There are two issues here. The constitutional rule and the current procedural rule.

The current procedural rule involves a formal process where the House formally delivers the impeachment articles and so forth. If the Senate would skip this, it would seem to require a rule change. Not easy apparently since Mitch McConnell himself said he was stuck with the current rules in place.

You then have to determine if this is constitutionally necessary. Take legislation. When one body does something, it formally informs the other. Is this formal process required? Marbury v. Madison is perhaps telling here -- merely confirming wasn't enough, a formal commission had to be delivered.

Just where does the "power to impeach" end? It appears to me an open question if it ends with the vote or with a formal delivery of the counts to the Senate.
 

OP is absolutely 100 percent correct. Sole power means sole power.

At any rate, this is really outrageously silly. We all know what the end result is. He's getting acquitted. So what's the point of refusing to transmit the articles? Just to win a spin war? What benefit does that afford to the public?

Pelosi should transmit the articles, and if she doesn't, McConnell should simply a set a trial date and, if the House managers do not show up, have a vote and acquit the President.

And no, I don't think formally informing the other body is at all constitutionally required. If the House and Senate eliminated it tomorrow, that would not be declared unconstitutional. The importance of the commissions in Marbury was simply that it was the mechanism by which the judges were being blocked from taking their seats. Again, if Congress created a system with no commissions, where confirmation automatically seated a judge, that wouldn't violate Marbury.
 

"Just to win a spin war? What benefit does that afford to the public?"

It isn't about benefit to the public, and never was. It's about throwing a hissy fit over Trump winning, and damaging his reelection prospects.

Impeaching furthers those ends, acquittal works in the opposite direction, so they really want to have an impeachment without any acquittal. Further, once he's acquitted, it's hard to explain why they're continuing the impeachment investigation, and it serves as a good excuse for digging through his papers and harassing him.

Now, I don't think they're going to delay long, because after a short while refusal to transmit will be functionally equivalent to acquittal in terms of public opinion, maybe worse, as the public figures out it was all a farce from the beginning. But I'm sure they can stretch things out until early January.

On the subject of the OP, I believe they have now impeached, constitutionally, and that's the end of that, transmittal isn't required by the Constitution. Constitutionally, the Senate could now set a trial date, and dismiss the charges if the House doesn't show up to prosecute.

Constitutionally. Senate rules are another matter. As Joe said, McConnell believes himself stuck with the existing rules; While Trump's popularity with Republicans precludes enough Senators voting to convict on these BS charges, (It would probably be different if Trump had actually broken the law.) enough Republican Senators hate Trump with a passion that McConnell is looking at the prospect of losing rules votes if they're held. So he IS stuck with the current rules, and those do seem to require the transmittal to kick things off.

And there WILL be a transmittal, because too much delay is bad PR for the Democrats, and this is nothing but a public relations ploy from the start. If they don't do it today, probably early January.
 

The respectable author of the post, has ignored simply the fact, that we deal with " Double sole powers " according to the constitution. The power to Impeach ( the House ) and the power to try ( Senate). Here I quote :


The House of Representatives shall chuse their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.

And :

The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.

End of quotation:

That is why, the Senate must rely upon managers, and records from the House. The real issue is whether, the Senate can initiate and create its own records ( like summoning witness, that not yet appeared before the House ).

That is what the Senate rules also dictates, I quote Rule I ( relevant part):

Whensoever the Senate shall receive notice from the House of Representatives that managers are appointed on their part to conduct an impeachment against any person and are directed to carry articles of impeachment to the Senate, the Secretary of the Senate shall immediately inform the House of Representatives that the Senate is ready to receive the managers for the purpose of exhibiting such
articles of impeachment, agreeably to such notice.

End of quotation:

So, to the Q of the House, the Senate acts, or rather can act.

Thanks
 

Just correcting my comment above:

Not only the relevant part has been cited ( rules of Congress) but the whole rule.

Thanks
 

Just a side note, since Marty doesn't enable comments: Did he not have the slightest twinge of irony while writing that essay?

Where could Trump possibly have gotten the idea that it was OK to initiate criminal investigations of potential political opponents? What's he going to do next, have the FBI lie to a FISA court to fraudulently obtain a warrant to wiretap his opponent's campaign staff?

I can see thinking Trump has done wrong here, but to think he's breaking new ground in this is laughable.
 

"Further, once he's acquitted, it's hard to explain why they're continuing the impeachment investigation"

I disagree with this. If the President does something else the public sees as outrageous and/or illegal, I don't see how a previous acquittal would affect whether the House could investigate it.

I think the reality is impeachment-acquittal ends up being like 2 punts in football- the ball ends up exactly where it was before.
 

Well, no, I agree that, as a formal matter they could always explain it. Especially if, "We wouldn't have done that!" and "You're not rolling over and playing dead!" are acceptable charges. If they hold onto the House, (And there's a fair chance of that.) they could, formally, initiate a new impeachment investigation every month for the next 4 years.

But unless they can produce evidence of some actual crime, and by that I mean evidence that persuades people who didn't already want rid of Trump, it will start to get a bit dicey from a public relations standpoint.
 

The Democrats have given us the first impeachment of a POTUS without a count of treason, bribery or other high crime or misdemeanor. Why wouldn’t these outlaws ignore the Constitution’s plenary grant of trial power to the Senate?

McConnell should set a trial date now under the same procedures unanimously granted Clinton. If the House prosecutors fail to appear, hold two votes - one to acquit and a second resolution to seal all records of the House impeachment citing the implied Article III power to seal after a dismissal for lack of evidence. The latter resolution is purely symbolic, but the symbolism is powerful.

As an aside, one has to wonder whether the Democrats have an electoral death wish. The Trump message is the Democrats are attempting to nullify his voters and the only remedy is to reelect Trump and fire the Dem House in 2020. That message is resonating.

Polling of swing state and district voters show impeachment is wildly unpopular with Republicans and Independents. The Trump campaign polled the districts of the 30 Dems in Trump districts (excluding the Jersey rep who switched parties to the GOP) and found only a bit over a third of voters think their Dem reps deserved to be reelected if they vote for impeachment. The conservative groups carpet bombing these districts with ads tying their Dem rep with impeachment asked the reelect question for specific Reps and came up with similar results. Even assuming the GOP polls over-count GOP voters, Trump district Dems are still deeply underwater.

On the flip side, using impeachment as a foil, Trump is setting attendance records at his mega-rallies and small donation records to his campaign and the GOP. Trump gained $15 million in small donations in the three days after Pelosi announced articles of impeachment, the same amount it took Biden three months to raise in donations of all sizes.

See ya next November.
 

Pelosi seems to be on board with just holding onto the impeachment, so that Trump never has the opportunity to be acquitted in a Senate trial. If there was ever any hope of persuading people this was something besides a PR gesture, that kills it.
 

"If the House prosecutors fail to appear, hold two votes - one to acquit and a second resolution to seal all records of the House impeachment citing the implied Article III power to seal after a dismissal for lack of evidence."

Um, you can't just make up stuff that isn't in the Constitution.

The Constitution certainly grants the House the power to designate certain portions of its records as non-public. The Senate has no power over that, though, and there are strong First Amendment objections as well.
 

My guess is, if Pelosi holds it more than over the Christmas break, McConnell will convene a vote and the Republicans will change the rules and start the trial.
 

There's at least as much authority to argue the House can hold the articles indefinitely (based on the premise that the current Senate has, through the comments of the majority leader, proven they cannot possibly even have the semblance of a fair 'trial' in mind) as there was behind the GOP caterwauling about things like 6th Amendment or due process rights being violated in the House process.

A major feature in our politics is you have an asymmetry of extremism in the two major parties. The Democrats may be somewhat going through an increased polarization but the GOP, coming off the Teap Party thing (and pre-existing efforts to oust all 'RINO's') has become far more extreme. If the Dems were like the GOP they would say 'the GOP has proven they can't be fair here so we're going to withhold impeachment articles until the people have their say next election and get on to other work important to the nation' and then, a la Merrick Garland, just take a pass on any questions about this.

But the Democratic party doesn't have an entire widespread media appartus that just is a tool of the party so it's harder to get away with that kind of thing and their base isn't as easy to keep in line.
 

To the legal point of the OP's argument, could a Senate hold an impeachment trial absent any proceedings in the House? Perhaps so, but that seems passing strange, and if the answer is no then I think there's a stronger argument that they cannot absent a formal delivery of articles from the House.
 

"and by that I mean evidence that persuades people who didn't already want rid of Trump"

Trump supporters here have said, channeling what Trump himself as said about them, that they'd support him even if he committed murder in broad daylight in a crowd. Only insane people would wait for Trump supporters to be convinced.
 

"What's he going to do next, have the FBI lie to a FISA court to fraudulently obtain a warrant to wiretap his opponent's campaign staff?"

