples from listing both parents names on the child's birth cert.

Maybe he likes typing more than Kagan does? Is writing an opinion a problem? Should judges not have their own opinions? Then again, Justice Thomas has spoken once from the bench in over a decade. And it was a joke. By such a standard is he a terrible judge, a great judge, or is it just the way he operates?

You are presumably referring to the dissent in Pavan v Smith.
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/582/16-992/dissent3.html

Note that the dissent is based on procedural grounds, not on the merits of the case. He did not believe that summary reversal should have been granted, and that the case should have been heard. He may or may not have ruled on spurious anti-gay grounds, but we don’t know that because the case didn’t get that far.

He has been, and will continue to be an horrific choice, chosen by McConnell throwing out the norms of the Senate to get him voted in.

Sorry. I just haven’t seen it yet. Your arguments seem based more on occasional rulings you don’t like or misunderstand than any particular outliers.

everlast75

The simplest way of describing what is privileged and what isn't.

You can inform your lawyer that you murdered someone (covered) but you can't have your lawyer help bury the body (not covered)

Quin_Dub

notobtuse wrote: »

I’m no lawyer, but it seems very restrictive what investigators can and can’t use and how they can and can’t obtain information when raiding an attorney’s office. I'd be interested in how the warrant was written and what the explanation is as to why the investigators couldn't get the information they were looking for by any other possible means. NPR has a pretty good article on the subject.

https://www.npr.org/2018/04/10/601153729/does-fbi-raid-on-trump-lawyer-cohen-mean-attorney-client-privilege-is-dead

I think there are a few elements here.

1st off , to get the warrant to begin with (and a no knock warrant at that) they would had to have shown that there was a real risk of non-compliance or indeed potential destruction of evidence were they simply to have sent Cohen a subpoena for whatever documents etc. they were looking for. That in itself is extremely telling as multiple layers of legal review would have taken place before the judge finally signed the warrant.

Now , if during the review of documents they find clear evidence of a different crime (or crimes) either involving the lawyer alone or evidence of Crime-Fraud between a lawyer and his client then they can act on it.

But it all depends on the timing of the information, from your link above

the most frequently cited is known as the "crime-fraud exception." Boiled down to the basics, this says that discussions between a lawyer and client about a future crime or fraud are not privileged. Conversations about past crimes, however, are.

So a mafia boss can't send an email to his attorney that says, "I want you to arrange the murder of my enemy" and then keep that email out of evidence in court by citing attorney-client privilege.

notobtuse

Really Interested wrote: »

notobtuse wrote: »

I don't believe they can use things not related to the warrant in court. But that doesn't stop them from illegally leaking information to the press in order to do what they can to take Trump down. Sort of an insurance policy against Trump.

So are you saying if during the search they uncover evidence of serious let’s say fraud by someone that they can not use such evidence. Can you post US case law to support your claim?

I’m no lawyer, but it seems very restrictive what investigators can and can’t use and how they can and can’t obtain information when raiding an attorney’s office. I'd be interested in how the warrant was written and what the explanation is as to why the investigators couldn't get the information they were looking for by any other possible means. NPR has a pretty good article on the subject.

https://www.npr.org/2018/04/10/601153729/does-fbi-raid-on-trump-lawyer-cohen-mean-attorney-client-privilege-is-dead

Leroy42

Yet again Trump has back himself into a corner.

It seems likely that missiles will be fired into Syria. What happens is one of them (or more) is shot down? Does he target Russia directly, does it increase sanctions, he can't really do nothing.

Quin_Dub

mcmoustache wrote: »

Seems all but confirmed.

I'd imagine he sees the writing on the wall.

If I'm not mistaken, this would mean that his seat is up for grabs and the main contenders are the moustache guy (Bryce) and the alt-right guy (Nehlen).

Mumha wrote: »

Yes Ironstache will likely be the Dem candidate. It was thought that Ryan would still have won, but now this puts Bryce in a great position.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding but in terms of Nehlen I thought he'd only managed to get on to the GOP Primary panel and if Ryan is standing down someone else can now stand against Nehlen in a GOP Primary.

Or has the timing of all of this meant that Nehlen now moves forward unopposed as the GOP candidate??

If he is the official candidate , that's incredible , the GOP themselves think he's far to out there..

Mumha

It gets better ...

jooksavage

demfad wrote: »

If Trump fires Mueller there will be a tsunami of indictments and leaks that will sink him. The sooner his presidency is over the better as far as I can see.

