The Trump Impeachment Thread

Quote: SOOPOO

What a sad state of affairs. The TOTALLY incompetent Democrat Senate leadership (essentially Schumer) forces a vote on allowing witnesses to be called. And as soon as the vote is taken, they changed their minds and decided not to call witnesses! You can’t make this up!
These are the people we have entrusted to lead us. God help us. Or if you are an atheist, we need lots of positive variance!

Its an unusual process
Mistakes will be made
Dems will negotiate among themselves on the best way forward
This how a political party works
How a political party becomes dysfunctional is to be beholden to the bizarre whims of one man

I ABSOLUTELY would have voted to allow witnesses if EITHER side requested it! The fact that this is even up for debate is ridiculous. And yes, I felt the same way during the first impeachment trial.

Does the impeachment charge only apply to the speech, because the managers have been using a whole timeline of things which is the correct way to look at a crime in the real world.

I think Mission is arguing it only has to be about the speech.

If the impeachment charge is ONLY is about the speech, then I agree with Mission. But IS IT?

Quote: rxwine

I didn't know that expression was limited to civil cases. But hey, not a lawyer.

The only thing you need to blow the whole idea out of the water that Trump didn't incite insurrection is for instance a statement by Trump that that was what Trump meant to happen. That's why it matters what he did before and afterwards. And if you can show enough evidence that that was the intent you may convince a jury. But it doesn't have to be a statement, it could be other evidence.

I've admitted before that, if you're (general 'you') ever charged with a criminal offense, you could do a hell of a lot worse than having me on your jury.

Not only is the word, "Incitement," a problem...another problem is the word, "Insurrection."

Definitionally, insurrection essentially means a revolt against the Government. Not only does Trump have to have incited the mob for, "Incitement of Insurrection," to have happened, but he also has to incite the mob, specifically, to revolt against the Government.

The mob obviously DID revolt against the Government, they attacked a Government building, after all. However, that doesn't mean that Trump incited them to do that. Even if Trump was deliberately inciting them to commit a violent act that wasn't necessarily against the Government itself, then, "Incitement to insurrection," would not have happened...but some other incitement would have. The concept of freedom of speech demands that speech must be pretty specific in what sort of violence is to be conducted against a pretty specific person(s) or property for incitement to succeed.

I'm not saying that Trump would literally have to say, "Storm the Capitol Building," but it would have to at least be closer to that than, "Fight like hell," and other colloquialisms along those lines.

The managers have been building a case that Trump was building a foundation for months. Not just during the speech.

You get enough precarious dominoes lined up, only takes a touch to move the whole thing in just a few minutes.

Quote: SOOPOO

I ABSOLUTELY would have voted to allow witnesses if EITHER side requested it! The fact that this is even up for debate is ridiculous. And yes, I felt the same way during the first impeachment trial.

I'm not sure as there are pragmatic considerations at play. It is Saturday, after all.

The hill that many Republican Senators have built is that it's not Constitutional to impeach someone who is no longer in office. The Senate voted otherwise, (overall) but that does not mean individual Republican Senators cannot use that as their reasoning to vote against. It's a really stupid reasoning that would set a ridiculously bad precedent, but I don't generally expect Republicans to be terribly intelligent. They're in full damage control mode, anyway.

You have to figure that voting to impeach Trump (for those Republicans who ever ardently supported him, or supported him at all, really) is tantamount to admitting that they made a mistake in ever supporting him. Admitting mistakes is usually not a strong suit of politicians.

I'd obviously favor witnesses were this a real trial or had the House of Representatives presented an article that could have been better argued, but I see all possible witnesses as having exactly zero probability of changing the ultimate result and I tend to think everyone knows that.

Quote: rxwine

If the impeachment charge is ONLY is about the speech, then I agree with Mission. But IS IT?

That's pretty much my position on it, but discussing that would make for a more fruitful exchange between us. I'd even grant that things said or done outside of that particular speech (as long as they were at some point prior) could be admitted as evidence and considered.

I wouldn't consider anything after the insurrection had already started as evidence because you can't incite something that's already happening. You might want to make an argument for aiding and abetting (as opposed to dereliction of duty), I suppose, and that would be a different conversation...but you can't incite something that is already taking place. Incitement is what leads to an event happening, and therefore, cannot describe any conduct during the course of an event already taking place.

It depends on what your definition of is is.

Quote: petroglyph

It depends on what your definition of is is.

That's ballgame, folks. 57-43 in favor of Guilty, insufficient.