It is UNCONSTITUTIONAL and UNJUST

And what point was that?

You made statements. I made statements in opposition to your statements. Start there and then come back to me, I see no need to repeat myself.

He did this publicly:
politico.com/story/2016/07/ … hip-226282

This claim is clearly exaggerated and a bit incoherent, but I’ll let you provide support for the claim if you have it. I’ve seen the video of all the ‘local’ anchors saying the same thing, but they were all part of the Sinclair Broadcast Group, a company that is generally pro-Trump and has special access arrangements with the GOP. So that seems to weigh against your claims. I challenge you to show something similar from liberal-leaning sources.

Also note that presenting the same facts is not in itself an indictment; two people reporting the same story truthfully should present the same set of facts, as there will often be general agreement about what facts are relevant and worth reporting.

At some point, that testimony is duplicative. Take a hypothetical where a whistleblower tips off investigators to the existence of a recording of a call, and investigators subsequently obtain that recording and make it the basis of an indictment. What additional information can the whistleblower add? Forcing that person to testify can only dilute good information with worse information, and introduce whatever bias that person has. It doesn’t move anyone closer to truth.

I don’t think we should make that distinction, at least to the extent we can prove them. What matters is the message that’s communicated. If someone threatens to hurt me, it doesn’t matter to me whether they’ve said “I’ll hurt you” or “shame if something were to happen to you, capisce?” If someone intends to communicate X, and successfully communicates X, it doesn’t really matter how the communication was achieved. Indeed, the implicit quid pro quo is, if anything, worse, because it is evidence of a guilty mind (again, assuming we can independently prove that the intent was to communicate X).

But if that’s so, why would so many career civil servants been so shocked by it? These were Republican appointees who have worked through many administrations, they would know if this was business as usual, and they immediately recognized it as crossing lines. That’s inconsistent with it having been acceptable before.

I agree with this with respect to laws, but not with respect to founding documents. Founding documents need to be inspirational, because the instutions they create are only part of the equation: those institutions need popular buy in, they need to represent a grand vision, and such a vision is best communicated through grand pronouncements and flowery prose.

I also think that vagueness is underappreciated. In a pluarlist society, where compromise is hard and opinions differ, a vague clause is often better because it lets people who would disagree on a very precisely worded clause, agree on something. Again, drawing from my legal day job, where there are clauses that are very unlikely to come up and on which we can’t agree, we can sometimes move the negotiation forward by leaving it vague and letting each party have their own pet interpretation, and ‘crossing that bridge if and when we get there’. That’s useful and rational.

But, following on that, I think we agree that it would be better to amend the Constitution to settle down areas where we have arrived at the bridge and we need clarity on which future we’ll choose for ourselves, or where vagueness has allowed interpretations that are bad for society.

(I will also note that I am biased by previous decisions on this question: in writing the founding document for ILP, I intentionally eschewed precision in favor of grand pronouncements and flowery prose.)

Yes. But I don’t think that’s what Trump has done. He’s lied to hide his administrations failures, to exaggerate their successes; in essense, to deprive the people of the information they need to develop an informed opinion on his presidency. That kind of lying is bad faith, it is incompatible with the faithful administration of the office.

But I think I take your general point: I am making a claim based on my interpretation of the oath of office, and it isn’t based on anything other than my reading of the oath and my interpretation of what good faith means.

Sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that. Rather, Urwrong suggested that only fraudulent voting or altering vote counts would qualify as foreign interference in an election. I presented the above hypothetical to show that there are definitely non-voting actions that would qualify. And I think it challenges your assertion that as long as voters are permitted to vote how they like, there is no interference.

My follow-up to Urwrong was a further hypothetical, also not what has happened, but intended to be closer to the current situation to help us draw lines:

I would say that this is foreign electoral interference. Do you agree? If so, step three is imputing vicarious intent, when the foreign country is coerced into starting such an investigation by someone with the intent to affect the election, which is what we have here.

I agree that the testimony can become duplicative, “At some point,” as relates a specific underlying subject matter. I believe the first question that we would have to answer is, “At what point?”

For an unrelated example of a case in which I would agree with the general statement: Suppose Person A shoots Person B in the head in an urban setting and there are fifty people who visually witnessed this event, I quite probably do not need to hear the testimony of all fifty of those people. If there is video evidence of that from beginning to end, then I may well not need the testimony of any of them.

The recording of the call is quite different because the decision to be made here is whether or not something rises to the level of, “High crimes and misdemeanors,” and honestly, I haven’t even determined what I take that term to mean just yet. I would have an easier time with, “Crimes and misdemeanors,” because then I could simply look at applicable statutes and determine whether or not the activity in question fits any of those.

The murder in my example is much clearer. A murder definitely happened.

Instead, I am the left with a qualifier, “High,” which under my interpretation of common language would suggest that it has to be a pretty bad crime or misdemeanor. Other interpretations, including yours, would suggest that it does not have to represent anything on the books that is even a crime or a misdemeanor in the first place.

But, even assuming I come to my own conclusion (itself a problem) as to what a High Crime and Misdemeanor is or could be, we are still left with Question 3 as to whether or not the call rises to that level. Assuming that the call, in and of itself, is not sufficient (based on a reading of the transcript) to rise to that level, now I have to get into thought processes and related evidence. That is where the whistleblower could come in handy. Because he has awareness of the event in question (the call) it is not unreasonable to believe that he could have awareness of the thought processes involved (via discussion) both before and after the call. He might also have awareness or evidence of other matters directly related to the subject of the call. Not least of which is whether or not Trump actually intended to withhold the aid until such time that his purported demands were met.

He did not withhold the aid until his purported demands were met, this much we know, but what we cannot know is whether that was because outside influences changed his decision-making process in this regard or if it was simply a true bluff. We can’t know either of these things absent Trump telling us directly, and that’s only assuming one decides to believe him.

And, like it or not, who the whistleblower is could add credence. Who precisely thought that this was such a big deal and reported it? Is it unacceptable to suggest that Mike Pence being the whistleblower would carry with it more weight than the whistleblower being some random staffer neither of us has ever heard of?

It does matter because the first instance in your example is undeniably a threat and, I believe, could constitute menacing at a minimum. The second statement, on the other hand, could be explained away as something else entirely or as legitimate concern for your well-being. In the second statement, it is being suggested that something could happen to you, and it would be a shame if it did, but it does not in any way even suggest that the speaker would also be the actor. Even if you want to argue that there is definitely an implied threat, it is not necessarily the actor threatening you, but instead suggesting that you should feel threatened.

I do agree with you about the intent, but then you get into that keyword: prove. With the first statement, the clarity is such that the proof exists in the statement itself. I believe I have read the transcript of the call, but who knows, I might have found a fake transcript or something. To me, the call didn’t strictly prove much of anything.

I have two things in response to this:

1.) Does something always cross a line because of what it is, or can it cross a line because of how it was done? That kind of gets into what we talked about above.

2.) The fact that they were Republicans is irrelevant. Unless for strictly political reasons, (which I believe, but also believe that is why the Impeachment happened in the first place) the fact that ZERO Republican Representatives voted for Impeachment fails to give the fact that the staffers were Republican any weight whatsoever. In the procedural sense, the appointees are tasked with suggesting that the activity may have crossed a line, they did that, those tasked with making the decision vis-a-vis Impeachment (on the Republican side) said, “No, it did not cross a line.” The Representatives (as far as Republicans go) can be assumed to be a greater authority as to the position a Republican should take.

All of this also gets back to the fact that the Democrats telegraphed a partial intention and inclination towards Impeachment prior to Trump even taking office. Had the telegraphing not occurred, then I think that it is fair to say that these events would potentially carry more perceptive weight with people, particularly on the Republican side. As it stands, many people fairly (in my estimation) conclude that the Democrats would happily take any excuse to Impeach that they could get. Does that mean Impeachment is wrong? No, not by itself, but it does change the perception.

If the founding documents carried no more or no less weight than the Mission Statement of a business, then I would be inclined to agree with you. Unfortunately, the founding document itself declared its absolute importance not only as an inspiration, but also the absolute law of the land and further tasked (and limited) the highest Judicial body in the land to be bound only to making decisions based upon their interpretation of the founding document. The whole thing was screwed from the word go.

That is to say that they did not need to make the founding document simultaneously the incontrovertible (absent amendment) legally-binding document in the land to accomplish all of that other stuff that you said that it does. The founding document and the ultimate legal document of the land could have existed separately, or you could just not have the latter thing and instead focus on laws.

The Constitution made no effort to build as many bridges as possible, and therein lies the difference. With your contracts, you essentially say, “Let’s come to an agreement that allows us to build as many bridges over this divide as we possibly can now, and then any bridges that are too cumbersome to build now, we will build later if it is determined that a bridge is needed in that particular spot of the divide.”

Not only does The Constitution fail to itself build very many bridges, those that it does build are not structurally sound. The SCOTUS, as an entity, often has to commit great leaps in logic to untie its own hands of The Constitution while simultaneously, and with only limited success, giving the appearance of the strictest possible adherence.