Richard Painter wrote an excellent article a few weeks back which sums up the obstacles and repreucussions that Trump would face

https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2018/03/20/three-big-obstacles-trump-firing-mueller-and-why-might-try-anyway/AXYCeWioDqu0HKU2Mp6ygM/story.html

He'd almost certainly have to fire Sessions and Rosenstein and even then, he might find it impossible to replace them with someone who would be willing to fire Mueller (no one wants to be remembered as another Robert Bork). If Mueller was fired, that action would prove, in itself, that Trump obstructed justice. In the end, the investigation still wont go away, even if Mueller was fired.

Mumha

mcmoustache wrote: »

Seems all but confirmed.

I'd imagine he sees the writing on the wall.

If I'm not mistaken, this would mean that his seat is up for grabs and the main contenders are the moustache guy (Bryce) and the alt-right guy (Nehlen).

Yes Ironstache will likely be the Dem candidate. It was thought that Ryan would still have won, but now this puts Bryce in a great position.

Mumha

Igotadose wrote: »

Thing is, who replaces him as Speaker? If the tGOP keep their majority which is a strong possibility - it's only April and a lot can happen like a war with someone that'll keep the GOP around - then do we get Steve "NRA toolbooy" Scalise? Ryan was insipid and weak, his replacement might be a lot worse, he might actually have a worked-out repeal of Obamacare and a way to strongarm the votes.

I dunno, the devil you know seems to apply here. Ryan's not a Trumplodyte at least.

No. Whatever about the Senate, the Republicans are going to get bate out the gate in the House.

There's going to be a much reduced GOP after the midterms, and Ryan has done the Koch brothers bidding. No point staying with the Democrats launching all sorts of investigations into GOP corruption, which may well implicate him.

demfad

Igotadose wrote: »

Eh. Would need to pass the Senate, which might happen if it gets voted on, and then need to pass the House... much less likely. And, there's that pesky veto that Trump can apply.

McConnell's made noises already he doesn't see the point of voting on this bill.

If Rosenstein won't fire Mueller, Trump'll ask Sessions to fire Rosenstein and replace him with someone that will. If Sessions won't fire Rosenstein, Trump'll fire Sessions and get someone in who will.

Or something like that - hard to predict. Memories of the Saturday Night Massacre spring to mind when Nixon fired Archibald Cox.

If Trump fires Mueller there will be a tsunami of indictments and leaks that will sink him. The sooner his presidency is over the better as far as I can see.

demfad

Sonics2k wrote: »

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/372943068267573249

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/373054743742275584

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/497771551887228928?lang=en

Syria has cleared all airports bases etc in anticipation of attack. Russia knows that the attack is coming and the type of missile that will be used.

B0jangles

Mumha wrote: »

You got that in one. An Ayn Rand devotee, the Queen of selfishness.

Ryan himself was a childhood beneficiary of the kind of programs he is so keen to destroy.

From the age of 16, when his 55-year-old father died of a heart attack, until he was 18, Ryan received Social Security payments, which, according to a lengthy profile in WI Magazine, he put away for college. The eventual budget czar attended Miami University in Ohio to earn a B.A. in economics and political science, and landed a congressional internship as a junior.

https://www.rawstory.com/2011/04/paul-ryan-already-benefitted-from-the-social-security-fund-he-now-wants-to-gut/https://www.rawstory.com/2011/04/paul-ryan-already-benefitted-from-the-social-security-fund-he-now-wants-to-gut/

Like many of his type, he believes government support is only good when it benefits him personally. It's pure, unadulterated selfishness masquerading as a political philosophy.

Mumha

Trent Houseboat wrote: »

Ryan is probably retiring because he's achieved his life goal of making sure billionaires/corporations pay feic all tax and thus ensuring the implosion of social services.

You got that in one. An Ayn Rand devotee, the Queen of selfishness.

Igotadose

Sonics2k wrote: »

Looks like a bipartisan bill is being introduced to the Senate to protect Mueller soon. Wonder if Trump tries to get in there before this happens.

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/11/senate-bill-protect-mueller-514494

Eh. Would need to pass the Senate, which might happen if it gets voted on, and then need to pass the House... much less likely. And, there's that pesky veto that Trump can apply.

McConnell's made noises already he doesn't see the point of voting on this bill.

If Rosenstein won't fire Mueller, Trump'll ask Sessions to fire Rosenstein and replace him with someone that will. If Sessions won't fire Rosenstein, Trump'll fire Sessions and get someone in who will.

Or something like that - hard to predict. Memories of the Saturday Night Massacre spring to mind when Nixon fired Archibald Cox.