Welcome to the United States of Dystopia!
This reminds me of a few things …
First, a metaphor from Shakespearean days, at the Bard's theater, where the nobles sat safely above the pit, watching both the play and the rabble below in the pit, who whooped and hollered at the actors, and occasionally threw rotten vegetables onto the state, while brawling with one another in the pit.
It reminds me of the days before the French Revolution, where the divide between the haves and the have-nots was as great as it is here today, and the attitudes of both sides are similar.
But more than anything, it reminds me of the WWE, where the rabble surrounding the ring behave much as the wrestlers in the square circle … booing the good guy and cheering the baddie. Where winning mostly involves an illegal hold or substance out of the sight of the referee, and the outcome is a foregone conclusion. Where civility is non-existent and morality is focused on 'winning' at all costs.
We are at a point in our culture where a bald-faced lie on the floor of the U.S. Senate goes unchallenged under the auspices of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
We are at a point where the President can slur rivals (or anyone who disagrees with him) on Twitter and destroy reputations or re-e******n chances.
We are at a point where no matter what the President says or does, the members of his cult blindly follow and accept those actions and words as gospel.
We are at a point where the actions of the government are so melded with the actions benefitting the holder of the presidency that the two are indistinguishable.
We are at a point where the president can spend $100,000,000 of taxpayer dollars so that he can golf one-third of the time that he has been in office and nobody says a word.
We are at a point akin to N**i Germany in the mid-1930's immediately prior to Hitler's rise to power. Granted, the economic situation is better, but the underlying sentiments of grievance and loss of power because of 'others' is almost identical.
This is the state that we find ourselves today and these are but a few of the problems that we face.
We have a morality problem, in that what we are seeing in our society is a lack of it. Some claim to be "devout Christians" yet still support a man in the presidency that has broken most of the Commandments that they cling to as a basis for their own morality. Those two situations cannot exist simultaneously.
We treat each other with a grossness and lack of civility that I don't remember being this bad in my almost eighty years of memory. It seems that we have receded from a civilized society to one of pseudo-anarchy where it's every 'man' for themselves and the rules are only enforced when the f**grance of the offense cannot be ignored. "Might makes right, and justice is the interest of the stronger" [paraphrased from Plato's Republic, Chapter 1].
The justice system has two branches … one for the well-to-do and another for the rest of us. A well-publicized case in San Francisco involved F. Lee Bailey, the well-known lawyer, who was accused of drunk driving. He brought in two of his high-priced lawyers from his law firm, made mincemeat of the arresting officer, was acquitted in spite of overwhelming evidence, and avoided felony conviction. That would not have happened to most of us.
The economic system isn't much better. The stock market is OK, but for most of us, our economic situations haven't improved. Automation is taking more and more of our jobs, and retraining a secretary to be a computer technician to maintain a robot probably isn't in the cards. This is going to get exponentially worse.
Finding a place to work where the employer values their employees and treats them well is rare these days, and most of the jobs are where the employee just fills a slot and does rote work is the norm (for low wages, too.)
All in all, we're becoming a dystopian society. There's no denying this. And I'm not sure that recovery will ever be complete, if at all. Trump will probably be reelected … we have to remember that this is a person that will use every trick (legal and illegal) to win the e******n, and we can underestimate him at our peril. After that, it's gonna be a rough patch for the country.

Hamilton was a wise, talented & multi-faceted Founder. His death in a dual with Aaron Burr short-changed a young nation of his many talents...

Alexander Hamilton (January 11, 1755 or 1757 – July 12, 1804) was an American statesman, politician, legal scholar, military commander, lawyer, banker, and economist. He was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He was an influential interpreter and promoter of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the founder of the nation's financial system, the Federalist Party, the United States Coast Guard, and the New York Post newspaper. As the first Secretary of the Treasury, Hamilton was the main author of the economic policies of George Washington's administration. He took the lead in the Federal government's funding of the states' debts, as well as establishing a national bank, a system of tariffs, and friendly trade relations with Britain. His vision included a strong central government led by a vigorous executive branch, a strong commercial economy, a national bank and support for manufacturing, and a strong military. Thomas Jefferson was his leading opponent, arguing for agrarianism and smaller government.