Let’s ask this: If The Constitution was at all definitive, would the perceived political leanings of potential appointees to SCOTUS Justice be perceived of as being at all relevant?

Let’s start with, “He’s lied to hide his administration’s failures.”

—Okay, one thing that accomplishes is that it, in intent, gives the perception of rightness to the American people as well as to those abroad, which could include enemies. The lie, as it were, is only detrimental if found to be a lie which, I think we could agree, is not the goal of a lie.

—Lying to exaggerate successes, if accurate, also accomplishes the same goal.

Therefore, I would counter-argue that it could very well be not only compatible with faithful administration of the office, but more than that, could actually be beneficial to the country provided the lie is not discovered to be a lie.

The other thing to understand is that is just how Donald Trump conducts business. He exaggerates. He uses grandiose terms even when most people would think that those terms do not apply.

I appreciate our differences in the interpretation. And, again, if The Constitution intended for the President to always be truthful in everything that he says aloud and to the American public, then The Constitution should have said that.

The Oath of Office is 35 words long and whether or not the second half of the Oath is fulfilled could only really be decided by the Speaker himself. It’s abysmal.

I do not agree for several reasons:

1.) France can announce whatever it wants to announce.

2.) France cannot interfere in our elections without actually being on our soil, or if they could, it would take more than making an accusation.

3.) Government is an entity made up of entities, namely Government officials. Any person can make an accusation. In my view, no accusation (absent evidence) carries with it any more automatic weight than any other…and people accuse Trump of various things all over the place. Do the Americans who accuse Trump of various things (if there is nothing to indicate those things are true) also commit electoral interference?

4.) While I recognize it may not be true for everyone, absent proof, I care nothing about a mere accusation. That is especially true when the accuser himself or herself faces no possibility of punishment for making the accusation. Granted, if France made such an accusation about Trump, then Trump could retaliate both now and if he wins the election with unfavorable action against France, but such action does not necessarily harm the speaker of the accusation.

5.) Same thing, but I really want to stress that I only care for proof, so I am saying it twice.

—Now, for the purposes of your example, let’s suppose for a second that France actually fabricated evidence of this non-event, or suppressed exculpatory evidence…then I think you might have an argument for electoral interference.

Did you actually watch the speech? He was doing his very typical sarcasm to introduce Hillary’s criminal 30,000 emails missing issue. Anyone with half a brian not corrupted immediately knew that he was not making any serious plea to Russia. It was a joke that only malignant people would spin into a Russia collusion hoax.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kxG8uJUsWU[/youtube]

The question is, why did you take it seriously? Did you merely hear about it from leftist media? Or did you witness it directly and failed to see the obvious truth of it?

If that is all you had as evidence of this accusation, next accusation please?

I started to display all of the research on this issue yesterday but I don’t know enough about how to get youtube to display. I suspect that Fox News Channel being blocked in certain countries prevents easy transport of their videos. And in addition there are many videos displaying montages of the exact effect that I mentioned. It is nothing new. But searching videos is extremely time consuming. I decided that for sake of someone who argues before doing any research and insultingly presumes that “some random dude on a sub-forum” couldn’t possibly know anything that he hadn’t been fully inform about was impossible, it wasn’t really worth it.

One video from Tucker Carlson, “Tucker: No One Is Above The Law Except Democrats” contained a short montage displaying the effect. Perhaps you can look it up if you care. He has run several in the past months concerning different verbiage (yes “verbatim”). Sean Hannity ran others. And I think Laura Ingraham ran one or two. So counting their investigation and production teams, there are at least a dozen people who were aware of this besides that one random dude on a sub-forum (not to even mention 100’s of psychologists and mass media professors and students). How Pav was left out of the loop will remain a mystery.

I am more interested in your litany of accusations. I have observed Mr Trump intimately for years and I believe that I know him and his intentions and motivations very well. But unlike others on your board here, I like to research things before I make serious accusations. Such research incentive leads to asking people like yourself to yield whatever evidence they have concerning any issue of interest to me.

And since I first signed onto this board and began interacting with these people, I have been mystified why James S Saint (my research subject) stayed here for so long. It was an unanswered question that has been plaguing me while I was poking around for clues. I mention that because as I began to respond on the subject of your accusations, I believe that I finally discovered the answer. The answer, I feel certain about now, is simply, “is there anything that I have missed”.

And that is what I am looking for with your reasoning - is there possibly anything that I have missed?

On your first count, it seems not unless you have further evidence for that charge.

Was your argument going to be that the other side does the same thing? Or was it to be the highly typical liberal tactic of hypocritically accusing the opponent of their own guilt?

Either way, I am not really interested in getting into that discussion because it would take far too much time to bring the facts forward to people who seem to not really care to find them or hear them.

Next accusation, please.

Obsrvr524,

First off all, let me apologize to you if you took genuine offense to my statement about some random dude on an internet message board. It was not meant to insult you. It was meant to do nothing more than point out that, if it is in fact a cabal, then it does a really bad job of being a cabal. Like, astoundingly bad.

What is the liberal media and what does the liberal media do? I think we fundamentally agree on the second question and disagree on the first. That is to say that we fundamentally agree about what it does, but not what it means. I have already stipulated that I do not consider those outlets to be news, but rather biased news entertainment. I have questioned whether or not they are really journalism. I stop short of admitting to a cabal because:

A.) I do not see many qualities that would render it a cabal, namely, secrecy. I consider what they are doing and why they are doing that to be relatively obvious; it is not my fault if other people do not.

B.) Where it does maybe satisfy qualities that a cabal might have, my combination profit-motive and message-promotion motive explanations satisfy me that those things are more likely the case.

You have promoted the theory that they are a cabal. I have countered with a theory that they are simply (as a news entertainment product) attempting to appeal to a target market. If there was a large enough market for those who wish to have the facts presented to them as objectively as possible, then I should assume that there might be a channel designed to accomplish just that. Of course, many viewers of the leftist stations, and of Fox News, will claim that their news entertainment outlet of choice does exactly that. The claim that they are at least attempting to do that…I probably could not prove that claim to be false to the satisfaction of very many of those people.

While it does not discredit what you are saying in and of itself, every single person that you just referenced is a Fox News host. These are multiple accounts of events coming from the same base source. Like, have you heard of Blaze TV or The Daily Wire? I’m just saying that there are other conservative media outlets available, though they are smaller.

That does not make the Fox News accounts wrong, I’m not saying that they are wrong or right; it’s just that if you’re going to promote the notion that different liberal media outlets have the same general messaging, why should that notion not apply to an individual conservative media outlet?

I’m unaware of your educational background and make no implications or assumptions with the following statement; I would be loathe to offend you again: If an individual sets about doing a college research paper, or perhaps even a high school research paper, one thing that you will generally notice is that the professor/teacher will stipulate a minimum number of different base sources to be cited and found on the, “Works Cited,” page.

Why should we suppose that should be the case?

Without getting too far into the weeds, I would say that the basic reasons are twofold:

1.) The assumption that a single source will generally agree with itself. This often applies also to websites, though those websites may have different writers working for them. If a person finds different sources to support that person’s position, then that person’s position (whether accurate or not) is considered to be better supported. That is generally considered true even if the different sources generally agree with one another.

2.) While an individual will likely cite sources that support that person’s position stated in his/her thesis, (unless deliberately doing a compare/contrast paper-by demand or by choice) I think that the real hope of requiring the person to research and cite so many works is that it will cause the individual to be exposed to different views on an underlying matter. The goal there is naturally to force critical thinking, which, in my opinion, is what making someone do a research paper ought be about.

-But, there is a secondary element involved, as well. What if, in this critical examination, an individual comes across a work that makes a point that supports the individual’s point, despite the fact that the source involved is actually trying to do the opposite and advocate against that individual’s point? By this means, the individual may learn not only how to construct arguments, but also how to deconstruct arguments to find critical flaws.

Holy shit. I’m not a professor myself, but if I were, he just went up a letter grade.

Same quote, but I’ll quote you again since it has been a few words:

I will watch the specifically suggested video and offer my thoughts on the breakdown. Prepare yourself for an attempt at objectivity in action. I’m not promising complete objectivity, (how could I?) but I do promise an attempt.

Start-0:41

Tucker (who I dislike, so you should thank me for watching this, by the way) starts off by saying that Trump is rallying his supporters in Hershey, PA. There is no Earthy reason that I can think of for anyone to argue against that assertion.

Tucker follows up by stating the time and day that President Trump took the Oath of Office. Tucker points out that, minutes later, Democrats (key) were calling for his Impeachment. Tucker admits that such might be an exaggeration, but if it is, then it is barely an exaggeration:

MY THOUGHTS:

I agree with Tucker that some Democrats were calling for Trump’s Impeachment, and I don’t think he’s exaggerating with minutes later, but is actually underestimating the case. I believe that some Democrats were calling for Trump’s Impeachment prior to Trump even taking office in the first place.

