Split Thread A second impeachment

[Dr.Sid]

"It's not my fault I told the violent mob to burn down the orphanage, they would have done it anyway"

Yeah airtight defense that.

But he didn't say to burn the orphanage .. so ..

 

[Segnosaur]

"It's not my fault I told the violent mob to burn down the orphanage, they would have done it anyway"

Yeah airtight defense that.

But he didn't say to burn the orphanage .. so ..

You are right, he didn't say "Burn the orphanage"... instead he said "Those Orphans are evil, so you must fight against them."

If you tell people orphans are evil, you shouldn't be too shocked if people burn orphanages, even if you don't give them specific instructions too.

 

[No Other]

You are right, he didn't say "Burn the orphanage"... instead he said "Those Orphans are evil, so you must fight against them."

If you tell people orphans are evil, you shouldn't be too shocked if people burn orphanages, even if you don't give them specific instructions too.

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Should Schumer be held accountable for his comments?

 

[Dr. Keith]

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Should Schumer be held accountable for his comments?

Yes, to the extent that it can be shown that his followers understood his comments to be a call to violence and then acted upon it.

 

[No Other]

Yes, to the extend that it can be shown that his followers understood his comments to be a call to violence and then acted upon it.

Inciting does not mean an act has to occur. These Judges are elected for a lifetime, they underwent personal scrutiny by Congress, the comments were made while SCOTUS was conducting business... what could Schumer mean by his comments?

 

[JoeMorgue]

One of my favorite comedy skits of all time is from the old days of College Humor where a beleaguered substitute teacher tries in vain to explain the simple school dress code to the students because they want to rules lawyer and make outrageous false equivalencies.

Student 1: "Can I wear my strapless dress?"
Mr. Stephens: "Yes, that is fine."
Student 2: "Then why can't I wear my dressless straps?" (Student stands up to reveal they are literally wearing an outfit that consists of only dress straps but no actual dress)

*Later*

Student 3: "Can I wear my Belly shirt?"
Mr. Stephens: "I don't see why not."
Student 4: "Can I wear my belly skirt?" (Said skirt is literally a strip of frilly fabric around her midwaist, leaving everything above and below it nude.)


That's what Republicans and all their troll army of apologist sound like right now.

 

[metacristi]

Then your understanding here is no better than it has been elsewhere in this thread. In order to be barred from office by that simple majority vote in the Senate, he must first be convicted by a 2/3 Senate majority of the charges brought by the impeachment. You getting this? What you "cannot agree more" should be done cannot be until after what you think should not be is. (Ok, but I like that sentence!)

And isn't it just a little inconsistent on your part to agree that he should be barred from office for an offense that you think he shouldn't be convicted for? The barring from office would be for the same thing- you're effectively saying he should do the time without any necessity of conviction for the crime.

Sorry for CNN then. Or no? No of course . As for Trump's being punished via being barred from holding office in the future that's especially for his overall attitude regarding democracy, especially after the fact that his legal attempts to change the result of the election were rejected by the courts. The Congress can definitely do that after Biden takes office, be it entirely as a political decision, there is no need to resort to all sort of lies, half truths, 'incitation to insurrection' and tortuous reinterpretations of what the First Amendment protect (restraining free speech).

 

[dirtywick]

Sorry for CNN then. Or no? No of course . As for Trump's being punished via being barred from holding office in the future that's especially for his overall attitude regarding democracy, especially after the fact that his legal attempts to change the result of the election were rejected by the courts. The Congress can definitely do that after Biden takes office, be it entirely as a political decision, there is no need to resort to all sort of lies, half truths, 'incitation to insurrection' and tortuous reinterpretations of what the First Amendment protect (restraining free speech).

interestingly enough, his lies and half truths incited an insurrection. i like your word choice, but not the order you're using them

 

[Stacyhs]

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Inciting does not mean an act has to occur. These Judges are elected for a lifetime, they underwent personal scrutiny by Congress, the comments were made while SCOTUS was conducting business... what could Schumer mean by his comments?