A side-note: We seem in accord with the subject and direction of this thread.

There is no single issue surrounding what trump did or defense would say he didn't do...so what the GOP is left with is f**ed outrage about the horror of H****r B***n making $50,000 a month. Here's a newsflash, it isn't what he'd be making as a salary, lobbyists make way way more. The oligarchs working with the corrupt prosecutor were stealing billions.

And here's the real irrelevance, it happened before trump was president, it has no bearing on a new president and the Ukraine's anti corruption stance in which they have been getting rid of the control corrupt officials and corporations had. The damage this administration with the three amigos and Giuliani is far more worrisome...with Perry's bunch obtaining a contract for a Texas group for tens of millions of dollars (no favors there, right?).

H****r B***n has nothing to do with anything that means a thing, and the idea that there is anything that warranted trump withholding aid is about as stupid an idea as it gets. I don't know how grown men can go on about their f**e outrage in light of what they are trying to make as a point, which is nothing.

We are at opening statements, which is where defense teams generally lay on the BS extra thick on their nothing burgers, the trial is where prosecutors get to prove their case and the defense gets to try to respond to those proofs. This is a defense that has nothing to go with excet evidence that will destroy any defense. When they try to make a point the counterpoint is offered right there by the prosecution. This would decimate the rhetorical and non substantive defense as it stands.

As Congress moves toward a possible formal impeachment of President Donald Trump, they should consider words spoken at the Constitutional Convention, when the Founders explained that impeachment was intended to have many important purposes, not just removing a president from office.

A critical debate took place on July 20, 1787, which resulted in adding the impeachment clause to the U.S. Constitution. Benjamin Franklin, the oldest and probably wisest delegate at the Convention, said that when the president falls under suspicion, a “regular and peaceable inquiry” is needed.

Statements were made at the Constitutional Convention explaining that the Founders viewed impeachment as a regular practice with three purposes:

1) To remind both the country and the president that he is not above the law
2) To deter abuses of power
3) To provide a fair and reliable method to resolve suspicions about misconduct.

The Convention delegates repeatedly agreed with the assertion by George Mason of Virginia, that “no point is of more importance … than the right of impeachment” because no one is “above justice.”

One of the Founders’ greatest fears was that the president would abuse his power. George Mason described the president as the “man who can commit the most extensive injustice.” James Madison thought the president might “pervert his administration into a scheme of [stealing public funds] or oppression or betray his trust to foreign powers.” Edmund Randolph, governor of Virginia, said the president “will have great opportunitys of abusing his power; particularly in time of war when the military force, and in some respects the public money will be in his hands.”

Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania worried that the president “may be bribed by a greater interest to betray his trust and no one would say that we ought to expose ourselves to the danger of seeing [him] in foreign pay.” James Madison, himself a future president, said that in the case of the president, “corruption was within the compass of probable events … and might be fatal to the Republic.”

William Davie of North Carolina argued that impeachment was “an essential security for the good behaviour” of the president; otherwise, “he will spare no efforts or means wh**ever to get himself re-elected.” Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts pointed out that a good president will not worry about impeachment, but a “bad one ought to be kept in fear.”

Until the very last week of the Convention, the Founders’ design was for the impeachment process to start in the House of Representatives and conclude with trial in the Supreme Court. It was not until Sept. 8, 1787, that the Convention v**ed to give the Senate instead the power to conduct impeachment trials.

This is clear evidence that the Convention at first wanted to combine the authority and resources of the House of Representatives to conduct the impeachment investigation – a body they called “the grand Inquest of this Nation” – with the fairness and power exemplified by trial in a court.

Even though trial of impeachments was moved from the Supreme Court to the Senate, Congress can still draw on the example of court procedures to accomplish an effective inquiry, especially if they are trying to get information from uncooperative subjects. In many of the investigations that are now part of the House’s impeachment inquiry, the Trump administration has refused to hand over documents and blocked officials from testifying to Congress.