Key to honesty is that Tucker just says, “Democrats,” with no qualifier whatsoever. Literally, this would only interpret itself to, “More than one Democrat,” which is how he might defend his phrasing, but I don’t think that is critical or intellectually honest. Why would Tucker simply say, “Democrats,” absent a qualifier? He doubles down and says, “The left has been howling…”

—This is nothing more than an attempt to define terms and control the narrative/messaging. I believe that it is more than fair to stipulate that fewer Democrats were calling (at least, openly) for Trump’s Impeachment within ten minutes of him taking office (or any time prior to that) than there were…say…two months ago.

—Why would Tucker fail to make this obvious distinction? Again, messaging. The right messages and the left messages and they do this, in part, by virtue signaling. By using terms such as, “Democrats,” and, “The Left,” without a qualifier…what is being accomplished is continuing to set up a battle of: Them v. Us They are the Democrats, they are The Left, they act as one.

—He does not go as far as to directly state that not a single Democrat was opposed to Impeachment then, or is opposed to Impeachment now, because such a statement would be seen as completely ridiculous on its face and can be easily disproven. The balance to strike here is to send that message without making a disprovable statement, and Tucker performs that balance adequately. “The Democrats,” could mean any number that is greater than one, it could mean all of them except for one, it could mean 10%, 20%, 99.856%…you name it. A more specific claim would be provable or disprovable.

—Now, now, don’t get upset. The Left media ALSO does these same exact things because the left media shares the same exact goal, just on the other side. They will say, “The Right,” or, “The Republicans,” also without quantifying or qualifying those statements as it suits them. The goal is to send a message, to virtue signal, to create a them v. us: And, in so doing, to give the viewers what they want. To make them want to tune into the program the following night, the following week, to check out our different programs…but mostly…

Please watch our damn advertisements!!!

Because that’s how we get paid.

Next section, off we go now:

0:41-1:36

The rest mainly just needs into a news clip, where the (physical) speaker does the same exact thing that Tucker just did. He makes dogmatic and uncritical statements as to what has happened:

“That is exactly what President Trump did.”

There are a few problems with that simple sentence:

1.) The House of Representatives votes upon Articles of Impeachment, which then go to a trial in The Senate. If we hold the presumption of innocence as tantamount for that trial as we would for any other, then it is for the Senate and the Senate alone to decide whether or not The President did what is being suggested. The House of Representatives cannot make that conclusion, they only conclusion that they can make is that they accuse President Trump of doing what he said. This would otherwise be an extremely important legal distinction to make, because it touches upon the actual Constitutional process of Impeachment. You don’t “Convict,” a President in an Impeachment, you just Impeach him.

2.) It’s dogmatic. He doesn’t say, “The House of Representatives has decided that he did it,” but rather that he just did it. Even then, you could make an argument that the House of Representatives doesn’t speak with a single voice on this matter (in fact, Democrats were the only ones to vote to the contrary of the majority of their own party), but legalistically speaking, it is understood that the House of Representatives, by way of vote, does speak with a single voice…so maybe I’m engaging in sophistry a bit.

The fact remains that the House of Representatives cannot, or should not be able to, flatly declare that he did it…just that they accuse him of doing it. The Senate decides whether he did it or not.

But, again, this is really just about narrative/message controlling, anyway.

And we continue:

1:36-2:22

“No one is above the law.”

Speaking with one voice, narrative/message control. They speak with one voice to show solidarity and control the message. They want those who agree with them to speak, basically, with that same voice. I consider this not only NOT surprising at all, but also see no evidence of a cabal.

3:22-4:12

“Solemn”

-First of all, Jesus Christ is this guy insufferable. That’s not a shot at Fox News or a promotion of any other news, as I am sure they have insufferable people also…but did this guy aspire to be an actor, fail, and decide to go into pseudo-journalism, instead? I don’t mind a little mocking laughter to emphasize a point, but could he at least be the least bit subtle about it? Do news watchers (not just Fox) not have the intelligence to pick up on a message that’s not thrown directly in their faces?

Anyway, the rest is more examples of narrative control. The Democrats are promoting narrative x by doing y. See all of them doing it the same way? I do. Point taken. A cabal/conspiracy that does not make. Those things have to be secret, for one, at least, the way that I would use either of those words.

4:13-4:23

“Dig your hand a little deeper into the stocking, another present.”

—I found that very amusing.

4:20-4:29

“…Chuck Schumer, the professional Wall Street shill who lies for a living. Going onto the Senate floor…and accusing us of being dishonest.”

Okay, so you can say he lies for a living, but he can’t accuse you of being dishonest. Got it. Double standards are fun, aren’t they?

—Both sides! Both sides! Calm down, my friend.

4:30-5:10

Actually, Schumer also called them liars. He didn’t say, “Being dishonest,” he said something worse than that. Being dishonest could at least mean something more akin to, “Lied on this occasion,” or, “Was not critical and objective.” No, he flatly also called Fox News liars.

At what point does the higher ground get taken? I guess never. The higher ground might not be inflammatory enough, though it does spare one the fire for another minute or day.

Anyway, Tucker was being charitable to suggest that Schumer merely accused them of dishonesty. He’d have done better to not also call Schumer a person who lies for a living.

----But, why didn’t he? Is it not true that, to do so, he might make Fox News a more sympathetic figure? “Look at this, he called us liars! Can you believe that? We would never accuse him of lying, we just have different opinions.”

----But, Fox News has its viewers and would like to get more like-minded people who wish to be entertained, speaking in a non-inflammatory and non-divisive way does not entertain…unless one has an inclination towards Philosophy…which few do. They’re not trying to convince me, in other words, they are only trying to further convince the people who believe they are right and the other side is wrong.

****Wait, wait, the left does it too!!! Easy, tiger.

5:11-5:38

“What the left accuses you of doing is precisely what they are doing themselves.”

—Yup. It sure is. Granted, the verbiage again emphasizes the THEM v. US aspect because that is what the viewers want. What the right accuses the left of doing is also, sometimes, what they themselves are doing, also.

5:39-6:42

Christ this guy is an over actor. I’d need to do actual research into the Hunter Biden relationship with Ukraine before arguing for or against what Tucker said.

—See that? Do you see that? I’d have to do INDEPENDENT RESEARCH into it. In other words, it’s not automatically wrong in my view merely BECAUSE it comes out of the mouth of someone whose mannerisms and presentation I find to be completely melodramatic and insufferable. It’s not automatically wrong in my view because Fox News promotes it. This is attempted objectivity in action. Most who converse with one another on the affairs political (not necessarily meaning anyone here) should be taking fucking notes right now.

—The only aspect of anything he said that I specifically disagree with is to say that Hunter Biden is, “Otherwise unemployable.” As in, like, he couldn’t get a job anywhere? McDonald’s wouldn’t even have him?

6:43-7:58

If I muted this video and watched it side-by-side with one featuring Cenk Uyger of The Young Turks, I think I would see a ton of similarities. Did both of them fail out of the same acting school?

7:59-8:25

“Both parties know it’s not a reason to Impeach.”

—Um…This is tantamount to, “They’re lying, they’re all lying.” Yeah, the other side can play that game, and frequently does. If his voice wasn’t so grating, I’d probably have been asleep by now.

8:26-END

Oh my god! Finally! Meat! Substantive argument! Taking and defending positions!

1.) Twitter doesn’t accept defeat and thinks it would nullify the loss.

—I agree that the folks on Twitter are generally displeased and further agree that this, to some degree, was Impeachment on demand. I haven’t been alive for many Presidents, I’ll be honest, but nary do I remember a time where every single action taken by the President was scrutinized with an eye towards a, “Gotcha,” moment that could lead to Impeachment.

—I disagree that it would nullify the loss and that anyone (with 0.2% or more of a brain) actually believes that. Hillary Clinton does not become President if Donald Trump is removed from office, Mike Pence does. The Election is not nullified, there is no asterisk, the results of the Election itself are unchanged.

—“Doesn’t accept defeat,” is vague enough that I will leave it alone.

2.) “Ignore every lesson that came with that Election; the lessons that both of our parties needed to learn, but didn’t.”

—I’m not sure what lessons he is referring to, but for the first time (in this one specific clip) I like his sentiment. It admits that both parties are not flawless, needed to learn (!?) and failed to do so.

3.) “…But, we kicked him out, we don’t need to think about why voters would have supported him in the first place.”

—Damn good argument. Rock solid. I very rarely see anyone, as I did in a different thread, take a minute to consider, “Why would they have voted for Trump?” That would require an attempt to understand the other side rather than mock, belittle, condescend to and flatly declare as wrong. It’s kind of a shame that Tucker spent the first few minutes of the video doing exactly those things, since he clearly seems to grasp the alternative concept.

***Why would they have voted for Trump? Not often enough asked by the other side. When it is, I frequently see answers like, “Rednecks, stupid, basket of deplorables, racists, hate-mongerers.”

—If we want to begin to critically evaluate claims so that we can make and support claims to the contrary, point out flaws in the other claims, or perhaps even find flaws in our own claims…then we must first know what those claims are. I don’t think very many, if any, people went to the polls and said to themselves, “I am an idiot, and as an idiot, I must vote for Trump.”