Had Schumer previously made statements in any way either directly or indirectly suggesting or supporting harm to the Supreme Court Justices? Or afterward show support for it unlike Trump did for the rioters? No. In fact, immediately after the cherry picked quote above he also said:

"The bottom line is very simple: we will stand with the American people. We will stand with American women. We will tell President Trump and Senate Republicans who have stacked the court with right-wing ideologues, that you're gonna be gone in November and you will never be able to do what you're trying to do now, ever, ever again. You hear that over there on the far-right? You're gone in November."

He was clearly referencing the coming elections when he made the statement at an abortion rights rally. Additionally, rather than defend his remark like Trump, he said the next day:

"I should not have used the words I used. They didn't come out the way I intended. My point was that there would be political consequences for President Trump and Senate Republicans if the Supreme Court, with the newly confirmed justices stripped away at a woman's right to choose.
I shouldn't have used the words I did, but in no way was I making a threat, I never, never would do such a thing."

Your attempt to compare the two falls flat on its face. Hard.

 

[Meadmaker]

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Should Schumer be held accountable for his comments?

It means Schumer is a moron. What's your point?

Should he be held accountable? You mean at election time? That's up to the people of New York, but I'm not a big fan. Sadly, though, by the time voters get to the polls, an awful lot of decisions have been made over which they have no control. They can't choose the perfect candidate, only the ones on the ballot.

It was easily among the worst things he has ever said so......start a thread about it or something.

What he did not do is lie for months about an election and finally tell a crowd to fight against the results of a democratic election.

 

[JoeMorgue]

It means Schumer is a moron. What's your point?

"The political ideology I have to keep defending because I'm not intellectually mature enough to admit I was wrong has become so morally and intellectually defunct that I have to stretch pointless equivocations to absurd lengths."

That's the point of all the Alt-Right apologists.

 

[dirtywick]

well let me know when trump apologizes for his comments, then we can compare them

 

[bruto]

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Should Schumer be held accountable for his comments?

Warning that stupid actions may lead to violence (or perhaps that they amount to violence themselves in their consequences), or that those stupid actions might induce other repercussions unspecified, is not the same as a call for violence. Even if you consider Schumer's statement intemperate, it is not a call for violence, and, addressed as it is to the Supreme Court justices, it is far fetched, I think, to consider it an incitement to some unspecified other party. That is quite different from T****s incitement, which was explicitly addressed to persons whose stated and known intent was to do harm to democratic government in accordance with his own stated and known intent to do the same.

One might also note in passing that one criterion for evaluating incitement might be whether something actually ensues, and the difference here seems pretty great.

edit to add: if one really thinks Schumer's warning amounts to incitement, then so, obviously is the recent warning of conservatives that impeachment and prosecution will make the mob, definitively shown to be dangerously anti-democratic, murderous and violent, dangerously angry. If "Don't do X or you'll be sorry" is an unallowable incitement, we're left with little that isn't.

 

[Segnosaur]

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Should Schumer be held accountable for his comments?

Did he make the comments to an audience comprised mainly of people who were prone to violence?

Did he make the comments after lying about what exactly those "awful decisions" were?

Did anyone attack Drunky McRapeface, and afterwards schumer told the attacker "love you"?

 

[metacristi]

Er.. that is still not widening the 1st amendment which was your claim.

I said that some try to 'loose the interpretation of the First Amendment' via claiming that not only the clear incitement to violence is punishable by law but much more, usually along 'progressive' lines. One of the first tenets of good argumentation is to answer the strongest interpretation of one's argument, what you did is I'm afraid mere word games.

 

[turingtest]

Sorry for CNN then. Or no? No of course . As for Trump's being punished via being barred from holding office in the future that's especially for his overall attitude regarding democracy, especially after the fact that his legal attempts to change the result of the election were rejected by the courts. The Congress can definitely do that after Biden takes office, be it entirely as a political decision, there is no need to resort to all sort of lies, half truths, 'incitation to insurrection' and tortuous reinterpretations of what the First Amendment protect (restraining free speech).

Sorry, what? Look, if you want to say they can't impeach him at all after he leaves office, that's fine, do that. But the point here is that, if they don't, they cannot "punish" him for some unspecified "attitude" problem by barring him from office, it can only be for what they've first convicted him of after impeachment. Do you understand this part of that article?