The Constitution makes clear that impeachment is not a criminal prosecution: “Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office.” If impeachment trials had remained at the Supreme Court, the Court could therefore have consulted the rules it has approved for civil cases. It makes sense that when the Convention at the last minute decided Congress would have complete power over impeachment, the delegates intended Congress would have at least the same powers the Supreme Court would have exercised.

In civil cases, courts have powerful tools for dealing with someone who blocks access to the very information needed to judge the allegations against him. The most commonly known method is the rule that says that once a person is legally served with a lawsuit against them, they must respond to the complaint. If they don’t, the court can enter a judgment against them based on the allegations in the complaint. But there are other processes as well.

One court tool that could easily be adapted to the impeachment process comes from the federal rules of civil procedure. In a process called “request for admission,” one party to a lawsuit can give their opponents a list of detailed factual allegations with a demand for a response.

If the party does not respond, the court can treat each allegation as if it were true, and proceed accordingly. If the respondent denies one or more particular allegations, there is a follow-up procedure called a request for production, demanding any documents in their possession or control supporting the denial. If the respondent refuses, again the court has the power to order that the alleged fact be taken as true.

In an impeachment process against President Donald Trump, the House of Representatives could present the president with a request for admission to the following two simple factual statements, which could be inferred from a whistleblower complaint:

1) “In July 2019 President Trump personally issued instructions to suspend all U.S. security assistance to Ukraine.”
2) “President Trump issued these instructions with the intent to pressure the government of Ukraine to conduct a formal investigation of H****r B***n and his father Joe Biden.”

The House could give Trump a brief amount of time to respond, including providing any evidence that might disprove the allegations. If he refused to respond, or if he denied but refused to produce supporting documentation, the House could assume the set of alleged facts to be true and include them in articles of impeachment. Then the House could v**e and, depending on the outcome of that v**e, the matter would then proceed to the Senate for trial.

Congress could engage in a long, drawn-out battle trying to use its oversight and subpoena powers to force various executive branch officials to release documents or testify about what they saw, heard and did. Or they could try this simple and quick procedure, which does not require the cooperation of the Department of Justice or court action.

Benjamin Franklin told his fellow delegates the story of a recent dispute that had greatly troubled the Dutch Republic. One of the Dutch leaders, William V, the Prince of Orange, was suspected to have secretly sabotaged a critical alliance with France. The Dutch had no impeachment process and thus no way to conduct “a regular examination” of these allegations. These suspicions mounted, giving rise to “to the most violent animosities & contentions.”

The moral to Franklin’s story? If Prince William had “been impeachable, a regular & peaceable inquiry would have taken place.” The prince would, “if guilty, have been duly punished — if innocent, restored to the confidence of the public.”

Franklin concluded that impeachment was a process that could be “favorable” to the president, saying it is the best way to provide for “the regular punishment of the Executive when his misconduct should deserve it and for his honorable acquittal when he should be unjustly accused.”