—No. Why was Trump preferable? Why does Trump’s vision appeal to you more than Clinton’s? What policies do you think are important? Why are you on Trump’s side when it comes to that policy? What are your goals? What are your fears?

—But, these questions would require caring, perhaps even empathy. If not those things, then at least intellectual curiosity.

Generally speaking, I do not think Fox News is intellectually curious, of it they are, that is often not what they present. Same goes for Leftist media.

4.) “…believe it will help their case in the 2020 Election.”

-I agree with this. As I read the analyses presented by FiveThirtyEight as pertained Impeachment and Removal from Office, one thing that I noticed was those analyses were not focused on whether or not Trump did the right or wrong thing. At least, not for the most part. 538 was primarily concerned with not who will dissent from his/her own party, but by who can afford to dissent, in the political sense, from his or her own party.

***PARAPHRASE FOR EXAMPLE: Well, District 7 is an extremely Liberal district, 78% of them voted for Clinton, you know, so that’s obviously going to be a lock. District 15, on the other hand, is more interesting. District 15 actually voted for Trump 50.1% to 48.6% with the rest going to other candidates, largely a rural district, you know, with exception to (example town) of about 20,000. This Representative could quite possibly vote against Impeachment, you know they are going to be working on him, but if he does, you can expect there to be a challenger in the Primary, that’s for sure, possibly (potential candidate XXX XXX). I mean, he himself is fairly popular and just cruised in the General Election last time, despite the fact that the District went to Trump, one of only (number) of Districts in the country to vote for Trump, but also to vote for a Democratic representative. You have to figure he’s going to get challenged in the 2020 General Election anyway, but there’s nothing to indicate that he faces any real opposition in the Primary at this time.

-So, it’s what is good for the vote rather than whether or not the Impeachment itself is right or wrong.

-That’s what makes the matters underlying the Impeachment itself so foggy for me. When the accuser has every possible motive not to accuse, but then does it anyway, that is impactful. When the accuser is extremely strongly encouraged to accuse…by legions of the accuser’s supporters…maybe now not so much.

-It doesn’t mean I definitely would have viewed the actions and evidence as grounds to remove before, especially not with such a standard open to interpretation, but I would have been more likely to do so. I could have smelled the air and not detected a faint fragrance of biased bullshit.

5.) Polls and Stuff.

-The poll that he cited was interesting. More interesting, in my view, are the polls related to the agreement of removing Trump from office or not doing it. Shortly in advance of the House presentation and vote, the percentage of people who supported removing Trump from office:

projects.fivethirtyeight.com/im … id=rrpromo

DROPPED!

After the House of Representatives presented their evidence and voted to Impeach, the numbers picked back up a little bit, but did not return to where they were a week prior, except with Republicans (what few there are who support Removal).

In other words, Removal is seen as a less supported outcome after the case was actually made to the House of Representatives. What does this mean? It means that they made their own prior, that Donald Trump should be removed from office, less generally compelling.

Will this impact be seen at the polls in 2020, or did the Democrats accomplish their goal of exciting the base to actually turnout and vote, despite the drop in the support for Removal from Office? I don’t know, because the numbers didn’t change dramatically and also because one is only loosely related to the other such that any causal effect would likely be extremely minimal. Will there be a correlative effect? Don’t know. Supporting removal and actually going out and voting later this year are two very different things and there is quite a time chasm in between where plenty of other stuff could happen such that this event no longer directly effects in either direction.

Conclusion

And, we’re done. I can’t stand that guy. You should appreciate the fact that I conducted this experiment. He was even overly emotive to an extremely irritating degree (in my view) during the parts where I explicitly agreed with what he was saying.

***Please note, if I expressed agreement or disagreement anywhere in which the source of my opinion is not specifically cited, there was research involved previously that resulted in my priors. I tried to say, “I don’t know,” or, “I have no opinion,” or, “I would need to do more research,” when that was true, but might have missed a few spots. Tucker made quite a few absolute statements that I did not specifically address because I would have to know more about them.

just a few things -

1. I was addressing Carleas, not asking for you to go look up evidence. There was far too much evidence to sort and present for me to prove my point to you.

2. Can’t you identify fact from opinion? When you see a video of a speech, for example and forgiving the possibility of fake videos or out of context clips, the video montage, you are witnessing an event. What you see is fact. When someone tells you that someone said something, that is opinion. The subject of concern was repeated exact words and phrases. Tucker showed a montage of video. He showed the fact, He was not giving opinion even though he agrees with you completely on the issue of separation of opinion from news. He and Hannity frequently remind their audience that they are only opinion hosts, not news anchors. They both have had shows explaining why that is important. They both also very quickly apologize when they get something wrong (without having to be sued, unlike the mainstream).

3. I imagine that Tucker says “the Democrats” for the same reason the Iranians say “the Americans” killed Soleimani. By the way, Tucker is a Democrat.

4. “They speak with one voice to show solidarity and control the message. They want those who agree with them to speak, basically, with that same voice.” By what means did they agree to do that? That is what defines a cabal. Don’t ask me to explain why they didn’t send you the memo. It wasn’t my idea.

5. You are obviously not familiar enough with Tucker to be injecting motives into his words. You complained that you knew Carleas as a friend and are sure that he doesn’t hate. I said that merely from the little that I have seen of him that I am certain that he does. But you have the upper hand merely from your much longer experience. I have a little advantage because I have a habit formed of immediately separating fact from opinion (an observer not a pundit). I didn’t agree with you, but I didn’t continue in argument either. Tucker is someone who I have more experience with and thus are more likely to guess his motives. I don’t agree with everything he says, nor Hannty nor the entire Fox network. I observe for facts being shown, not reports and skewed opinions being promoted. I don’t care who’s side anyone is on. But I have little patience for those who willingly deceive.

6. The mainstay tactic of the loony left is hypocrisy and inflaming suspicion often by simply lying and projecting. So of course both sides say the other is lying. At very least one of them is right. Being able to distinguish fact from opinion reporting is how you tell the difference. The example that Carleas just brought up concerning Trump’s bid to have the Russians dig up Hillary’s emails is an example of seeing the evidence SHOWN (Mr Trump making the speech), having enough experience with the situation (knowing how Mr Trump talks and what he means by it), and distinguishing fake news being reported about it (“Trump solicited foreign aid”). It isn’t about liking Mr Trump. It is about disliking deception and being able to filter it.

There is trouble tormenting here.
Historically a fifty to a hundred billions of dollars is not unheard of, there are various potentates who have reached many trillions over and above.

Plainly, capital has been around for a long long time without calling it Capitalism.

It is plainly not a question of ideological policy to accumulate privilege over years, decades, centuries. It is more basic then that.

The will has no possible effect without power, and it is the power to will that is lacking in such spreads of historical accumulation that is vested in an indefinite future.
The problem here is, in the world, that ideology has been ousted from modern life, and the differential between classes is becoming accentuated by immensely exploded populations.

Given that scenario, the control of population takes in another configuration in terms of economic planning.
There are those who qualify new reactionary ploys without the figures.
The substance of planning, is inimical in the very procedural lack, the Republicans vine about.
The demand something that they inversely reject in the upcoming Senate trial, the use of corroborating witnesses.

The inverse serve a two regions, the use of clarification to get to the ‘facts’, and by the use of a linguistic coincidence that they are wringing out of shape to get there.

Second, it is obvious, as always, that monetary considerations are inversely applied by a supposedly neutral agency, such as the Federal Reserve, an institution not created by congressional fiat. To name an inverse approach is to create a sense of collision between a raising of interest rates and a maintenance of low interest.

This appearent collision, on deeper analysis is an illusion, an illusion to create the collusive stench of indeterminate monetary policy, so as to look like the collusive basis that divides the nation.

In fact, it subtly reinserys an inverse dialectic between the social contract prefiguring as the Constitutional bill, of the rights of man, and their ultimate material dialectic.
This formula, as all social processes require them is the foubdemental problem with the epoch of postmodern Capital

The ancien regime had the same problem, the actors changed but the act remains the same. The industrial revolution gave fodder to the dynamic because the means of exchange labor for profit became the new element.

The quantified substratum below the dynamic was not well understood, it was formula drawn in very large letters, that the current holders of capital do not have to face off on.

The increasing number of millionaires, living off current indigenous populations is the new method by which the optics can create illusions of fairly even social distributions of wealth , across the board. Especially so, because the incredibly powerful supercomputers , co-relate between two entities: the market, and it’s correlative, the defense of it.

It appears, that only the inflationary tendency of Capital poses considerable risk. The clash of civilisations, long ago predicted, will go the way of real danger to the economy

In addition, how does the man on main street, really enjoying this great run the economy is having, while traders, are very worried by the political reality which is supposed to guarantee the continuation of this best of all worlds?

There is profound weaknesses that is best left unsaid.

Well, let me know if you change your mind.

The repeated words and phrases did not support your opinion of the Leftist media outlets to the extent that not a single person in the montage (that I could tell) was a member of the media. I’m pretty sure they were all politicians of one ilk or the other. How does that montage demonstrate anything about the media?

