The Impeachment Process Has Officially Begun (1 Viewer)

[Andrus]

By Laura Bassett

After months of internal arguing among Democrats over whether to impeach President Donald Trump, the dam is finally breaking in favor of trying to remove him from office. The Washington Post reported that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would announce a formal impeachment inquiry on Tuesday, following a bombshell report that Trump illegally asked Ukraine’s government to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, one of his political opponents. (He essentially admitted to having done so over the weekend.)

“Now that we have the facts, we’re ready,” Pelosi said Tuesday morning at a forum hosted by The Atlantic. At 5 p.m. the same day, she was back with more. "The actions taken to date by the president have seriously violated the constitution, especially when the president says Article Two says I can do whatever I want," referring to the segment of the Constitution that defines the power of the executive branch of the government. Pelosi's message was that checks and balances of those branches are just as central to the Constitution. And one more thing: "Today, I am announcing the House of Representatives is moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry," she said at a conference broadcast on Twitter by the Huffington Post. ...

Read the Full Story - InStyle

 

[SaintForLife]

fair enough. I couldn’t remember who engaged in the whataboutism. It’s a tempting trap to fall into (using whataboutism) I’m sure I’ve done it before myself. But we should call it out no matter who is doing it. It’s an attempt to obscure the topic under discussion, over anything else, when used to divert the topic.

we can also call out hypocrisy, but not use that to deflect from admitting a valid point from whoever we are currently discussing with.

I don't think Jim was deflecting anything. I think he asked a valid and relevant question. If Trump should be impeached for Obstruction of Congress, should Obama have been impeached for ignoring subpoenas from Congress?

 

[JimEverett]

Do possible defendants mount a defense in front of a grand jury?

Or perhaps more applicable... is it common for anyone under congressional investigation directly or as part of a department to have their own counsel able to cross examine other witnesses?

Like, Clinton for the various Benghazi hearings. At least the one she spent all day testifying in. Only using it, because it was somewhat recent and not involving Trump.

Grand jury testimony isn't aired publicly.
I don;t know the answer to your second question. But I would note that when you set the rules with little or no input from the minority then claiming that the President's refusal to partake in the process amounts to proof of his guilty. because "he could prove his innocence" is a big problem imo. Really, even without the partisan nature of rules making the argument would be a terrible argument to make

 

[cuddlemonkey]

I don't think Jim was deflecting anything. I think he asked a valid and relevant question. If Trump should be impeached for Obstruction of Congress, should Obama have been impeached for ignoring subpoenas from Congress?

It was not valid. It was seriously flawed, and here’s why:

Even if the two situations are exactly the same and I say Obama should not have been impeached, thus revealing complete hypocrisy, it would not immediately invalidate my belief on the situation at hand. It would not automatically make me wrong in regards to the current impeachment proceedings.

That is why whataboutism is a logical fallacy.

 

[MT15]

I don't think Jim was deflecting anything. I think he asked a valid and relevant question. If Trump should be impeached for Obstruction of Congress, should Obama have been impeached for ignoring subpoenas from Congress?

people who pose that question are ignoring (conveniently in JE’s case) what Trump has done that no other president has done. Trump has contended that he has something called “absolute immunity”. Meaning he doesn’t respond to any requests from congress at all. According to him, he will provide nothing. Not one document, not one witness, nothing. His lawyers have gone before a judge and argued that he can’t even be investigated at all. Almost everyone should be able to see how problematic that is, besides the fact that it’s just a made up thing.

Other presidents may have ignored a subpoena selectively, but have worked with Congress to provide reams of documents, and many witnesses. If there was executive privilege, it was worked out what specifically was covered. There hasn’t ever been this assertion before that the House won’t get anything.

Everything the House got, it got from members of the Executive branch who ignored Trump’s orders and obeyed what they considered lawful subpoenas.

