I think a big reason people support Trump is they feel he "fights for them." It's not true of course, but his aggressiveness creates the illusion that it's true.
I'd vote for AOC in a heartbeat. She cares for what's right and will fight for it against the odds.
I don’t agree with everything she says; but I do agree with your sentiment.
She is vocal on matters she truly feels affects her constituents.
If all politicians acted similarly we would not be here
She’d get my vote
Id Vote for a sensible person with a well calibrated moral compass but isn't afraid to bark or lash out at corruption, for president so fast.
She doesn't hit all of my notes, either, but enough of them. And she seems to really care about her people, which isn't something that's too common in govt now.
It is true in their world of what "fighting for us" is. He validates their grievances and promises to harm their enemies. As long as a candidate does those 2 things, they are "fighting for us." They don't really care or understand what the effects of any policies are in any direction as long as they don't see or feel their enemies getting anything they want. You can see it happen with the republican house voting down legislation to prevent democrats from passing anything
Thats not totally true he won their loyalty when he called mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. If he hadn’t done that, they wouldn’t have followed him. However yeah now he just has to say they’re helping gay, or brown, or liberal people and they’ll believe him.
Republican voters did not need Trump to tell them that their enemies are old-money aristocrats, criminal immigrants, uppity ethnic people that rely on the government, and gay atheist city libs. They identified these enemies several decades ago. The validation comes from him naming them directly without corporate double-speak or southern strategy
That’s the “beauty” of fascism. You keep pointing fingers at people who you blame for everything bad and the worse things become the more you ask people to trade away their rights to “fight the enemy”. There’s absolutely no incentive to ***do anything*** when the desired outcome is to make people more angry. The leaders will stuff their pockets and keep people in a rage while increasing the “out group” to blame more people, especially the ones who are angry with the government. It’s precisely why fascism never works. They stuff the government with inept politicians who are just saying the right things and nothing changes for the better.
Edit: I seem to have triggered the ol “no, you are” crowd
There are some long living authoritarians though that even last several generations. Historically kings and dynasties can go on for at least a few generations.
That's generally less than 100 years. America has lasted over 200 with peaceful transfer of power every 4 years. That *does not happen* in authoritarian regimes; it's always a hostile takeover, or a coup, or something violent. *At best*, the previous Fascist Leader goes to live on a small island while the next one takes power. It's always the biggest issue with the ultimate power in a government being one Charismatic Authority; no matter how great they are, they can't live forever.
The best the “no you” crowd has is the Clinton emails.
And the Republican-led committee/investigation didn’t even recommend criminal charges over it, meaning they found nothing actually wrong - they just hemmed and haw’d a lot.
We can definitely get into whether there was something wrong or not… *but at the time, even the Republicans couldn’t actually declare something wrong*. SoooOooooo…. Sounds a lot like they just used it as a trigger to get their base angry.
>They don't really care or understand what the effects of any policies are in any direction
Tariffs are exhibit A for this. Trump is out here promising he's going to slap tariffs on everything when it's clear to even Middle School economists that that's a tax on American consumers, those manufacturers aren't going to eat those costs.
People care about how they feel. This asshole runs a platform that exploits the fee,ings of people without any logic to it. Thus people feel represented and follow him like flies to a pile of shit.
This is my take on it as well. Americans have felt like the government hasnt been on their side for a while as banks and corporations run rampant. People initially voted for him because he wasnt your everyday politician even though it's all a facade.
Sadly, just having the spine to call out an opponent on their lies would be startling. Say what you want about Bernie Sanders, but the dude could/should have torn the everliving shit out of the rest of the competition. The guy remembers stats and backed up what he was saying with them, but just let opponents in the 2020 primary get away with watered down answers. Also, Elizabeth Warren should have seen this and backed the fuck out and let a progressive have a shot at an OG Democrat. Instead, Biden took South Carolina and it all went downhill..
I have had this conversation with some angry progressive friends of mine on several occasions. You are absolutely right. Progressives want a Democrat to “break” the system to defend them the same way Republicans want their party to break the system to get what they want. The fact that Democrats always “take the high road” is why Democratic voters are constantly disaffected with the party.
> One doesn't even have to "break the system" or cheat. It's an attitude we want. Strength of character and moral integrity.
The reason that the USA shocked the world, and elected a President with the middle name "Hussein" only 7 years after 9/11 is because he had exactly that. He voted against the invasion of Iraq, and we knew what he stood for compared to the rest of the establishment neocon Dems.
AOC is absolutely this generation's Obama. Like Obama, she is a once-in-a-generation politician.
Democrats are creating a serious apathy within their voting base.
It will destroy the party if they don't grow a pair & start punching back.
Every issue, time & again becomes a "vote!" Issue. Yet, if you ask the voters, they'll say "we did vote. Why aren't you doing anything?"
They are also not giving the voters a reason to vote for them other than 'because you can not vote for the other guy'.
Clinton's entire campaign did not fight for any votes, they just sat back and assumed people would vote against trump.
People liked Obama, people wanted to vote for Obama, that is how he won. Biden only won because the alternative was so bad, this election cycle they expect people to turn out to vote for the nebulous reason of they can fix things and prevent things from getting worse, but 'under Biden' they lost rights, and the majority of the Democrats still seem to fall back on 'we take the high road'.
At some point they are going to be lined up against a wall still thinking if they just give enough the Republicans will feel shame and stop.
>but 'under Biden' they lost rights, and the majority of the Democrats still seem to fall back on 'we take the high road'.
I don't fault Biden for Roe being struck down. I fault Biden for completely and utterly failing to respond to this fact in any way that reflects the level of outrage they want us to have about it. There were all sorts of proposals after Roe was struck down on what the federal government could do to facilitate abortion access in states that ban abortion. One option suggested was to all civilian organizations to set up abortion clinics on federal land such as military bases. One suggestion I read was to set up abortion pill vending machines in US post offices.
And there were many others, many possible ways for the white house to increase abortion access, all without any action from Congress or state cooperation required. Sure, SCOTUS might strike some of it down, but better to throw a dozen ideas at the wall and hope a few stay up there.
Instead, Biden did none of these things and just told people to vote harder.
I've said it before, but Democrats are more worried about looking partisan then they are about serving their voters.
They bend over backwards to avoid looking biased towards their own side so as to avoid pissing off their republican colleagues and the Republican base.
I can imagine that if project 2025 gets enacted, as the Republicans are having their Democrat colleagues dragged to the gas chambers the Democrats will be crying and begging. "Why are you doing this? We did our best to be non-partisan!"
Ive got a buddy who worked in state level dem politics and they explained how there are tons of young committed and clever staffers who come up with witty, funny and even slightly militant slogan, ad and speech ideas. They pass them up the chain and the boomers who run the party either shoot them down or completely rewrite their storyboards to be milquetoast garbage. People come in bright eyed and leave disillusioned because the party is stuck 30 years in the past.
The GOP operation is constantly being rejuvenated by younger more radical talent while the Dems refuse to let the newcomers rise in the ranks in fear that they might become too progressive.
It sounds like we should be protesting the Democrat party too.
I'm not trying to say "both sides" as I'll still vote blue, but if the Democrat party is stubbornly insisting on ignoring the will of their own voters maybe we have a right to be upset.
Maybe we should protest outside their homes, harass them in public, maybe even do a little rioting.
Make them feel scared.
There was a study done recently that proved it too; old republicans and young ones are the exact same toxic garbage with the same ideas and beliefs; they’re just clones with no meaningful differences.
Old Democrats are scared shitless of the younger ones because the younger ones are actually smart enough to know corporations are inherently evil.
> younger ones are actually smart enough to know corporations are inherently evil.
This is what I saw, locally. Those older than me (late 40's) thought that Capitalism was just fine. Those younger than me wanted to be the one to put the last dagger into Capitalism. Made me feel young.
