Split Thread: A second impeachment

[Dave Rogers]

Originally Posted by slyjoe

This is true. But in politics, four years is a long time. His mental faculties are not going to improve. He may run, but it could be quite embarrassing.

It was pretty embarrassing the first time.

Dave

[slyjoe]

Originally Posted by Dave Rogers

It was pretty embarrassing the first time.

Dave

No argument there, but I have to believe it will reach a point...

[dirtywick]

the house is full of maniacs and extremists. 10 yea from them is impressive

[Captain_Swoop]

To be impeached once may be regarded as a misfortune.
To be impeached twice is a clear sign you’re a lying, corrupt, sociopathic fascist

[Captain_Swoop]

Who would thought the man with 6 bankruptcies, 2 divorces, 4000 lawsuits and 26 sexual assault accusations would get impeached twice?

[turingtest]

From the Washington Examiner via MSN, Group of Republican lawmakers introduce legislation to have Trump censured:

Quote:

A group of Republicans on Capitol Hill introduced a resolution calling on President Trump to be censured for violating his oath of office and “attempting to unlawfully overturn the 2020 presidential election.”
...
“In the aftermath of the riot at the Capitol last week, lawmakers have the solemn duty to accomplish two missions: hold the President fully and unequivocally accountable for his actions, and simultaneously calm and heal the fever-pitch tensions in our country,” the news release read.

Yeah, that part right there? ********. A censure is you wagging your finger in his face and giving him the frowning of a lifetime- it's meaningless, and by design. Holding him "fully and unequivocally accountable for his actions," the way people think the rioters should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, would be to impeach him, convict him, and make sure he's never in office again. You want the rioters to pay a full price for their actions, but you think the President's accountability should be a free pass. And doing so to "calm and heal the fever-pitch tensions in our country" is to pay the price that is demanded as ransom by the same people who rioted to begin with. You might as well adopt Stephen Colbert's new GOP slogan: "We don't negotiate with terrorists- we give in to them!" Of course, I'm sure that's only true when the terrorists you want to appease are the voter base you want to appeal to.

ETA- Gaaaahhh, the more I read that, the more it flabbergasts me. I just cannot understand the mindset that offers a tut-tut action that amounts to "what you did was bad, don't do it again, ok?" in active opposition to an action that would ensure that he could never do it again.

[AnonyMoose]

Originally Posted by Steve

Political parties are not the real problem. They don't actually believe most of what they say. They will change their positions to whatever is profitable at the time. The real long term problem is the many millions of violent racist morons who have crawled out of their holes due to Trump's encouragement and honestly believe the crap the politicians are feeding them. These true believers are going to be around causing serious problems for many years.

Agreed.

But the problem starts at the top and works its way down. Otherwise known as "**** rolls downhill".

If the republicans can't get fixed, then neither will the nutbags who do their dirty deeds on behalf of them. These nutbags would rather watch their country burn to the ground than to allow another librul to sit on the throne.

[AnonyMoose]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

To be impeached once may be regarded as a misfortune.
To be impeached twice is a clear sign you’re a lying, corrupt, sociopathic fascist

You know that, I know that, and most everyone else on this forum knows that. But this is how republicans and their voter base sees it:

To be impeached once may be regarded as an overstep by libruls.
To be impeached twice is a clear sign all libruls must be stopped, permanently.

[sphenisc]

Technical question. Do they have to complete the process for the second impeachment before they start a third one?

[Delphic Oracle]

Originally Posted by Myriad

I don't see how the Republicans can stop Trump from winning the 2024 Republican primaries, if he decided to run, even though he couldn't win the election. Which makes him an enormous and lasting liability for the rest of the party. Convicting him and making him ineligible to hold office again would partly solve that problem. So I would think the party leaders would want that to happen.



He could still back someone else, either in the Republican primaries or as a third party, but there's no evidence he's capable of actually backing and promoting someone besides himself.

