The Impeachment Process Has Officially Begun (4 Viewers)

[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

 

[Lazybones]

The investigation began as investigation into Page. Page's interactions with the president's campaign is what brought the president into the investigation. The investigators didn't go looking for the president, Page brought the president to the attention of the investigators.

There's is no credible evidence of any conspiracy against Trump.

It’s a really nice story to push that the left and the media have not been out to over turn the election the moment they lost. It has been 1 controversy after another. Impeachment has been the goal for 3 years now.

Unfortunately for the left, they keep thinking Hillary and the old worn out tricks will win. Fortunately for the country they continue to be wrong.

 

[LA - L.A.]

The emotions of election night, 2016, translate directly to the current impeachment proceedings, in my opinion.

People gathered at election night rallies are going to have heightened emotional reactions to the elections results.

It's a mistake to assume that the reactions in the photos posted are typical of everyone's reactions.

It's a mistake to assume that everyone in those photographs are stuck in that emotional place. It makes for a good story, as you illustrated, but it's not grounded in the reality of how the overwhelming majority of people operate emotionally.

Don't be fooled by the photographic and video attention given to people acting in emotional extremes. The extreme wings of our society and those that live in a constant heightened emotional state, make up an underwhelming minority of the country.

I want Trump impeached and I fell asleep watching the election coverage. Nobody that I know shed a single tear or did a single fist pump when they found out Trump one. Trump is abnormal. His most devout supporters and his most tenacious detractors are not typical of the majority of America. The extreme are a minority in our society. Like brats throwing tantrums in public, they get way more attention than they deserve and is healthy for our society.

 

[Beach Friends]

First, I just checked and neither of these mention the word fun.

https://madaboutpolitics.com/General_Posting_Rules_Guidelines.html

https://madaboutpolitics.com/Community_Discussion_Board__Posting_Rules_Guideline

I don't think this site is intended to be a rhetorical fight club where people come to have fun by bloodying and beating each other into submission with barbed comments and baseless opinions. There's plenty of other places on the internet for people to do that. I'm pretty sure Andrus wants this board to be above that fray.

The word that is mentioned repeatedly throughout the links above is discussion. A discussion is not a fight. Even a passionate and heated discussion is not a fight. Someone genuinely seeking a discussion has a different mindset and intention from someone seeking a fight. Someone looking for a discussion is not looking for a fight, and a someone looking for a fight is not looking for a discussion.

Second, this is relevant to the impeachment of Trump. Trump is always looking for a fight. He has no interest in having any discussions. Most of the evidence so far indicates that trying to rhetorically bloody Biden is what drove Trump to pressure Ukraine to publicly announce they were going to investigate Biden for corruption. It seems that Trump wanted to publicly embarrass Biden so badly, that he misused and overstepped his presidential power to do so. If Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush, or Obama had done what the evidence indicates that Trump had done, then I'd want them impeached as well.

If it had been discovered that any of them had done what the evidence indicates Trump has done, then I have no doubt that they would have been investigated and probably impeached by the House.

And here we are numerous posts later still discussing what is an appropriate posting style or whether one member should be admonishing another.

Let's drop it.

 

[SaintForLife]

Could the reason for all the leaks be because so many people are genuinely alarmed by Trump’s behavior?

That's possible, but doesn't it seem more likely that all the leaks to undermine him could be because he's not an absolute supporter of the military industrial complex? He campaigned on saying we shouldn't be in all these wars and I'm sure that makes all the people who profit from the never ending wars and conflicts nervous.

 

[LA - L.A.]

...looks like a pretty normal exchange, one I am sure has been duplicated many times in the past by every president there ever was.

What is the factual or historical basis of this opinion?

What examples are there of other presidents doing the equivalent of what the evidence suggests Trump did?

 

[LA - L.A.]

In order to give the defendant the best defense possible - yes, the identity of the tipster can help. Do you not think it matters in that respect?

But more importantly, impeaching a sitting, duly-elected President is not on par with stopping a money laundering-scheme.
I think the process of trying to remove a sitting PResident should make everything out in the open. It should be completely transparent. The idea of it not being so is somewhat scary.

Do you think that same standard of complete transparency should apply to the president under investigation for impeachment, meaning they can't claim executive privilege to withhold information or witnesses that the investigators are asking for?

 

[LA - L.A.]

I will wait to see if you keep up the same energy when the rolls are reversed. so far, I have seen numerous 1 liners that are slights to conservatives and I haven’t seen you white light for them.

Please explain the following.

What are you going to do after your waiting period is up?
What energy do you see me expending?
What roles are you referring to?
How will those roles be when they are reversed?
Which specific 1 liners are slights to conservatives?
What exactly is "white light"?
Which posts do you think I have "white lighted" in and what specifically in those post do you see as "white light?"