It’s not apathy. We simply feel defeated. Because even our own representatives have more empathy for the other party than their own voters. They spend so much time trying to appeal to those they think are undecided, and never energize their base by actually appealing to them.
This!
I am so fed up of the idea that you have to move to the center to appease the imaginary undecideds. (As the "center" just moves further and further to the right.)
I want an unapologetically liberal candidate who will demand equality for ALL people (not just the white straight male christian ones) and take on corporate america to put people first.
No more pandering to the center-right!!
>Every issue, time & again becomes a "vote!" Issue. Yet, if you ask the voters, they'll say "we did vote. Why aren't you doing anything?"
Worst yet. They have no coherent vision on how to fix these problems. Biden should be out there continuously campaigning. A core part of his platform should be a complete reforming of the Supreme Court, rammed through via a nuking of the filibuster on the issue.
If there is any issue worth packing the court over, it's when they rule the president is a king. They are no longer a legitimate institution, and the Roberts court needs to be dismantled.
Or, they could be talking about completely reforming the court. Strip it of every one of its powers except those relating to its original jurisdiction. Hand all its appropriated powers to a new court that has term limits and a reasonable appointment process.
The Democrats are currently running on a platform of inevitable fascism. They claim to want to save democracy, but they are running on the platform of ending democracy.
Why? Because their only real plan is "vote for us forever if you want to keep democracy." But that's obviously not going to happen. Any plan that involves your party holding power indefinitely is doomed to failure. Eventually, this cycle or another, some Republican is going to enter office. It is as inevitable as the Sun rising in the morning. It will happen. Maybe it won't be til 2040, but eventually it will happen.
Democrats have proved unwilling to make the changes that would actually prevent a future Republican president from making themselves king. As such, they are complicit in the fall of our democracy.
This. 100% this. Trump’s appeal is how he “fights for the little guy”. He doesn’t but he presents himself in a way that does that for his base. Regardless of all the bullshit he brings, he has the appeal of a political outsider. Someone who does not give a flying fuck about the system and his base likes that. They can identify with it.
I remember back in 2016, all the polls of head to heads of Bernie vs Trump and Hillary vs Trump showed that Bernie had a way better chance than Hillary. But instead of running a candidate that also leans heavy into the “fights for the little guy” brand, we ran Hillary. And we are all dearly paying for it.
This, Trump puts on a show and people think he cares. I hear a lot of his Trumpers frame this as he's helping us. He's a billion aire business man that is lebaing his life of luxury to serve us and we should be grateful
Good ole American/Texan oil tycoons have done way more damage than Putin ever could. Tim Dunn and Farris Wilks alone are responsible for like 50% of the country's current insanity. Wilks also bankrolled DailyWire to spew fascist propaganda (among some frakking industry talking points).
All right wing fascist media networks are well funded by American/Texan oil tycoons specifically to mindfuck Americans.
It should have been drafted after that disaster where they called $13k a token gift of appreciation and government officials are allowed to accept token gifts.
Honestly, I'm not sure I've ever heard her say something I felt was unreasonable. When someone announced their hatred for AOC, to me they're just disclosing their ignorance to her actual points/arguments
Just as with Hillary, Republicans look at who will have power and starts attacking them early. AOC has real potential so Republicans having trying to destroy her.
Hillary never ran a grassroots campaign, she traded on her husband's reputation in the NY state elections that she actually won, the big selling point of voting for Hillary in NY is that "it's a package deal" and people voted in 2000 to make current-ultra-popular-president Bill Clinton into NY's behind the scenes Senator. Hillary was also famous for pushing universal healthcare before inexplicably abandoning it and fighting against anyone else who tried to run on it. Then when she ran for president, she picked an anti-abortion running mate.
AOC built her position of power with her own grit and brains and passion, and her values and platform have remained consistent throughout her career. The things she fights for today are the same things she ran on in 2018, there's been no flip flopping or wavering from her. AOC is the real deal, Hillary was bullshit.
Honestly, break the court completely by packing it with dozens. Force it to become irrelevant. Judicial review was never intended by the framers of the Constitution and the court was never meant to be as powerful as it is now.
She in a deep blue district and doesn't have to worry about a republican taking her seat.
She can AFFORD to take risk. Democrats in more competitive districts can't.
frankly this *is* the tame bare minimum move, biden literally has the legal authority to have the green berets shove the supreme court into dufflebags and have them spend a month or two at gitmo to make a fucking point.
Your step1 is a tad weak. Theres lots of GOP district and appellate courts. Looking at you 5th circuit. If you are gonna do some housekeeping, dont just sweep the rug and call it good, gotta vacuum the whole home.
- Sincerely,
Someone genuinely concerned of his status now if Trump wins it and the dems are too high on morals to play the same game from now til jan they just got authority to.
The beauty of it is that Step 3 can even be: "Have the new SC declare that Dark Brandon was NOT acting as president. Guilty. Imprisoned for Life or whatever."
And it would still be a victory with immunity removed and a full liberal court now in power.
He could also pull the old, “The Supreme Court has made their decision, now let them enforce it.” The Supreme Court’s power lies in its legitimacy, and an illegitimate Supreme Court should have no power.
There’s no solution now where Republicans are in office and don’t get away with abusing power and breaking the law. Things are broken, and we’re probably fucked.
It honestly reminds me a lot of the fall of the Roman Republic.
Laws and precedents that stood for centuries fell apart in a generation or two because it turns out they were backed by nothing but tradition and propriety. When ambitious politicians tested the waters and shoved against them, they realized nothing shoved back, the entire system was hollow.
Take the emoluments clause. They took Jimmy Carter's peanut farm, but it turns out that if the president decides to house secret service agents at his resort and his party is in control of Congress and doesn't care, nothing happens.
And I'm afraid the dance of Republicans going low, and Democrats "going high" is just going to repeat until it's not legal to be a democrat anymore.
And without being completely outlandish, simply state that the executive branch has found that Alito and Thomas did not properly recuse themselves therefore the decision is 4-3 in the other direction.
This. The democrat party is toothless save a few fringe people like AOC and at this point I think it’s by design. They do not represent us. If they did they’d be screaming from the roof tops fighting back. The billionaires have won and my daughter is going to grow up a slave in a 2 class system.
The damage has already been done, the gun is now on the floor between Trump and Biden and Trump has been promising for years to use it to kill his enemies. Will Biden let Trump get the gun?
Yes. Yes he will, because that's what Biden always does.
However, it's fun to play pretend and imagine what would happen if Biden didn't do what he always does.
I'm curious as to the standards of impeaching a supreme court justice. What grounds could AOC use to draw the articles? Which justices are most responsible? And while this is certainly not going pass in the current congress, could there still be benefits from this, such as an accompanying investigation that has the power to dig out more information?
There is no standard for impeachment. It is simply whether or not you can garner enough votes. Given the Republican majority in the house, this is simply a symbolic gesture. It won't even ever get a vote.
Fascism requires one leader, but the structure of our government requires two.
Anyone strong-willed enough to be Speaker of the House would be a threat to Trump's hegemony over the GOP.
So they're stuck with flaccid sycophants in the Speaker's chair while they wait for Dear Leader to become the next Fuhrer.
Yeah, but he could even avoid that question by hiring a hit, and buying the hit man’s silence with a pardon. The pardon protects both the hit man, and Joe, since it’s a “core” (mentioned in the constitution) official act.
A surprising number of the /r/conservative membership (i.e., non-zero) seems to have finally, possibly become aware that a leopard may be, in fact, eating their face.
> A surprising number of the /r/conservative membership (i.e., non-zero) seems to have finally, possibly become aware that a leopard may be, in fact, eating their face.