Obama wasn't running against Trump and vice versa, but more importantly there's not a scintilla of evidence that Obama, or say his personal lawyer, 'ha[d] the FBI lie to a FISA court to fraudulently obtain a warrant to wiretap his opponent's campaign staff.' As the IG report that Birther's were waiting for like Linus on the Great Pumpkin stated there is no evidence of political bias in the investigation of certain Trump advisors/staffers (and note there's a world of difference between advisors/staffers and the candidate himself, unless of course Birther's want to argue there isn't in which case the string of convictions against the staffers of Trump suggest he's...well, some can probably connect these dots).
 

"The Democrats have given us the first impeachment of a POTUS without a count of treason, bribery or other high crime or misdemeanor"

This, of course, is false. Abuse of power and obstruction of Congress fit comfortably into high crime or misdemeanor (in fact they're arguably the epitome).

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/10/what-does-high-crimes-and-misdemeanors-actually-mean/600343/

 

"To the legal point of the OP's argument, could a Senate hold an impeachment trial absent any proceedings in the House? Perhaps so, but that seems passing strange, and if the answer is no then I think there's a stronger argument that they cannot absent a formal delivery of articles from the House."

The Constitution gives the House the power to impeach, the Senate the power to hold the trial. It nowhere says anything about formal delivery.

The House has voted to impeach, the Senate isn't under any constitutional obligation to ignore that until somebody sends them a letter.

However, the current Senate impeachment rules say that they don't act until the House contacts them about it, so, barring a change in the Senate rules, (I'm not as confident as Dilan that McConnell has the votes.) you're right. Just not as a matter of constitutional law.
 

"Trump supporters here have said, channeling what Trump himself as said about them, that they'd support him even if he committed murder in broad daylight in a crowd. Only insane people would wait for Trump supporters to be convinced."

I for one have said nothing of the sort. Which supporter are you going to claim said that, and when?
 

HD: "If the House prosecutors fail to appear, hold two votes - one to acquit and a second resolution to seal all records of the House impeachment citing the implied Article III power to seal after a dismissal for lack of evidence."

Dilan: Um, you can't just make up stuff that isn't in the Constitution.

If an Article III trial judge has this implied power, then why wouldn't the Senate conducting a trial? I noted this approach is purely symbolic because the Democrat House will ignore it.

The Constitution certainly grants the House the power to designate certain portions of its records as non-public. The Senate has no power over that, though, and there are strong First Amendment objections as well.

Which begs the interesting question of whether a 2021 GOP Congress would enact aa law sealing the Trump impeachment records?
 

"It nowhere says anything about formal delivery."

It doesn't say a lot of things. A range of things in a text that in a range of way is not self-explanatory, rests on interpretation. Thus, the appeal by conservatives and others to original understanding, history and so forth.

I think the question is academic. From what I can tell, the plan is to carefully ("prayfully" probably) handle things, but eventually to formulate a resolution to officially transmit it to the Senate with selection of managers (hopefully including Rep. Amash, who I disagree with on a range of things, but respect him greatly on this). Plus, even if the Senate wanted to go on w/o formal transmittal, it would require a change of the rules. Like various academic debates, it's useful to talk about, but the ultimate thing rarely is pressed.

But, anyways, the language is simply not clear-cut as all that, and as Mr. W. notes, this leaves room for political wrangling, influenced by precedent and political winds. History has set up procedure -- and precedent matters here too -- that the "sole power of impeachment" include a complete process, finished when it is handed over to the Senate for trial. From what I can tell. And, logically, the bare text doesn't make that an unreasonable approach.

The care to split power here, including between two branches of Congress, is a standard concept in the Constitution. It would be somewhat problematic if the Senate could have a trial without the House formally delivering the impeachment counts. But, again, the text is vague. Anyway, we are just a bunch of guys on the Internet and it's a political question left to the House and Senate.

(If nothing else, the Supreme Court has enough on its plate.)
 

"Description: A lawsuit filed by the attorneys general of Alabama, Louisiana, and South Dakota to stop what they say is a belated and misguided effort to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment."

Prof. M. might be interested in this.

 

There's at least as much authority to argue the House can hold the articles indefinitely (based on the premise that the current Senate has, through the comments of the majority leader, proven they cannot possibly even have the semblance of a fair 'trial' in mind) as there was behind the GOP caterwauling about things like 6th Amendment or due process rights being violated in the House process.

The House can hold articles indefinitely, but the Senate doesn't have to be bound by it.

But yes, I agree. The 5th and 6th Amendment arguments are also made up.

I tweeted this the other day, but this is my main beef with impeachment debates- instead of arguing the politics of this and whether removing the President is good for the country (which should be the actual debate), everyone jumps right into constitutional argumentation- and really bad constitutional argumentation, where they make up a bunch of crap that isn't there. And usually these arguments are nothing more than hackish political talking points dressed up as law. (See, e.g., Bart's argument in this thread about the Senate sealing the House proceedings, or arguments in previous threads that the Chief Justice and every other Republican on the Supreme Court has a conflict of interest and has to recuse.)
 

Well, I stand on the fact that the text speaks to the House impeaching, not the House transmitting the impeachment. And the House has now impeached. If the Senate schedules a trial, what is Pelsosi going to do, go to court to stop them? On what basis, denying that the House has actually impeached him?

But it is somewhat academic in that McConnnell likely doesn't have the votes to proceed without the transmittal, in as much as that would require a rules change. Well, doesn't have them now; If Pelosi delays much beyond mid-January, some degree of impatience may set in.

As for Pelsoi's concern that the rules won't be fair, McConnell has announced that they're going with the rules that were adopted for the Clinton impeachment. Those were adopted unanimously, so what's the basis for Democrats complaining about them? That Trump isn't entitled to be tried under the same rules Democrats thought fair for Clinton?
 

To the legal point of the OP's argument, could a Senate hold an impeachment trial absent any proceedings in the House?

No. But that's not this case. The House has definitely held proceedings and impeached.
 

If an Article III trial judge has this implied power, then why wouldn't the Senate conducting a trial?

Because the House isn't a Grand Jury. Heck, you've picked up the Democrats' BS talking point and made it your own!

The House is the House. And the sealing of records in the House is governed by the Journal Clause, which gives the House the sole power of deciding this: "Each House shall keep a Journal of its Proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such Parts as may in their Judgment require Secrecy; and the Yeas and Nays of the Members of either House on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the Journal."
 

History has set up procedure -- and precedent matters here too -- that the "sole power of impeachment" include a complete process,

Don't confuse "way in which Congress has done something" with legal precedent. In a common law system, courts set precedents. But Congress does not- it passes laws. And rules, which it can repeal.

You can talk about a historical norm, but n0rms don't have the force of law.
 

Anyway, I'm not terribly concerned with Pelosi sitting on the transmittal over the holiday, since the Senate will almost certainly be in recess over the next couple of weeks. The schedule doesn't start slipping until she continues sitting on it into January.
 

Anyway, I'm not terribly concerned with Pelosi sitting on the transmittal over the holiday, since the Senate will almost certainly be in recess over the next couple of weeks. The schedule doesn't start slipping until she continues sitting on it into January.

And getting into punditry, one possible interpretation of what she is doing is performing a symbolic sop for those voices in her party who are complaining that the Senate trial will be a "sham" / perhaps creating some negotiating leverage to get some procedural guarantees for McConnell.

Under that interpretation, perhaps when we get to January she sends them over, possibly as part of a deal with McConnell.
 

There is also not an "one impeachment only" rule.

Repeat attempts (referenced in the text) to interfere with an election, while primary elections approach, made this rather time sensitive. You know, clock/calendar.

But, there are a range of investigations ongoing, including related to the financial documents being sought in the litigation the Supreme Court will examine, and as with Ukraine, something new might come up too.

A career criminal who is prosecuted for something specific that is acquitted by a stacked jury does not have some double jeopardy claim against a different prosecution on other grounds. Events will determine if that is warranted here.
 

Mr. W:

The Constitution expressly set the threshold for impeachment and removal at "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors."

When a law offers two or more specific items followed by a general catchall provision, the items included in the general provision are limited to the same class as the proceeding items. Eiusdem generis.

Strictly applied, this means "high crimes and misdemeanors" are limited to serious crimes on par with treason and bribery.

At minimum, this means some violation of the law - constitutional or statutory.

In no way, shape or form does this mean exercise of a perfectly constitutional power which the opposition party finds "abusive." Indeed, the constitutional convention expressly rejected impeachment and removal for "maladministration."
 

"Trump supporters here have said, channeling what Trump himself as said about them, that they'd support him even if he committed murder in broad daylight in a crowd. Only insane people would wait for Trump supporters to be convinced." ...Which supporter are you going to claim said that, and when?

Trump's lawyer said that at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit. Quoting the Washington Post (10/23/2019):

Judge Denny Chin pressed Consovoy about the hypothetical shooting on the streets of Manhattan.

“Local authorities couldn’t investigate? They couldn’t do anything about it?” he asked, adding, “Nothing could be done? That is your position?”

