I say YES. YOU say NO....Numero Tre! Enjoy!
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Another view of the not shining examples of U.S. citizenry.
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Prophetic words -- he must have forgotten them.
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Sick, sick, sick.
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Trump Is Said to Have Discussed Pardoning Himself
The discussions occurred in recent weeks, and it was not clear whether he has brought it up since he incited supporters to march on the Capitol, where some attacked.
President Trump has told advisers how much he likes having pardon power.Credit...Erin Schaff/The New York Times
By Michael S. Schmidt and Maggie Haberman
- Jan. 7, 2021Updated 3:23 p.m. ET
President Trump has suggested to aides he wants to pardon himself in the final days of his presidency, according to two people with knowledge of the discussions, a move that would mark one of the most extraordinary and untested uses of presidential power in American history.
In several conversations since Election Day, Mr. Trump has told advisers that he is considering giving himself a pardon and, in other instances, asked whether he should and what the effect would be on him legally and politically, according to the two people. It was not clear whether he had broached the topic since he incited his supporters on Wednesday to march on the Capitol, where some stormed the building in a mob attack.
Mr. Trump has shown signs that his level of interest in pardoning himself goes beyond idle musings. He has long maintained he has the power to pardon himself, and his polling of aides' views is typically a sign that he is preparing to follow through on his aims. He has also become increasingly convinced that his perceived enemies will use the levers of law enforcement to target him after he leaves office.
No president has pardoned himself, so the legitimacy of prospective self-clemency has never been tested in the justice system, and legal scholars are divided about whether the courts would recognize it. But they agree a presidential self-pardon could create a dangerous new precedent for presidents to unilaterally declare they are above the law and to insulate themselves from being held accountable for any crimes they committed in office.
A White House spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.
Mr. Trump has considered a range of pre-emptive pardons for family, including his three oldest children — Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump and Ivanka Trump — for Ms. Trump's husband, the senior White House adviser Jared Kushner, and for close associates like the president's personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani. The president has expressed concerns to advisers that a Biden Justice Department might investigate all of them.
Mr. Trump, who has told advisers how much he likes having the power to issue clemency, has for weeks solicited aides and allies for suggestions on whom to pardon. He has also offered pre-emptive pardons to advisers and administration officials. Many were taken aback because they did not believe they were in legal jeopardy and thought that accepting his offer would be seen as an admission of guilt, according to the two people.
Presidential pardons apply only to federal law and provide no protection against state crimes. They would not apply to charges that could be brought by prosecutors in Manhattan investigating the Trump Organization's finances.
The discussions between Mr. Trump and his aides about a self-pardon came before his pressure over the weekend on Georgia officials to help him try to overturn the election results or his incitement of the riots at the Capitol. Trump allies believe that both episodes increased Mr. Trump's criminal exposure.
As aides urged Mr. Trump to issue a strong condemnation on Wednesday and he rejected that advice, the White House counsel, Pat A. Cipollone, warned Mr. Trump that he could face legal exposure for the riot given that he had urged his supporters to march to the Capitol and "fight" beforehand, according to people briefed on the discussion. The president had appeared to White House aides to be enjoying watching the scenes play out on television.
Beyond that, the extent of Mr. Trump's criminal exposure is unclear. The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, outlined 10 instances in which Mr. Trump may have obstructed justice but declined to say whether he broke the law, citing legal and factual constraints of prosecuting a sitting president. Former Justice Department officials and legal experts said that several of the acts should be prosecuted.
The Presidential TransitionLatest Updates
Updated
Jan. 7, 2021, 1:57 p.m. ET- Barr says Trump's incitement of the mob betrayed his office.
- Biden to pick Gina Raimondo for commerce secretary and Martin Walsh for labor secretary.
- The House sergeant-at-arms resigns and Schumer says he'll fire the Senate sergeant-at-arms if needed.
In 2018, federal prosecutors in New York named Mr. Trump as a conspirator in an illegal campaign finance scheme.
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A mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol on Wednesday, after the president helped incite them.Credit...Kenny Holston for The New York TimesPardons can be broad or narrowly tailored. White-collar defense lawyers said that Mr. Trump would be best served by citing specific crimes if he pardoned himself, but such details could be politically damaging by suggesting that he was acknowledging he had committed those crimes.
A self-pardon would complicate the already fraught question for the Biden Justice Department about whether to investigate and ultimately prosecute Mr. Trump. Democrats and former Justice Department officials contend that if the president pardons himself and the Justice Department declines to prosecute Mr. Trump, it will send a troubling message to Americans about the rule of law and to future presidents about their ability to flout the law.
