Impeachment Round Two (15 Viewers)

Roofgardener said:

Indeed. Hence the outcome was a political outcome, not a judicial one !

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Wait...to make sure I fully understand. Are you saying that the outcome of a political process was a political one? That's as shocking as if the outcome of a legal trial was a legal outcome.

Roofgardener said:

Look at your history. In every single impeachment trial against a President, the presidents party almost exclusively voted against the impeachment, and the opposition party almost exclusively voted for the impeachment. Such behavior is statisticly unlikely if it was a fact-based trial.

Whataboutism.

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You are either stupid, naive, or disingenously trolling to make a statement like that. Facts have a place but politics is, unfortunately, often more powerful, especially when it involves a politician's reelection chances. Fact: Lindsey Graham said in 2016 that, "If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed...and we will deserve it." Who is one of his biggest supporters now? Marco Rubio said that Trump is an embarrassment and that he is cultivating a party of fear. But he has gone along with everything that Trump has done. Political expediency usually wins the day.

Your "statistical" analysis (with its whopping sample size of three), misses this crucial element. The Founders recognized the political nature of impeachment and set an extremely high bar for conviction of 2/3 of the Senate. That way you can feel comfortable that a conviction did transcend Party lines.

The White House is doing the right thing here... stay away.

Roofgardener said:

Indeed. Hence the outcome was a political outcome, not a judicial one !

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There is no such thing as a judicial outcome for an impeachment. It's not an option.

Optimus Prime said:

What I want to see is footage of Trump watching the events of Jan 6th on TV in real time

That would probably tell you everything you want to know

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may be as close as we get
====================
President Donald Trump was “horrified” when violence broke out at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, as a joint session of Congress convened to confirm that he lost the election, according to his defense attorneys.


Trump tweeted calls for peace “upon hearing of the reports of violence” and took “immediate steps” to mobilize resources to counter the rioters storming the building, his lawyers argued in a brief filed Monday in advance of Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate.

It is “absolutely not true,” they wrote, that Trump failed to act swiftly to quell the riot.
But that revisionist history conflicts with the timeline of events on the day of the Capitol riot, as well as accounts of multiple people in contact with the president that day, who have said Trump was initially pleased to see a halt in the counting of the electoral college votes.

Some former White House officials have acknowledged that he only belatedly and reluctantly issued calls for peace, after first ignoring public and private entreaties to do so........

For many White House aides, lawmakers and others who had been ensconced in the Capitol, Trump’s actions after the riots began were particularly offensive — even more objectionable, some said, than what he did to incite the crowd......

Another close adviser said that rather than appearing appalled, Trump was voraciously consuming the events on television, enjoying the spectacle and encouraged to see his supporters fighting for him.


At some point, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows was persuaded by staff to attempt to intervene with the president.


Finally, at 2:38 p.m. — more than 90 minutes after the siege had begun — Trump tweeted, “Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our Country. Stay peaceful!”


One person familiar with discussions about what the president should tweet said Trump had resisted adding the final phrase: “Stay peaceful.”.....

The impeachment manager's first exhibit is a video of January 6.

That was one powerful video, I hope it changes the minds of some of the spineless individuals like Rubio’s And Ron Paul

I recommend this timeline from Bill Moyers. Look at not just at January 6th but Trump's actions in the days and weeks preceding. Show me where this does not read like a textbook coup attempt.

brandon said:

The impeachment manager's first exhibit is a video of January 6.

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It is infuriating to watch... nsfw (language, violence/unsettling scenes, officers getting assaulted, what I think was the beating of Officer Sicknick, footage of ashli bobbit getting shot, and destruction of property)

Man, this closing from Raskin. If that doesn't touch a nerve...

GrandAdmiral said:

The White House is doing the right thing here... stay away.