“That is correct,” Consovoy answered, emphasizing that such immunity would apply only while Trump is in office.

I suppose, if you want to split hairs, that shooting and murder are different, but I expect that Consovoy would maintain the principle regardless.

I do recall seeing a supporter at a Trump rally open-mouthed in astonishment when candidate Trump proposed a Second Amendment solution to problems that HRC's prospective judges would cause for his supporters. So perhaps there's at least one supporter who would look askance at murder.

But Trump himself, just this past September, retweeted Pastor Robert Jeffress regarding the impeachment/removal process that is now at the halfway point: "If the Democrats are successful in removing the President from office (which they will never be), it will cause a Civil War like fracture in this Nation from which our Country will never heal.”

So perhaps you would defend Trump explicitly inciting a potential campaign of murderous violence. Especially if he is "only joking," or really meant to use a negative (or a double negative)... Or maybe you have the excuse is that this is just how he rolls, and it doesn't mean anything. Part of his strategy of putting so much static out there that the truth itself is obscured (in his dreams and rallies anyway)... something we've seen the House Republicans do a lot in the House during this process, and in loud voice like operatic tenors.
 

"I suppose, if you want to split hairs, that shooting and murder are different, but I expect that Consovoy would maintain the principle regardless."

If I wanted to split hairs, I'd point out that the claim was "supporters here" had said that. I have no responsibility for what somebody else might say.

My own position, expressed multiple times, is that Presidents have no immunity from prosecution whatsoever. The Constitution grants very limited immunity to members of Congress, it isn't reasonable to think it gives Presidents greater immunity by mere implication.

Though as a practical matter, they're unlikely to face prosecution at a federal level, as it would have to be initiated by their own subordinates, subject to being ordered to desist or to being fired. They don't even have that much protection from state prosecution. This may even become a problem in coming years, as "lawfare" becomes a more accepted approach to attacking political opponents. But the Constitution doesn't anticipate and deal with every possible problem.

Bart is rather more open to the idea of Presidential immunity, but I don't recall him endorsing the idea that a President could murder with impunity, either. So, who IS this supporter "here" who have said that?

On the question of threats of civil war and "2nd amendment remedies", let me state this clearly:

Government IS violence.

To urge that something be illegal, is to urge that it be met with violence. To urge that something be publicly subsidized, is to urge that those who will not ante up be met with violence. Government IS violence, or it is nothing, a non-violent government would be ignored.

So don't think for a moment threatening 2nd amendment remedies or civil war makes somebody more violent than your run of the mill statist. Everyone has their line in the sand, something they'll respond to with violence, or they're a spineless worm.

Yes, I think that, if Democrats manage to establish that Presidents can be removed from office for simply not being Democrats, (And, shorn of all excuses, that's what is going on here.) we have taken a major step towards civil war. No less than if the Democratic House started expelling members for being Republicans, no less than if the Supreme court were packed and effectively abolished civil liberties Democrats find inconvenient.

Way too much of the Democratic party's agenda is a recipe for civil war, and I suspect that's why gun control is on their agenda in the first place. Should we pretend we'll take it lying down when they strip us of our rights?
 

Story: "the offences, to which the power of impeachment has been, and is ordinarily applied, as a remedy, are of a political character. Not but that crimes of a strictly legal character fall within the scope of the power, (for, as we shall presently see, treason, bribery, and other high crimes and misdemeanours are expressly within it;) but that it has a more enlarged operation, and reaches, what are aptly termed, political offences, growing out of personal misconduct, or gross neglect, or usurpation, or habitual disregard of the public interests, in the discharge of the duties of political office. These are so various in their character, and so indefinable in their actual involutions, that it is almost impossible to provide systematically for them by positive law."
 

This is insane, Brett.

Yes, government threatens and uses violence to enforce its laws. But they are laws - established by, in a more or less democratic society - a process that the society has agreed to. Further the violence is, by agreement, limited. "Do x and you go to jail for five years," not "Do x and we'll do whatever we feel like to you and your family, up to and including murder." Further still, we demand that the government prove its case.

None of this is what you describe, which is violence motivated by personal grievance, so long as there are enough people sharing that grievance. And it is unlimited violence, indiscriminate violence.

You have taken it into your head that there is no case whatsoever against Trump. Not that it doesn't justify impeachment, but that there is no substance at all. That is madness, but OK, not surprising. But because bank robbers are imprisoned you somehow imagine that that grievance, or perhaps a slightly larger one, would justify you taking up arms against your fellow citizens. That's not OK.

It's dangerously irrational.
 

"Which supporter are you going to claim said that, and when?"

The Orange One himself hath said it.


 

"Presidents can be removed from office for simply not being Democrats, (And, shorn of all excuses, that's what is going on here"

If those I disagree with hold the crazy extremist position that I ascribe to them, then they're being crazy extreme!
 

"Yes, government threatens and uses violence to enforce its laws. But they are laws - established by, in a more or less democratic society - a process that the society has agreed to. "

Brett doesn't recognize the legitimacy of democratically recognized rules or laws, like any thug he has an idea of what he thinks is right (he might call it 'natural law' on a good day, but it's essentially 'things Brett thinks is right and likes) and he thinks violence, by himself, is warranted against others only when that right is, in his view, violated by others.

It's also funny to see him complain about a party theoretically using it's power to, say, expel members of the other party or pack the Court, since he thinks it's fine and dandy for government officials to use their power to consolidate their power in other ways (such as selective law enforcement).
 

OK, Brett, here's your lesson about government, violence, and civics.

It is absolutely true that at the core of government is violence. Indeed, despite all the lofty rhetoric of our framers about popular sovereignty, consent of the governed, we the people, and everything else, the true nature of government, all government, can be summed up in one phrase:

A government holds an effective monopoly on the use of force.

That's what makes government work. Government can collect taxes because it can bring whatever force to bear to get you to pay them, and you don't have access to the level of force necessary to prevent that. It can conscript you into the army for the same reason. It can require your business to serve people of all races for the same reason.

The point though is that part of that effective monopoly on the use of force is preventing citizens from exercising "Second Amendment remedies". It may be fun for people on the right to talk about, but any serious attempt to use them would run head-first into the fact that there's a Treason clause prohibiting levying war against the US government, as well as a whole bunch of duly enacted statutes, which will be enforced by courts, and the entire thing is backed up by the willingness of the US government to bring the force to bear necessary to defeat anyone who tries to pull such shenanigans.

That's how government actually works. It isn't the lovely sentiments of your civics textbooks. But it is brutally effective.

So there's only so much one can do for one's causes outside of playing within the system provided and voting for sympathetic politicians. One can, of course, organize protests. If one serves on a jury, one can nullify- while it is unlawful, nobody in the government can punish you for doing it. There are certain situations where one can even riot. It's not the most reputable thing in the world, and it can get you arrested and imprisoned but I would argue that violence in 1992 really did spark reforms in the Los Angeles Police Department, and a bunch of rioting right wingers really did help stop recounts in Florida in 2000. It's not pretty, but in rare situations, it can be effective.

But at some point, if you lose, you lose. Even if you think your claims are compelling, the government, in the end, has the upper hand. That's how civics actually works.
 

This comment has been removed by the author.
 

Democrats manage to establish that Presidents can be removed from office for simply not being Democrats.

Bush43 was "not a Democrat," but was not impeached by the Nancy Pelosi led House of Representatives. Early on, a Democratic congressman brought an impeachment resolution up against Trump, but the Democrats as a whole in the House rejected it. As Rep. Steny Hoyer noted last night, they rejected such resolutions three times. Like Peter denying Jesus, who per at least one member of the Republican caucus had it better than Trump.

Trump was not impeached for "not being a Democrat." He was impeached for two specific things. Others wanted more things added. They listed specific things, "not being a Democrat" was not one of them. "Not being a Democrat" was not why some general mass of Democrats (like the popular vote, of somewhat limited constitutional interest) early on supported impeachment as a general principle either. The fact some citation can be made that a fraction of them weren't particular on exact specifics, again in theory, not involving the actual body that impeaches, doesn't change that.

When Bill Clinton was impeached, some Democrats warned that impeachment would suddenly be the norm. It was not. Bush43 and Obama were in office at some point where the other part controlled the House of Representatives. Like Nixon not leading to Ford and Reagan being impeached, neither impeached.

Plus, if someone is very concerned about national power, they might appreciate a stronger use of the impeachment power. They might not trust one party but the system in place makes it hard for only one party to accomplish removal anyways. Merely impeaching someone and allowing them to defend themselves, especially when the person's party controls the Senate, seems like an irrational case for so-called (dubiously phrased, but that is for another time) Second Amendment remedy talk.
 

Way too much of the Democratic party's agenda is a recipe for civil war,

No it's not. That's just as crazy as the rest of your comment. If part or all of the Democratic agenda is enacted into law that means it was approved by Congress and, most likely, signed by the President.