 

[MT15]

Grand jury testimony isn't aired publicly.
I don;t know the answer to your second question. But I would note that when you set the rules with little or no input from the minority then claiming that the President's refusal to partake in the process amounts to proof of his guilty. because "he could prove his innocence" is a big problem imo. Really, even without the partisan nature of rules making the argument would be a terrible argument to make

I don’t think people are using his lack of participation to prove his guilt, rather they are objecting to the lamentations of “unfair” from his side, and the assertion that he didn’t have a chance to participate.

The closest I have seen to what you describe is the counter “why won’t he let his people testify if he is innocent?”

That maybe wouldn’t fly in a court of law, but makes a lot of sense in the court of public opinion.

Why not get testimony from Mulvaney or Bolton? They would be the ultimate fact witnesses. They could completely exonerate the President and put an end to this whole thing, right? The only reason they didn’t testify already is that Trump blocked them. Let them say what really happened. If Trump is telling the truth, this would blow up in the Democrats’ faces. Why wouldn’t he let them defend him?

I saw an opinion poll where something like 60-70% of Republicans want to hear from the president’s men.

 

[dtc]

Grand jury testimony isn't aired publicly.
I don;t know the answer to your second question. But I would note that when you set the rules with little or no input from the minority then claiming that the President's refusal to partake in the process amounts to proof of his guilty. because "he could prove his innocence" is a big problem imo. Really, even without the partisan nature of rules making the argument would be a terrible argument to make

The Republicans will not and have not acted in good faith in really any way since Obama was elected.

You cannot work with them and if your criteria for fairness includes some sort of combined effort then you're deluding yourself if you think it's possible.

There is nothing - not a damn thing Democrats could do short of dying that could get Republicans to work with them on anything except tax cuts and bad trade deals.

 

[SaintForLife]

It was not valid. It was seriously flawed, and here’s why:

Even if the two situations are exactly the same and I say Obama should not have been impeached, thus revealing complete hypocrisy, it would not immediately invalidate my belief on the situation at hand. It would not automatically make me wrong in regards to the current impeachment proceedings.

That is why whataboutism is a logical fallacy.

Okay so my translation was correct: Don't examine whether I apply my principles consistently.

 

[JimEverett]

It was not valid. It was seriously flawed, and here’s why:

Even if the two situations are exactly the same and I say Obama should not have been impeached, thus revealing complete hypocrisy, it would not immediately invalidate my belief on the situation at hand. It would not automatically make me wrong in regards to the current impeachment proceedings.

That is why whataboutism is a logical fallacy.

Looking at and using history is not a logical fallacy.

 

[SaintForLife]

people who pose that question are ignoring (conveniently in JE’s case) what Trump has done that no other president has done. Trump has contended that he has something called “absolute immunity”. Meaning he doesn’t respond to any requests from congress at all. According to him, he will provide nothing. Not one document, not one witness, nothing. His lawyers have gone before a judge and argued that he can’t even be investigated at all. Almost everyone should be able to see how problematic that is, besides the fact that it’s just a made up thing.

Other presidents may have ignored a subpoena selectively, but have worked with Congress to provide reams of documents, and many witnesses. If there was executive privilege, it was worked out what specifically was covered. There hasn’t ever been this assertion before that the House won’t get anything.

Everything the House got, it got from members of the Executive branch who ignored Trump’s orders and obeyed what they considered lawful subpoenas.

So only examples that are exactly the same can be given? The Democrats have demonstrated multiple times that they are on a fishing expedition and trying to harm Trump for the election. The latest example was the House not wanting to send the articles on impeachment to the Senate even though we've been told Trump is such a threat that he needs to be removed before the next election. Also they didn't include a single obstruction charge from Mueller's report. Trump probably thinks it's not legitimate. Let the courts decide.

 

[JimEverett]

people who pose that question are ignoring (conveniently in JE’s case) what Trump has done that no other president has done. Trump has contended that he has something called “absolute immunity”. Meaning he doesn’t respond to any requests from congress at all. According to him, he will provide nothing. Not one document, not one witness, nothing. His lawyers have gone before a judge and argued that he can’t even be investigated at all. Almost everyone should be able to see how problematic that is, besides the fact that it’s just a made up thing.