Biden’s strategy for Trump’s impeachment: Sit back and STFU

It "just makes no sense" for him to engage.

www.politico.com

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I think Biden has more important, pressing issues to try and deal with in terms of Covid-19 economic stimulus checks getting approved, dueling pressure from progressive Dems and GOP politicians on how much money, more or less should be given depending on average income earners. He's hoping he can get some GOP support although talks have been disappointing, so far still his party has a slight majority in both houses so maybe he push most of it through with a few legal wrinkles.
Plus, he has to deal with his first major foreign policy crisis with an ongoing military coup in Myanmar trying to restore military junta rule, detaining, imprisoning, and the likely specter of mass violence towards hundreds, if not thousands of pro-democracy protesters crowding their cities right now.

Their are bigger issues that need his administration's attention and most of the American public elected to him to try and solve or erase the most damaging, problematic aspects created by the Trump administration. This is more of a larger, eminently important legal and judicial matter that's better left handled to Congress and Senate. The Dems have at least 3-5 GOP senators they can rely upon to censure Trump and prevent him from ever running for political office again.

Sadly, that's the most realistic, achievable punishment they can expect to render on in terms of punishing Trump's seditious, incitement to riotous behavior he sparked with those far-right marchers who try to disrupt the legally sanctioned, recognized certification of Electoral College state returns.

Yggdrasill said:

You are either stupid, naive, or disingenously trolling to make a statement like that. Facts have a place but politics is, unfortunately, often more powerful, especially when it involves a politician's reelection chances. Fact: Lindsey Graham said in 2016 that, "If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed...and we will deserve it." Who is one of his biggest supporters now? Marco Rubio said that Trump is an embarrassment and that he is cultivating a party of fear. But he has gone along with everything that Trump has done. Political expediency usually wins the day.

Your "statistical" analysis (with its whopping sample size of three), misses this crucial element. The Founders recognized the political nature of impeachment and set an extremely high bar for conviction of 2/3 of the Senate. That way you can feel comfortable that a conviction did transcend Party lines.

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Well GEE WIZZ.. thanks for that Yggdrasill. So I am "stupid, naive or disingenous" am I ?
And yet, despite that nasty comment, you chose not to repudiate ANY of the points I made ?

I'm not sure that I'm going to continue on this forum if THAT is the kind of nasty responses I am going to get.

I thought this was a DEBATE forum ? If you are going to insult me WITHOUT repudiating any of my debate comments.. the.. well.. is that REALY the standard that this forum works on ?

I mean.. really ?

FullMonte said:

Wait...to make sure I fully understand. Are you saying that the outcome of a political process was a political one? That's as shocking as if the outcome of a legal trial was a legal outcome.

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ROFL

Fair point.. except that.. I got the impression from US media that they where presenting this as a Judicial process ?

I mean.. SURELY you are not implying that the likes of CNN and MSNBC could be misleading the American Public ?

(or.. at least.. foreign observers such as myself ? )

Nobody is presenting this as a real trial, literally nobody, roof. Every discussion I have seen takes pains to present the differences between an impeachment trial and a criminal trial. Every single one.

The only points you have presented is that this is a political process, which is rather stating the obvious. And that for some reason you take that to mean that there won’t be facts, which is just wrong.

So the first lawyer was just awful, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him removed from the case tonight. The second guy is MAGA all the way, he is combative and accuses the House managers of doing what Trump has spent five years doing. Pure gaslighting. Trump will love him.

MT15 said:

So the first lawyer was just awful, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him removed from the case tonight. The second guy is MAGA all the way, he is combative and accuses the House managers of doing what Trump has spent five years doing. Pure gaslighting. Trump will love him.

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I saw on twitter that this Castor fella lawyered this well in his opening remarks...

MT15 said:

So the first lawyer was just awful, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him removed from the case tonight. The second guy is MAGA all the way, he is combative and accuses the House managers of doing what Trump has spent five years doing. Pure gaslighting. Trump will love him.

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At some point in this speech, the second guy (Schoen) is probably going to yell, "This whole trial is out of order!"

nolaspe said:

I saw on twitter that this Castor fella lawyered this well in his opening remarks...

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"Bruce Castor's concluding statement: "He was removed by the voters." Ruh-roh. That's not what Trump says. #ImpeachmentTrial"

I said the exact same thing on another forum: "Maybe it's just me, but using your opening statement to talk about how Biden legitimately won the election might be a bad thing when your client is accused of drumming up violence in support of a fraudulent election."