That a minority of the country, including you, strongly disapproves of whatever passes is not grounds for civil war. It is not reasonable or rational for that minority to say what you are in effect saying, "We are angry and armed, and therefore should have veto power."

That's Timothy McVeigh logic.
 

There's not going to be a civil war, we aren't living in "historic" times (although I guess the impeachment resolution passed last night is somewhat historically significant), we aren't slipping into fascism, Trump isn't going to stay in office if he loses the election, the Democratic candidates aren't going to confiscate people's guns, the Democratic agenda is not going to leave people with no liberty.

The country is basically in fine shape. We have to figure out a way to wind down our involvement in foreign wars, we have to manage our inevitable decline as China becomes the world's most important country and dominant superpower, and we need to figure out how to deal with global warming, the one actual historic crisis that the country (and the world) faces.

But I swear, I think all this talk about apocalypse says more about the people who spout it than it does about the state of the country. People WANT to believe that the stakes are higher than they are, because it makes them feel important. Guess what? We aren't important (except if we screw up the planet).
 

Dilan,

Leaving the rest aside, I think there is a chance Trump will try to stay in office if he loses in November.

The scenario is not hard to envision. he alleges massive voter fraud cost him the election, and vows not to concede or step down until there has been a thorough investigation, by Barr's DOJ of course, with lawsuits heard by Trump appointees. Lack of evidence notwithstanding, the Bellmores of the country, and many Republican officeholders, back him up. Is that truly utterly unrealistic?

How it all ends, who knows, but it won't end well unless some people not noted for integrity to date suddenly find some.

This does not make me feel important. I'm not important, except to some friends and family members, and writing this won't change that.
 

He can't. In fact, MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell, no fan of Trump, shot it down in eloquent terms. Let's say he tries to stay. Well, first of all, the Secret Service guys aren't going to let him stay in the White House. They are going to usher him out. And they have guns- he doesn't. Second, the institutions of government are going to stop paying attention to him. The cabinet agencies will take direction from their acting secretaries, not from Trump's cabinet (assuming Trump's cabinet even supports Trump's decision in the first place). The Congress is going to send bills to the new President to sign, because they want them to become law. The courts will not treat Trump as President, and will treat the new person (sworn in by Chief Justice Roberts) as President.

This is like most conspiracy theories. You need way, way, way too many people to participate in the conspiracy. They can't. And that's before you get to the fact that you would probably have the largest general strike in the history of the country, bringing the country to a standstill and forcing him to leave. (Think about what just happened to Evo Morales in Bolivia, times 1,000.)

It's just not possible.
 

The likely best case scenario as to Democratic policy agenda is that a weakened form passes a U.S. Senate with the likes of Sen. Sinema, Manchin and the like as the deciding votes & even there some aspect of it won't survive the courts, led by the Supreme Court with five conservative nominees and two moderates who will try when possible to compromise with them (somewhat less often the other two, assuming here a replacement of one of the older justices comparably left leaning).

There are limited instances in our history where some one party has a supermajority and even there it was either short lived (Reconstruction was a particularly special case) or a mixed bag anyways (such as racists in the 1930s).

But, granting that happens, and Western democracy shows it isn't tyranny, as noted, it will be because of popular will. And, even there, there are lots of checks in place, including the means to vote in new people -- time shows that supermajorities split apart and new factions form.

The 2018 elections, e.g., was a response and led to Democratic control in the House, including in areas previously "red." A basic concern, other than support of certain policies, was a means to check the executive. This is basic checks and balance stuff. The new majority, reliant on various red districts, was somewhat conservative in nature. Many quite honestly didn't want to impeach. But, the Ukraine Extortion Racket just forced their hand. It was just too blatant.
 

I think everyone is missing the key point in responding to Brett: every accusation is a confession. He's not sincerely worried about what the Dems will do, he's projecting his reaction if the Dems did what the Rs are planning.
 

Dilan,

It is probably not possible to pull it off, for the reasons you give.

It is not impossible to try. Trump will have more than two months between the election and the inauguration to make trouble. Even if he fails, he can make a lot.

That gap ought to be narrowed, of course. Eliminating the pointless EC ritual or, better still the EC entirely would have the side effect of making that easier.
 

Regarding an attempt by Trump to stay in office after he loses the election (God willing), consider that his best bud Rudy Giuliani tried to stay in office as NYC's mayor after he was term-limited out of contention. Giuliani was trying to delay handing the keys to the mayor-elect, Michael Bloomberg (D, then R as mayor, and again now D as presidential candidate). The city is in crisis, September 11, etc.

But should Trump be so iniquitous as to delay departure after a lost election (inshallah), I doubt he would be satisfied with the brief delay that Giuliani in fact failed to obtain. The September 11 crisis was insufficient and the voters were pretty tired of Giuliani.

At least in 2018, the voters were even more tired of Trump.
 

Dilan: A government holds an effective monopoly on the use of force...The point though is that part of that effective monopoly on the use of force is preventing citizens from exercising "Second Amendment remedies"... any serious attempt to use them would run head-first into the fact that there's a Treason clause prohibiting levying war against the US government, as well as a whole bunch of duly enacted statutes, which will be enforced by courts, and the entire thing is backed up by the willingness of the US government to bring the force to bear necessary to defeat anyone who tries to pull such shenanigans.

When the citizenry is armed, the government no longer holds an effective monopoly on the use of force.

Under that circumstance, the only way the government maintains a superiority in the use of force is if that force is employed against individuals or small groups.

Remember, large armed gangs with anything close to firepower parity give law enforcement pause. Our military cannot defeat a far less well armed and trained force of Taliban who refuse to surrender.

Thus, if the government employs force against even a large minority of the armed citizenry or in a manner against which a large minority takes strong exception, law enforcement loses that superiority of force to the armed citizenry.

There's not going to be a civil war, we aren't living in "historic" times (although I guess the impeachment resolution passed last night is somewhat historically significant), we aren't slipping into fascism...The country is basically in fine shape.

Our ruling class has been moving away from liberal constitutional government and towards totalitarianism for a century now.

During that time, economic productivity growth gradually slowed until it hit zero during the Obama depression. Trump's "greatest economy in American history" only looks good when compared to the Obama depression. GDP growth is still short of the post-WWII average of 3% and the percentage of Americans with work has barely increased after bottoming out in 2015. The 50 year low in the official U3 unemployment rates still do not count millions of prime working age adults who remain under or unemployed. The Millennials are on course to be the first generation in American history worse off than their parents.

The citizenry is fundamentally divided geographically, ideologically and socially.

Nullification movements are running rampant. Blue states and cities refuse to enforce federal immigration law. Red counties and towns are refusing to enforce blue state firearms prohibitions.

Folks like Sandy seriously speak about secession.

We are currently in a cold civil war.
 

Weber's definition of the state: " a human community that successfully claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory".

It is neither the only definition, nor has it ever actually described our government, either as a legal matter, (Legality of self defense against government, legality of self-defense in general, a constitutionally guaranteed right of citizens to the means of violence.) or as a practical one.

But even if we run with it, it doesn't mean that the government can't be successfully challenged with violence, but rather, that if it is, it stops being the government. So, if you strike at the king you must kill him, not exactly a novel revelation.

Bottom line: If there are no circumstances under which you would respond to the government with violence, you're a worm, not a man. And if you can't imagine those circumstances arising, you're no student of history.

....

Trump overstaying? An absurd boogey man. The government barely tolerates his presence in the Oval office while it is unambiguously legal; The bureaucracy are insubordinate, the intelligence services plot to remove him, direct orders are refused. Five seconds after his term is over, it wouldn't matter if he claimed to be President, nobody would be listening to him. Heck, all they'd need is a plausible excuse to claim his term was over; If the 2020 election is even being actively contested by Jan. 20th, 2021, large parts of the government will openly revolt.
 

Extremist conspiracy theorists see things to be in an extreme state!

In other news, Mid-east peace talks stall...

It's not so interesting that our Birchers think like Birchers, what's interesting is that Bircherism is the *mainstream* for the GOP now, not the fringe.
 

It's also interesting to me how so many white, at least middle class, men are drawn to such extremist views which thrive on bleak, cynicism and apocalyptic fear. Imagine if blacks, gays, women, religious minorities, etc., who actually have, and long had, much more serious 'beef' with government turned so easily to such extremist points of view! For all the criticism of 'victimhood' on the part of these groups by conservatives (often white men), it's actually conservatives that are more and more becoming the victimhood class par excellence. And more dangerously for us all, they more quickly than any other group I can think of, see violence as the proper response for their victimization.
 

What's interesting is that you can regard a numerically mainstream viewpoint as fringe, if it's a viewpoint you disagree with, but would never generalize this to consider that the mainstream within the Democratic party might be operating on what ought to be fringe beliefs, too, such as the desirability of socialism.

The American polity is bifurcating, Mista Whiskas. Modern communications technology enables bubbles, where people only communicate with other people who generally agree with them, and view the beliefs of people outside their own bubble as fringe even if they're objectively numerically common.

