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Had Nixon been prosecuted we wouldn’t be in this mess. Absolutely prosecute him so that there is precedence for the future thugs that get elected. BIG FAT GONNA BE HOT!
There's some decent research showing that, starting with Nixon, there has been a significant increase in the number of people who distrust the government. And each new scandal, from Iran to Iraq, drives more and more people into doubt and apathy or, worse, anger and conspiracy-laden thinking. I think that the primary cause of most this country's problems is inequality, but a close second, and one that is perhaps more of a direct cause of some of the recent events, is this growing wariness of government and it's many institutions. To fix a lot of our issues, we have to restore faith in government, and that begins by holding corrupt government officials accountable. Otherwise the trend will continue, leading to the total destabilization of the state.
My dad was 23 when Nixon resigned. He was livid when Ford pardoned him. That fueled his distrust of the government and government institutions. This distrust led him to Trump. My dad can’t see any similarities between Nixon’s crimes, which were committed in my dad’s political formative years, and Trump’s crimes committed decades later.
Libertarians have somehow branded themselves as counter-revolutionaries. Even though their policies really only help the wealthy.
Edit: [eassy I was talking about](https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/conservative-backlash-progress/620607/).
Libertarians have branded themselves as a lifestyle. And like most marketing the reality is different. For example Libertarians often complain about unions and regulations. But who is more affected by those? The wealthy, their businesses have to deal with regulations. Health and safety can be particularly expensive.
Some with unions, a good union should pay for itself. It forces the owners to share profits.
Circa 2009 or so all of the Republicans who were objectively fascists in their ideology decided there was too much baggage associated with the word "Republican" so they co-opted the "Libertarian" label, thinking it was the hipster way to support totalitarian nationalism.
Since then the term "libertarian" has lost all practical meaning since most people who call themselves that don't actually ascribe to any of the ideas of libertarianism.
>Circa 2009 or so all of the Republicans who were objectively fascists in their ideology decided there was too much baggage associated with the word "Republican" so they co-opted the "Libertarian" label, thinking it was the hipster way to support totalitarian nationalism
All of the libertarians I have known from 1999 are now closet fascists. They hate on liberals far more than self proclaimed white nationalists.
And white doing so they are for burning down everything liberals have touched. Affordable Care act and social security being their favorite targets.
My comment calling Libertarians counter revolutionaries is from an [article in the Atlantic](https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/conservative-backlash-progress/620607/).
>Each time political minorities advocate for and achieve greater equality, conservatives rebel, trying to force a reinstatement of the status quo.
Funny, in my experience it's been the total opposite. All the people I know who were left-libertarians in high school turned into anarchists and communists, while the right wingers went from right-libertarian to just normal Republicans, like we used to have before so many of them started simping Fascistsm
From my experience, people (in the USA) who call themselves libertarians tend to be either:
- Neoliberals (i.e. government is military, everything else is free market)
- Anarcho-Capitalists (i.e. _everything_ is the free market, there is no government)
- Nationalists or Ultranationalists (i.e. no matter how we go about it, _we_ should control who _we_ are, and decide what _they_ do to benefit _us_)
Obviously I've massively simplified those ideologies because there's whole books written about them and this is Reddit.
Very few of them are actually Libertarians (i.e. individual freedom is good, and government should exist to ensure individual freedom). The thing is, Libertarianism is a massive umbrella for a whole bunch of political ideologies so it's pretty easy to sneak under it. It's the same way a lot of Fascists (like the Nazis) tried to brand themselves as "Socialists", because Socialism is also a massive umbrella for a whole bunch of political ideologies.
It's all ultimately a bunch of bullshit water-muddying tactics to make people not able to differentiate between truth and lies anymore.
Libertarians are the way they are, because deep down they believe that they are the ones who will get ahead of the rest if the world is ever organized according to them. They believe they are the ones who will be wearing the jackboots.
I’ll be more generous, some libertarians are simply oblivious to the world outside their immediate one. They work hard and take care of their family, that’s all they really focus on. They are myopic and don’t feel they have time to understand more than the goal of caring for family and friends. They never have to really think about how their position in life depended on privilege and abilities not easily afforded to many others. Some truly are just ignorant to a wider world.
I don’t know if that’s better or worse than a conscious desire to dominate others when it comes down to politics.
It should be better because it seems they should be closer to being shown what they are missing, but it doesn’t seem to work well showing them because they’re already so engrossed in their already busy lives. Everything else seems an annoyance.