"The Biden Justice Department will not want to acquiesce in a Trump self-pardon, which implies that the president is literally above federal law," said Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard law professor and former top Justice Department official in the George W. Bush administration.
A self-pardon would align with Mr. Trump's unprecedented use of the pardon power. The framers of the Constitution gave the president almost total authority to grant clemency for federal crimes, positioning the head of the executive branch as a check on the judicial branch and as someone who could dip into the justice system to show grace and mercy on the downtrodden.
But Mr. Trump has eschewed the formal Justice Department process set up to ensure pardons are handed out fairly. Instead, he has used his pardon power unlike any other president to help allies, undermine rivals and push his own political agenda. Of the 94 pardons and commutations Mr. Trump has granted, 89 percent were issued to people who had a personal tie to Mr. Trump, helped him politically or whose case resonated with him, according to a tabulation by Mr. Goldsmith.
The only president to receive a pardon was Richard M. Nixon. A month after Nixon left office, his former vice president, President Gerald R. Ford, pardoned him for all crimes he committed in office. The move was widely criticized at the time as allowing the presidency to hover above the law. Ford supporters later blamed the pardon for his election loss two years later, though ultimately the pardon came to be seen as a move that helped the country move on from Watergate.
Mr. Trump has maintained throughout his presidency that he has the authority to pardon himself and first discussed the possibility with aides as early as his first year in office. Those discussions began when his campaign's ties to Russia were being scrutinized and investigators were examining whether he had obstructed justice.
Legal scholars are less certain about Mr. Trump's declaration that he has an "absolute right" to pardon himself.
The Justice Department said in a short August 1974 opinion, just four days before Mr. Nixon resigned, that "it would seem" that presidents cannot pardon themselves "under the fundamental rule that no one may be a judge in his own case."
But the president is not bound by those opinions, and there is nothing stopping Mr. Trump from signing a pardon for himself. The questions would be whether the Justice Department under another president would honor the pardon and set aside any potential prosecution of Mr. Trump and, if he were prosecuted, whether the judicial system would ultimately decide whether the pardon insulates Mr. Trump from facing charges.
"Only a court can invalidate a self-pardon, and it can only do so if the Biden administration brings a case against Trump," Mr. Goldsmith said. "A Trump self-pardon would thus make it more likely the Biden team prosecutes Trump for crimes committed in office."
Throughout Mr. Trump's presidency, he and allies have looked to pardons as a way of helping the president protect himself in criminal investigations. During the Russia investigation, Mr. Trump and his personal lawyer John M. Dowd dangled pardons to former aides. One, his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, flouted a plea deal to work with prosecutors.
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Obviously Pence is feeling much freer to be a stand-up guy. Now that Trump has made himself such a dark, dark creep ( even though it was done quite transparently ) no one will blame Pence for not giving total and 200 % support to Trump. I will always blame Pence, but like others, any valiant action is coming at the 11th. hour. I do expect a number of Reps. ( some have already started ) to come just short of throwing themselves on their swords over the travesty they have stood right beside and supported for over four yrs.
We gave Trump a chance because we had no choice. You and your ilk were hoping in a miracle along with Trump that Biden won't take the reins at all. REALLY !! As one of the memes I saw read: Trump came in as Reps. president with Reps. Senate and House. He now exits having lost all three to the Democrats. So here come the great epiphanies.
Vice President Mike Pence is expected to attend Joe Biden's presidential inauguration later this month after overseeing Wednesday's chaotic certification of the president-elect's Electoral College win.
Three sources close to Pence said he would likely make an appearance at the Jan. 20 event in a show of support for the peaceful transition of power. The decision to attend, they said, became easier after President Donald Trump publicly criticized Pence leading up to, and following, his refusal to stop the certification.
"It was a much more difficult decision days ago, but less difficult now," said a person close to Pence.
Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/07/pence-expected-to-attend-bidens-inaugural-456005
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With Daniel Lippman
FALLOUT FROM CAPITOL BREACH DOWNTOWN: Condemnation of Wednesday's deadly insurrection at the Capitol continues to pour in from the business community, even as rioters' violent breach of the House and Senate chambers did not ultimately deter lawmakers from certifying President-elect Joe Biden's victory early this morning.
— Business groups, "many of whom had good relationships with the White House and the Trump administration ... weighed in Wednesday afternoon, at times abandoning their veneers of diplomacy and typically measured corporate rhetoric," our Lorraine Woellert writes in a great roundup of responses from the business community.
— Those condemning the violence included corporate power players like the Business Roundtable, whose members lead the largest companies in the world. The group minced no words, calling Wednesday's violence "inexcusable" while also faulting those who echoed President Donald Trump's baseless accusations of widespread voter fraud, saying yesterday's events "makes clear that elected officials' perpetuation of the fiction of a fraudulent 2020 presidential election is not only reprehensible, but also a danger to our democracy, our society and our economy."
