[The Unitary Executive] Courts Must Act for the Sake of Democracy

Some points.

Republicans always feared and suspected Obama for overstepping his bounds (czars, temp filling of appointees during recess, etc...) because Bush gave him a loaded weapon that he upgraded and got from Clinton (extraordinary rendition among others). The irony here is that these pundits and wonks are generally concerned about SoP when it comes to governing and circumventing laws and powers of the ruling class rather than the original and persistent purpose of eroding civil liberties of Americans and everyone else in the world both friend and foe.

Anyone familiar with Snowdrn knows that the "unitary executive" is not a crackpot theory in that it's has Been in practice and full force since Dubya.

Secret hearings, laws and directives that are hidden even among Congress has been going on for almost 15 years. If Trump is guilty of anything that this article has accused him of, well it's classified and you can't prove a ******* thing.

I don't know if America is reaching an endgame with democracy. It sounds tinfoil to think our leaders want to overturn privacy and other civil liberties... If they can only sharpie some lines on the Constitution. Things like Citizens Untied and it's theme of "dollars as speech" doesn't give me any confidence of Scotus.

With the way partisan politics is and no president willing to give up their King powers, we might as well count the days when one guy says **** it and not hand the keys over.

The fact that it's not too late makes these thoughts dark. I'm not sure if we're at a point to change this anxiety into political action as we're more afraid of what the other side of the fence will do rather than what our handlers are already doing.

 

...in for a penny, in for a pound, I say.

...we're this far down the road now, all of us (the Donald flooring the accelerator not withstanding)...

...if we (as a nation) have any intention of continuing our democratic experiment, then we're going to have to face facts.

We've legislated our way into a box here in the early 21st century (Patriot Act and Citizens United). Fear and paranoia and cowardice are not ways to govern. But they are a way to rule.

All those people that don't like kings or czars, and are wanting to make America great again, might want to keep all that in mind.

A riddle (for no one in particular):

...what's the difference between a lobbyist on Capital Hill and a protester on Main Street?
...(keep in mind that there's no one right answer here)...

...my favorite is that the lobbyists can afford to be where they are...!

 

Eh, not really buying it. I recognize what he's saying about the unitary executive, and I am concerned about Trump's expansive view of executive power. But, presidential immunity is not the linchpin. Temporary presidential immunity from prosecution is a good and sensible rule. The Congress should be the sole check (but it should be a more effective one!). But giving the president temporary immunity doesn't necessitate that he can't be investigated or that Congress shouldn't have oversight. You can accept the principle of immunity without going all in on the unitary executive.

 

Well the temporary immunity argument IS arguing that Congress can't investigate him either. His legal argument is that while Congress can impeach the president, they cannot request ANY documents from Trump or the executive branch. Theoretically, if they believed he had ordered his chief of staff to rape and murder someone, they would have to prove it without any witnesses or documents from the Executive branch AND furthermore that local law enforcement would have no authority to investigate the crime. Note that they aren't just saying he can't be charged, they have said there is no jurisdiction for law enforcement to investigate or interfere.

You can't create this loop. You create a dictator with this. Are we saying that the President can suspend federal elections, order the military to deploy on American soil (illegal) and begin indiscriminately shooting all Americans and nobody could do anything unless the Senate removes him from office? This absolutely paves the way to authoritarianism.

We get to 2020, Trump loses the election and he goes crazy and orders the results invalid, declares it a coup and says that the elections were rigged. He implements martial law and sends in military troops to secure the state and orders the arrest of political opponents in Congress for being enemies of the people. He orders the summary execution of all immigrants attempting to cross the border illegally and orders the military to secure all media outlets and to execute anyone who resists.

We are saying that nobody has the authority to stop this unless the Senate removes him? So we are saying that as long as someone is popular enough they can break all the laws they want and be as horrible as they want, murder whoever they want, and as long as his party won't impeach him we're good with it.

 

That's Trump's argument as it relates to immunity. If we're just talking about Trump's legal argument, we're already done. It's not the only argument. I think his argument is stupid, for many of the reasons you've already expressed, but the implication of the editorial is that immunity from prosecution must come with freedom from investigation and must come with the abrogation of congressional oversight. That you must throw out the baby to be rid of the bathwater. I'm just saying it's not the presidential immunity from prosecution that is the problem here -- it's the lack of respect for the authority of Congress to investigate. We don't need to throw away the OLC memo to get that.

The author is right that if we have a Congress that is so morally bankrupt that they'd abet a criminal president and shield him from removal by impeachment, we'd be pretty screwed (... oh, right). That doesn't mean we want to empower criminal prosecutors (like William Barr? lol) to ride to the rescue and indict where the Congress won't impeach. Maybe AG Schneiderman could have put us out of our misery a couple of years ago, but then 8 years prior to that, AG Greg Abbott would have been trying to haul President Obama before a judge for some offense or other. That's not a good model.

Besides I wouldn't want to do anything that could allow Congress to dodge their Constitutional duty. When everyone is in charge, no one is in charge. If Congress can shirk their responsibility and say, "well we need the AG to do X and Y first," they will. The House must understand they are the only ones who can impeach. And if Nancy Pelosi does not advance articles of impeachment, it will be written in the history books how she personally failed to uphold the rule of law. She can't look around and hope somebody else does something to fix the problem; it has to be her.

 

It's a good thing the courts have already ruled his argument null and voisd right?

Also Trump holds no sway on the military, the majority wants him gone as much as the public at large.

Just because you order something does not mean the military will carry it out, there have been examples of the pentagon ignoring things he wants since he has been in office.

Do you think the military is in the bag for Trump or do you think they would actually carry this out because the president said so?

You have a really fatalistic view of government and the military.

 

To be clear I wasn’t arguing these things would happen I’m arguing about whether we think it should be illegal.

it is being argued in court right now and will likely end up before the Supreme Court

 

OK my bad.

I have seen some other people talking about Trump just staying in office and using the coup analogy, so it makes me wonder what do they think of the military.

 

Right I gave ridiculous examples to make a legal argument. I don't think our military would follow orders to do what I laid out, I'm merely exploring the legal question.

The current legal argument of the Trump administration in coordination with the defense of his powers in Congress would essentially mean we have President who cannot be impeached, cannot be prosecuted, has full power under Article II to do "anything he wants" and the shield of a pardon to protect partisans in Congress who keep him in office. It would create a vicious loop where literally NOBODY has any authority over the president if he chooses to be a dictator.

 

That's why he will lose in most courts and it's actually just a stalling tactic.

I bet he just can't wait until he tells us how he has the power to pardon himself.

 

...sounds like we're, again, expecting (or hoping) the courts will do what they're supposed to do, at least.

...yummers.

 

Don't count on the court.

 

That's really all we can do.

Trump is a stress test to the constitution and the Judicial framework.