He wouldn't qualify to be placed on the ballot, anyone writing him in would be throwing their vote away.

State laws generally specify you must qualify to hold the office in order to register to be on the ballot.

FEC would rule he cannot collect contributions or use campaigning language, etc.

[Norman Alexander]

Given how fast his "friends", employees, associates, businesses, whole cities and now a country are trying to distance themselves from Diaper Don, his name is not worth spitting on for the rest of his miserable life. The most probable response to any political overture in future will be "Thanks, but no thanks."

Of more concern will be the Trump dynasty. Even though they are as useful as chocolate teapots, his offspring MAY be more acceptable in certain influential circles. Although the NYC response to Javanka may be indicative as well. They are about as welcome right now as four weeks of unpicked-up garbage.

[Captain_Swoop]

I wish Trump still had his Twitter account. The live meltdown would have been something to behold.

[Norman Alexander]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

I wish Trump still had his Twitter account. The live meltdown would have been something to behold.

Please. I'm eating my lunch here...

[Darat]

Originally Posted by sphenisc

Technical question. Do they have to complete the process for the second impeachment before they start a third one?

We’ll soon know!

[LondonJohn]

Originally Posted by Firestone

Now 10 Republican Yeas.

As someone remarked, the most bipartisan presidential impeachment in US history.

Well, aside from the very-far-from-insignificant matter of Trump being a dangerous idiot who may well also soon be a criminal....

.... there are three other systemic reasons why this should be the case.

The first is that in six days Trump is going to be out of office and a very long way away from the levers of power - not just within the federal government, but also (importantly) within the GOP. This means that House members of the President's colour have absolutely nothing to lose, and arguably quite a lot to gain, by voting against his impeachment. In all previous presidential impeachments, the president in question a) still had at least a year left in office*, and b) still had significant power and standing within his own party.

The second (IMO) is that the Republican party machine (including GOP representatives and senators) are mad as hell at Trump managing to wreck what should have been a Republican Senate majority, since it's generally agreed by pretty much everyone that the only way the Georgia elections went the way of the Democrats was on account of Trump's words and actions in the wake of the Pres Election. Trump can therefore be viewed as the one person who singlehandedly dismantled the only lever of power the GOP was going to have for the next four years.

The third (IMO) is the very personal factor related to last week's Capitol riot. Not only did congresspeople and senators have to watch (from a designated safe area) as their place of work - and a building which has such deep resonance as a hallmark of American values - was violated, many of them came away with genuine emotional trauma.


Of course, the thing of real interest (given that the House was always going to impeach, regardless of how much Republican support there was) is 1) when will the Senate trial take place, and 2) are there at least 17 GOP senators who are prepared to cross the floor? To me, it looks likely now that when the Senate reconvenes, it will schedule the trial for some time in April/May, for two reasons: first, this will give time and space for Biden to get his new team through the Senate confirmation hearings, and it will give Biden and his team the ability to pass new legislation through Congress; and second, I suspect that even in the current climate wrt Trump, senior Democrats and Senate leaders will judge that the next few months really should see Congress focussing very strongly on the Covid situation and its many ramifications. And after all, Trump will be out of office and effectively harmless (in purely political terms) after Jan 20th.



* Technically, the Andrew Johnson impeachment happened with 9 months left to run in his presidency, but in fact the impeachment process - which turned out to be messy and complicated - had begun the previous year.

[Captain_Swoop]

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) just promised Newsmax to introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on Jan. 21.

[turingtest]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) just promised Newsmax to introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on Jan. 21.

Wow, She really just does not get this whole "government" thing, does she?

[Paul2]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) just promised Newsmax to introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on Jan. 21.

and then for Kamala? Just to get President Pelosi?

[Norman Alexander]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) just promised Newsmax to introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on Jan. 21.

How quickly will this Q-tip be tossed from the House?