4.) Biden now falsely claims to have supported Obama’s 2011 raid that k**led bin Laden
The fourth lie Biden has told on foreign policy in recent days is that he claims now to have been supportive of President Obama’s decision in 2011 to launch a raid that ended up finally claiming the life of Osama bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Bin Laden had proved elusive for nearly a decade after the attacks, despite U.S. vows under two administrations to bring him to justice, but Obama finally got him in the spring of 2011—just before the 10-year anniversary of the deadly attacks that claimed thousands of American lives.
When asked by Fox News reporter Peter Doocy if Biden told Obama not to go after bin Laden in that successful raid, Biden falsely claimed “I didn’t.” But Biden himself in a 2012 speech admitted that he told Obama “don’t go” when Obama went around the room and asked all of the leaders whether he should do it or not: Obama himself, in a 2012 general e******n debate with then GOP p**********l nominee Mitt Romney, confirmed Biden told him not to go: Then-White House press secretary Jay Carney confirmed Biden was “speaking accurately” when he told Obama “don’t go” on the bin Laden raid:
Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, the eventual 2016 Democrat p**********l nominee, confirmed Biden was “skeptical” of the bin Laden raid in her book: As did former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta—who was at the time CIA director—in his book: So did then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates: But Biden, starting in 2013 and continuing through 2015 to the present day, has begun amending the historical record to reflect more favorably upon himself, now claiming he never told Obama “don’t go.”
Wolking said this history revision is more blatant dishonesty from Biden.
“Osama bin Laden, they k**led him in 2011,” Wolking said. “In 2012, Joe Biden was giving a speech—and this is on video—he told the story about how President Obama went around the table with all the senior people including the chiefs of staff of the military and said: ‘What do you guys think?’ Biden said he told President Obama my suggestion was ‘don’t go.’ At the time, this was pretty newsworthy. Jake Tapper even asked White House press secretary Jay Carney at the time about it. ‘Is this true? He was against it?’ Jay Carney said he was speaking, that Biden was speaking accurately when he told this story. And then when President Obama was debating Mitt Romney in 2012, he even made reference to the fact that his current vice president, Joe Biden, did not support the raid to get Osama bin Laden. This was backed up by at least five other senior administration officials from the Obama administration—Hillary Clinton, Leon Panetta, Bob Gates, Michael Morrell—and they all say Biden opposed the raid. Biden started changing the story in 2015. He repeated a different version of events just this past week when talking with Fox News’s Peter Doocy, who asked him: ‘Didn’t you tell Obama not to go after Osama bin Laden and launch that raid?’ He said: ‘No, I didn’t do that, I didn’t do that.’ Well, it’s on video Joe. You said it.”
5,) Biden now falsely claims he never supported moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem
After President Trump moved the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem—something the last several presidents of both parties promised but never actually did—Biden did an interview in November with PBS NewsHour in which he falsely claimed he never supported moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. “I wouldn’t have done it in the first place,” Biden said when asked about Trump following through on his promise to move the embassy, something Obama, Bush, and several other previous presidents promised but never accomplished.
Biden supported a number of pieces of legislation as a U.S. Senator that called for the embassy to be moved to Jerusalem, and in a 2008 interview as the vice p**********l nominee in Florida Biden even admitted that moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem has always been his position and Obama’s position. Biden said in that interview about moving the embassy:
That’s been my position for years, and that’s Barack’s position. Look, when Barack said ‘undivided,’ he was talking about that there can’t be physical barriers. People turned it around and said he’s talking about a divided Jerusalem. His point was you can’t have a Jerusalem that has any physical divisions. Jerusalem must be the capital of Israel. Wh**ever decision the Israelis make, that’s a decision we’ll support.
Wolking said this is yet another example of Biden’s dishonesty in an effort to attack President Trump. “Another example of him running from his record. He supported this for many years,” Wolking said. “President Trump keeps his promise to the American people and does this, and proves the experts wrong in terms of the consequences of this decision, which was overall positive. Of course, Joe Biden then says he’s against it.”
6.) Biden claims ‘nobody warned me’ about conflict of interest with son H****r and Ukraine dealings
Another recent foreign policy fib Biden has told came in early December, when the former vice president claimed that “nobody warned me” about a potential conflict of interest over his son’s business dealings with Burisma in Ukraine. “Nobody warned me about a potential conflict of interest,” Biden said in an interview with NPR in December. “I never, never heard that once at all.”
It turns out that Biden’s office was warned about this conflict of interest, as State Department official George Kent testified that he did alert the vice president’s office on the matter during his testimony in the House Democrats’ impeachment push against President Trump.