 

[Lazybones]

Please explain the following.

What are you going to do after your waiting period is up?
What energy do you see me expending?
What roles are you referring to?
How will those roles be when they are reversed?
Which specific 1 liners are slights to conservatives?
What exactly is "white light"?
Which posts do you think I have "white lighted" in and what specifically in those post do you see as "white light?"

Typo. White Knighting is what was meant. I was waiting for you to reply to ward with the same energy as you did to the poster with the one liner. I would think you would want to be consistent.

 

[LA - L.A.]

Okay, so what's going on here, @Lazybones? You said this:

Kind of concerning if the same standard is used before employing an investigation into the president.

I replied with this:

The investigation began as investigation into Page. Page's interactions with the president's campaign is what brought the president into the investigation. The investigators didn't go looking for the president, Page brought the president to the attention of the investigators. There's is no credible evidence of any conspiracy against Trump.

And then you respond with this:

It’s a really nice story to push that the left and the media have not been out to over turn the election the moment they lost. It has been 1 controversy after another. Impeachment has been the goal for 3 years now.

Please explain how your response addresses the fact that the initial investigation was aimed at Page and not Trump?

You bemoan and accuse other's of pushing a story, but your response pushes a story while avoiding the facts of what we were actually discussing.

 

[LA - L.A.]

I am assuming we have all seen the name of the guy who is purported to be the blower by now.

I haven't.

From what I am hearing, he is 100% resistance.

Please share the sources you are hearing this from.

 

[LA - L.A.]

Typo. White Knighting is what was meant.

I'd still like you to explain what you meant when you said:

I will wait to see if you keep up the same energy when the rolls are reversed. so far, I have seen numerous 1 liners that are slights to conservatives and I haven’t seen you white light for them.

• What energy do you see me expending?
• What roles are you referring to?
• How will those roles be when they are reversed?
• Which specific 1 liners are slights to conservatives?
• What exactly is "White Knighting?"
• Which posts do you think I have "White Knighted" in and what specifically in those posts do you see as "White Knighting?"

I was waiting for you to reply to ward...

Your post was #844 and Ward's was #852. How were you waiting for me to respond to Ward's post when you posted before he did?

...with the same energy as you did to the poster with the one liner.

I didn't respond to any poster who made a one liner post and I didn't respond to anyone with a one liner post, so which specific post are you talking about?

I would think you would want to be consistent.

I am fairly consistent and consistently fair.

 

[V Chip]

What is that supposed to mean?

So this is your reply? To be even less constructive and then to add on top of it be dismissive and flippant. Are you truly saying this is how a true conservative acts? Because if so what is the point of them engaging with you at all. Your mind is made up and you just want to be immersed in an echo chamber.

How do I asked to be moved from liberal standing to moderate? Because I thought liberal/progressive was supposed to be an individual who espoused ideals of trying see a view through another's eyes. What I am seeing here is nothing but castigating those who don't see every issues your way.

Speaking of platitudes and drive-by posting, see exhibit A.

I posted one snarky non-productive comment and I got called out by 3 people. Which is good, I should have been called out because it's not helpful to post drive-by comments even if they are a valid opinion of the poster.

I'll echo Lazybones post in that I hope these continue to call out drive-by posts and non-productive comments by all sides (and perhaps curb their own as well).

@Lazybones if you really want to know what I meant, hit me up in a private message.

 

[Dadsdream]

Good grief, now it seems we have 2016 election night Democratic Party reaction deniers!

I channel surfed that night. Stayed up until 3 am. It wasn't cute camera tricks. I posted just one video here. Review Google videos 2016 Election Reaction, see,what you find.

It was an unbelievable event, the likes of which I had never seen in all my previous decades of watching such events unfold. Don't try to tell me how to interpret what I see. I've been a fairly well-educated witness to history for quite a while now and find the suggestion tha I don't know what I saw is rather insulting.

It wasn't just the people at the rallies either. The responses online were, if anything, even more accentuated. The reaction among friends, family and co-workers was much the same. Shock disbelief, even genuine fear to the point of panic in some cases.

I question the veracity of anybody who wamts to deny that Hillary's defeat was anything other than a traumatic watershed event with a deep and profound impact on the psyche of those counted themslves as her supporters.

Given there are people who deny we landed on the moon, I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

Don't kid yourself. We did land on the moon.

The Democratic Party was traumatized by Hillary's loss and the foreboding prospects that entailed. It remains so.

We saw it in the riduculous Kavanagh hearings and we are about to see it again in the impeachment hearings.

Just watch. I hope I'm wrong. But, I know I'm not.

 

[LA - L.A.]