[The Atheist]

And a surety the trial won't even start before Biden's inauguration: https://justthenews.com/government/c...te-impeachment

[Delvo]

A perfect illustration of how detached Congress is from everybody else: almost all Republicans there voted to protect the guy behind the terrorist attack on the Capitol, when only 18% of the voters in their own party are in favor of that attack. (8% for the whole country)

[Horhang]

Originally Posted by The Atheist

And a surety the trial won't even start before Biden's inauguration: https://justthenews.com/government/c...te-impeachment

This makes me unsure there will be a trial. There is no precedent for this after he has left office. Impeachment trials are to remove someone from public office. As of Jan 20 he no longer holds public office. I think this will wind up in the courts before it goes before the Senate.

[dudalb]

Originally Posted by turingtest

Wow, She really just does not get this whole "government" thing, does she?

SHe does not get the whole 'You can't bring charges agianst someobody and make it sitck unelss he actually does somehting" thing.

She is do stupid that I am betting even the Freedom Caucus will not want to be associated with her.

[Darat]

Originally Posted by turingtest

Wow, She really just does not get this whole "government" thing, does she?

Oh I don’t know, she seems to have a sound grasp of republican politics!

[JoeMorgue]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) just promised Newsmax to introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on Jan. 21.

"For abuse of power."

Ahhh... Biden's not President yet. What power has he abused?

These are the kind of questions that if you don't have answers for when you make charges should have consequences.

But "This should have consequences" rather is the zeitgeist of the age, isn't it?

I look forward to the Republicans just throwing everything against the wall to see what sticks because there's no risk or downside.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Originally Posted by Captain_Swoop

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) just promised Newsmax to introduce articles of impeachment against Joe Biden on Jan. 21.

Apparently she hasn't gotten the hang of how things work yet.

[trustbutverify]

Originally Posted by Norman Alexander

How quickly will this Q-tip be tossed from the House?

You're talking about our next president there. Have some respect.

[Regnad Kcin]

Originally Posted by JoeMorgue

Everyone gets that "This sets a bad precedent" is a backhanded threat, right?

They aren't really worried about precedent, they are telling us to expect them to do the same to us to "get even."

Bingo, bango, bongo.

[trustbutverify]

From the right wing National Review:

Quote:

A paltry ten House Republicans mustered the guts and the patriotism to vote to impeach Donald Trump. By way of comparison, 139 Republicans in the House voted to overturn the 2020 election. If the American public concludes that this is a party of irresponsible crackpots who can no longer be trusted with power, it will be impossible to blame them.

[turingtest]

Originally Posted by JoeMorgue

"For abuse of power."

Ahhh... Biden's not President yet. What power has he abused?

These are the kind of questions that if you don't have answers for when you make charges should have consequences.

But "This should have consequences" rather is the zeitgeist of the age, isn't it?

I look forward to the Republicans just throwing everything against the wall to see what sticks because there's no risk or downside.

I don't know exactly what she said, but from what I've read about her, she seems the type to claim that just Biden being sworn in and assuming an office he cheated to get into is the abuse of power.

[Norman Alexander]

Originally Posted by trustbutverify

You're talking about our next president there. Have some respect.

This is the most respect I can muster, honestly.

It's an F- for her first class assignment.

[trustbutverify]

From the Paleoconservative American Conservative:

Quote:

This man deserves the most forceful repudiation possible. More than that, this country needs to know that its leadership, in both parties, regards this kind of behavior as utterly disqualifying for public office, or respect. A bright red line must be drawn and defended.

Quote:

I find that dishonorable — worrying about whether or not you’ll pay a greater political price for abandoning Trump. Of course many of them will. But it’s the right thing to do. How about showing some leadership, for once? If the price of winning your next primary is remaining silent on the question of Trump and his post-election behavior, which culminated in the storming of the Capitol by a “Hang Mike Pence!” mob, then you have lost your priorities. If you cannot explain to voters why they are wrong to give a pass to a president who behaved as Trump has done, and what it means to have a president who fouls American democracy by rousing the rabble to break down the doors of the Capitol and shout for lynching the vice president, then why are you in public service? If that’s what it takes to keep your job, why would you even want a job like that? Honestly, I do not get it.