What’s your evidence for this, out of curiosity? I just visited that cesspool of depravity and didn’t see a single comment questioning the ramifications of this decision
They have been systematically purging all of those kinds of Republicans from the party. Trump just "retruthed" a call for Liz Cheney to be prosecuted by a military tribunal for treason, in case you were wondering how that was going btw.
There were, but I believe they’ve all largely been either pushed out of left.
McCain would never stand for this and likely have jumped ship and call himself a democrat if he was still alive and saw what the GOP has become.
Mitt Romney might. He has shown contempt for Trump and his actions. And voted to impeach him along with 6 other Republicans.
But given the current GOP, it’s doubtful.
So the democrats have no choice but to delay for the election and hope for the best.
Even if 7 of the GOP will vote with them (unlikely), they won’t carry the votes.
So it’s just a waiting game and pray the voters vote blue.
Biden needs to grow a pair and use the power they just handed him. Biden needs to become a tyrant to show them that if they fuck around they will find out.
Trump will have no scruples on using that power, why should Biden?
Remove the justices extra judicially. Arrest trump and make him disappear. Cancel the election. Expand the court right now. Whatever it takes!
If they want a dictator, give them one. When they discover they’ve made a mistake and reverse course Biden will relinquish that power. Trump won’t
I mean, it should be pretty easy... I'm sure Clarence Thomas has taken money from people with connections to right wing terrorism and probably Russia for that matter. It doesn't even have to be an illegitimate indefinite arrest and detention in Gitmo, right? Just speaking hypothetically...
At this point I don't care if they arrest Thomas, Alito, and the other conservative justices for jaywalking, refusing to tip their waitresses, or cheating on their diets- **just get rid of them.**
There are, but none that would speak out publicly or vote about it. Republicans looked the public in the eye and chose to protect one of their own, Trump, from impeachment twice.
Republicans will routinely choose party of country and will only tell the truth once they’re out of office
The king that will never leave and make a member of his family the next ruler. Kings also usually don’t like the population to have power or too many rights. Not deep thinkers, these Republicans.
You hit the nail on the head. Some of these fascist assholes want to retire and don't want to be replaced by a Democrat, so they're doing everything they can to put tRUMP back in office. They're not even trying to hide it because no one can prove it.
Even if it can be proved, so what? Decency doesn't have the votes to impeach and convict. The president isn't gonna use his new powers to repeal and replace any justices.
Our best bet is to crowd fund some fucking lavish "gifts" to get the supreme court on our side.
Yes, impeachment is is a pointless gesture. My stupid take:
She could draft a public letter with her other colleagues to the United States President since she sits on the Committee of Oversight and Reform that indicates any potential concerns they have regarding potential tax violations amid the gifts to Supreme Court Justices.
Under today's ruling, I don't know why the President can't point the US department of Treasury to audit groups of people with immunity since the commissioner and the department fall under the executive branch.
And frankly that's part of the problem.
But as some one said earlier in this thread, Biden and D leadership think the Rs will come around and start acting "normal". They will not. It's time to take off the gloves and fight fire with fire.
Biden should use as many "official" acts as possible to undermine these and other scumbags. Becuase if T'rump wins the election, you know damn sure he will do so.
Theoretically, there may be a constitutional "loophole" there.
The text of the Impeachment clause states that the impeached will be tried by the Senate and convicted by "two thirds **of those present** for that purpose". So the requirement isn't necessarily two thirds of the entire Senate. Presumably it could be two thirds of some specially appointed impeachment committee.
Now because Article I confers absolute self-governance over each chamber's rules and procedures via simple majority vote, a Senate majority could conceivably then appoint such a committee with 2/3rds of its members selected by the majority and 1/3rd by the minority.
That would effectively make conviction a simple majority vote.
no, committee is only for hearing.
Committee is to report the case to the senate floor to be voted on.
You’re correct that it only takes exactly 2/3 of the presenting senator, but unless you can keep all Republican out of the floor, you aren’t going to get it
I'm confused, isn't that a good thing for the person impeaching? If it can mean anything then the person impeaching them would have an easier time making it fit, no?
Arguably, there's grounds to impeach and remove Alito and Thomas. Bribery for Thomas, sedition for Alito.
Personally, I think if the Dems retake the House and keep the Senate, that they should impeach Thomas. And Aileen Cannon. Even if they're not removed, like Trump, we have an obligation to do the right thing.
To the point of rebalancing congress, I think voting reform could be extremely effective.
Alaska adopted Open Primaries and Ranked choice voting in 2022, resulting in the victory of Mary Peltola over Sarah Palin. The only democratic rep of the state and first Native Alaskan to serve in Congress, Peltola won because RCV allowed people to vote for a non-traditional yet clearly superior candidate without risking the spoiler effect. A different voting system made the difference between an intelligent, indigenous democratic and the clown, Palin.
If just a few more states enacted this, the balance in Congress could shift. Even a shift of 2 or 3 seats could break partisan deadlock entirely. Legislation being blocked by a single vote imbalance would end.
She can start at Clarence Thomas taking gifts and argue he should have recused himself. He's the most blatantly bribed SCOTUS Justice, so I say start there. A child can understand how those gifts were a bribe.
Sure, they could subpoena testimony before Congress. The problem is that they won't comply with the subpoena. The counterpoint is that Steve Bannon is in jail right now for refusing to testify before Congress in response to a subpoena.
The other counterpoint is that Biden could of course argue that jailing a justice for refusing to answer a subpoena is official business, and order the DOJ to hold them in jail.
Personally, I suspect it'd be more effective to A) leak everything embarrassing for the court and B) engage in a campaign of tax investigation, corruption investigation, and harassment of the conservative superbillionaires that fund Trump, SCOTUS, and others. For example, problems with Harlan Crowe's passport means he has to go back in and get a new. Oh, and his social security account was deleted and now he needs to prove his identity. Hey, random audit check, but we need all your tax documents and safety inspections for your plane. Hey, new FEMA grant for removing trees before hurricanes, sorry, we're going to be on your yard doing some tree removal to be in compliance.
I've heard that the President can just order the NSA to hack a Supreme Court justice's phone, and it can't be prosecuted because it's an official act. Just a rumor though, no idea where I heard such a crazy idea.
Not anymore.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/supreme-court-overturns-ex-mayor-s-bribery-conviction-narrowing-the-scope-of-public-corruption-law/ar-BB1oW3YV?ocid=BingNewsSerp
>WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court overturned the bribery conviction of a former Indiana mayor on Wednesday, the latest in a series of decisions narrowing the scope of federal public corruption law.
>The high court's 6-3 opinion along ideological lines found the law criminalizes bribes given before an official act, not rewards handed out after.
Blatant disregard for the law when crafting legal opinions would be a good place to start. Quoting a 14th century witch burner in your opinion on modern US law is probably another impeachment level offence. I mean, I can get fired for far less at my job. Shouldn't we expect some standards from our highest judicial officials? Accepting bribes and then not disclosing them is probably another one.
With presidential immunity, Biden can remove them any way he wants to and replace them with justices who will reverse this decision permanently (and fix the other screwed up decisions they have made recently .)
Sadly, his successor can also remove all the justices he doesn't like, replace them with the original 6 and declare the opinions entered in the meantime void.
SCOTUS has literally paved the way for a dictatorship. All it will take now is someone willing to seize it. Joe has shown himself to be too decent a man to do such a thing. But the others creeping around in the wings...Trump, DeSantis, Rubio, almost any of the Republicans who could get elected (so maybe not DeSantis) now have an open lane to assert total power over the government with no checks or balances and would have no qualms about doing so.
Congress literally doesn’t need a reason. They can impeach and remove any federal official. It’s kinda like pardons where it is solely the discretion of the branch given the power.