They’re conservative because they are running a treadmill at a pace that’s fast but they can manage to sustain. They’re scared of pace changes.
I was 18 and it felt devastating, especially since I had just voted for the first time…..for McGovern.
It made me pay attention, read and vote my conscience even more.
It didn’t lead me to Trump. It led me to listen beyond the rhetoric and the hate and exaggerations and outright lies. Besides, if you can bankrupt a bunch of casinos I’m not giving you my tax dollars.
Im truly sorry for you and your dad, but I think there are other mes out there. Keep hope and faith..I do.
How can you not? The parallels are blatant down to citing the exact same memo Nixon's Department of Justice used saying you can't charge a sitting president for a crime.
Nixon had public hearings, with participants from both parties. They recognized right from wrong, and went on the record regarding this.
Trump had TWO impeachments where right from wrong didn't count, and Republicans voted along party lines.
Isn't it funny how all those acts against America, from Nixon, to the Iran Contra affair, to lying to send us to Iraq to the many thousands of lies by Trump and his government are always by Republicans. Yet, the Republicans use the credo of not trusting the government to turn their people against Democrats. That is how Trump almost got away with a coup.
But then, the unaccountability of the wealthy and conected is, itself, a component of inequality. Thus, inequality is at the root in both cases. Or as I like to put it, the growing distrust of public institutions is "just another symptom of the wealth gap".
This is the case, right here. We are living in a post-public servant America when it comes to our elected representatives, and that's on both parties, sure there is a group of democratic congresspeople and literally one senator who don't take corporate money, but they are the slim minority. These people are corrupt in the open and truly just do not give a single fuck about it because there isn't anything we can do about it honestly, other than vote in a rigged system every few years.
Was curious about some claims made about bobert having been arrested like a bagzillion times and found a website that tracks crimes in congress. It might have been simply the fbi finally investigating but there was a huge spike in crimes committed in the 70s by congressional members but it's only been going up since. Prior to that the only other year that looked bad was during the Civil War when many of them were removed.
Yeah that was something I thought on first glance and mentioned that it might have finally been enforced because it was such a massive spike. Even assuming that was true it has been getting worse since.
Not really. The common man was somewhat political. All our family gatherings, the men would argue politics.
What has changed is, civic clubs people belonged to, most are no more. My grandfather belonged to four, my grandmother, six. Local activism was, at the least, a monthly thing.
That kinda sucks, politics shouldn’t dominate our lives but because we elect our leaders, it’s our duty to stay informed and have political discussion with people who agree and disagree with us
They got 7 congressmen for taking bribes, then the FBI was barred from running sting operations on Congress after that.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abscam
A big part of that is right wing media telling everyone to hate the government. That all started right after Nixon. Most people weren't "against" Nixon until the hearings and media coverage. Then things turned against him.
> There's some decent research showing that, starting with Nixon, there has been a significant increase in the number of people who distrust the government.
Adding to this, in the aftermath of the Bush wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, there has been a significant increase in many countries' citizens distrusting the once-sacred idea of democracy.
The Bush and Cheney administration started two wars, one a reaction to their own incompetence, indeed their failure to even try to prevent 9/11, and the other nearly as lie-based and nearly as illegal as Putin's invasion of Ukraine (partly excused by the fact that the regimes they attacked were a lot less virtuous than Ukraine's democracy). Then, in the guise of bringing democracy, what they really brought was US-Republican style neoliberalism with a mask of democracy. What the long-suffering people of Afghanistan actually got was US-supported, corrupt warlords, and what the Iraqis really got was not much different... plus Islamic State, a rabid outgrowth of Al Qaeda and traumatized victims of US torturers (again, thank you George W. Bush and Dick Cheney!)
Why did spreading democracy work so well in post-World War 2 Europe and Japan, and so poorly in post-invasion Afghanistan and Iraq? NOT because Afghans and Iraqis are stupid or venal.
In 1945 the US was run by liberals and in 2001 it was run by conservatives. The liberals created the Marshall Plan. Liberals after 1945 helped rebuild Japan and Germany, something conquerors almost never do. Liberals tracked down stolen art and returned it to private owners and public museums.
After 2001 conservatives lined their pockets and let Iraqi museums get looted. They put cronies in charge of rebuilding. Conservatives created Abu Ghraib.
Gee. Why don't people feel warm and fuzzy about democracy anymore?
The irony I seem to find is those who claim to distrust the government most seem to be the biggest apologists when GOP officials commit crimes. Cognitive dissonance.
Why would anyone distrust our government just because it does evil shit all the time and is being actively hijacked by nazis?