Good grief, now it seems we have 2016 election night Democratic Party reaction deniers!

I guess you didn't understand what I said. I didn't deny you saw what you saw. I actually acknowledged that you saw what you saw.

What I said is that those reactions you saw are not the typical reactions of the majority of Americans. All you saw on TV was shots of people gathered in groups to watch the election results. The majority of Americans did not gather in public places to watch the election results. When people gather together in a crowd to cheer for anything, they get more emotional than they do in their day to day life.

It's like fans at sporting events or concerts. Do you think they dress and act the same way at work, church, school and other places, as they do when they go to games? The people who go to games or sports bars make up a small percentage of the people who watch games. The same is true of the people who gather in public to watch election results.

Do you watch fans reacting at a game, in sports bars are online, and think to yourself, yep that's how everyone everywhere acts all of the time and how everyone everywhere will continue to act from this moment forward?"

That's just not how most people are. You're seeing extreme, atypical behavior and assuming it's the normal and typical behavior of the majority of people. It is not. Recent studies have shown that the extreme left and right wings make up a very small percentage of the population.

What you saw on election night is no more indicative of the typical Republican or Democrat, than the countless white nationalists gatherings filled with MAGA red hat's and other Trump promoting items indicates that the typical Trump supporter is a white nationalist.

I'm fairly confident that you don't think the typical Trump supporter is a white nationalist. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

That's possible, but doesn't it seem more likely that all the leaks to undermine him could be because he's not an absolute supporter of the military industrial complex? He campaigned on saying we shouldn't be in all these wars and I'm sure that makes all the people who profit from the never ending wars and conflicts nervous.

Trump campaigned on increasing the military budget. He has since fulfilled that pledge. Defense contractors profits have increased under Trump. So, I don’t think it’s more likely.

It seems weird to me that people think it’s everyone out to get him, including people who support his policies, than it is to believe a single person is just that bad.

 

[N.O.Bronco]

This is a discussion forum that reuberay is posting on, not a debate forum. The debate forum on this site hasn't even been activated yet. He is welcomed to post his opinion if it's honestly believed. You in turn can post your honest opinion about his opinion without ridicule or condescension. Let's not turn this Community Discussion Forum into another PDB echo chamber.

Community Discussion Board:

Moderated common discussion board where all members are welcome to debate, This board is for intelligent debate. Passionate debate is ok, however, there are behavioral rules. Uncivil behavior and personal attacks are not tolerated. If you cannot carry on a meaningful discussion then we suggest using The Mud Pit discussion board where the rules are relaxed.​

​

As it has been explained to me, as the mission statement reads, this is designed to be a place where you are expected to engage and debate political matters intellectually and in good faith, personal attacks and uncivil behavior, even if you genuinely believe it to be true or justified, are not to be a part of that. This is also supposedly not the place to just be unloading your personal hot takes.

If you would not be ok with someone coming in here and calling the right a bunch of racist sympathizers as the sole justification for defending Trump, it seems equally inappropriate to roll into a thread and poison the well of the discussion by drive-by attacking those that carry certain positions or have drawn certain conclusions as acting immorally, nefariously, and without good faith. As there is nothing civil, impersonal, or intellectually defensible in that behavior.

 

[Archies Ghost]

What is the factual or historical basis of this opinion?

What examples are there of other presidents doing the equivalent of what the evidence suggests Trump did?

This is the part where I provide examples of president’s engaging in foreign affairs activities that are both in the national interest and politically expedient and you reply that none are EXACTLY the same as the incident in question, a phone call on a Thursday referencing a former VP now running for president whose son got kicked out the Navy.

Sorry, not playing. You aren’t the teacher, this isn’t a classroom and this isn’t a test where you get to demand answers.

 

[N.O.Bronco]

This is the part where I provide examples of president’s engaging in foreign affairs activities that are both in the national interest and politically expedient and you reply that none are EXACTLY the same as the incident in question, a phone call on a Thursday referencing a former VP now running for president whose son got kicked out the Navy.

Sorry, not playing. You aren’t the teacher, this isn’t a classroom and this isn’t a test where you get to demand answers.

Again, if some of you are not interested and not willing to put in effort to engage, are you sure this part of the forum is the right place to be expressing these sentiments?

There are places designated for simply expressing random political thoughts or assertions without any conditions or expected obligations, this board, as I quoted above in the explicit mission statement stapled to the top of this part of the forum, by all accounts is specifically purposed for people to engage one another in tightly moderated intellectual debate and meaningful discussion.

If you have no interest and no intention of explaining your positions, qualifying statements, and engaging others with any sort of effort, to the point of being confrontational when asked for some bare minimum supporting evidence, does that feel in compliance with the spirit of this board?