“If you think about the story about how Joe Biden and then-Secretary of State John Kerry, who has endorsed Joe Biden, are now telling in regards to these recent questions about H****r B***n’s role and who knew what when, it really just doesn’t pass the smell test, right?” Wolking said. “We now know that all of these senior administration officials at the State Department and elsewhere—including George Kent—were worried that H****r B***n was engaging in a conflict of interest in Ukraine at the time that Vice President Biden was leading our foreign policy in that country at the time. So, we have George Kent who went to Joe Biden’s staff at the time, who said, ‘hey this is a problem’ and they just kind of brushed him off. Joe Biden claims he didn’t know anything. And John Kerry claims he didn’t know anything. But, it really just doesn’t pass the smell test. All these people were complaining about and raising red f**gs about this potential conflict of interest—nobody told the Secretary of State? Nobody told Joe Biden, the Vice President, whose son was involved? It just doesn’t pass the smell test.”
Author: Matthew Boyle -Prtr**tic Times
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January 7, 2020
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced plans to restrict President Trump’s ability to conduct military operations against Iran, potentially crippling the U.S. ability to respond to an attack. Pelosi and other Democrats have been largely critical of Trump’s decision to conduct an airstrike in Iraq that k**led Iranian terrorist Gen. Qassem Soleimani, claiming he did not properly notify Congress in advance and warning about the risk of escalation in the region, although his strike did not require congressional authorization.
Trump has also threatened additional action if Iran retaliates for Soleimani’s death. “This week, the House will introduce and v**e on a War Powers Resolution to limit the President’s military actions regarding Iran,” Pelosi wrote in a letter to fellow Democrats, referring to a similar Senate resolution to be introduced by Sen. Tim Kaine. “It reasserts Congress’s long-established oversight responsibilities by mandating that if no further Congressional action is taken, the Administration’s military hostilities with regard to Iran cease within 30 days.”
In essence, Democrats in the house will v**e to manufacture a virtual surrender of the United States to Iran, putting every American at risk. House Intel Chairman Adam Schiff, doing the only thing he knows, called for Congressional hearings into Trump’s drone strike that k**led Soleimani.
“The president has put us on a path where we may be at war with Iran. That requires the Congress to fully engage,” Schiff told WaPo. Schiff echoed Speaker Pelosi and said there’s “absolutely no way” Trump should retaliate to a potential attack from Iran with “disproportionate” actions.
Obama’s DHS chief Jeh Johnson said on “Meet the Press”: “If you believe everything that our government is saying about General Soleimani, he was a lawful military objective, and the president, under his constitutional authority as commander in chief, had ample domestic legal authority to take him out without an additional congressional authorization. Whether he was a terrorist or a general in a military force that was engaged in armed attacks against our people, he was a lawful military objective.”
On Saturday, the White House sent Congress formal notification of the drone strike under the War Powers Act, a senior administration official told The Associated Press. The notification, required by law within 48 hours of the introduction of American forces into an armed conflict or a situation that could lead to war, had to be signed and sent to Congress. The document sent Saturday to congressional leadership, the House speaker and the Senate president pro tempore was entirely classified, according to a senior aide for the Democrats and a congressional aide speaking to the AP.
Trump tweeted Sunday afternoon that advanced “legal notice is not required” for him to take additional action, but said that his online posts provided notification to Congress that he “will quickly & fully strike back, & perhaps in a disproportionate manner” if Iran attacks “any U.S. person or target.”
Iran had vowed retaliation for the death of Soleimani, even suggesting that Trump properties could be targets. Iranian general Esmail Ghani, who was chosen to replace General Qassem Soleimani by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday, appeared on Iranian TV to threaten the United States. “God the almighty has promised to get his revenge, and God is the main avenger. Certainly actions will be taken,” said Ghani, according to the Associated Press. Iranian officials also announced they would be abandoning the 2015 nuclear deal, signaling threats of further nuclear proliferation. Following Trump’s earlier tweets that even Iran’s cultural sites were potential targets for U.S. military action. “They’re allowed to k**l our people. They’re allowed to torture and maim our people. They’re allowed to use roadside bombs and blow up our people, and we’re not allowed to touch their cultural sites? It doesn’t work that way,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One.
Source-We The People Daily-AP-GHANI,ESMAIL-

LOL, don't you wish to the bottom of your gizzard that the impeachment had been about any one at all other then the orange nitwit you love to your dying day...

The right wing is in such a sorry state.. all the c***ting invented by them and still the hero of the hour gets impeached..

As he sits in the Oval office reflecting ( if he can) on his disgrace, will any of you come to see any of his misdeeds as the worthless, ineffective self serving thieving efforts his entire life has been made up of??

Naw, you will love as if infatuated by the image of your dreamed.

It may have leaked out that I am not a fan of those who do not serve the people, even if only in a small district, those people should be the first consideration.. To help those who put them into office..

And rather the orange con has run more cons to screw the very people who let him slither into the oval office.. and you refuse to see the carving in the rock of history..