There was no reminder in that video, but assuming what you say about Tucker and Hannity is true, I very much appreciate the fact that they say they are opinion hosts. I care not whether or not they apologize every individual time they get something wrong if they are presenting themselves as opinion hosts and nothing else. Opinions exist and can only result in three possibilities, one of which is to be proven wrong, so I imagine it happens a lot.

Yeah, messaging. I am an American, I did not kill Soleimani, so to say all of us did it would be false and clearly absurd. To say, “The Americans,” without all just implies that more than one American was complicit.

I know that he used to be a host for MSNBC, but the messaging of that station moved too far to the left for him and they couldn’t really find a use for him. I find the fact that such happened (at least, in my oversimplified version) a great credit to Tucker. Certainly he could have, “Seen the light,” if I may, and moved to the left as the station did. If he lost his job for that, that is admirably intellectually honest. I appreciate you pointing that out.

My understanding is that Tucker is a Democrat for the purpose of voting in local primaries. I used to live in Ohio. In Ohio, you don’t per se register as one party or the other, but when you go to the Primary to vote you ask for a particular primary ballot. Whatever ballot you ask for is what you are (according to Ohio) until the next Primary. In this case, one might register other than how one identifies for reasons of a local Primary interest. Perhaps more frequently, to vote for the (non-incumbent) Presidential Primary because it is assumed the incumbent will win and asking for the other ticket is the only way to have a say in that.

No, no, they want those who agree with them (in the media) to speak with that same voice. They don’t have to agree to do that. The (left) media simply hears what they are saying and repeats that. No secret handshake or smoky backroom in a seedy dive bar needed. Not even the back table at an Italian restaurant, unfortunately, even though Italian food kicks ass.

So, it’'s not an agreement by the media, it’s something that those media outlets choose to do of their own volition. Fox News chooses not to parrot the Leftist politicians. I could turn on MSNBC and they could theoretically have stopped parroting them and never parrot them again, but I don’t think that will happen. I could also turn on MSNBC and they theoretically could decide to start broadcasting a documentary on the different recipes for a good horseradish sauce. That I would watch. Horseradish sauce kicks ass, but not on pasta, so let’s not get the ends of the two paragraphs mixed up.

Is it dinner time?

I don’t need to inject a motive if the words themselves make the motive clear to me, at least, from my view. Aside from that, I concede that you are likely more familiar with Tucker than I am. I wouldn’t go out of my way to watch him again because his presentation annoys me, but I did learn new things about him today. Thank you.

As long as you are making the, “Loony Left,” something different than just, “The Left,” I have no basis to argue with that statement without further specification on your part.

Where x and y are opposites:

Person 1: I say x, but I know it’s not x.

Person 2: I say y, but I know it’s not y.

THE CASE: z

This demonstrates to you that both sides can be lying, whether or not they know the case is z. If two parties are saying something that they do not believe to be true, even if the two different statements are diametrically opposed, it doesn’t automatically make one side or the other right.

It also wouldn’t automatically mean that either side is lying, as with:

Person 1: I know x, I will say x.

Person 2: I know y, I will say y.

THE CASE: z

In this case, neither side is lying, because to lie requires intent. Both sides are saying what they believe to be true, but unfortunately, both sides are making false statements.

And, another:

Person 1: I say x, but I know it’s not x.

Person 2: I know y, I will say y.

THE CASE: z

In this case, one side is lying and the other side is not. However, the side that is not lying is still making a false statement.

—So, I would not be inclined to make a statement that says, “Nobody ever lies,” because I believe both sides (meant VERY generally) do, on occasion. I believe both sides believe what they are saying is true, though what they are saying is false, on occasion. I believe both sides have made true statements.

—As far as Carleas goes, just in the limited time I’ve been around and involved again, I’ve seen him admit to possible biases. I don’t think Carleas is one who is inclined to be intellectually deceptive. That doesn’t mean that he is incapable of making a statement that is false.

Well, you might be right about that. I was just starting to gather the evidence and gave up. So my apologies for a poor example.

Another thing that you might not have considered is that there is such a thing as “the tail wagging the dog”. The “tail” being the story being told and the “dog” being the real event being inspired into being even though it is assumed as the opposite. You probably already knew that much. But have you considered that the “tail” is the media and the politicians are the “dog” being wagged. In reality, the ideology controls the money. The money controls the media corporations. And the media controls the politicians into supporting the ideology. I will admit that is currently all merely my opinion but not irresponsibly formed. In some cases, the media is circumvented directly, such as with AOC being directly hired and controlled by her millionaire socialist “boyfriend”.

I’m curious as to exactly how you define that.

My sympathies.

Again, I believe that is an issue of the tail wagging the dog. The media is arranging, even extorting the politicians. Think about it. The politicians are very sensitive to what the media does, but the media is very largely independent of what the politicians do. Who really has greater influence over whom? What is a politician going to do to MSNBC without potentially getting crushed within an hour?

You almost certainly, along with most of the American population, have the influence perception backwards (Satanism in action).

I think that perhaps you missed my point - FACT vs OPINION. Fact being what YOU see. Opinion being what someone TELLS you happened. That is the only serious discussion that I am interested in.

And time for me to get ready for work. Enjoy your dinner.

Apology accepted, good sir.

Your theory is interesting, definitely more interesting than your theory’s opposite, which is what I thought you were originally suggesting. But, again, nothing necessarily evidences a cabal…as we will get to shortly.

Messaging? In the corporate world, one might call it, “Branding.” That’s the closest comparison I can think of. I fear any definition I offer for my use of the word would either be overly-encompassing or perhaps not encompassing enough. The voices of the many speaking as one, or closely enough.

It happens sometimes. I don’t mind so much.

I would have used, “Controlling,” rather than, “Extorting,” but that control does not have to be direct. It does not have to be by way of any agreement. No agreement, no cabal.

Getting back to the points I made about 538, the decision-making process by which one would decide to Impeach or not to Impeach, it was assumed, could come down to a simple question of caring for one’s own political well-being. Not getting voted out. Not facing a primary challenger. But, the voters are not (as a whole) putting any direct pressure on the politicians on this specific issue. That is to say that not every single person who voted for this politician is marching on Washington D.C., or that Representative’s in-state office. Most of them just vote and then leave it alone until it’s close enough to start paying attention again.

The media can be the same way. The pressure might be implied. If I am a Democrat and I do or say something that I think MSNBC might strongly disagree with, then MSNBC might unleash it’s full fury on me, which negatively impacts my political well-being and perhaps future electability. I don’t want that. I had better keep MSNBC happy with what I say and do, or if not happy, make it so they basically ignore me.

But, again, that wouldn’t make anything a conspiracy or a cabal. It would just mean that the two things relate to one another in some way.

Everyone’s a critic.

I presented a fact as we discussed above where I thought it was relevant. It was a fact that the montage was entirely comprised of politicians talking and not media persons.

I will, thank you. Safe travels and a good day at work to you.

But there were a dozen people on that call, some of whom have testified in the House to the content of the call, and others who have been subpoenaed who have much better insight into Trump’s mental state in relation to the request. We don’t have any reason to believe that this is someone close enough to Trump to have any insight into Trump’s intention or meaning (indeed, we actually know who it was and we know that he wasn’t at all close to Trump). The whistleblower just isn’t that valuable as a witness given the other witnesses we have.

I don’t actually think this matters much. For one thing, there’s a good argument that withholding the aid as long as he did was illegal (as DoD lawyers pointed out to the White House at the time). But for another thing, even if it was entirely a bluff, what he’s bluffing for is an improper use of the office (more on that below).

Yeah, I am proceeding under the assumption that the statement itself is not the totality of evidence of the existence of a threat. If the only evidence we have is the statement, then we agree that it matters whether it’s implicit or explicit. But if, as here, we have the statement, together with overt acts by the person making the statement showing that they intend to follow through (military aid was actually withheld), and over acts by the person being threatened showing that they understood the statement to be a threat (Zelensky was actually preparing to announce an investigation), we have corroborating evidence that shows it was intended and received as a threat. In that case, it’s no defense to say, “well yes, but I only implicitly said X, so the fact that I intended to communicate X and that he understood me to be communicating X doesn’t count”.

I don’t think this is a sharp distinction. If Trump had gotten Congress to vote to withhold aid, I don’t think anyone would bat an eye; is that what is is or how it’s done? In a government of laws, how it’s done is baked into what it is, and acts can be legitimate or illegitimate, criminal or lawful, based on how they’re done.

I think it goes to sincerity of the shock. If they were all Obama appointees, it would be easy to write off the shock as affected. Where it’s Republican appointees, Trump appointees, it suggests the shock is actually about a perceived violation of norms.

This is a solid point.

Tangentially, one thing I’ve long thought the Constitution needed was a much more robust system of amendments. I’ve even toyed with the idea that a much more minimal document should have been written which established the rules for making future constitutions, e.g. providing for periodic Constitutional Conventions. One big problem with the Constitution is that it hasn’t been amended enough, because it has needed updating many times and many times it’s been too hard to achieve. That creates a kind of pressure build up, which would be dissipated in a system where the document could shift a little more freely. It’s a delicate balance, and I can’t fault the Founders for getting it a little wrong, but they erred too far towards preventing change.