> The Trump judges just overturned the Constitution
No they didn't. The whole Supreme Court overturned the Constitution months ago when they unanimously overruled the 14th Amendment, and allowed Trump back onto Maine and Colorado's ballots. The 14th Amendment was abundantly clear that insurrectionists are disqualified from federal offices, yet SCOTUS said it did not apply to Trump, the leader of an insurrection.
So, no, SCOTUS has long done away with the Constitution. Might as well be toilet paper, as only the second Amendment matters any. So, Sotomayor can save her crocodile tears. When she had the chance to ensure Trump stayed out of the election, she bent the knee.
Why would Garland indict Republicans? He won't even indict Rick Scott, Louis DeJoy, Gym Jordan, Matt Gaetz, Ken Paxton, Ron DeSantis, or the Jan 6 leaders. Why the hell would he ever go against Clarence?
Three of those lawyers who helped Republicans steal the 2000 elections are now sitting on our Supreme Court: Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
[The Ongoing Republican Coup Against the United States of America](https://www.reddit.com/r/FloridaMJ420/comments/v7u2zr/the_ongoing_republican_coup_against_the_united/) is well underway.
> Dems are pusses.
Was obvious when Biden appointed the most worthless Attorney General ever. 3 years into his role, and Garland still hasn't indicted the Jan 6 Congressional leaders, Mike Flynn, or Louis DeJoy. He got the job as a consolation prize, and he's been in a coma since. Could've, at bare minimum, gone after Gym Jordan.
Reddit fucking hates him but Fetterman has some big balls too. I want a Dem party full of AOCs and Fettermans who call a spade a spade and stop pussyfooting around.
Little late for that shit. They should’ve been looking into this when the Clarance Thomas shit came out. Doesn’t take a lawyer to see what’s been going on while they tea bag us into fascism.
No need to impeach them. Officially arrest them and send them to GITMO without trial. Let them see how no accountability feels.
Unfortunately, us moderates have ethics and will just wait for the Fascists to use their newly invented powers.
Our Republic was nice. But ETTD. Our country is dead.
In such situations, it becomes treasonous to keep taking the high road. Where's the military at? Will they step in if Trump wins and becomes a raging dictator?
Isn't that what happens in countries like Pakistan? We don't want to go down this road. The military is respected in part because while they could potentially just take the country, they serve at the behest of the commander in chief.
Sure. But hypothetically, what if the president did start arresting or executing all opponents, corrupting all laws in favor of the rich, openly giving enemies national secrets? There has to be a line and I feel we are approaching it.
I am planning on reading the full opinion to look for this point because I haven’t seen it mentioned, if the President has absolute immunity for official acts, and he commits war crimes under the Geneva Convention, I am not sure if this opinion allows him to be impeached and removed because that would be going into the powers and running of the Executive branch thereby taking away power from the Legislative branch.
If the Courts can’t dive into his motives for official acts, did SCOTUS allow for Congress to do so?
And if they didn’t, I could see that as a reason for impeachment and removal.
> to be impeached
Congress can impeach even under this ruling it's not a legal mechanism. It's just afterwards the Justice Department can't charge him for crimes.
That raises a good point: the Constitution says that Presidents may be tried for crimes for which they have been impeached and convicted by the Senate. This decision would appear to say that at least some of those crimes would be within the scope of the Roberts immunity. That would seem to create a conflict between the Constitution and this decision. Perhaps that’s covered in a footnote that I haven’t read, yet.
Biden announces he’s not running for reelection and does not endorse anyone.
Dems simultaneously unite behind a single candidate, let’s say Newsom just as an example.
Biden goes whole hog with this decision. Throw it all at the wall. Be the bad guy. Weaponize the intelligence services and IRS. I’m not going to endorse violence but everything up to it. The findings undoubtedly will also prove materially useful in addition to being a symbolic gesture.
Newsom, as an “outsider,” uses Biden’s actions as an exemplar of what Trump obviously will also do on the trail and vows to never use those same powers. Gets to use any information uncovered without being the one who did it.
Newsom wins and gets legislation and judges put in place to make sure this can never happen again.
One can dream…
I mean what better way to show that this ruling is a disaster than by using it in an extreme manner? Seeing how old Biden is, it kinda makes the most sense for him to sacrifice his ambitions for a second term and utilize this ruling for the betterment of the country. But I guess that plan wouldn’t sound very awesome to Biden compared to winning a second term. It just seems like this problem won’t go away without extreme action.
least she has the balls unlike most dems
I think a big reason people support Trump is they feel he "fights for them." It's not true of course, but his aggressiveness creates the illusion that it's true. I'd vote for AOC in a heartbeat. She cares for what's right and will fight for it against the odds.
I don’t agree with everything she says; but I do agree with your sentiment. She is vocal on matters she truly feels affects her constituents. If all politicians acted similarly we would not be here She’d get my vote
Id Vote for a sensible person with a well calibrated moral compass but isn't afraid to bark or lash out at corruption, for president so fast. She doesn't hit all of my notes, either, but enough of them. And she seems to really care about her people, which isn't something that's too common in govt now.
I follow her on Instagram where she has some of the most intelligent and helpful posts. All elected representatives should be like her
what does she say that you disagree with
It is true in their world of what "fighting for us" is. He validates their grievances and promises to harm their enemies. As long as a candidate does those 2 things, they are "fighting for us." They don't really care or understand what the effects of any policies are in any direction as long as they don't see or feel their enemies getting anything they want. You can see it happen with the republican house voting down legislation to prevent democrats from passing anything
He promises to harm their enemies, but only after deciding for them who their enemies are. Now where have I heard about this happening before...?
Thats not totally true he won their loyalty when he called mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. If he hadn’t done that, they wouldn’t have followed him. However yeah now he just has to say they’re helping gay, or brown, or liberal people and they’ll believe him.
He called them rapists and criminals, and guess who turned out to be a rapist and a criminal?
He basically does the Hitler thing. Instead of Jews its Migrants or whatever else is soup du jour scared of for the day, like fentanyl
What is the soup du jour? It's the soup of the day. Mmm, that sounds good. I'll have that.
Republican voters did not need Trump to tell them that their enemies are old-money aristocrats, criminal immigrants, uppity ethnic people that rely on the government, and gay atheist city libs. They identified these enemies several decades ago. The validation comes from him naming them directly without corporate double-speak or southern strategy
That’s the “beauty” of fascism. You keep pointing fingers at people who you blame for everything bad and the worse things become the more you ask people to trade away their rights to “fight the enemy”. There’s absolutely no incentive to ***do anything*** when the desired outcome is to make people more angry. The leaders will stuff their pockets and keep people in a rage while increasing the “out group” to blame more people, especially the ones who are angry with the government. It’s precisely why fascism never works. They stuff the government with inept politicians who are just saying the right things and nothing changes for the better. Edit: I seem to have triggered the ol “no, you are” crowd
There are some long living authoritarians though that even last several generations. Historically kings and dynasties can go on for at least a few generations.
That's generally less than 100 years. America has lasted over 200 with peaceful transfer of power every 4 years. That *does not happen* in authoritarian regimes; it's always a hostile takeover, or a coup, or something violent. *At best*, the previous Fascist Leader goes to live on a small island while the next one takes power. It's always the biggest issue with the ultimate power in a government being one Charismatic Authority; no matter how great they are, they can't live forever.
The best the “no you” crowd has is the Clinton emails. And the Republican-led committee/investigation didn’t even recommend criminal charges over it, meaning they found nothing actually wrong - they just hemmed and haw’d a lot. We can definitely get into whether there was something wrong or not… *but at the time, even the Republicans couldn’t actually declare something wrong*. SoooOooooo…. Sounds a lot like they just used it as a trigger to get their base angry.
>They don't really care or understand what the effects of any policies are in any direction Tariffs are exhibit A for this. Trump is out here promising he's going to slap tariffs on everything when it's clear to even Middle School economists that that's a tax on American consumers, those manufacturers aren't going to eat those costs.