To continue the physical analogy, once these bubbles form, they start condensing. Viewing the interior of the bubble as the entire universe, the outer edge of the bubble becomes the new fringe, and is expelled or converted. The acceptable range of opinion becomes reduced. Rinse and repeat.

You can see this as positions Democratic politicians themselves held as mainstream only a few years ago, such as opposition to SSM, or enforcement of immigration laws, has now become the sort of thing only Nazi monsters would do. A candidate who got only 2.1% fewer votes than your candidate is an obvious criminal who no right thinking person would even consider supporting.

A similar thing is happening on the right, with the open borders and anti-gun Republicans being marginalized. I may think they ought to be marginalized, but I don't dispute it's happening.

I think it happens a bit more on the left, because of your dominance of the media, but I would think that, wouldn't I?

I honestly don't see how we pop these bubbles, and stop the process. Nor do I see secession as a viable option, because we may be separated in information space, but not in physical space. And so I see us trending towards civil war, as the bubbles embrace mutually exclusive paths, and reject the alternatives as not just undesirable, but unthinkable.

The least we can do is try to remain aware of what is really going on here, and realize we are condemning as monsters people who hold widespread views, views that were common in our own groups short years ago. And reflect on whether our righteous indignation isn't a form of moral hysteria.
 

I said before the fringe has become the mainstream for one Party and that that process is likely occurring with the other (though it lacks the bubblish conspiracy minded media apparatus that the former has, that's probably why the second parties demagogue/extremists, such as Sanders, are polling around 20% only).
 

Mista Whiskas said... Extremist conspiracy theorists see things to be in an extreme state! ...It's not so interesting that our Birchers think like Birchers, what's interesting is that Bircherism is the *mainstream* for the GOP now, not the fringe.

Cold civil war Ex. 1

Imagine if blacks, gays, women, religious minorities, etc., who actually have, and long had, much more serious 'beef' with government turned so easily to such extremist points of view!

This is why Democrats sought to disarm and terrorized the slaves the GOP freed.
 

Point is, if the "fringe" is big enough to be the mainstream of a major party, it can't really be said to be a "fringe". A mainstream opinion doesn't become "fringe" just because you really, really disagree with it.


 

"This is why Democrats sought to disarm and terrorized the slaves the GOP freed."

Which party is it now that defends monuments to those terrorists and which seeks to take them down?

It's almost like things change over a hundred plus years.
 

As I've said, what once was quite recently fringe is now mainstream for the GOP. It's also a particularly dangerous fringe combining conspiracy thinking with a quick call to vigalante style mass violence.
 

BD: "This is why Democrats sought to disarm and terrorized the slaves the GOP freed."

Mr. W: Which party is it now that defends monuments to those terrorists and which seeks to take them down?

There are monuments to the KKK?

It's almost like things change over a hundred plus years.

Not really. The Democrats remain the party of government racism.

I have a grand bargain for you. I will agree to outlaw monuments to Confederate generals and the like if you agree to outlaw the Democratic Party and all government racism.
 

I honestly don't see how we pop these bubbles, and stop the process.

Start by telling your friend Bart that there was no such thing as the "Obama depression." Then reflect on the fact that there is no more sealed bubble than the one you live in.
 

There are monuments to the KKK?

Well, there is this.

More important, there are plenty of monuments to the traitors who fought to maintain slavery, and of coursed they are defended by the "fine people" Trump so admires.

The business about the GOP being the great defenders of African-Americans and Democrats their oppressors is tired, and stupid.
 

byomtov said... Start by telling your friend Bart that there was no such thing as the "Obama depression."

A depression is a major recession without a recovery back to the precession growth and employment trend line. These are also known as "L-shaped recessions."

We have suffered from two progressive depressions over the past century under Roosevelt and Obama because of similar tax and regulatory policies.

Indeed, the Obama "recovery" was worse than the Roosevelt "Great Depression," with lower GDP growth, almost zero productivity growth and a falling percentage of Americans with any type of work.

Yes, depression is the proper term.
 

Bart:

The US government has always had a monopoly on the use of force. The only serious challengers were the Southern antebellum militias, who believed as Bart and Brett did. They became the Confederate States Army, and the United States squashed them like a bug.

This whole right wing fantasy of taking up arms against the government is complete bunk.
 

" It's also a particularly dangerous fringe combining conspiracy thinking with a quick call to vigalante style mass violence."

Can the party that keeps calling in the Antifa really condemn vigilante style mass violence?
 

BD: There are monuments to the KKK?

byomtov: Well, there is this. (statue of Nathanial Bedford Forrest)

Good example of the dichotomy at work here.

The statue portrays a damned good Confederate general. The Army still teaches NBF's tactics as an example of its doctrinal leadership principles.

On the other hand, unlike most other Confederate generals, NBF later become a KKK terrorist. The statue does not portray this.

Once again, if your purpose is to air brush out of history the political and military supporting the evils of slavery and other government racial discrimination, you have to outlaw the Democratic Party along with statues of its Confederacy.
 

"The US government has always had a monopoly on the use of force. "

No, it hasn't, not ever. Not as a matter of fact or of law.

Private violence in the form of self defense has always been legal in the US, and routine. Yes, even violent self defense against agents of the state: "where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction when the officer had the right to make the arrest from what it does if the officer had no such right. What might be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed."

It's rarely prudential, unless the alternative is clearly your being murdered on the spot, however, because police will typically respond by attempting to make sure you never see the inside of a courtroom alive to assert that what you did was legal.

But we aren't talking here of the individual case of a citizen illegally targeted for death by the government, but rather of the circumstances laid out in the Declaration of Independence: " a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism".

The modern Democratic party platform hasn't quite reached the point of honestly being described that way, but much of what is routinely discussed by the left would, if put into effect, easily qualify.
 

Dilan: The US government has always had a monopoly on the use of force.

Never happened.

You mistake law for reality.

Do you realize how often during our history the citizenry used armed force against others, including the military and police, for a variety of reasons from enforcing their rights or the law as they saw them to self defense?

The only way a government can enjoy a de facto monopoly on the use of force is to disarm the citizenry.

 

As you can see, Bircher Bart, like most GOPers today, goes to laughable lengths to not call for pulling down monuments to the terrorists he cited.

They're the party of the Confederacy and Klan today.
 

Antifa is not mainstream for the left much less the Democratic Party. On the other hand our two regular conservative commenters here are indistinguishable for the John Birch Society, once fringe now mainstream for the GOP (much less the right).

The problem with extremists is that they always see a 'long train of abuses' running up to or over the line invoking violent response. Always, it's a continual state. And when that extremism is rooted in ideas of being heavily armed that's incredibly dangerous.
 

"imagine"

We need not. A black preacher, with some cause, is too angry, and the presidential candidate (a moderate type that disappoints the actual "the Left" -- to the degree there is one) has to be sure to reassure everyone he isn't like that.

And, people tar him, suggest he isn't really a natural born citizen and the head of the Republicans in the Senate say his prime job, the prime job of his party, is to make sure he is a one term president. OTOH, like Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats regarding Bush43, he did not lead an impeachment effort, since "not being a" is not why impeachment has occurred over our history. Even after partisans said it would be.

But, like Mark said, perhaps things have changed, and the Republican Party will impeach based on some weak sauce [though chances are the Republicans here will find it well grounded, like when some Republicans said in 2016 they were thinking of impeaching Hillary Clinton right away & they pointed out she was a felon ... well, if so, impeaching her in early 2017 made some degree of sense if she was elected!] as payback or something.

This talk of Second Amendment remedies and so forth is asinine. Using constitutional means, while Republicans control the Senate, with lots of grounds, the people who the voting population voted in to check the executive impeached Trump. Meanwhile, regarding "controlling media" -- even if there is a movie out about how women there were sexually harassed -- there is a Fox News, local networks where pro-conservative messages are required to be included in broadcasts, many written publications supporting him & even those who don't repeatedly have "both sides do it" material. The analysis of the news in the fall of 2016 also shows it is far from some pro-Democratic propaganda mechanism.

The divisions of the country are duly noted though that was true at various points in our country. I don't think we quite are at 1850s levels, for one thing. Still, it is a problem, and the people are left with a key role in dealing with it.
 

Bart,

I have no desire "to air brush out of history the political and military supporting the evils of slavery and other government racial discrimination.."

I do have a desire to stop glorifying those who did the supporting, and to recognize them for what they were. Despite your idiotic obsession with past political positions, this is a desire much more widely shared among Democrats than Republicans today.

It is Republicans, not Democrats, by and large, who love the Confederate flag, and the statues of Lee and others. Consider, for example, Haley's comments that the flag was a wonderful thing until Dylann Roof misappropriated it.

As for NBF, I'm no more interested in glorifying him for his tactical skills than I am in glorifying Rommel. He was a traitor and a terrorist. To claim that the statue somehow exempts his terrorism is absurd.