I think this doesn’t give the Founders enough credit. The notes from the various ratifying conventions show vigorous debate around ratification, with different factions arguing it goes to far or doesn’t go far enough. The 3/5 Compromise, for as horrible as it is, is pretty clear evidence that the authors went to frankly absurd lengths to appease opposing factions on the hot button issues of the day. It may not seem like that today, but in an era where everyone who mattered in politics was a wealthy white male, they built as many bridges as possible within that exclusive demographic.

This too is a solid point.

I do think liberal and conservative something a bit different in the context of Supreme Court justices than they do in the context of politicians, but it is still the case that many important and seemingly unrelated outcomes can be predicted based on the politics of the justices (why should privacy and bodily integrity jurisprudence be correlated with 2nd amendment jurisprudence?).

I think misunderstood your argument here:

If France arrested a candidate with the intent of changing the outcome of an election, that wouldn’t be foreign interference? That seems untenable. It also seems intention with your claim here:

If France announces an investigation it knows is vacuous and it does so with the intent to change the outcome of an investigation, I don’t see the difference. When a public official announces a criminal investigation, that strongly suggests that it has some reason to conduct such an investigation, i.e. that it has some evidence of wrongdoing. Strictly speaking, that isn’t fabricated evidence, but when real evidence exists it isn’t generally provided when the investigation is announced, so knowningly announcing an investigation for which insufficient evidence exists is effectively fabricating some unnamed piece of evidence (and which in context we would expect to be unnamed).

This can’t be right. Impeachments and indictments are accusations, and they are different in kind from the same number of people making an accusation of the same conduct. More generally, when someone makes an accusation in their offical capacity as the representative for some larger body, particularly one charged with making formal accusations of wrongdoing, those accusations are different in kind.

This is what you’d call an “affirmative defense”. You aren’t saying that Trump didn’t solicit foreign hacking of his opponent, you’re saying that he was joking when he solicited foreign hacking of his opponent. The fact still stands that he solicited foreign hacking of his opponent.

Let me be clear: the President should not jokingly solicit foreign hacking of his political rivals.

Your claim, as I understand it, is that left-leaning news media are speaking from the same script. I knew of an example of news media literally speaking from the same script, but it was not left-leaning media.

Now, if your belief is that all major media is speaking from a script biased by some small set of central controllers, I don’t disagree, but it that case it’s disingenuous to frame it as a problem on the left. There’s a difference between saying “John’s an idiot” and saying “all humans are idiots”, even though the latter entails the former.

Please refer to my littany of accusations above, and the subsequent posts where I elaborate on them and provide links to support my claims.

When you discover that the “whistleblower” (not actually) is a CIA operative that milked someone like Vindman (known for being anti-Trump and a very weak minded person) into saying something that was negative and potent fodder for a socialist/democrat led impeachment case and then collaborates with Adam Shiff so as to create an important sounding, yet false, claim, then it matters. Yes.

Especially when that one official has been proven to be a liar and political shill.

It was not a solicitation and he said nothing about hacking political rivals. He said,
“Russia, if you are listening, I hope that you can find Hillary’s missing 30,000 emails. You will be rewarded mightily by our press.”

You, now that I know that you have heard what he actually said and have misrepresented it yet again, are clearly complicit with willful deception.

You point out that there is a conservative corporation reading from a single script. I am talking about collaboration of multiple, supposedly competing, corporations reading from the same script - MSNBC, NBC, CBS, ABC, and AT&T (CNN), not counting many smaller, more diverse distributors and print media.

Significant difference.

Well okay.

I’m curious what your defense for the “general demeanor” allegation is because it sounds amazingly fascist.

How do justify canceling the votes of half of your nation due to general demeanor?

How is that not fascist?

This is such a post-hoc rationalization for why we need to interview the whistleblower, changing the justification from calling him because he’s a witness to the alleged misconduct, to calling him because he’s the handler for other witnesses of the alleged misconduct.

Are you calling Zelensky “a liar and political shill”, or is this just due to an itchy trigger finger for scoring partisan points? Because I was talking about Zelensky (i.e. the foreign government official making a formal criminal accusation against a candidate in a way that is different in kind from other kinds of accusations).

Vladimir Putin walks down the street, and stumbles over a pile 0s and 1s lying on the sidewalk. “Well well, what have I found here?” he says to himself, as he imagines the mighty rewards to be had from the US press.

Yep, definitely me being deceptive to think that Trump couldn’t have intended to convey something other than hacking.

What formal accusation was made against whom?

So when you don’t like the manner in which an elected President talks to and about an obviously messed up world, you think that he should be impeached. Your accusation of racism is probably wrong even though not directed at Mr Trump. By “conspiracy-mongers”, you must be referring to Nadler, Shiff, Pelosi, and the like.

That certainly is fascism - “YOU speak the way WE demand or else!”

So okay, the bottom line is that American left fascists don’t like Mr Trump. The Iatola doesn’t like him either. Surprise, surprise. i wonder if there is a connection (like $150 billion).

This is again in the context of trying to pin down what constitutes “foreign interference”. Pav is taking a similar line to Urwrong: that anything short of vote tampering or fraudulent voting doesn’t count. But I’m challenging his claim that announcing a criminal investigation is just another accusation. It isn’t, it’s different in kind when a government accuses someone formally.

So the formal accusation is what Zelensky was being asked to do: announce a criminal investigation into the Bidens.

Not liking it isn’t the standard. Trump’s demeanor is damaging important social institutions: the presidency, global alliances, norms of public discourse, respect for government, etc. When a president undermines the very institutions whose faithful execution he’s sworn to uphold, he should be removed from office.

This is directly tied to doing the job of president. Among the presidents roles are as head of state and chief diplomat. If a CEO of any publicly traded company tweeted the way Trump does, she would be fired in an instant. If any diplomat treated allies with the level of disrespect Trump does, she would be recalled in an instant. Trump’s demeanor, the way that he represents the country, is deeply damaging domestically and abroad. That constitutes a basic failure to do the job of president, and it’s grounds for removal.

That’s an oversimplification of my position, but we might get there in my response to you. I like to read everything four or five times and then read it again (and on a separate tab) as I am responding.

I am going to conditionally concede the point assuming the whistleblower is who he is widely reported to be, even though, “We don’t know and could get sued for saying we do.”

In this case, based on who he is reported to be, here is what we have:

1.) Registered Democrat.

2.) Millennial.

3.) Ivy-League educated.

4.) Grew up affluently.

He also worked under President Barack Obama and directly under Vice-President Joe Biden in a similar capacity to his current capacity as CIA analyst dealing with issues relevant to Russia/Ukraine.

Carleas, we need to have a little talk, but first, I’ll stipulate and allow for a few things:

1.) None of this changes the conduct of the call.

2.) None of this changes the actions or intentions of the call, nor does it change anything that happened before/after the call.

First of all, I would suggest that the whistleblower, if not directly linked to the President per se, can certainly offer a unique insight into affairs concerning Ukraine because affairs concerning Ukraine is a major part of his job.

Secondly, this is definitely less impactful than if the whistleblower had been, say, Mike Pence. The whistleblower, while admittedly not overtly political, checks basically every box of the prototypical Democrat. The fact that this individual, if he is indeed the whistleblower, saw fit to escalate the whole Ukrainian thing to this level is, therefore, hardly surprising.

You may counter, as I have seen, that there is no evidence that this person is a political activist. But, I mean, he’s CIA. He probably wants to keep his job. I imagine being openly against someone who is at least indirectly above you (i.e. The President) is a good way not to keep your job.

Also, I consider that this whistleblowing might actually be irresponsible and done without an eye towards the long-term stability of the country.

Think about it:

1.) This action caused further divisiveness within the citizens of this country at a time that we may be more politically divided than ever.

2.) This action was always extremely unlikely to result in anything aside from the Impeachment itself. I think that we can agree that it is true that Trump is extremely unlikely to be removed from office unless he were Impeached for reasons that are, what’s the technical term I’m looking for…like, really, really bad.

3.) This action may lend to political instability down the line. Many things change when one President leaves office and another President takes office, though I think that we could agree that as many working parts (especially at the operative levels) as possible staying the same leads to continued stability. People can keep doing what they are doing. One CEO replacing another in a business almost never, if ever, has led to the dismissal of as many employees as possible below the CEO. Businesses would be going down the tubes left and right if that happened.

Now, there may be different policies, laws, stipulations, etc…that would prevent such a thing from happening immediately…but could future Presidents do it to as great an extent as possible over fear of something like this? Let’s put aside the matter as relates Trump directly for a second and focus on a few things that you have advanced:

1.) “High Crimes and Misdemeanors,” do not necessarily require a thing to be a crime or a misdemeanor at all.

2.) The term is open very much to interpretation, and even if that is not acceptable, it must be accepted for now.

3.) General conduct could be Impeachable.

We may draw different conclusions here, but I think what this leads to is that the House of Representatives can Impeach (and the Senate theoretically remove) virtually any President for virtually any reason that it believes to be acceptable.