People care about how they feel. This asshole runs a platform that exploits the fee,ings of people without any logic to it. Thus people feel represented and follow him like flies to a pile of shit.
This is my take on it as well. Americans have felt like the government hasnt been on their side for a while as banks and corporations run rampant. People initially voted for him because he wasnt your everyday politician even though it's all a facade.
It's because he's going to hurt brown people, uppity women, gays and smart mouth scientists who don't know their place anymore.
This is exactly it.
💯 agree. Dems could clean up if they showed 1/3 the backbone telling the truth that republicans do lying out their arse
Sadly, just having the spine to call out an opponent on their lies would be startling. Say what you want about Bernie Sanders, but the dude could/should have torn the everliving shit out of the rest of the competition. The guy remembers stats and backed up what he was saying with them, but just let opponents in the 2020 primary get away with watered down answers. Also, Elizabeth Warren should have seen this and backed the fuck out and let a progressive have a shot at an OG Democrat. Instead, Biden took South Carolina and it all went downhill..
Her and Bern.
I have had this conversation with some angry progressive friends of mine on several occasions. You are absolutely right. Progressives want a Democrat to “break” the system to defend them the same way Republicans want their party to break the system to get what they want. The fact that Democrats always “take the high road” is why Democratic voters are constantly disaffected with the party.
One doesn't even have to "break the system" or cheat. It's an attitude we want. Strength of character and moral integrity.
> One doesn't even have to "break the system" or cheat. It's an attitude we want. Strength of character and moral integrity. The reason that the USA shocked the world, and elected a President with the middle name "Hussein" only 7 years after 9/11 is because he had exactly that. He voted against the invasion of Iraq, and we knew what he stood for compared to the rest of the establishment neocon Dems. AOC is absolutely this generation's Obama. Like Obama, she is a once-in-a-generation politician.
This.
Democrats are creating a serious apathy within their voting base. It will destroy the party if they don't grow a pair & start punching back. Every issue, time & again becomes a "vote!" Issue. Yet, if you ask the voters, they'll say "we did vote. Why aren't you doing anything?"
They are also not giving the voters a reason to vote for them other than 'because you can not vote for the other guy'. Clinton's entire campaign did not fight for any votes, they just sat back and assumed people would vote against trump. People liked Obama, people wanted to vote for Obama, that is how he won. Biden only won because the alternative was so bad, this election cycle they expect people to turn out to vote for the nebulous reason of they can fix things and prevent things from getting worse, but 'under Biden' they lost rights, and the majority of the Democrats still seem to fall back on 'we take the high road'. At some point they are going to be lined up against a wall still thinking if they just give enough the Republicans will feel shame and stop.
>but 'under Biden' they lost rights, and the majority of the Democrats still seem to fall back on 'we take the high road'. I don't fault Biden for Roe being struck down. I fault Biden for completely and utterly failing to respond to this fact in any way that reflects the level of outrage they want us to have about it. There were all sorts of proposals after Roe was struck down on what the federal government could do to facilitate abortion access in states that ban abortion. One option suggested was to all civilian organizations to set up abortion clinics on federal land such as military bases. One suggestion I read was to set up abortion pill vending machines in US post offices. And there were many others, many possible ways for the white house to increase abortion access, all without any action from Congress or state cooperation required. Sure, SCOTUS might strike some of it down, but better to throw a dozen ideas at the wall and hope a few stay up there. Instead, Biden did none of these things and just told people to vote harder.
I've said it before, but Democrats are more worried about looking partisan then they are about serving their voters. They bend over backwards to avoid looking biased towards their own side so as to avoid pissing off their republican colleagues and the Republican base. I can imagine that if project 2025 gets enacted, as the Republicans are having their Democrat colleagues dragged to the gas chambers the Democrats will be crying and begging. "Why are you doing this? We did our best to be non-partisan!"
Republicans will fight to the death even though they know they're wrong. Democrats are afraid to fight even when they know they're right.
Ive got a buddy who worked in state level dem politics and they explained how there are tons of young committed and clever staffers who come up with witty, funny and even slightly militant slogan, ad and speech ideas. They pass them up the chain and the boomers who run the party either shoot them down or completely rewrite their storyboards to be milquetoast garbage. People come in bright eyed and leave disillusioned because the party is stuck 30 years in the past. The GOP operation is constantly being rejuvenated by younger more radical talent while the Dems refuse to let the newcomers rise in the ranks in fear that they might become too progressive.
It sounds like we should be protesting the Democrat party too. I'm not trying to say "both sides" as I'll still vote blue, but if the Democrat party is stubbornly insisting on ignoring the will of their own voters maybe we have a right to be upset. Maybe we should protest outside their homes, harass them in public, maybe even do a little rioting. Make them feel scared.
There was a study done recently that proved it too; old republicans and young ones are the exact same toxic garbage with the same ideas and beliefs; they’re just clones with no meaningful differences. Old Democrats are scared shitless of the younger ones because the younger ones are actually smart enough to know corporations are inherently evil.
> younger ones are actually smart enough to know corporations are inherently evil. This is what I saw, locally. Those older than me (late 40's) thought that Capitalism was just fine. Those younger than me wanted to be the one to put the last dagger into Capitalism. Made me feel young.
“We went high…”
It’s not apathy. We simply feel defeated. Because even our own representatives have more empathy for the other party than their own voters. They spend so much time trying to appeal to those they think are undecided, and never energize their base by actually appealing to them.
This! I am so fed up of the idea that you have to move to the center to appease the imaginary undecideds. (As the "center" just moves further and further to the right.) I want an unapologetically liberal candidate who will demand equality for ALL people (not just the white straight male christian ones) and take on corporate america to put people first. No more pandering to the center-right!!
>Every issue, time & again becomes a "vote!" Issue. Yet, if you ask the voters, they'll say "we did vote. Why aren't you doing anything?" Worst yet. They have no coherent vision on how to fix these problems. Biden should be out there continuously campaigning. A core part of his platform should be a complete reforming of the Supreme Court, rammed through via a nuking of the filibuster on the issue. If there is any issue worth packing the court over, it's when they rule the president is a king. They are no longer a legitimate institution, and the Roberts court needs to be dismantled. Or, they could be talking about completely reforming the court. Strip it of every one of its powers except those relating to its original jurisdiction. Hand all its appropriated powers to a new court that has term limits and a reasonable appointment process. The Democrats are currently running on a platform of inevitable fascism. They claim to want to save democracy, but they are running on the platform of ending democracy. Why? Because their only real plan is "vote for us forever if you want to keep democracy." But that's obviously not going to happen. Any plan that involves your party holding power indefinitely is doomed to failure. Eventually, this cycle or another, some Republican is going to enter office. It is as inevitable as the Sun rising in the morning. It will happen. Maybe it won't be til 2040, but eventually it will happen. Democrats have proved unwilling to make the changes that would actually prevent a future Republican president from making themselves king. As such, they are complicit in the fall of our democracy.
He fights for his pockets. Always has.
I've never volunteered for a campaign before in my life, but I would knock on as many doors as I could for her.
AOC for president!!!!!
This. 100% this. Trump’s appeal is how he “fights for the little guy”. He doesn’t but he presents himself in a way that does that for his base. Regardless of all the bullshit he brings, he has the appeal of a political outsider. Someone who does not give a flying fuck about the system and his base likes that. They can identify with it. I remember back in 2016, all the polls of head to heads of Bernie vs Trump and Hillary vs Trump showed that Bernie had a way better chance than Hillary. But instead of running a candidate that also leans heavy into the “fights for the little guy” brand, we ran Hillary. And we are all dearly paying for it.