— Others, like North America's Building Trades Unions President Sean McGarvey , demanded Trump either resign or be removed via the 25th Amendment, along with Republican lawmakers who objected to certification, singling out Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) by name. Former congressman and OMB Director Jim Nussle, who now leads the Credit Union National Association, announced on Twitter that he is leaving the GOP, "outraged and devastated by the actions of too many elected Republicans (some I know and served with) and supporters." The National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors sought to move past the "disgraceful" violence, congratulating Biden in a statement this morning while calling for unity.
— The National Association of Manufacturers' Jay Timmons amplified his call yesterday for Trump to be removed from office in an op-ed in The Washington Post this afternoon, arguing that "it is not enough to merely hope that there will be a peaceful transition. The only way to prevent further violence in these critical days is to address the root cause: the person inciting the violence." Timmons, who once served as the executive director of the NRSC, lambasted the president's defenders, writing that lawmakers doing so are "violating his or her oath to the Constitution and rejecting democracy in favor of anarchy." He added: "Anyone who indulged conspiracy theories to raise campaign dollars is complicit."
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A Snap Impeachment Should Be Done Within 24 Hours
William Rivers Pitt, Truthout
A snap impeachment could be done in a day, and must be done within literal hours.
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Betrayal, today I started the long put-off project of painting the bathroom! Too bad it takes a national calamity to get home Improvement projects done!
If you haven't listened to Merrick Garland's speech, do so. It will give you hope. It made me cry....but from happiness.
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Just looking back at the events of yesterday--and earlier--I keep thinking one thing: these folks who follow Trump want a world that no longer exists. They want a world where women stayed home and took care of the kids, blacks served and were cowed by their white bosses and fellow citizens, and white men ruled society on every level (and where the South won the war)....
Ain't gonna happen.
I can't see these people as EVER being enlightened or progressing...they are too entrenched in how they see and organize reality.They'll now take their bunker mentalities and go back to their rural enclaves, waiting for the next Trump-like Messiah who will come and lead them out of what they see as Hell.....
(I wonder if, when their sore-loser-itis finally abates, they will take in the fact that if a bill Biden & Co are pushing to pass is a 50-50 deal in the Senate it will be a WOMAN OF COLOR who will see that it passes? Hah!)
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Yes to everything you just posted, Trill. These extremist want a United States that is gone with the wind.
Dh and I were talking about how those who stormed the Capitol are now trying to say it wasn't them, that it was antifa, ect. even after making countless comments on social media about their plans to protest. Dh even saw a post beforehand showing an entire plane full of Trumpers on their way to DC to riot. He said he wanted to comment on the post: “Now would be a good time for engine failure." but didn't want jeopardize himself with lunatics coming after him.
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Divine, that's a good way to put it! Think Margaret Mitchell and Scarlett would agree 100%!
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I squint and see the Capitol behind them as the White House, the guys descending rats deserting a sinking ship.....
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I just heard on the local news--and saw footage--where the rioters were ALLOWED in...you know there must be Trump-followers in the Capitol police....bet he was managing this from the White House....
If this isn't insanity I don't know what is....
Who the HELL is he supposed to be???? Doubt that even he knows....
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No mention of Trump.....
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An acquaintance on FB posted this:
Yesterday at the Capitol was bad. But I'm not sure we all realize just how bad it could have been.
Note the prepared zip ties for hand restraints. If the terrorists had gotten into the chamber while Congress was there, they were obviously planning to take hostages.
This was, indeed, an attempted coup d'etat. Not just a stunt. The reason the national guard wasn't there right away was because it was the President's duty to call them.
VP Pence finally called them, but that was an illegal act, since the president, alone, has the authority to do that.
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About that white supremacist Viking wannabe Jake Angeli:
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And here he is with Rudy, that guy in Borat:
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☹️
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That man has more ink than he has brains and I cannot think how anyone would find this attractive. I am sure those with Norse backgrounds are not considering this a proud moment and not proud that their heritage has been co-opted to represent supremacists.
Ruth, got the ceiling done and two of the walls but the cutting in took more time because I still cannot kneel or bend my left knee since I tore the posterior meniscus. So will finish first coat tomorrow and start second later in the day so I can finish maybe. Surprising how good what I did do looks and it raises the question about the old paint "what was I thinking"?. LOL. Productive day and I will look for Merrick Garland's speech.
edited for spelling
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He has the nerve to post this on his Twitter page just a little while ago.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1347334804052844550
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Follow the link to a good article that shows and names some of the terroists:
Super-satisfying Instagram page is ID'ing the domestic terrorists who stormed the capitol
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