Ignoring that aspect for a second, does it not stand to reason that a President would therefore want to staff, to the greatest degree possible, with people who like him and generally agree with his policies? If I were Donald Trump and one of my priorities was to get rid of anyone who I saw as a potential threat, this suggested whistleblower would be packing his box on Day 1. If not that, he would be getting sent somewhere else to do something else that is not related in any way whatsoever to anything that I do or might be doing.

But, if it becomes the case that such a thing is seen as desirable (cost/benefit) we sacrifice stability.

But, even with all of that, I would LOVE nothing more than to call him as a witness because I would like to hear what his perspective on what the whole Ukraine thing is, in general. I would also like to hear, from his unique viewpoint, could there have been any possible legitimate reason to investigate the Bidens.

Save me some research, please. Is it merely a good argument that it could have been illegal, or would I conclude that withholding it as long as he did was definitely illegal? Because, right now in the world of the politicos, I have seen many unrelated arguments (even before this) both for and against Impeachment, and have found almost none (on either side) to be particularly compelling. I guess the burden would also be more on those who favor Impeachment, probably for more than these two reasons, but at least because of these two reasons:

1.) It’s just an unusual thing to do.

2.) It’s an action rather than an inaction. What is the case (President Trump is President Trump) will remain the case without Impeachment and Removal from Office. It will also remain the case if he is not removed. In general, I think most people require a sufficient motivator to effectuate something that is not already the case.

In this case and to the first sentence, that’s exactly why I want to hear from as many people as possible. I believe that I have read the phone call transcript and that, taken by itself, is completely insufficient for me to have been inclined to do anything whatsoever. One thing I notice about Trump’s speech patterns…he jumps from thought to thought and it takes him a long time to ever actually say anything. He often doesn’t really manage to convey a thought, which I think is by choice. Since President Trump does not often convey clear thoughts, I think it is possible that it could maybe just be a misunderstanding:

whitehouse.gov/wp-content/u … 9.2019.pdf

Like, does Page 2, “Interfere,” with the relationship between Ukraine and Germany? Should we impeach him for interference in matters that don’t directly involve us in terms of direct relationships with other countries? I’m sure there’s some obscure/ambiguous term that could be made to fit.

I like the top of Page 3. If I were Zelensky, I would be thinking, “WTF did he just ask me to do? No, really, WHAT was the meaning of the words?” And, I’m a native English speaker.

Also on Page 3, Zelensky freely says, “All of the investigations will be done openly and candidly.” Does that include the investigation for which Trump is purportedly withholding aid? Certainly someone talked to Zelensky and someone else to Trump prior to this phone call. How can Trump pressure Ukraine to do what they have already said they are doing?

Next, the first time, “Biden,” comes out of Trump’s mouth…absent any accompanying threat that I can see…Zelensky says that he intends to put in place a prosecutor, who will definitely get through approval because his party is in the majority wherever that is relevant, and that the prosecutor will investigate it. It sounds like, in order for the prosecutor to be nominated by Zelensky, the person will be required to have already spoken to Zelensky and agreed to do this. Zelensky then asks Trump for any additional information he might have on an investigation into some Ambassador.

While I accept that convincing me changes nothing…I have to ask…what is supposed to be wrong with anything whatsoever in the call itself? I have to assume that something is supposed to be wrong outside of the call. And, because of that, I would want to hear from as many witnesses as I possibly could. You should also want witnesses. I thought the Democrats were mad right now because there might be no witnesses?

Anything that follows after this conversation, in my view, would only pertain to the investigation that Zelensky (based on the conversation) said he was already going to do as part of, “All of the investigations,” before Trump even asked about it. Something must have happened before this conversation in order for anything to be a problem.

Also, has Zelensky not directly denied that he took there to be a quid pro quo arrangement here?

Getting back to your hypothetical, doesn’t it fall apart if the speaker is not completely direct and the person being spoken to did not even get that message from it?

I mainly meant in terms of perception, but we agree on this as a general point. My point was simply that parties involved (whistleblower included) might have simply not liked the way all of this was done, but not so much a problem with the thing that was done itself. You have stated that the withholding of the aid (for as long as it was withheld) may well have been illegal by itself. I guess that would be a good avenue of pursuit.

The whistleblower, if that is who it is, was certainly not a Republican appointee.

I agree with everything said, but would counter that the Founders got it more than, “A little wrong,” and my statement as relates would be, “The Constitution is almost totally fucking stupid.”

How much can you really do with a document that essentially forces a reference back to itself when it itself is very limited?

Yeah, unintended consequences and all of that. I think some of this could have been preventable, but I wasn’t there, so who knows? It doesn’t make it any less stupid now. The fact that it even must be dealt with now is on the Founders, but yeah, I don’t know how much was foreseen or could have been.

Anyway, they made it too hard to amend. I could forgive that, but completely tying the hands and restricting the highest court in the land…I really have a tough time with that.

Exactly. Lifetime appointments are also stupid. As we so often see, it makes the political leanings of the potential justice matter even more. It can’t even be seen as having the goal of a person being relatively Moderate, otherwise, you would need more than a simple majority of the Senate.

I guess it might not have been seen as much of a problem at that time because, in Article 1, Section 3 and how it used to be (1913), Senators for each state were put in place by State Legislatures who…pursuant to the Tenth Amendment…could decide what the process of voting for Senators for that state should be. In other words, the states’ Legislatures could go 2/3rds, majority, 3/4th’s…whatever they wanted.

So, I think that the whole process of an individual ascending to the Supreme Court was at least expected to go through layers and layers of lawmakers (indirectly) before that could actually happen.

The House of Representatives could kind of be the rabble who screams at one another until they, as if by accident, actually manage to send a bill to The Senate for their vote. The House would be more, “Of the people,” while the Senate might be more analytical, particularly legally. Perhaps more objective, considering that appealing to the masses wouldn’t really be much of a concern.

HOUSE: Dude, wouldn’t it be cool if? House Votes 310-125, in favor.

SENATE: That’s a really stupid idea for a whole litany of reasons. I really wish The Constitution would have given you guys some sort of babysitter. Senate Votes 97-3, opposed.

But, yeah, I’ll be a little more forgiving on the SCOTUS thing because they obviously had no reason to know or believe that the means by which the Senate is made up should ever change. Lifetime appointments remain stupid. The highest court in the land being tied to one document remains stupid.

If France knew that the charges were false, it would. But, a wise philosopher known as my mother always said, “Sayin’ ain’t doin’.”

I guess my point is that I don’t see the difference between one guy saying something and some other guy saying something. Foreign leaders lie about our leaders (not just referring to Trump), like, all the time. What’s the qualitative difference between one lie and another lie?

Furthermore, I don’t think that Trump or Zelensky would automatically conclude or, ‘know,’ that any such investigation would be vacuous.

I also don’t think there was any Russian interference in any sense that would matter to me. I would be loathe to take someone’s vote away, and support no law that would do so…but if someone made his/her voting decision based in whole or majority part because of something that person saw on Facebook, then I conclude that person:

A.) Is an idiot.

OR:

B.) Is not an idiot, but does not care enough about the political process such that he/she really should be voting.

So, I’d never question that person’s right to do so, but I would definitely prefer if that person would abstain of his/her own volition.

I see all these campaigns to drive up voter turnout purportedly in general (but I know who is funding it and know what the likely correlation of the target market of the ads represents, on the basis of any individual ad) and it makes me want to puke a little bit. I think on each position or office being voted upon, voting would be much better (and result in better things) if a person could detail at least one contrast in a particular policy position as well as what the possible effect of that policy position might be. Don’t just look at a candidate’s stated goal, look at whether or not the policy behind the stated goal is actually likely to possibly achieve that goal.

But, that’s just a question of who I would prefer to be voting and who I would prefer to stay at home…or maybe at least not feel the need to vote in each individual category. Do you know that there are actually people who think you have to make a vote in each individual category lest your ballot be thrown out!? Scary, I know.

Also, the straight ticket button should be illegal.

I meant no accusation from an individual person about a different individual person outside of a judicial context, I should have been specific. I won’t even say, “More specific,” because that gives me too much credit. I assumed a contextual clue that was not there and I apologize. I reread it. The contextual clue was not there in what I wrote or what you said prior. I mean, it was to me, but not clearly enough there.

I’ve been trying to work on it for years. It’s tough to find a balance between avoiding verbosity (my natural inclination and writing style) while simultaneously avoiding going from Point A to Point C on the map when I should have scheduled a stop at Point B to smell the flowers. Hopefully Easter Lillies.

So you conflate an investigation with an accusation. You seem to have an extraordinary compulsion to strawman.

1. On your issue of foreign interference, it is untenable to tell foreign nations what they are allowed to do based on the idea that it might affect your elections. That is just silly wishful naivety. They are constantly doing things either to favor or disfavor American politics. And no one has the authority to tell them that they may not investigate this particular US citizen for criminal activity because he is our insider Grand Master and PooBah running for a high office.

