Justice Department Now Counsel to the President
In a shocking shift that is now appearing complete, the DOJ has morphed from law enforcement to protect the United States to DOP (Defense of the President) against the United States. Starting under Jeff Sessions, and driven home under Bill Barr, the DOP has turned over 150 years of Constitutional law on its head. Up until 2 years ago, the DOJ strictly interpreted the emoluments clause, even extending it beyond the president to others in the federal government from receiving ANY funds or gifts from a foreign government. No more. After several lawsuits were filed asserting that Trump receiving funds from foreign governments through his hotels and golf courses, his lawyers said that this is perfectly OK since those funds are received by his company in a “commercial” transaction. They interpreted the emoluments clause as meaning direct payments to the president for actual action from the president; in other words, directly paid bribes.
The DOP has now adopted that very same position, turning 150 years of precedent on its head. Now that the DOP is 100% Trumpland, along with the Senate, the courts are our only hope, but even that is now corrupted with the radical judges that Trump has succeeded in getting seated on the SCOTUS after McConnell stole a seat in 2016. The result is that We the People are now completely exposed to Trump’s corruption. The executive branch is broken; the DOP is corrupted and now representing Trump personally; the legislative branch is broken with the Senate in Trump’s pocket; the SCOTUS is corrupt with grossly unqualified judges political operatives sitting on the court.
What’s needed is nothing short of a complete overhaul of the laws, traditions, and statutes surrounding governance of all three branches of the federal government from campaign finance to ethics rules to term limits for EVERYONE. Beto has just presented a plan for a constitutional amendment that limits house and senate members to 12 years, and SCOTUS judges to 18. I would say that’s a good start.
Also, the House is broken, as it’s checks and balances against a criminal executive are only used against Democrats for things like lying about consensual sex between adults.
1This header is astounding:
House to vote next week on contempt charges
Jun 03 2019
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. House of Representatives will vote next week on whether to hold Attorney General William Barr and former White House counsel Don McGahn in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with subpoenas related to the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, the No. 2 House official said.
They are talking about gun control today. The roulette wheel never stops at red OR black.
Walking down the long hallway and never arriving at the doorway of direct action.
Pelosi has already floated the idea of CENSURE in lieu of Impeachment to her colleagues. And this after suggesting prayer as a palliative to resorting to painful choice.
218 years seems almost reasonable for SCROTUS, then there’s Boofie Kavanaugh for whom 18 seconds was too much. Congress abdicated their war responsibilities, failed to perform oversight on nominations, and are on track to relinquish the responsibility to impeach. Contact your varmints. Let them know impeachment is not a ‘constitutional crisis.’ Just the opposite, it’s a means to correct mistakes and avoid crisis.
If this maladministration fails to 25 the 45, Congress won’t impeach IQ4.5 and another presidential election is corrupted, that will not be a trifecta. It will be the perfect storm to unleash the .22, .38, .45 and worse alternatives to pitchforks in the streets. Impeach now and don’t gamble on a ‘clean’ election.
3To use a quote from Game of Thrones, Anyone who thinks this will have a happy ending hasn’t been paying attention.
4Term limits do more harm than good. Think about where we would be with inexperienced leaders in the House of Representatives. Fortunately we have seasoned, experienced leaders like Pelosi to stand up to the Pussy Grabber. Term limits weed out the best leaders by disqualifying the most qualified candidates. What we need is educated voters, not Constitutional Amendments.
5Before we go jiggering with term limits, which have had severely deleterious effects IMHO on the state level, let’s fix the elections process itself.
-Constitutionally, end the Electoral College.
-Determine a national algorithm for drawing congressional districts (end gerrymanders).
-Outlaw corporate contributions, PACs, SuperPACs, federally fund all federal elections. (Money is not speech)
-Mandate paper ballots for all federal elections with an auditable trail.
-Full suffrage for all citizens 18 and over, restricted only for election-related crimes, and then not for a period to exceed 8 years.
-Minimum 6-week early voting, plus a national holiday for Election Day.
-Provide federal money to the states and/or counties to be in compliance with all of the above.
Give me this wish list, and I guaran-damn-tee you wouldn’t need term limits at ANY level.
6Primo, I love your list. But the people who would need to implement it are the people who benefit from the current corruption, electoral and otherwise, so I don’t see how we can get any of it passed. We can try to Vote the Bastards Out, but that would take a hell of a lot of voters to change their rutted minds, and the bastards would change the rules again, to their own advantage, if they saw that kind of change coming.
7If Trump’s #1 protector, Pelosi, is “Seasoned”, I’d prefer unseasoned with a pinch of constitutional duty. If term limits mean inexperience with the current Status Quo that Pelosi is so comfortable with, I’m 100% for term limits.
8Term limits were originally a right wing idea with the goal of clearing the field. Sure, I’d like a clear field, too – but we already have term limits. They’re called “elections.”
Case in point: The poster child for Houston’s term limits was Kathy Whitmire, who at the time was running for an unprecedented (I forget, 6th?) term. She was defeated in the same election that had the term limit proposition on the ballot.
A few more cases in point: Pistol Pete, Culberson…
9It absolutely buggers belief that one ignorant, psychotic, narcissistic and egotistical bully could possibly have such an unrestrained influence that history will forever be changed.
Tramp’s impact on, not only the United States, but the entire world is having and will have a negative effect that the earth and her inhabitants will most likely never recover from.
The lack of foresight of those that could end this travesty is both pitiful and terrifying.
The depth of corruption is staggering.
10Term limits guts any legislative institional memory and surrenders “authority” to speak knowledgably on issues to corporate lobbyist and civil service instititionalists.
Oh yeah how about a draconian penalty on campaigns that try to skip out on paying bills.
11Most recent deadbeat is demented donnies refusla to pay El Paso the $470K he owes them for his elmer gantry revival/scam.
Ralph @5, K @10; IMO term limits is a good idea if the corporate &wealthy are compelled to a personal level responsibility to disclose every penny expended by whatever means, dodge, no exceptions, within a 30-day period of each expenditure, eg. The entrenched bureaucracy also must be taken into account of responsibility.
12No system is going to be perfect nor long lasting. The trumpsters will always be with us to ply their trade.
I’ll vote for whoever plans to bring back tumbrils and the “National Razer”.
13You get what you pay for. I wonder how much Barr is worth?
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