Me neither.

[dirtywick]

i'm not sure if mitch mcconnell is actually willing to vote for impeachment or he's sending a message to trump that he's safe as long as he doesn't do anything else. but it's also his last chance to get the GOP out from under his thumb

[Meadmaker]

Originally Posted by Firestone

Now 10 Republican Yeas.

As someone remarked, the most bipartisan presidential impeachment in US history.

That's something I find somewhat depressing.

You can't convince me that there are no Democrats who think that impeaching him so close to the end of the term is a bad idea.

You can't convince me that there are no more than 10 Republicans who consider him unfit to be the President, and who thinks it's important to at least make a statement to that effect.

In other words, there's nothing inherently partisan about the question of removing him, and yet we get an almost perfect straight party line vote.

[JoeMorgue]

Originally Posted by The Atheist

And a surety the trial won't even start before Biden's inauguration: https://justthenews.com/government/c...te-impeachment

*Wack off motion.*

McConnell, you pushed through the nomination of Barrett in 4 days, you can impeach Trump in 5.

[Nova Land]

Originally Posted by JoeMorgue

Again the idea the Senators can just... like not vote is already stupid to me. I mean that's literally your job.

You raise an interesting subject. Should members of congress be allowed to skip out on congressional proceedings?

As things currently stand, of course, they very often do. That's especially true when they're running for re-election and prefer spending time on the campaign trail to spending time in session. It's also common when they'd prefer not to have to vote one way or another on a controversial matter.

I'm inclined to agree with you that they shouldn't be allowed to skip out whenever they feel like it. I'd like to see a number of changes made to the job requirements for members of congress, with a requirement to show up regularly for work being one of them.

That looks like a topic worth discussing. But this isn't the thread for doing that. The subject of this thread is whether a successful impeachment requires 2/3 of all senate members to vote to convict (as USA Today in the article I quoted, and a lot of other people, seem to think) or whether it requires 2/3 of the senate members present for the trial to vote to convict (which is what the constitution says and what I believe the rule actually is).

I included an example to illustrate why the difference between those two interpretations matters (so that people here don't think I'm just being persnickety about some minor problem with the wording USA Today and others are using in writing about Trump's impeachment proceedings). Therefore the example I provided (of a way Democrats could get a conviction of Trump in the senate vote with fewer than 67 votes) is also fair game for discussion in this thread. But the question of whether members of congress should be allowed to skip out on congressional proceedings and to skip out on votes, and whether our current system which permits them to do so is stupid and needs to be fixed, is a separate topic which should have a thread of its own.

Therefore I've opened a thread for you so that we can discuss the topic over there. I likely won't have much time to take part in that discussion at present, but I'm looking forward to reading what you and others have to say about it now and hope to take part in that discussion at some point in the future.

[acbytesla]

Well, the Republican party just tied itself to sedition and insurrection. They have defended the indefensible. This is all about messaging now. Something generally they are usually better at then the Democrats.

Still, this is going to be a hard sell.

I spent almost 30 years selling IT equipment and the one thing I can say is that it is one hell of a lot easier to sell quality then crap. Fortunately a large portion of their target consumers have been eating crap for a few years.

[Nova Land]

Originally Posted by Nova Land

... People keep saying we need 2/3 of the votes of the senate membership -- i.e. 67 votes -- to convict Trump. That's not what the constitution says. What the constitution says is that it takes 2/3 of the votes of those present.

If every senator were present, that would be 67 out of 100, but it's a mistake to assume 100 senators will be present ...

Originally Posted by Crossbow

Sorry, but I do not believe that you are entirely correct.

While you are correct in what the US Constitution has to say about '2/3 of the Senators present'.