2. Additionally anything that a President does that is publicly known might be to his personal political benefit. That is what politics is all about, appealing decisions to gain votes. But you would then proclaim that he should not be allowed to do anything that the public favored (never mind the thousands of times prior US Presidents have benefited from their official decisions).

I image that it is safe to assume that you would also have him impeached for doing anything NOT favored by the public as well (giving the US media even more control over politics), just to insure that your bases are covered.

And yet the substance of your accusation is that he would not be liked and respected by foreign leaders. They think that his manner is quirky, strange, and cowboy. But he is most certainly respected and by a few even admired, especially by the Five Eyes leaders.

All of that is YOUR calculus and hope filled projection. You don’t get invited into the Royal Palace if you are an embarrassment and disrespected. You don’t get to walk into North Korea if you are an embarrassment and disrespected. You don’t get China to sign anything at all to your favor if you are an embarrassment and disrespected. And you sure as hell don’t get the Iatola to back away if you are disrespected.

A corporation is neither a republic nor a democracy. A corporate CEO is not voted into office. And I think that relates to your problem.

It seems that you think that the US should NOT be run by the people but instead by erudite elitist snobs condemning anyone for not meeting their standards for pomposity. And as for the public - “Let them eat cake.” By recent accounts you appear to be a true typical socialist.

I was beginning to think that perhaps you were yourself one of these pompous snobs yearning to rule the world but then a different thought occurred to me -

Perchance do you work in Washington? Perhaps a part of that swamp being drained? A part of that deep state being exposed? A part of that bureaucracy that is getting put back down into its place?

That would certainly explain a lot because this is getting like trying to explain to Silhouette that two infinite lines are more than one infinite line despite incoherent liberal media strawman reporting.

I worry that this is post-hoc. As far as I can tell, the reason the Republicans want to force the whistleblower to testify is to smear the whole procedure as politically motivated and part of a deep-state conspiracy, and to discourage future whistleblowers from using the channels that have been established for raising concerns about Presidential conduct. We have laws that are intended to make whistleblowing safe, to give people who see some misconduct the ability to flag it for review without needing to leak to the press or worry about their jobs. Currently, that system is hurting the Republican president, and so the Republicans are trying to implicitly dismantle those protections.

As I mentioned earlier, there were a dozen people on that call, all of whom were on the call because of some part of their expertise and official duties. If the whistleblowere weren’t the whistleblower, if he were just one of the dozen duty officers on the call, would we be very interested in his unique insights? It doesn’t seem so. We aren’t calling for testimony from the other low-level participants on the call, and I don’t think we would be calling for the whistleblower either. He’s the target of Republican interst not because of what he saw on the call, but because he blew the whistle about it: they want him because he reported the bad behavior, not because he has any particular insight into that behavior that we can’t get from more senior people with more access to the president.

But my point is that the whistleblower’s report can be completely discard, and we can instead rely on the testimony of named witnesses before the House, especially those witnesses who were in the Ukraine, who were Trump appointees or earlier Republican appointees, who don’t check any of the partisan box, but who have testified that the president’s conduct was wrong. We have a dozen witnesses that paint a picture of presidential misconduct, there’s no reason to focus on one witness who checks boxes for political bias other than to try to taint the proceedings.

Similarly, this isn’t relevant. If he had tripped and fallen and accidentally delivered a write up of his concerns to the House Intelligence Committee, we would still have mounds of evidence independently corroborating those concerns. His motives do not matter, other than as political theater.

But several of the witnesses who testified to corroborate the allegations against Trump were Trump appointees!

More generally, this is a slippery slope. The president’s powers are limited, and there must be a mechanism for oversight. The fact that future presidents will want to clean house is an argument against any mechanism of oversight. It’s also quite speculative: maybe this leads instead to removing more hiring and firing decisions from the President, to an amendment that reigns in executive power, to the creation of new oversight bodies, etc.

There’s a common joke about lawyers that their answer to any yes-or-no question is, “it depends”.

To address a refusal by Nixon to spend appropriated funds, Congress passed a law purporting to make it illegal for any officer of the United States to defer spending, with a few narrowly tailored exceptions that must be stated explicitly when they’re used. Trump deferred spending, and did not state (and appears not to have available) any of the exceptions.

That said, the relationship between Congress and the Executive is always uncertain. I don’t know that that law has ever been applied to a president or tested in court, and there is always a separation of powers question when Congress purports to restrict the president. When I say that there’s a strong argument, I mean that it seems clear from the letter of the law that withholding the aid was illegal, and that impression is shared (and informed) by a lot of people who know this area of the law much better than I do (including attorneys in the DoD).

We should be careful with this, as Obsrvr correctly cautioned me earlier in this thread: we don’t have a transcript, we have a memo prepared from notes made by someone on the call. It’s not word-for-word, it’s a cleaned up version of the conversation. Some of the incoherence may be due to that (and some of the coherence may also be due to that as well).

But it does establish that certain facts that tie together with witness testimony, e.g. that the president asked Zelensky to investigate the Bidens, and that Giulliani was working on behalf of the president in his interactions with Ukrainian officials.

Yes, Zelensky said that, in a press conference seated beside Trump, speaking in a second language (he pauses to ask an interpreter for the word “elections”), and he tries his best to stay out of the matter and defer to the transcript. He says, “Nobody pushed… pushed me”, and Trump helpfully clarifies, “In other words no pressure.”

I don’t see this as particularly strong evidence, and certainly not stronger than the fact that the aid was withheld for weeks leading up to the call, Giuliani was in direct contact with Ukrainian officials, and once the aid was release, the plans to announce an investigation were suddenly shelved.

Fiona Hill was a Trump appointee. She hired Vindeman. Sondland was a Trump appointee. Volker was appointed by Rex Tillerson, Trump’s Secretary of State. George Kent was appointed by John Sullivan, then acting Secretary of State for Trump. Michael McKinley was advisor to Pompeo, also Trump’s Secretary of State. Bill Taylor was made acting top diplomat to the Ukraine under Trump. Philip Reeker was made an ambassador by George W. Bush and became Assistant Secretary of State under Trump. Catherine Croft and Chris Anderson worked for Volker. David Hale was nominated as Undersecretary of State by Trump. Jennifer Williams was a policy advisor to Pence.

This isn’t a politically motivated witch, many of Trump’s chosen people, or people hired by his appointees, are making accusations and corroborating the details of the accusations of others.

I would never impugn a mother’s wisdom, so I’ll assume we are not wise enough to understand her true meaning, but when a government official is empowered to make pronouncements that carry the force of law, saying is indeed doing.

I don’t think this kind of lie happens very often. This is an empirical question on which I can’t say I’m particularly well informed, but I’m not aware of many other cases where an ally has lied about criminal conduct of another country’s political candidate in order to sway an election. Maybe Russia in 2016 qualifies, but that too seems abnormal.

I do agree that this is a tough call, but I also think it matters. Russia intentionally attempted to affect the outcome of a US election, that intent alone is problematic, if only because it telegraphs what they’re likely to do in future elections, and how they might escalate their attempts. I don’t think it had a particularly large effect, but it was a close election so it’s hard to say. But it’s dangerous to ignore it.

(I will say that the discussion around Russian ‘collusion’ is weird and tribal and doesn’t clearly delineate what the wrongs are. Trump knowingly accepting illegally obtained information or funding is wrong (even attempting to accept information he believed to be illegally obtained is wrong). Russia knowingly trying to influence the election was wrong. There doesn’t need to be an explicit conspiracy hashed out in detail for those things to be wrong.)

And it’s true that the people who vote based on Facebook memes are idiots, but our idiot founders set it up so that the best informed voter and the worst informed voter have exactly the same vote, and we know that lots of Facebook meme idiots are going to vote. It’s fine to judge the people who vote that way, but we should also hold it against people who use those idiots to influence the outcome, particularly when the Facebook memes are intentionally false or misleading.

The public announcement of a non-existent investigation, yes. And we know that that’s how it would be received. And we know that’s why Trump was pushing for it.

These don’t seem responsive to anything I’ve said.

I mean, this is a pretty uncharitable way of putting it, but yeah, him ruining all our global alliances is a problem for me. Note the difference, though, between me liking him and foreign leaders thinking he’s a reliable or competent ally.

Are you talking about the ones caught laughing about what a buffoon he is?

1. The US is not run by the people. It isn’t a direct democracy. It isn’t a one-person-one-vote representative democracy. Even to the extent that it is a democracy, the founding documents intentionally restrict democratic choices to protect people from themselves. The candidates that we can vote for pass through layers and layers of elite gatekeeping, and even the little choice we do excercise is constrained because elected officals aren’t allowed to do anything they want.

2. There’s a reason that every culture around the world hit upon elaborate formal rituals for diplomatic affairs. Diplomatic formality is a costly signal of reliability and willingness to cooperate. A functioning, peaceful, cooperative relationship between nations is facilitated by that kind of costly signaling.

No, I live in Washington, but I don’t work here (I commute outside the District), and I don’t work in government or nonprofit. In fact, Trump has been great for my bottom line, and I’m not that worried about my own situation. I’m just a stubborn philosopher who votes against his interests.

Silhouette is right.