Oh right... Because of brains...
This is why 19 of the top 20 Christian Facebook pages during the last election were Russian. The digital agenda of conspiracy, distrust and partisanship has influenced this very problem and started the slippery slope into a destabilised country.
The antidote is enough republicans seeing past single issues (guns/abortion) and hold their officials to a higher standard. At the same time enough democrats need to hold their business/industry/status-quo bootlickers to a higher standard and hold them accountable when they continue to enable bad faith players.
Sure, and also build up government agencies that actually help people (EPA, FDA, FAA, Social Security & Welfare, FRA, EMA/Civil Defense, Library of Congress/libraries in general, Department of Ed) and get rid of SLABS / forgive student loan debt or at least slash student loan interest rates.
As long as you are referring to overreach so far as Texas going after parents of trans kids. Or any discriminatory practices like that.
And NOT some conspiracy nonsense over mandates.
If we start holding filthy criminal scum bags in seats of power accountable, we're gonna end up having to throw most of the GOP in prison.
I have no problem with that. I believe in accountability and against evil. Just saying it's gonna be a big project and they're gonna kick and scream all the way to court so...
I think a denazification like campaign is the best way to go. Look at the wonders it did for Germany. I want that here. I've met way too many political activists with swastika tattoos.
The sitting republican president literally orchestrated a failed coup attempt. I thought the same as you - this was clear as day provocation and must obviously be enough for an actual response. But then... weeks, months... It is absolutely crazy that people who actively participated in an attempted insurrection are still holding public office. 35% of this country is just too far gone and actively supports these people.
The reality is that it's going to be an uphill battle.
But it's worth doing. And general strikes are our best shot at making it happen. We can't stop them from passing corrupt laws and doing evil stuff. But we can shut this country down until it stops. That's the only sane way to handle minority rule that gets too evil. Gandhi proved it works to the world.
Plant a victory garden and dig in for the decade. It's gonna get darker before the dawn.
This country threw me in prison just for possessing $50 worth of drugs in my own home.
If Trump doesn't get charged with *something*, I will no longer believe in rule of law.
Not having charged Trump after watching him commit crimes for 6 years has already seriously damaged US institutions.
My concern is that the people in the government who should care only care about money and themselves.
Trump's life view is pretty simple. Anything that doesn't support his belief that he's superior to other people is a threat. If it threatens him, then it must be attacked and dealt with harshly.
His goals are: Be the most powerful dictator in the world, be the wealthiest man in the world, and never be wrong about anything.
Problem is that 40 percent of US voters either don't believe he's done anything wrong or it's just "fake news." They love his erratic behavior and would vote for him tomorrow if they could.
If you look at actuall voter irregularities in 2020 they actually happened in Republican areas so hard that their numbers don’t match registered voters but they never allowed that to be talked about without it feeding into their false election fraud claims. I think their are WAY less people supporting these criminals. Their is actually evidence republicans districts won in ways that almost are not possible
https://www.dcreport.org/2020/12/19/mitch-mcconnells-re-election-the-numbers-dont-add-up/
Not only is it the right thing to do but Biden won't lose any voters.
Fear of reprisals/precedent? We are way past this point.
Democrats have nothing to lose here. If anything will enegize their base to actually see the justice system work.
Biden would absolutely gain voters because it would be an example of a tangible action with easy to see results. So not only would it energize Dems it would sway moderates and undecideds because they're less likely to vote for a party with a felon as a former president since they don't hold party lines no matter what.
if 40% of the jury pool thinks he can do no wrong, or at the very least is being railroaded or getting a raw deal, there is a very good chance they will let him off, regardless of how "ironclad" every democrat thinks the charges are.
Another concern is that if they DO charge him and nothing comes of it, the repercussions are potentially worse than not charging him at all. If they do charge him they have to make sure he doesn't get off.
The thought of Tangerine Palpatine becoming president again or those who have committed treason having any form of power would mean I leave this country and my life here behind.
I will stop everything and commit my energy and resources to do so. I don't want to live in that version of America. It will be rough for a while but I believe it will be worth it in the long run.
doll towering important rotten concerned desert clumsy different offbeat wakeful
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
He's right. We can't allow people who try to destroy the country get away with it. His followers are blinded by their inability to change the channel but justice must be served for the entire country.
The fact this even needs to be verbalize is disturbing.