Except that voting to remove Trump from office isn't all Senate Republicans could do. See, if 67 senators vote to convict and remove Trump, then another vote could be held on whether to ban Trump from seeking any future public office. And that vote would only require a simple majority (50+1) of senators to pass.

So, no...the Congress can not "definitely" bar Trump from holding office in the future unless they've convicted him first on the specific charge in the impeachment- it's a pretty simple "if-then" construction in your article, and I don't get why you're having such a hard time with this.

 

[Meadmaker]

"The political ideology I have to keep defending because I'm not intellectually mature enough to admit I was wrong has become so morally and intellectually defunct that I have to stretch pointless equivocations to absurd lengths."

That's the point of all the Alt-Right apologists.

Indeed.


Here's one of the many things I don't get. The defenders of the President will try to parse that speech to show that of course he didn't want them to storm the Capitol. I can't read his mind. I don't know what he was thinking, but I don't need to know the exact thought in his head during any given sentence.

I know that he told falsehoods about the election results for two months. That either means:
1) He is lying and is trying to steal the election or
2) He is insane.

Either way, it's a good reason to throw the bum out.

I know that during the speech and for weeks in advance, he said that Mike Pence could do something about the results. That means either
1) He is lying. or
2) He is insane.

And I don't mean "insane" in the colloquial sense of believing things that are not true. That would work for you, or me, or the people on this board, because we don't have access to the kind of information and advice that Trump has.

He is listening to lots of lawyers, scholars, advisers, and government officials, and I will guarantee you that not one of those people ever told him that Mike Pence had the authority to refuse those electoral votes. Not even Rudy would say that. Ok, maybe Sydney Powell might say that, because she's nuts. If that group of people told him, "Mr. President. The Vice President has no authority to do this," and he still went out and told a rally that he expected Mike Pence to do it, what explanation is there for that action?

Stupidity is not an adequate explanation. It's one thing to not understand the Constitution. Lots of people don't understand it. To tell a bunch of people who have lots and lots of knowledge about this that they are all wrong is a completely different thing. If he believes that Pence could do it, and all of those advisors are wrong, then he's mentally ill. If he doesn't believe it, and he knows Pence couldn't do it, then he's criminal.

There really are no other options.

Even if Charles Schumer said something stupid.

 

[Meadmaker]

One more thing that really does have to be considered about the President's actions on January 6. The President-Elect got on the airwaves to tell the crowd to stop before the President did. That's totally unforgivable.

 

[metacristi]

Sorry, what? Look, if you want to say they can't impeach him at all after he leaves office, that's fine, do that. But the point here is that, if they don't, they cannot "punish" him for some unspecified "attitude" problem by barring him from office, it can only be for what they've first convicted him of after impeachment. Do you understand this part of that article?

So, no...the Congress can not "definitely" bar Trump from holding office in the future unless they've convicted him first on the specific charge in the impeachment- it's a pretty simple "if-then" construction in your article, and I don't get why you're having such a hard time with this.

Even if it may be how you put it here (not be that sure though) I only said that 'from what I understand Trump can be barred from holding future office with a simple majority'* and the wider idea was that Trump should rather be isolated politically instead of marching ahead with the lie that we have clear evidence that he instigated 'insurrection' (Trump's eviction will very probably be speculated way further by the 'progressive justice') . What you say is entirely marginal to my argument and definitely does not make the reasons behind this impeachment more plausible ('insurrection' , when in fact this falls apart from the beginning, if one reads carefully what Trump said before the assault). Sorry but I see much more merits in this.


* I saw one of CNN's analysts saying that a few days ago, without any other comments however

 

[Fast Eddie B]

“You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”... Schumer to Gorsuch and Kavanaugh

Should Schumer be held accountable for his comments?

A HUUUGE difference...

Schumer said something improper and dumb. Something all humans do from time to time.

He very quickly apologized for his choice of words and tried to explain what he should have said instead. Something Trump is incapable of doing, due to either a deep psychological impairment, or slavish devotion to tenets established by Roy Cohn and later carried forward by Roger Stone. Regardless, the result is the same: NEVER admit fault - the blame always lies elsewhere.