 

John Oliver had a segment on Sinclair Broadcasting and the requirement to include pretaped segments in local broadcasts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc

I'd note that even to the degree certain conservative leaning publications have called out Trump etc., supporters often look past them and have their own media sources, helped by online materials. For instance, see religious reporter Sarah Posner responding to Christianity Today supporting impeachment.
 

Mr. W:

Until you started whipping out the term as some sort of pejorative, I had not heard anyone refer to the John Birch Society for decades.

I'm curious. What do you think the John Birch Society stands for and how many members do you think it actually has?

Don't look it up now. You should know to what your labels refer.
 

Of course Bircher Bart's defense of Forrest is ludicrous. Forrest the able general is the same man as Forrest the KKK terrorist, and this was known when the monument went up. Note Bircher Bart like most GOPers cannot muster the tiny bit of moral integrity to denounce a monument to a known KKK terrorist, yet he accuses his Democratic opponents a century later of being KKK supporters. Such lack of self awareness is at the heart of the Bircher Party.
 

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byomtov: I have no desire "to air brush out of history the political and military supporting the evils of slavery and other government racial discrimination.." I do have a desire to stop glorifying those who did the supporting

Where do you draw that line? When does historical depiction become glorification of evils?

For example, General Sherman both freed the slaves and waged ruthless military campaigns against the civilian population of the South and later the western Indian tribes. What should we do with his statutes?

You may be familiar with the sanitized Robert Redford movie Jeremiah Johnson. If you go up to Fraser Valley, Colorado where the actual man lived in the mountains, along side his bust you can read how Jeremiah was actually called "Liver eating" Johnson for his cannibalism of the Indians he killed in his feud with the Crow. Ooops! Should we tear down that bust?

FWIW, I would leave the statues standing and place signs next to them providing an objective history of the man or woman portrayed. Let visitors decide for themselves how they feel about the person.
 

"Forrest the able general is the same man as Forrest the KKK terrorist"

Fort Pillow was just practice.
 

Mr. W: Note Bircher Bart like most GOPers cannot muster the tiny bit of moral integrity to denounce a monument to a known KKK terrorist, yet he accuses his Democratic opponents a century later of being KKK supporters

Ummm... I was the one who called NBF a KKK terrorist.

I noted that the Democratic Party remains the party of government racial discrimination, which is a statement of objective fact. Telling how Democrats like yourself cannot muster the tiny bit of moral integrity to admit that fact.
 

Of course Bircher Bart's defense of Forrest is ludicrous. Forrest the able general is the same man as Forrest the KKK terrorist,

Exactly. Nobody is saying we can't talk about Forrest's tactics in history classes, and even praise them from a perspective of pure military theory. Many generals who fought on the wrong side of conflicts, such as Rommel, are nonetheless praised and studied for their tactics, and that's totally fine.

But when you put up a statue of someone, you are saying he is good, not simply that he is skilled. I doubt Bart would want to see statues of Lenin, even though Lenin's skill in leading a revolution is unarguable. It still matters what he fought for.
 

For example, General Sherman both freed the slaves and waged ruthless military campaigns against the civilian population of the South and later the western Indian tribes. What should we do with his statutes?

You can actually make a reasonable case for taking down Sherman's statues, and you can also make a case- which is going to be very painful for folks on the left- that one reason there is no push to do so right now is there are a lot more black Democrats than there are American Indian Democrats, so there isn't any political benefit in waging that fight.

There is definitely a political element in whose claims get recognized.
 

Bart, you will never be able to overthrow the US government, and neither will anyone else. The fact that some people are sometimes able to use individual force or even form a posse or lynch mob doesn't change that. The government still has an effective monopoly on the use of force.

As I said, we have one instance of the militias rising up. It ended up with hundreds of thousands of southerners dead. They learned, in the most emphatic way possible, that the federal government indeed monopolizes the use of force.
 

Where do you draw that line? When does historical depiction become glorification of evils?

A statue is not "historical depiction." It's not a photograph, or a chapter in a history book. Statues of historical figures are put up in public places to honor their subjects.

Those subjects being human, they will have some warts. The question is whether the things worth honoring outweigh the warts. We need no nuanced line-drawing to know that in the case of Forrest and the other Confederates the warts are heavy, and the things worth honoring are few or for the most part non-existent. Maybe they loved their dogs or horses, but that's not enough.

"Where do you draw the line" arguments are sometimes useful, but often a sham or a distraction. The existence of grey areas does not imply that there are no black and white areas.

I would leave the statues standing and place signs next to them providing an objective history of the man or woman portrayed. Let visitors decide for themselves how they feel about the person.

Nonsense. Why do we want statues of traitors, terrorists, and fighters for slavery? And what are you going to put on those plaques? How are you going to properly describe the career of Lee, for example. Local politics, and inadequate space, will prevent you from offering a full description of what a bastard he was. Take down the statue and let anyone interested get a history book or two.
 

Private violence in the form of self defense has always been legal in the US, and routine.

It's useful to be careful here, but to be clear, the rules are that of the state. We don't just follow natural law rules or something.

Self-defense is allowed under the rules of organized government. To determine if it was justified, people go in front of government officials, perhaps ultimately juries of their fellow citizens (I am not aware of any place where non-citizens can serve though in theory it is possible as historically non-citizens were allowed to vote in various places). Even "stand your ground" type laws are by governmental rule.

The fact we are debating Confederate monuments here is striking. For the third time in history, not because "he is not a Democrat" (many of the members had the chance to impeach multiple Republicans, but did not, with some limited exceptions), someone was impeached after repeatedly committing impeachable offenses, including after a life time Republican, a Vietnam vet, a former head of the FBI appointed by Bush43, testified regarding ongoing foreign attempts to interfere with our election.

After a sitting member of Congress said Jesus had it better than Trump, defenses of an originator of the Klan (who have good people, you know, or as someone else noted, maybe just a bunch of somewhat foolish types) are really not surprising.

[The person isn't unique. I myself was told how Trump was being "persecuted," a term evangelicals would naturally associate with Jesus Christ or Christians martyrs in general.)
 

The existence of grey areas does not imply that there are no black and white areas.

Edmund Burke: "Though no man can draw a stroke between the confines of day and night, yet light and darkness are upon the whole tolerably distinguishable."
 

"It's useful to be careful here, but to be clear, the rules are that of the state. We don't just follow natural law rules or something."

If Dilan had written, "The government has always claimed a monopoly on deciding when the use of force is legitimate.", rather than on the use of force itself, I'd have still disagreed, but less vociferously. He'd be on solider legal grounds anyway, though shoddy philosophical ones.

The US was not founded under the ideology of Max Weber. It was founded on principles Max Weber would violently disagree with, that sovereignty is the people's, and is only partially delegated to the state, with major reservations, and the perpetual option of revoking that delegation. Part of the justification for the 2nd amendment was to assure that option could never be taken away.

You might say that our politicians are pursuing a project of transforming the US into a Weberian state. They have not yet succeeded, and I pray they never will.
 

Again, note our Birchers cannot bring themselves to just say that we should take down the statue glorifying a traitor in the name of slavery, war criminal and white supremacist who founded the worst domestic terrorist organization in our history. They can't do this simple thing. Remember this the next time they speak about cherishing liberty or this nation.

The fact that it was Bircher Bart who brought all this up as an attack on the other side just shows the stunning lack of awareness and moral integrity of today's GOP.
 

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Mista Whiskas, I'm not an iconoclast, I'm perfectly capable of seeing a statue of somebody I don't personally admire or think worthy of emulating without suffering the compulsion to tear it down. As Bart says, if you want, put a plaque by the statue telling the whole story. Don't devote yourself to destroying the past this way, ISIS and the Taliban do not make good company.

We oppose this not because of where it starts, but because of where it ends. Some roads have horrible enough destinations at the end of them it's best not to set foot on them out of a misguided confidence you'll be able to stop.
 

I am not familiar enough with Max Weber to go into discussions here about his thought, but others might wish to do so.

Society involves the community, including the people delegated as agents in government, setting the rules of force. This includes when self-defense is allowable. Those self-expressed as "conservative" generally find this common sense in nature.

It's well known by everyone here that there is some ability to defend oneself so citing that is at best a rejoinder on framing. I find the whole thing tedious in the current context, especially for the reasons already expressed above.

===

As to statues and such, Sandy Levinson wrote an interesting book on the subject entitled "Written in Stone," though I did not read the updated version. Being raised and living in the South during segregation days, his perspective has added value.

A diverse approach is useful there, especially regarding the reason some things were put up. To take an extreme approach, after some dictator is overturned, society would sensibly wish to remove monuments glorifying the person, especially if another reason it was there was to promote a message some other group was unfit for society.