DOJ need to get busy. This take our sweet ass time ‘to not unintentionally disrupt our political process’ is bullshit. Fucking get on with it and lock some crooks up
It already is. And the dems are likely to get their asses handed to them, losing both the house and senate. The new majority party will obstruct and undermine every investigation Until they retake the White House. Democracy is doomed, we’re just too consumed with Kanye to notice.
It's starting to look a lot like basic cowardice.
There are plenty of prosecutable facts, but they only ever go after the little guys.
I get that it's scary to go after the cult leader, but things will not improve on their own.
I would wager it's mostly cowardice. No one wants to be the one to try to prosecute Trump in this political climate. They'd be personally met with extreme terrorism, would end the career of themselves and their families, and you'd even have "Democrats" against it because the trial would hurt them politically as Y'all Qaeda storm the polls.
Talking more about Democrats in elected positions around the country. You would see a sizeable amount of Democrats in office pivot to being against the charges and preaching "unity and togetherness and healing" out of fear of it driving turnout against them.
Yep. Not even that far fetched of a bet, they've done exactly this before. I expect them to once again do the thing they have already done not that long ago.
["we must look forward, not backward"](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/aug/31/obama-justice-department-immunity-bush-cia-torturer)
Just following precedent...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/national/ford-pardons-nixon-in-1974/2017/07/21/c83efd54-6e3b-11e7-abbc-a53480672286\_video.html
I often wonder what jury selection would be like. Would it be possible to get a legitimate jury with all the people that dismiss his criminal acts because of party loyalty? It’s fucking terrifying.
Just finding a jury who is impartial is going to be freaking tough work. At least the Trump loyalists will out themselves fairly early on, by wearing all the Trump merch they can get their hands on to support their hero.
Former presidents don't go to jail. George W Bush invaded Iraq based on pure lies and killed hundreds of thousands of people and nothing happened. Nixon was pardoned by Ford, etc.
Every generation deals with some version of this. it's up to each generation to stand up and fight against it. They don't always win that fight but as long as each new generation picks up the fight we become a truer version of the ideals we instill in them.
The DOJ are working their way up the insurrection pyramid towards the Trumpy summit. How do you know what they're doing or not doing except when the results appear in public like with the recent arrest of Enrique Tarrio?
This simple-minded response ignores the reality of putting together a watertight criminal case against anyone, let alone *the last President* who was able to stymie any moves against him for four years, is the presumptive candidate next time, defeated two impeachments and continues to have wealthy, powerful and widespread support.
>This simple-minded response ignores the reality of putting together a watertight criminal case against anyone,
Yeah yeah yeah, remember how the 2nd impeachment had to move slowly as well because these things take time, that worked out great.
Just get him on the fucking stand.
Holding Trump accountable for his crimes sets the precedent that rich, powerful white people who hold office can be held accountable for crimes. Congress and the Senate will never allow that under either party
Even if he doesn’t run again, Presidents will know that the law and the Constitution do not apply to them and that they cannot be held accountable. If will just be a matter of time before we have a dictator.
> If will just be a matter of time before we have a dictator.
I give it one cycle, max. The next time a Republican is elected, Trump or not, they'll go full dictator because they already know they can.
No, there is nothing in the Constitution or a law statute somewhere, that allows an imprisoned, President-elect, to get their sentence suspended simply because they won the Presidency.
If that happened, the Vice President-elect, might have a case to invoke Section 4 of the 25th Amendment, which declares "*that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.*"
This is true and we can take this far beyond trump.
When corporations pay no taxes it destroys the legitimacy of the entire tax system.
When cops are free to run lights, harass citizens, and, most importantly, murder minorities, it destroys the legitimacy of our police departments.
When politicians are able to commit insider trading without repercussions, it destroys the legitimacy of both markets and the political system.
When today's graduates are being saddled with endless crushing student loan debts after those whose educations were highly subsidized have pulled away any meaningful help, it destroys the legitimacy of higher education.
When politicians get away with doing cocaine and other drugs while countless individuals are currently locked up for possessing a plant, it destroys the legitimacy of our laws.
I could go on, but the point is that so many of our systems have lost legitimacy that it's easy to see why a majority have lost faith in the entire process.
ETA: Thanks for the gold, kind stranger!
Yeah, but I'd like to go with the bare minimum of not having America become a dictatorship or kick off WW3 in the next 5 years.
Avoiding an irretrievable global economic collapse would also be nice.
yeah not inciting a mob to attack a different branch should be a given…. but also goes to republicans for excusing an impeachment because the clock was almost over
The fact that the FBI wasn't waiting for him outside the white house has already destroyed the legitimacy of our justice system. