3029

Well ideally we funnel the fullness of our righteous anger at everyone who votes Republican, instead.

3030

Agree, that’d what got me arguing initially. I’m as angry and frustrated as anyone, but blaming Democrats or worse – threatening to vote Republican next election – is counter productive. I get frustration with how slow it is and wanting something to be done now, but ultimately the Democrats are playing from a weak position. It’s the Republicans and their enablers that have us in this mess, not Pelosi or the Democrats. Get 18 Republican senators on board and DJT is gone, rule of law re-established.

3031

That’s assuming you get all 48 Democrats. I think you probably could, but you never know.

3032

Now that would be the Democrat to pillory and vote out of office.

3033

The slow blade penetrates the shield.
— Gurney Halleck

3034

She’s just pushing his buttons and I love it. She knows what to say to trigger him and she knows that when he gets triggered he says and does stupid shit that undermines his arguments in the court of public opinion.

I think the middle ground on the debate of the last few days is to acknowledge that the Democrats are doing a lot to build a case against Trump but to be frustrated that they are not better at controlling the narrative. They can’t assume that the case will be self-evident to the average American as more and more comes to light. They need to be out there hammering the message home repeatedly. They should not mince words.

“It’s clear that the President has repeatedly engaged in obstruction of justice.”

“The President is abusing the office for personal gain and we will continue to bring evidence forth illustrating this abuse.”

“Many people in Trump’s campaign and his administration collided with the Russians and we need to determine to what extent the President himself engaged in such behavior.”

“The laundry list of impeachable offenses grows by the day and we will continue to investigate these issues so that when we inevitably move to impeach, Senate Republicans will have to choose between upholding the rule of law or blind loyalty to Trump.”

There is something to be said for proceeding deliberately and conservatively when the stakes are this high but, as always, the Democrats need to up their game when it comes to messaging.

3035

LOL. Can you imagine the stewing going on over that? Pure cartoon caricature with steam blowing out the ears.

3036

Bush league psych-out stuff. Laughable, man.

3037
3038
3039

The ultimate guardrails are elections. 2018 worked out OK. Assuming legitimate elections in 2020, we should be relatively OK. Yes, there’s lasting damage and nobody knows how to bring the GOP back towards democracy… but the final guardrails will still be there.

3040

I see both sides. The anger is completely justified and should be more widespread. It is also true the Democrats aren’t doing nothing, but because the process is so slow it certainly looks like nothing to the casual observer.

I think Congress should be far more aggressive at asserting its inherent contempt authority and start jailing executive branch officials who ignore subpoenas.

Basically, I want the administration officials to get a court order to get them out of jail, rather than wait for months or years for courts to tell Congress that yes constitutionally your subpoenas can’t be ignored.

For critical things,like his tax returns and financial records. I think Trump will defy even court orders, which puts Congress back in the same spot we are right now but a year later.

3041

He’ll certainly try, but it’s not Trump who will get the subpoena. He won’t be the person in contempt of court, when it gets to that.

3042

I’m not sure why somebody like Bill Barr would treat a contempt of court citation any differently than contempt of Congress.? Ultimately, the US Marshal’s work for him. But the House Sergeant of Arms, and the Capital police work for the House of Representative and Nancy Pelosi.

3043

Do Federal judges rely on the DOJ to execute their Contempt orders? What about the Supreme Court? Seems like a separation of powers problem if a SC order requires the executive branch to execute it.

3044

Except for the dead people. Or the otherwise fucked people.

3045

I think the bailiffs work directly for the Court, in the classic movie scene. “I hold you in contempt bailiff take him to jail.” But the US Marshall department is part of the Justice Department, so it has always been a potential separation of powers problem. But every previous President has bought into the concept that when the court issues an orders even against my administration, I won’t interfere in it’s execution.

I don’t think that’s true anymore.

3046

I agree with regard to people like Barr, Mnuchin etc. But some of these subpoenas will go to accountants, banks, etc.

And even for people like Barr, contempt of court is potentially more serious than contempt of congress. There are actual reinforcement mechanisms when a judge is pissed off. Congress has nothing, really, other than fever dreams of the Sgt at Arms playing hero.

3047

U.S. Marshals Service one_eyed_fat_man_by_sketchmarcks_d37vv4b

3048

How trustworthy is Wolff?