The Impeachment Process Has Officially Begun (24 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

 

[N.O.Bronco]

If Adam Schiff had not been so darn unprofessional yesterday, he would surely have won the respect of a very serious and respectful party whose leader calls him "Adam Schitt" in his own respectful and professional public statements.

He's moved on from Adam Schitt into full-on anti-semitic territory now: Shifty Schiff. But, of course, the real offense is not letting Nunes break the rules so he can let his patsies spam the hearing about how they want to out the whistleblower so they can personally attack him/her.

 

[B4YOU]

We are seeing process complaints and hurt feelings because discussions on substance only lead to talking about Trump committing bribery.

 

[SaintForLife]

I can only speak for myself when I say that what I expect is reasonable discourse where all participants not only ask honest and reasonable questions, but receive honest and reasonable answers.



No need to take anyone's word for it. This is the relevant portion of HR 660:

"Notwithstanding clause 2(j)(2) of rule XI of the Rules of the House of Representatives, upon recognition by the chair for such purpose under this paragraph during any hearing designated pursuant to paragraph (1), the chair and ranking minority member of the Permanent Select Committee shall be permitted to question witnesses for equal specified periods of longer than five minutes, as determined by the chair. The time available for each period of questioning under this paragraph shall be equal for the chair and the ranking minority member. The chair may confer recognition for multiple periods of such questioning, but each period of questioning shall not exceed 90 minutes in the aggregate. Only the chair and ranking minority member, or a Permanent Select Committee employee if yielded to by the chair or ranking minority member, may question witnesses during such periods of questioning. At the conclusion of questioning pursuant to this paragraph, the committee shall proceed with questioning under the five-minute rule pursuant to clause 2(j)(2)(A) of rule XI."

Text - H.Res.660 - 116th Congress (2019-2020): Directing certain committees to continue their ongoing investigations as part of the existing House of Representatives inquiry into whether sufficient grounds exist for the House of Representatives to ex

Text for H.Res.660 - 116th Congress (2019-2020): Directing certain committees to continue their ongoing investigations as part of the existing House of Representatives inquiry into whether sufficient grounds exist for the House of Representatives to exercise its Constitutional power to impeach...

www.congress.gov

Are you saying that this is something Schiff could have said that you would consider to be more professional than what he actually said?

Forgive my ignorance, but what is a Permanent Select Committee employee?

 

[cuddlemonkey]

Forgive my ignorance, but what is a Permanent Select Committee employee?

Someone employed by the committee. In this case, it was agreed upon to be counsel for the majority and minority.

It does not apply to members of the committee, as they are not employees of the committee itself.

 

[SaintForLife]

Someone employed by the committee. In this case, it was agreed upon to be counsel for the majority and minority.

It does not apply to members of the committee, as they are not employees of the committee itself.

Was it was agreed upon by both the Democrats and Republicans or was it included in the vote that was only supported by Democrats?

 

[samiam5211]

If any of us had said something on Twitter about someone as they were testifying against us similar to what the President did yesterday, Twitter would have banned us within the hour.

 

[SaintForLife]

If any of us had said something on Twitter about someone as they were testifying against us similar to what the President did yesterday, Twitter would have banned us within the hour.

It was definitely a stupid thing for Trump to do, but I don't see how it can be construed as witness tampering. She would have never known he said that during her testimony if Schiff didn't mention it.

 

[insidejob]

If Adam Schiff had not been so darn unprofessional yesterday, he would surely have won the respect of a very serious and respectful party whose leader calls him "Adam Schitt" in his own respectful and professional public statements.

Schiffty Schitt can't possibly be professional no matter what. It's why he's called Schiftty Schitt in the first place.

 

[xpuma20x]

It was definitely a stupid thing for Trump to do, but I don't see how it can be construed as witness tampering. She would have never known he said that during her testimony if Schiff didn't mention it.

It's called witness tampering because it's designed to stop future people from speaking. Or possibly to have that individual change their testimony later, or if they have to come back for future testimony.

 

[The moose]

It was definitely a stupid thing for Trump to do, but I don't see how it can be construed as witness tampering. She would have never known he said that during her testimony if Schiff didn't mention it.

Why might I ask?