But it is my understanding that according to the rules of the Senate, that unless a senator has some terribly important reason for being absent, then all 100 of the senators must be present when the Senate is going through a Presidential impeachment trial.

As such, it will take at least 67 senators to convict Trump.

It's certainly possible there is such a senate rule. I'm not aware of that rule, but I'm not aware of many things.

It would be helpful if you could locate the place where this is rule is stated (if it is indeed a rule which is set down somewhere, and not just an assumption some people are making about what the rules are). Could you, or someone, try to locate this rule and then quote it in a comment for the rest of us to see?

As a small bit of help, here are what appear to be the official senate impeachment rules. But my quick skimming of these rules did not turn up anything like what you are saying.

Quite the opposite, in fact; the wording of these rules, like the wording of the constitutional passage, refers consistently (in regard to the administering of the oath senators are required to take as well as in regard to the vote on whether to convict) to members present. I do not see anywhere in these rules where it says all members will be present or that all members are required to be present. From the actual wording of these rules, it looks to me like the rules do not assume, require, or expect that all members will be present.

(Unfortunately this is a pdf document so I am unable to do a quick copy-and-paste of the text I'm referring to, and don't have time at the moment to type out the relevant portions. But I have provided the link so you can examine these rules for yourself.)

If the constitution and these rules are indeed the official rules regarding impeachment, that means it does not take 67 votes to convict. It takes 2/3 of the members present for the trial, whatever that number turns out to be.

It is likely that, normally, the great majority of senate members would want to take part in such an important senate proceeding. But it is by no means required. It is by no means guaranteed. And really, regarding impeachments, they occur so infrequently that we should not assume any impeachment is normal.

I think this is an extraordinary one, and it may be a time where a number of Republican members might prefer not to take part and not to have to cast a vote either to acquit or to convict if they think they can get away with it. If Democrats actually want to get a conviction I think they'd be strategically smart to quietly try to convince those Republicans members of the advantages of their boycotting the proceedings. (And if McConnell really would like to see Trump convicted in order to get him off the neck of the Republican party, as he seems to have indicated, McConnell would be smart to let those Republican members he's fine with their skipping out on the proceedings and will not penalize them for doing so.)

There may be possible penalties Chuck Schubert and Mitch McConnell could choose to impose on members who refused to attend the impeachment, but there is nothing in the rules I can see which says they have to make that choice. Senators are free to skip out on senate proceedings, including impeachments, if they choose, and there is no requirement that they be penalized for doing so. The current impeachment is an exceptional occurrence where almost everyone except Donald Trump might benefit by their making that choice.

[angrysoba]

Originally Posted by acbytesla

I spent almost 30 years selling IT equipment and the one thing I can say is that it is one hell of a lot easier to sell quality then crap. Fortunately a large portion of their target consumers have been eating crap for a few years.

Unfortunately most of them really seem to like the taste of crap. The crappier the better, it seems.

[angrysoba]

Originally Posted by Nova Land

Quick note: I need to be outside getting other things done so won't be at the computer much for a while, but I will return tonight and can comment then if anything in what I wrote is unclear or needs discussing.

I think it is pretty clear what you are saying. It is 2/3 of those who vote.

So the question is "What if lots of senators don't vote?"

Well, do you think it is likely that lots of Republicans won't turn out to vote?

I think the majority of them will be "Hey, what he did was bad, but let's let bygones be bygones, heal the nation, move on, agree to disagree... blah blah blah... excuses, excuses...." and then vote not to convict.

I would love to be wrong, and presumably if anyone can influence the GOP it would be McConnell. It is possible that the Establishment GOP might want to finally seal the fate of Trump and his crazies. McConnell does seem to be making some noises that way, and as far as I know is not running for senate again. With less to lose personally, he might get Republicans to vote or sit out...

Either way, their record should speak for itself. If they don't vote to convict then let their vote or abstention damn them.