Other presidents may have ignored a subpoena selectively, but have worked with Congress to provide reams of documents, and many witnesses. If there was executive privilege, it was worked out what specifically was covered. There hasn’t ever been this assertion before that the House won’t get anything.

Everything the House got, it got from members of the Executive branch who ignored Trump’s orders and obeyed what they considered lawful subpoenas.

I've made my arguments on this earlier in this thread - and that was before the Articles of Impeachment were drafted.

The House Democrats agreed with my view. What Trump was doing did not amount to Obstruction of Justice.

 

[Beach Friends]

Looking at and using history is not a logical fallacy.

Correct. I get opposition to whataboutism, but in the legal world precedence matters. Can you imagine citing caselaw to a judge and the court telling you "stop your whataboutism?"

Anyone who has paid attention to the debates over impeachment knows that history is especially important when it comes to impeachment That's one of the biggest concerns with setting a bar so low. We don't want to end up having in effect a vote of no condfidence.

 

[Beach Friends]

Prof. Noah Feldman was one of the three Democratic witnesses on the legalities of impeachment. (He was the effeminate blond headed guy).

Anyway, Prof. Feldman has expressed an opinion that because Pelosi has failed to transmit the articles to the Senate, President Trump has not been impeached.

Are the Democrats satisfied with this sort of glorified censure? Do you think if Nancy sobers up after the Holidays she will send them then?

 

[Farb]

Prof. Noah Feldman was one of the three Democratic witnesses on the legalities of impeachment. (He was the effeminate blond headed guy).

Anyway, Prof. Feldman has expressed an opinion that because Pelosi has failed to transmit the articles to the Senate, President Trump has not been impeached.

Are the Democrats satisfied with this sort of glorified censure? Do you think if Nancy sobers up after the Holidays she will send them then?

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/dec/20/noah-feldman-democrat-impeachment-witness-says-tru/

I was just reading this article you just reference....in case you are asked to show your work.

 

[cuddlemonkey]

Looking at and using history is not a logical fallacy.

You didn't ask about history, though. You asked for my personal opinion:

So your position is that Obama should have been impeached when he ignored subpoenas issued by Congress?

My personal position on something that happened in a previous situation is irrelevant to the discussion at hand. Even if I take a completely contradictory stance, it does not change this situation.

Okay so my translation was correct: Don't examine whether I apply my principles consistently.

It doesn't matter, though. Let's say that this exact same situation happens again in 3 years, but it's my guy in office and I am adamant that he should not be impeached.

If this happens, I will be a hypocrite and everyone could look at my stance in 2019 and my stance in 2022 and see that for themselves. What will not change is whether or not the actions of the presidents in question are impeachable. The potentially impeachable actions do not depend on my personal thoughts.

Quite frankly, this entire line of discussion is a distraction from the topic at hand. It's why I suggested that Jim start a thread about it for further discussion, so we don't clutter this thread even more than it already is.

 

[Saintamaniac]

If there's one thing that this thread has shown me is that there are some people who will support and defend obvious wrong-doing by people in power as long as the people in power are from their "team".

 

[MT15]

I've made my arguments on this earlier in this thread - and that was before the Articles of Impeachment were drafted.

The House Democrats agreed with my view. What Trump was doing did not amount to Obstruction of Justice.

This doesn’t appear to be about the point I was making, or at least that I thought I was making, lol.

Never said anything about obstruction of justice (that would be referencing the Mueller report). What I was saying was that trying to say that what Trump is doing with congressional subpoenas is the same as any former administration ignores the scope of what he is doing and the “absolute immunity” claim. No administration has ever taken it this far, nor made up some sort of blanket exemption from all requests for testimony or documents.

 

[JimEverett]

If there's one thing that this thread has shown me is that there are some people who will support and defend obvious wrong-doing by people in power as long as the people in power are from their "team".

It has shown me that people will gladly support bad process that will undermine the country for years to come simply because they dislike the present President so intensely.

 

[V Chip]

So where the hell were all of the “person being investigated needs to have the opportunity to cross-examine all witnesses” people during the Benghazi hearings, or the “her emails” hearings, or during the Clinton impeachment?

Right. Right.