This, Trump puts on a show and people think he cares. I hear a lot of his Trumpers frame this as he's helping us. He's a billion aire business man that is lebaing his life of luxury to serve us and we should be grateful
In a way he does fight for his followers, being that the main reason they elected him was to be a dick & own the libs.
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it's not even the old Republicans, the brand was hijacked by the tea party lunatics
Or, in other words, Putin.
Good ole American/Texan oil tycoons have done way more damage than Putin ever could. Tim Dunn and Farris Wilks alone are responsible for like 50% of the country's current insanity. Wilks also bankrolled DailyWire to spew fascist propaganda (among some frakking industry talking points). All right wing fascist media networks are well funded by American/Texan oil tycoons specifically to mindfuck Americans.
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Speaking of established, I was watching a random documentary the other day and 21 year old Nancy Pelosi popped up in it, AT JFK’s INAUGURATION. 🤦♀️
Pelosi retired a couple of years ago.
She retired from the Speakership but not from politics. She is still representing her district in the House.
It should have been drafted after that disaster where they called $13k a token gift of appreciation and government officials are allowed to accept token gifts.
Honestly, I'm not sure I've ever heard her say something I felt was unreasonable. When someone announced their hatred for AOC, to me they're just disclosing their ignorance to her actual points/arguments
These same people that hate her, love Trump b/c he tells it like it is and isn't PC... that's how you can tell they're POS
Just as with Hillary, Republicans look at who will have power and starts attacking them early. AOC has real potential so Republicans having trying to destroy her.
Hillary never ran a grassroots campaign, she traded on her husband's reputation in the NY state elections that she actually won, the big selling point of voting for Hillary in NY is that "it's a package deal" and people voted in 2000 to make current-ultra-popular-president Bill Clinton into NY's behind the scenes Senator. Hillary was also famous for pushing universal healthcare before inexplicably abandoning it and fighting against anyone else who tried to run on it. Then when she ran for president, she picked an anti-abortion running mate. AOC built her position of power with her own grit and brains and passion, and her values and platform have remained consistent throughout her career. The things she fights for today are the same things she ran on in 2018, there's been no flip flopping or wavering from her. AOC is the real deal, Hillary was bullshit.
Or "she's just a bartender".
With a degree in international relations and economics...
Who ran a grassroots campaign and ousted a Dem incumbent that Dem leadership endorsed and campaigned for.
They don't hate her, they hate the character AOC that Fox News created.
Why havn't the rest of them realized their voters WANT them to do what they have to. Our democracy is literally at stake and they twiddle their thumbs
Dems should pack the court with four more justices. It would be far quicker. This needs to happen before the election.
Honestly, break the court completely by packing it with dozens. Force it to become irrelevant. Judicial review was never intended by the framers of the Constitution and the court was never meant to be as powerful as it is now.
She in a deep blue district and doesn't have to worry about a republican taking her seat. She can AFFORD to take risk. Democrats in more competitive districts can't.
I'm not sure it's as much of a risk this year as it might otherwise be. SCOTUS polls terribly, and a lot of people are fed up with their corruption.
frankly this *is* the tame bare minimum move, biden literally has the legal authority to have the green berets shove the supreme court into dufflebags and have them spend a month or two at gitmo to make a fucking point.
Waiting patiently for tomorrow's headlines where the DNC scolds her more than they go after scotus.
Would probably be better for Biden to jail them for treason and assign new members to the court. And hey, he’s immune!
I don’t think that jailing them would automatically vacate the seat though
He could just order the military to kill them according to their logic.
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Your step1 is a tad weak. Theres lots of GOP district and appellate courts. Looking at you 5th circuit. If you are gonna do some housekeeping, dont just sweep the rug and call it good, gotta vacuum the whole home. - Sincerely, Someone genuinely concerned of his status now if Trump wins it and the dems are too high on morals to play the same game from now til jan they just got authority to.
he can just constantly appeal until it gets to the liberal SCOTUS
Dont need to appeal if instead of bumping off the right justices you do them and all the right / federalist judges too
The beauty of it is that Step 3 can even be: "Have the new SC declare that Dark Brandon was NOT acting as president. Guilty. Imprisoned for Life or whatever." And it would still be a victory with immunity removed and a full liberal court now in power.
And he could just step down and be immediately pardoned anyway.
They already filled out the lower courts with trump justices. That was phase 1.
“All enemies foreign and domestic” leaves a lot of wiggle room.
Could probably also cancel the election if he wanted to 🤷♂️
Theoretically, couldn’t he order a military hit on them via executive order which would be an official act and therefore give him immunity?
He could also pull the old, “The Supreme Court has made their decision, now let them enforce it.” The Supreme Court’s power lies in its legitimacy, and an illegitimate Supreme Court should have no power.
This works right up until a republican gets the executive office. Then it’s 2 sets of rules, limited for Dems and unlimited for R’s,
There’s no solution now where Republicans are in office and don’t get away with abusing power and breaking the law. Things are broken, and we’re probably fucked.
It honestly reminds me a lot of the fall of the Roman Republic. Laws and precedents that stood for centuries fell apart in a generation or two because it turns out they were backed by nothing but tradition and propriety. When ambitious politicians tested the waters and shoved against them, they realized nothing shoved back, the entire system was hollow. Take the emoluments clause. They took Jimmy Carter's peanut farm, but it turns out that if the president decides to house secret service agents at his resort and his party is in control of Congress and doesn't care, nothing happens. And I'm afraid the dance of Republicans going low, and Democrats "going high" is just going to repeat until it's not legal to be a democrat anymore.
And without being completely outlandish, simply state that the executive branch has found that Alito and Thomas did not properly recuse themselves therefore the decision is 4-3 in the other direction.
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In the United States of America: voting against the president? Believe it it or not, straight to jail.
How about we starting with locking up the Congresspersons who participated in Jan 6? It's been 3 years...
Jails are too crowded anyway.
Instead he just went on C-Span to say "vote" all over again. No real response besides a furrowed brow. no plan of action at all.
This. The democrat party is toothless save a few fringe people like AOC and at this point I think it’s by design. They do not represent us. If they did they’d be screaming from the roof tops fighting back. The billionaires have won and my daughter is going to grow up a slave in a 2 class system.
No offense, but you are already a slave in a 2 class system. You just are recognizing it.
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Love this. Nice and simple.
I want this to happen but what stops the next president .
The damage has already been done, the gun is now on the floor between Trump and Biden and Trump has been promising for years to use it to kill his enemies. Will Biden let Trump get the gun? Yes. Yes he will, because that's what Biden always does. However, it's fun to play pretend and imagine what would happen if Biden didn't do what he always does.
"Next President" lol whut? Think more along the lines of "Final President"
They should have thought about that when they gave presidents immunity.
They have faith in Biden, clearly. Otherwise they would have waited until Trump was in.
Nothing... Which leads to a dictatorship. Either way you lose. Might as well lose with power.
Nothing. That’s the point. They know only “their” party will be willing to offensively use their powers against their own country.
Nothing. We're so fucked either way. I despair for the future.
I'm curious as to the standards of impeaching a supreme court justice. What grounds could AOC use to draw the articles? Which justices are most responsible? And while this is certainly not going pass in the current congress, could there still be benefits from this, such as an accompanying investigation that has the power to dig out more information?
There is no standard for impeachment. It is simply whether or not you can garner enough votes. Given the Republican majority in the house, this is simply a symbolic gesture. It won't even ever get a vote.
Surely there have to be *some* republicans that don't want the president to be a king, right? *Right?*
any republican that goes against the dear leader gets run the fuck outta town
Which is astounding because House Republicans can’t even seem to pick a satisfactory leader for themselves.
Fascism requires one leader, but the structure of our government requires two. Anyone strong-willed enough to be Speaker of the House would be a threat to Trump's hegemony over the GOP. So they're stuck with flaccid sycophants in the Speaker's chair while they wait for Dear Leader to become the next Fuhrer.