They might leave certain ones up and add more than "a plaque" perhaps to provide a complete account of things. Having a "Civil War memorial" with both Union and Confederate generals with a diverse account of things, however is not really why many want such monuments up. Monuments often generally positively promote and honor, so leaving them up sends a special message. Again, leaving up statutes of Hitler or Stalin or their agents since "who knows of where it ends" is not the only sane approach here.

A variety of Southern politicians have spoken eloquently on the subject in recent memory though the former governor of South Carolina's remarks was at best a mixed bag.
 

Brett,

Tearing down the statue does not destroy the past. Rather, it clarifies it.

I will tell you what destroys the past - the real past - or, as some would have it, erases history. It is the glorification of the Confederacy and its leaders, which ignores or erases their true history and nature. It pretends they were fighting for something, anything will do, other than their true cause - the preservation of slavery. It makes them heroes of liberty - while they fought to keep not much less than half of the inhabitants of their states (over half in MS and SC) in chains.

That is what erases history - factual history. And it went on, unchallenged, for well over a century and still continues in some quarters - see Nikki Haley, Republican, quoted above.

I'm perfectly capable of seeing a statue of somebody I don't personally admire or think worthy of emulating without suffering the compulsion to tear it down.

Good for you, but who cares? When a statue is put up in a public place that is, whether you and Bart like it or not, an expression by the community that the subject is to be honored. The community is entitled to change its mind, especially when it becomes clear that the original grounds for the honor were bogus. If it turns out that you submitted falsified credentials for your job you may well be fired.
 

Dilan: As I said, we have one instance of the militias rising up. It ended up with hundreds of thousands of southerners dead. They learned, in the most emphatic way possible, that the federal government indeed monopolizes the use of force.

The Civil War involved two governments fighting a conventional war against one another, not a revolution by an armed citizenry.
 

"Good for you, but who cares?"

Well, yes, that's obviously the point: The people who do suffer from that compulsion want to decide the matter for all time in their favor. They think they're entitled to: Only their view of the matter matters, after all, everyone who disagrees with them is a Nazi.

And they've got an advantage: Destruction is easier than preservation. All the destroyers need to do is gain the upper hand for a moment, the preservationists must maintain it uninterrupted or lose. So the destroyers WILL prevail in time.

That's why I'm glad my son got a chance to travel to DC this year to see the national monuments on the Mall, before somebody bombs them.

My culture, my culture's history, is being burned down around me. The great books no longer taught, old movies dropping out of availability, history fictionalized to push an agenda by people who think, "Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.", who think 1984 was an instruction manual, and are following it faithfully.

I'm living through the modern burning of the Library of Alexandria, and it depresses me. Don't expect me to cheer it.
 

Folks,

The old adage those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it applies to both good and evil.

If you erase the history of evil, you will surely repeat it.
 

You see? They can't do it. They can't even say that a statue of a man primarily known for treason in the promotion of slavery, war crimes and the founding of the white supremacist and greatest terror organization in our history should be torn down from public lands.

And their arguments are as embarrassing as this moral color blinded ness. As said the statues are not neutral historical markers or descriptions (notably if you go to, say, Monument Avenue in Richmond VA you will see no statues of the many Virginian born Union officers that distinguished themselves in combat there). These are glorification so of certain men of a certain cause. You no more 'destroy history' to tear them down than US troops 'destroyed history' when they pulled down Hussein's statue in Iraq or Nazi monuments in Berlin, they are no more 'destroying history' than when Georgians and Ukrainians changed Soviet era glorification of the evil communists that oppressed them.

It's equally embarrassing to play the 'I can't condemn easy cases because some cases later might be hard'. This is to say that no historical monument no matter how terrible the person or cause should ever be torn down lest all be torn down. Incoherent.

Bircher Bart and Brett think it's fine and dandy that people in majority black cities should have to daily walk by a glorification of a Confederate general and founder of the KKK. These are people who have given up their moral compass (if you can't condemn Forresr who or what can you condemn?), and for what? Tribalism? An unwillingness to disagree with people they know are otherwise loyal partisan comrades? What can explain such a lack of moral sense?

This is the epitome of why I could never be a contemporary Republican. It's a moral and intellectual embarrassment par excellence.
 

"If you erase the history of evil, you will surely repeat "

The embarrassment compounds itself. One sure way to fail to learn historical evils is to continue to glorify it via public monuments.

We don't think Hitler is not evil because all monuments to him have been torn down, indeed it's BECAUSE we realize his evil that all monuments to him were torn down.

Again, this is the greatest moral and intellectual embarrassment in politics right now and the GOP owns it.
 

"My culture, my culture's history, is being burned down around me. The great books no longer taught, old movies dropping out of availability, history fictionalized to push an agenda by people who think, "Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.", who think 1984 was an instruction manual, and are following it faithfully."

Even we're all this true it would not justify being unable to say that a glorification of a man primarily known for treason in the promotion of slavery, war crimes and founding the greatest terror organization in our history should continue on public lands (and in cities predominated the ancestors of those that Forrest fought to keep enslaved and later terrorized!).

But it's also not true and/or analogous. No one is preventing great books from being taught, at most some books considered great are chosen less to study (and this itself is greatly exaggerated: my college age kid recently had Chaucer, Shakespeare, Faulkner, etc taught to them). And old movies being 'dropped from availability' just means owners of these products no longer want to sell them. This is not analogous to moving glorifications of KKK founders off public land (and maintained via public funds).

Again this is a person who says he's a libertarian collapsing this distinction!

But this man is not a libertarian, he's an authoritarian Bitcher who likely sees Forrest as part of his 'tribe's' culture and so contorts his professed principles to tribalism. It's morally pathetic.
 

Brett, the United States was not founded on "popular" sovereign. Go back and ask blacks, women, or Indians if they were sovereign.

At any rate, there is actually no such thing as popular sovereignty. Only a government can be sovereign anyway. Popular sovereignty is Somalia during its civil war.

One of the reasons we need governments is to prevent and regulate private violence with a threat of overwhelming force. "The people" can't do this, and the framers were lying when they said they could, trying to get the Constitution enacted.
 

"The Civil War involved two governments fighting a conventional war against one another, not a revolution by an armed citizenry."

WTF?
 

Speaking of forgetting history, almost all of those statues were actually put up long after the end of the Civil War -- by people whose interest was not in some antebellum "society" but rather for the same purpose as Jim Crow laws: to embellish and elevate white supremacy.

As for the idea that taking them down would somehow cause history to be forgotten, somehow I suspect there's no danger of that happening either for the white supremacists ... or for Americans of a certain color other than white. They may, indeed, someday forget, but that day is many generations off.

Finally, consider a similar case I ran into in Chile, in the late 70's: visiting Santiago, climbed a little hill next to the presidential palace, where there was a flame burning. Read the caption and only the presence of an armed guard prevented me from outright laughter.

The caption read: "Augusto Pinochet lit this eternal flame of freedom ..."

Just as you won't find statues to Washington, Jefferson, and the rest, in England (or Canada) today, you should not expect to find statues put up to people who rebelled as traitors to the country they had been born into. Simple honesty requires that the traitors of the CSA be labelled properly and then consigned to the history books.


 

The people who do suffer from that compulsion want to decide the matter for all time in their favor. They think they're entitled to: Only their view of the matter matters, after all, everyone who disagrees with them is a Nazi.

No. They have the right to decide the matter now. Fifty years from now someone else will have the right. Besides, why don't you complain about those who want the statues to stay up forever. It looks to me that they certainly want to "decide the matter for all time in their favor." No objection from you.

That's why I'm glad my son got a chance to travel to DC this year to see the national monuments on the Mall, before somebody bombs them.

The people most likely to bomb things in DC are your pals, Brett. You know, the ones who are ready to start a revolution if the Supreme Court pisses them off. The ones who already have an established record of violence.

My culture, my culture's history, is being burned down around me. The great books no longer taught, old movies dropping out of availability,

Nobody's burning a damn thing, well, almost nobody. Are you seriously suggesting that movies being unavailable is some kind of Communist plot, rather than the workings of a market economy? That's deranged.

history fictionalized to push an agenda by people who think, "Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.", who think 1984 was an instruction manual, and are following it faithfully.

History fictionalized??? Who is fictionalizing history, exactly? Is it those who treat Lee as practically a demigod, a man of great honor, and so on, or those who describe him as a man who waged war on his own country to defend slavery, and was a particularly nasty slaveholder himself? Those who call the Confederacy a glorious cause, with only incidental connection to slavery, or those who point out, using the Confederates' own words, that it was an organization based on slavery, established to defend it?

I'm living through the modern burning of the Library of Alexandria, and it depresses me. Don't expect me to cheer it.

Again, no burning. Just your paranoia. You complained above about bubbles. Get out of yours.
 

You see? They can't do it. They can't even say that a statue of a man primarily known for treason in the promotion of slavery, war crimes and the founding of the white supremacist and greatest terror organization in our history should be torn down from public lands."

Yes, it's true: Disagreeing with you, we "can't even" agree with you. Bizarre, isn't it? Why, it's as though we had our own views, not yours. As though we had minds of our own! How dare we have minds of our own...