If the person that bad mouthed her and ruined her reputation instead of just transfer her is in real time bad mouthing her it is important.

He really could have just transferred her. The childish and vindictive stuff he has done to people that are career civil servants is horribly wrong. It only is worse when you consider the bone spurs!

I personally feel horrible for her. In that line of work if you are good at what you do you get the crap jobs. By her assignments she was exceptional.

For the life of me why would anyone want the president to tweet?

When we no longer have a press secretary that talks to the people. Who is Stephanie Grisham I have never heard her speak except to Fox news only yet she is the press secretary!

 

[insidejob]

Why might I ask?

If the person that bad mouthed her and ruined her reputation instead of just transfer her is in real time bad mouthing her it is important.

He really could have just transferred her. The childish and vindictive stuff he has done to people that are career civil servants is horribly wrong. It only is worse when you consider the bone spurs!

I personally feel horrible for her. In that line of work if you are good at what you do you get the crap jobs. By her assignments she was exceptional.

For the life of me why would anyone want the president to tweet?

When we no longer have a press secretary that talks to the people. Who is Stephanie Grisham I have never heard her speak except to Fox news only yet she is the press secretary!

It's no accident that he can't fill (and doesn't want to fill) any of the plethora of empty cabinet positions. No one wants their career to be defined and ultimately ruined by being a part of his White House and the less people he has around, the more shady stuff he thinks he'll get away with.

 

[cuddlemonkey]

Was it was agreed upon by both the Democrats and Republicans or was it included in the vote that was only supported by Democrats?

It was in a resolution that the entire House had the chance to vote on. Does that make a difference?

 

[xpuma20x]

They knew the rules, they knew they voted on the rules. This was specifically set up for fake outrage because they knew this would be televised. It allows for a foot in the door to spin the coverage. If they can get people talking about "how rude" Schiff was, even though he wasn't, or get people talking about how the Dems won't allow the GOP to question the witness etc, they'll win the day's fight.

 

[insidejob]

They knew the rules, they knew they voted on the rules. This was specifically set up for fake outrage because they knew this would be televised. It allows for a foot in the door to spin the coverage. If they can get people talking about "how rude" Schiff was, even though he wasn't, or get people talking about how the Dems won't allow the GOP to question the witness etc, they'll win the day's fight.

I don't remember any of this crybaby bull from Democrats in the endless Benghazi hearings/investigations. It's like the GOP has completely lost their footing as to who they are since they're all just Trump sycophants now and they just follow his lead of talking out their butts and complaining about how unfair everything is for them. It's embarrassing us as a nation on the international stage. But that apparently matters not anymore since our allies are now our enemies and our enemies are what Trump aspires to turn America into.

 

[SaintForLife]

It was in a resolution that the entire House had the chance to vote on. Does that make a difference?

No I was just curious because I have seen some people say that the Republicans agreed to the rules.

 

[cuddlemonkey]

No I was just curious because I have seen some people say that the Republicans agreed to the rules.

Fair. They are bound by them whether they agree or not.

 

[V Chip]

The Mueller report addressed collusion, conspiracy, and coordination:

"We applied the term coordination in the sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian goverment in it's election interference activities."

The piece you quoted says exactly what I said -- there is no legal term for collusion. Read it again:

"But collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal law. For those reasons, the Office's focus... was on conspiracy as defined in federal law."

And again note -- as I pointed out in another thread, the explicit language used in the report:

"In some instances, the report points out the absence of evidence or conflicts in the evidence about a particular fact or event. In other instances, when substantial, credible evidence enabled the Office to reach a conclusion with confidence, the report states that the investigation established that certain actions or events occurred. A statement that the investigation did not establish particular facts does not mean there was no evidence of those facts."

"We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

(Emphasis mine)

The report states it will point out when there is absence of evidence about a fact or event. It then states explicit language that will be used ("the investigation did not establish particular facts") that does NOT MEAN there was no evidence of those facts. It then uses that same exact language when referring to the "facts" of Trump Campaign Coordination with the Russian government -- therefore, it does NOT mean that there was no evidence of coordination. It did NOT state that there was absence of evidence about coordination, because it says it would have stated as such if that were the case.

 

[SaintForLife]