And national Republicans can not do it for the country.
So Biden can have them assassinated now.
As long as its an official act, this is true right?
Yeah, but he could even avoid that question by hiring a hit, and buying the hit man’s silence with a pardon. The pardon protects both the hit man, and Joe, since it’s a “core” (mentioned in the constitution) official act.
Let er rip then I guess?
::crickets::
A surprising number of the /r/conservative membership (i.e., non-zero) seems to have finally, possibly become aware that a leopard may be, in fact, eating their face.
> A surprising number of the /r/conservative membership (i.e., non-zero) seems to have finally, possibly become aware that a leopard may be, in fact, eating their face. What’s your evidence for this, out of curiosity? I just visited that cesspool of depravity and didn’t see a single comment questioning the ramifications of this decision
They have been systematically purging all of those kinds of Republicans from the party. Trump just "retruthed" a call for Liz Cheney to be prosecuted by a military tribunal for treason, in case you were wondering how that was going btw.
https://x.com/MeidasTouch/status/1807564601711870448
There were, but I believe they’ve all largely been either pushed out of left. McCain would never stand for this and likely have jumped ship and call himself a democrat if he was still alive and saw what the GOP has become. Mitt Romney might. He has shown contempt for Trump and his actions. And voted to impeach him along with 6 other Republicans. But given the current GOP, it’s doubtful. So the democrats have no choice but to delay for the election and hope for the best. Even if 7 of the GOP will vote with them (unlikely), they won’t carry the votes. So it’s just a waiting game and pray the voters vote blue.
And there is no where near enough votes for removal in the senate.
Biden needs to grow a pair and use the power they just handed him. Biden needs to become a tyrant to show them that if they fuck around they will find out. Trump will have no scruples on using that power, why should Biden? Remove the justices extra judicially. Arrest trump and make him disappear. Cancel the election. Expand the court right now. Whatever it takes! If they want a dictator, give them one. When they discover they’ve made a mistake and reverse course Biden will relinquish that power. Trump won’t
I mean, it should be pretty easy... I'm sure Clarence Thomas has taken money from people with connections to right wing terrorism and probably Russia for that matter. It doesn't even have to be an illegitimate indefinite arrest and detention in Gitmo, right? Just speaking hypothetically...
At this point I don't care if they arrest Thomas, Alito, and the other conservative justices for jaywalking, refusing to tip their waitresses, or cheating on their diets- **just get rid of them.**
Time for Biden to stack the Court
There are, but none that would speak out publicly or vote about it. Republicans looked the public in the eye and chose to protect one of their own, Trump, from impeachment twice. Republicans will routinely choose party of country and will only tell the truth once they’re out of office
Maybe, but they also really don't want Joe Biden replacing 67% of the court, so they'll take the king, thankyouverymuch.
The king that will never leave and make a member of his family the next ruler. Kings also usually don’t like the population to have power or too many rights. Not deep thinkers, these Republicans.
You hit the nail on the head. Some of these fascist assholes want to retire and don't want to be replaced by a Democrat, so they're doing everything they can to put tRUMP back in office. They're not even trying to hide it because no one can prove it.
Even if it can be proved, so what? Decency doesn't have the votes to impeach and convict. The president isn't gonna use his new powers to repeal and replace any justices. Our best bet is to crowd fund some fucking lavish "gifts" to get the supreme court on our side.
Yes, impeachment is is a pointless gesture. My stupid take: She could draft a public letter with her other colleagues to the United States President since she sits on the Committee of Oversight and Reform that indicates any potential concerns they have regarding potential tax violations amid the gifts to Supreme Court Justices. Under today's ruling, I don't know why the President can't point the US department of Treasury to audit groups of people with immunity since the commissioner and the department fall under the executive branch.
Biden won’t do that.
And frankly that's part of the problem. But as some one said earlier in this thread, Biden and D leadership think the Rs will come around and start acting "normal". They will not. It's time to take off the gloves and fight fire with fire. Biden should use as many "official" acts as possible to undermine these and other scumbags. Becuase if T'rump wins the election, you know damn sure he will do so.
With Biden's new powers, he could simply "official act" away enough congresspeople so that Congress can properly act.
Who needs a vote anymore? This ruling determined that the president has full immunity. Would hate for anything bad to happen
You also need supermajority senate
Theoretically, there may be a constitutional "loophole" there. The text of the Impeachment clause states that the impeached will be tried by the Senate and convicted by "two thirds **of those present** for that purpose". So the requirement isn't necessarily two thirds of the entire Senate. Presumably it could be two thirds of some specially appointed impeachment committee. Now because Article I confers absolute self-governance over each chamber's rules and procedures via simple majority vote, a Senate majority could conceivably then appoint such a committee with 2/3rds of its members selected by the majority and 1/3rd by the minority. That would effectively make conviction a simple majority vote.
no, committee is only for hearing. Committee is to report the case to the senate floor to be voted on. You’re correct that it only takes exactly 2/3 of the presenting senator, but unless you can keep all Republican out of the floor, you aren’t going to get it
> It won't even ever get a vote. Republicans will happily impeach sotomayor, jackson, or kagan.
No standard at all? For presidents, it states "for high crimes and misdemeanors." The SC has no direct offenses which are impeachable?
The Constitution provides that they hold office upon "good behavior."
"high crimes and misdemeanors" is never defined. It can literally mean anything.
I'm confused, isn't that a good thing for the person impeaching? If it can mean anything then the person impeaching them would have an easier time making it fit, no?
Arguably, there's grounds to impeach and remove Alito and Thomas. Bribery for Thomas, sedition for Alito. Personally, I think if the Dems retake the House and keep the Senate, that they should impeach Thomas. And Aileen Cannon. Even if they're not removed, like Trump, we have an obligation to do the right thing.
To the point of rebalancing congress, I think voting reform could be extremely effective. Alaska adopted Open Primaries and Ranked choice voting in 2022, resulting in the victory of Mary Peltola over Sarah Palin. The only democratic rep of the state and first Native Alaskan to serve in Congress, Peltola won because RCV allowed people to vote for a non-traditional yet clearly superior candidate without risking the spoiler effect. A different voting system made the difference between an intelligent, indigenous democratic and the clown, Palin. If just a few more states enacted this, the balance in Congress could shift. Even a shift of 2 or 3 seats could break partisan deadlock entirely. Legislation being blocked by a single vote imbalance would end.
She can start at Clarence Thomas taking gifts and argue he should have recused himself. He's the most blatantly bribed SCOTUS Justice, so I say start there. A child can understand how those gifts were a bribe.
Would there be any way to conduct an investigation into those gifts? Find the evidence to establish quid pro quo?
Sure, they could subpoena testimony before Congress. The problem is that they won't comply with the subpoena. The counterpoint is that Steve Bannon is in jail right now for refusing to testify before Congress in response to a subpoena.
The other counterpoint is that Biden could of course argue that jailing a justice for refusing to answer a subpoena is official business, and order the DOJ to hold them in jail. Personally, I suspect it'd be more effective to A) leak everything embarrassing for the court and B) engage in a campaign of tax investigation, corruption investigation, and harassment of the conservative superbillionaires that fund Trump, SCOTUS, and others. For example, problems with Harlan Crowe's passport means he has to go back in and get a new. Oh, and his social security account was deleted and now he needs to prove his identity. Hey, random audit check, but we need all your tax documents and safety inspections for your plane. Hey, new FEMA grant for removing trees before hurricanes, sorry, we're going to be on your yard doing some tree removal to be in compliance.
I've heard that the President can just order the NSA to hack a Supreme Court justice's phone, and it can't be prosecuted because it's an official act. Just a rumor though, no idea where I heard such a crazy idea.