And you think it's not legitimate for us to not agree with you. That's why you're so dangerous, not that you'll understand that. Because you can't accept that it's legitimate for people to peacefully disagree with you.
 

Brett, the confederates were traitors who sought to perpetuate slavery.

There just isn't any argument that they were on the right side pf the war. So why were they honored all over the South

This isn't about forgetting history. It's just about finally calling evil people evil.
 

But we're not arguing about whether to perpetuate slavery. We're arguing about whether to smash statues.

The people who want to keep the statue aren't enslaving anybody. They just don't want their state's history airbrushed away.

So, put a plaque on the statue saying, "Evil guy! Defended a slave state! Bad!" Don't go around erasing everything that offends you. Even if today you erased everything that offended you, tomorrow you'd find something new to be offended by, and set out to erase that. That's the road you want to walk, and it doesn't stop any place you can defend, it keeps going into a dark and nasty place.

And you'll walk it to it's end if we don't stop. If the day comes when you're happy, the next guy will take up the clause.
 

BD: "The Civil War involved two governments fighting a conventional war against one another, not a revolution by an armed citizenry."

Dilan: WTF?

What are you missing?

Our federation of states divided into two, with each side forming an army to fight a conventional war.

During this "War between the States," the closest thing to an armed citizenry going to war against a government was maybe the guerrilla war in Missouri and Kansas.
 

Bart "Colonel Jefferson Beauregard Lee" DePalma -- why not refer to it as "The War of Northern Aggression"?

 

BD: "If you erase the history of evil, you will surely repeat it."

Mr W: "One sure way to fail to learn historical evils is to continue to glorify it via public monuments."

Glorify what to whom?

Do you honestly think that someone who sees the statute of Nathaniel Bedford Forrest will be inspired to reestablish the Confederacy and slavery?

Or that some German who sees a statue of Adolf Hitler will be inspired to reestablish the Nazi government and the concentration camps?

The Germans eagerly tore down statues of Hitler to deceive others they were not Nazis.
 

C2H5OH said...Bart "Colonel Jefferson Beauregard Lee" DePalma

Doesn't quite work, does it?

FWIW, my family are all yankees from NY and PA, and my Irish immigrant ancestors likely fought for the Union.

If I can stand the sight of statues of long dead Confederates, I am sure you snowflakes can survive.

why not refer to it as "The War of Northern Aggression"?

Because I was making a point about two collections of state governments at war with one another.
 

All your little comment signifies is that white supremacy has metastasized. Which I can attest to: some of the worst racists I've known are from northern states. Wisconsin and South Dakota for two.

You pretend that change over time does not exist, (except, of course, when you can use changes to support an argument -- hardly impressive evidence of your honesty.)

But the point remains -- the CSA was a fiction, proved false by the event. To pretend otherwise is to indulge in a falsehood. Or, simply put: you lie.

 

This comment has been removed by the author.
 

Look at the ludicrous arguments the current GOPers will proffer to defend a statue of a man primarily known for treason in promotion of slavery and founding the KKK.

Bart wants to argue that *monuments* don't glorify anything, in defiance of the definition of a monument, the historical facts surrounding the efforts to erect the monument and common sense.

Brett repeats his ridiculous 'put a plaque beside it' argument.

Bircher Bart and Brett hold that monuments to Hitler and the Nazis should have been left up with plaques put beside them.

This is how morally and intellectually bankrupt these people are.
 

Brett,

They just don't want their state's history airbrushed away.

That is exactly what they do want. They have been airbrushing for 150 years. Can you possibly deny that? Listen to them. What is all that "heritage" nonsense? They don't want a statue to point out what bad guys the Confederates were, as if that moronic fantasy would ever come to pass. They want one that sings the praises of noble warriors fighting to defend "the Southern way of life," without admitting the reality of what that way of life was.

And they want to decide that the statue should be there "for all time," to use your phrase. Apparently you object to someone wanting that only when you dislike them, and have no problem with a minority of members of a community insisting that their preferences be honored eternally.
 

Bret's couching his defense in a rant about 'his culture' being 'burned' illustrates my point above.

Let's say Brett has a point that 'his' (white male straight? Southern?) culture is being 'burned.'

Even arguendo surely he's facing a scintilla of what blacks, women, gay etc persons face in this area. For a vastly longer period of time their culture was actively squelched by government and private terrorism (Brett and Bart want the leaders of these efforts to continue to be monumentalized of course). Women, blacks and gays were systemically denied access to equal education, opportunities and platforms to make art and culture or even to see themselves in art and culture. White, make straight guys like Bircher Brett vastly dominated culture as a result. For most of film history white straight guys were the stars, producers and lead characters. For most of novels the same. For comic books, the same. Etc., etc., etc.

Now for a very brief moment the art and culture of non-straight white guys is receiving more attention and some of the past work dominated by Bretts that has long seen as offensive by non-Bretts is being played down.

This relatively slight slight has Brett in such a victimhood spiral that he contorts himself to defend a statue of the founder of the KKK.

Wow.
 

Exactly. If this were about history or heritage there'd be statues of the many Southern born Union stars that distinguished themselves commonly found in the South. But of course there's not. These monuments were raised to commemorate and glorify a particular cause-the Confederacyvand the white supremacy for which it stood.
 

The thoughts of the designer of the Forrest statue which our Birchers want maintained on public land with public funds:

The monument was designed by Jack Kershaw, a Vanderbilt University alumnus, co-founder of the League of the South, a white nationalist and white supremacist organization, and a former lawyer to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr's killer.[2] In the face of public criticism of the installation, Kershaw defended the statue by saying, "Somebody needs to say a good word for slavery."[2]
 

A little more research reveals that all of us have been operating under a misconception: the Forrest monument in question is on private land. I of course think private displays of even hateful imagery should largely be protected. Of course, the fact that our Birchers defended it under the conception it was public is still evidence of their moral and intellectual bankruptcy. Under the arguments they made here today Nazi and Soviet monuments should never have been removed (after all you'd be 'erasing' history, failing to 'learn' from them, and once they were torn down who knows what else might be suggested to be torn down). Amazing.
 

Enjoy this footage of the U.S. Army failing to learn from history (and seemingly out of contextualizing plaques) by blowing up a Nazi monument in Nuremberg and Ukranians erasing history by toppling a statue of the murderous VI Lenin (which was totally not glorifying anything):

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FTodK24KG6E

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3Jll9qtIbe0



 

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To return to the opening argument:

To hold that the House's presence at the trial is constitutionally required, though, strikes me as an infringement upon the Senate's exclusive power over impeachment trials.

I think the appropriate path here is to read the various provisions in place as a united whole, which adds further meaning to specific clauses. This "intertextual" approach to me would show that the House's power to impeach also needs to be weighed here.

The Senate has the sole power to try impeachments, but this does not mean there is no other provision to take into consideration. Thus, e.g., a basic norm against trying one's own case would lead me to question the absolute rule of the Chief Justice presiding. I offered, e.g., the hypo of an impeachment involving the Chief Justice themselves such as a claim of bribing the Chief Justice to win a lawsuit.

The rule regarding the vice president not presiding doesn't mean any goes there necessarily. There can be various reasons why the Chief Justice presides here in particular. The need for a vice president to preside by those overly literal if impeached suggests the problem. If possible, absurdities are avoided and widely accepted rules guiding legal text is a basic well accepted principle.

Thus, the fact that specific details -- like the requirement of formal delivery -- not being present does not answer all questions. The House power to impeach is also "sole." It is simply not clear that it does not only end when they formally deliver the counts to the Senate and are given the chance to provide managers.

Anyway, that has been the historical practice. And, the need to formally deliver is arguably separate than a need to be present too.
 

Bart, what you are missing about the Civil War is the Confederate States Army started out as Second Amendment style state militias. Indeed, I believe they remained under state control throughout the war, and, e.g., Georgia's governor refused to outfit units not from Georgia.

The Confederacy was PRECISELY what conservatives who talk of Second Amendment remedies talk about. A rebellion by citizen militias against the US government. Indeed, they even called themselves "the second American revolution".

Of course, they did, after secession, form a separate country. But that doesn't at all detract from the point that they thought the US government did not hold a monopoly of force, and were taught the contrary as they were smashed by the Union Army.
 

"I think the appropriate path here is to read the various provisions in place as a united whole, which adds further meaning to specific clauses. This "intertextual" approach to me would show that the House's power to impeach also needs to be weighed here."

The House exercised that power. Nancy Pelosi needs to run for the Senate if she wants to dictate terms there.

You are just making up phony interpretative metrics because you don't want Mitch McConnell to win.
 

One of the Volokh guys did some actual historical work, which suggests support for Pelosi's action, but also suggests Trump would not officially be impeached until the House communicates the impeachment to the Senate.

https://reason.com/2019/12/20/when-is-an-officer-impeached-ii/#comments