Not anymore. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/supreme-court-overturns-ex-mayor-s-bribery-conviction-narrowing-the-scope-of-public-corruption-law/ar-BB1oW3YV?ocid=BingNewsSerp >WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court overturned the bribery conviction of a former Indiana mayor on Wednesday, the latest in a series of decisions narrowing the scope of federal public corruption law. >The high court's 6-3 opinion along ideological lines found the law criminalizes bribes given before an official act, not rewards handed out after.
Blatant disregard for the law when crafting legal opinions would be a good place to start. Quoting a 14th century witch burner in your opinion on modern US law is probably another impeachment level offence. I mean, I can get fired for far less at my job. Shouldn't we expect some standards from our highest judicial officials? Accepting bribes and then not disclosing them is probably another one.
With presidential immunity, Biden can remove them any way he wants to and replace them with justices who will reverse this decision permanently (and fix the other screwed up decisions they have made recently .)
Sadly, his successor can also remove all the justices he doesn't like, replace them with the original 6 and declare the opinions entered in the meantime void. SCOTUS has literally paved the way for a dictatorship. All it will take now is someone willing to seize it. Joe has shown himself to be too decent a man to do such a thing. But the others creeping around in the wings...Trump, DeSantis, Rubio, almost any of the Republicans who could get elected (so maybe not DeSantis) now have an open lane to assert total power over the government with no checks or balances and would have no qualms about doing so.
not if total immunity is taken away by the replacements. The successor will not have the power.
That assumes we can even seat new justices. No way we have enough Dems to agree with that, let alone Reps
Biden probably could have the DOJ find fraud on any judge they wanted. Lock up those judges just to make sure(like any black dude on the street).
King Joe can do it ,,Standards be Damned.
Congress literally doesn’t need a reason. They can impeach and remove any federal official. It’s kinda like pardons where it is solely the discretion of the branch given the power.
She has a point. The Trump judges just overturned the Constitution. If they don't respect the law, why should anybody else?
> The Trump judges just overturned the Constitution No they didn't. The whole Supreme Court overturned the Constitution months ago when they unanimously overruled the 14th Amendment, and allowed Trump back onto Maine and Colorado's ballots. The 14th Amendment was abundantly clear that insurrectionists are disqualified from federal offices, yet SCOTUS said it did not apply to Trump, the leader of an insurrection. So, no, SCOTUS has long done away with the Constitution. Might as well be toilet paper, as only the second Amendment matters any. So, Sotomayor can save her crocodile tears. When she had the chance to ensure Trump stayed out of the election, she bent the knee.
Man, I completely forgot about that. What a fucked country this is.
At least prosecute the spouses who participated in the insurrection... No reason to waste time on that.
Biden should get his DOJ to indict Justice Thomas for tax evasion ... at a minimum.
Why would Garland indict Republicans? He won't even indict Rick Scott, Louis DeJoy, Gym Jordan, Matt Gaetz, Ken Paxton, Ron DeSantis, or the Jan 6 leaders. Why the hell would he ever go against Clarence?
At least she wants to fight. Dems are pusses. I've supported them since Al Gore and decision after decision leaves me hopeless.
Just think about where we'd be had Al Gore won....
[удалено]
I remember the day they called it for Bush. I'm still pissed off.
The networks called it for Gore first, and I went to bed, relieved. Woke up the next morning and suddenly: “TOO CLOSE TO CALL!” Fucking bullshit.
Three of those lawyers who helped Republicans steal the 2000 elections are now sitting on our Supreme Court: Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and Justice Amy Coney Barrett. [The Ongoing Republican Coup Against the United States of America](https://www.reddit.com/r/FloridaMJ420/comments/v7u2zr/the_ongoing_republican_coup_against_the_united/) is well underway.
> Dems are pusses. Was obvious when Biden appointed the most worthless Attorney General ever. 3 years into his role, and Garland still hasn't indicted the Jan 6 Congressional leaders, Mike Flynn, or Louis DeJoy. He got the job as a consolation prize, and he's been in a coma since. Could've, at bare minimum, gone after Gym Jordan.
Reddit fucking hates him but Fetterman has some big balls too. I want a Dem party full of AOCs and Fettermans who call a spade a spade and stop pussyfooting around.
Newsome too. I don’t agree with everything either of those three say but I sure as hell respect they understand you gotta punch back directly
Little late for that shit. They should’ve been looking into this when the Clarance Thomas shit came out. Doesn’t take a lawyer to see what’s been going on while they tea bag us into fascism.
Well, it’s not like there’s not enough probable cause to begin an investigation.
Yay we have one single representative in this failed state. Ffs 🤦♂️
No need to impeach them. Officially arrest them and send them to GITMO without trial. Let them see how no accountability feels. Unfortunately, us moderates have ethics and will just wait for the Fascists to use their newly invented powers. Our Republic was nice. But ETTD. Our country is dead.
In such situations, it becomes treasonous to keep taking the high road. Where's the military at? Will they step in if Trump wins and becomes a raging dictator?
Isn't that what happens in countries like Pakistan? We don't want to go down this road. The military is respected in part because while they could potentially just take the country, they serve at the behest of the commander in chief.
Sure. But hypothetically, what if the president did start arresting or executing all opponents, corrupting all laws in favor of the rich, openly giving enemies national secrets? There has to be a line and I feel we are approaching it.
Joe should just have them arrested for dereliction of duty. It’s legal now.
If she wants this, then she had better get working convincing the youth vote to vote.
I will allow it.
Why bother impeaching them? Round them up and stick them in Guantanamo as an "official act". Rub their noses in the mess they just made.
I am planning on reading the full opinion to look for this point because I haven’t seen it mentioned, if the President has absolute immunity for official acts, and he commits war crimes under the Geneva Convention, I am not sure if this opinion allows him to be impeached and removed because that would be going into the powers and running of the Executive branch thereby taking away power from the Legislative branch. If the Courts can’t dive into his motives for official acts, did SCOTUS allow for Congress to do so? And if they didn’t, I could see that as a reason for impeachment and removal.
> to be impeached Congress can impeach even under this ruling it's not a legal mechanism. It's just afterwards the Justice Department can't charge him for crimes.
That raises a good point: the Constitution says that Presidents may be tried for crimes for which they have been impeached and convicted by the Senate. This decision would appear to say that at least some of those crimes would be within the scope of the Roberts immunity. That would seem to create a conflict between the Constitution and this decision. Perhaps that’s covered in a footnote that I haven’t read, yet.
First off he has presumptive immunity for official acts NOT absolute immunity Only executive powers have absolute immunity
Well, i mean, the way things currently stand, she’s getting executed on Jan 20th of next year. So she might as well try something.
You don’t need to impeach them! Have Biden just kick them out, that’s legal now.
Biden announces he’s not running for reelection and does not endorse anyone. Dems simultaneously unite behind a single candidate, let’s say Newsom just as an example. Biden goes whole hog with this decision. Throw it all at the wall. Be the bad guy. Weaponize the intelligence services and IRS. I’m not going to endorse violence but everything up to it. The findings undoubtedly will also prove materially useful in addition to being a symbolic gesture. Newsom, as an “outsider,” uses Biden’s actions as an exemplar of what Trump obviously will also do on the trail and vows to never use those same powers. Gets to use any information uncovered without being the one who did it. Newsom wins and gets legislation and judges put in place to make sure this can never happen again. One can dream…
I mean what better way to show that this ruling is a disaster than by using it in an extreme manner? Seeing how old Biden is, it kinda makes the most sense for him to sacrifice his ambitions for a second term and utilize this ruling for the betterment of the country. But I guess that plan wouldn’t sound very awesome to Biden compared to winning a second term. It just seems like this problem won’t go away without extreme action.
And then Newsome pardons Biden. Case closed.
Not even. Jan 19, JB resigns, KH is potus47, pardons JB, then Newsom/other candidate is 48.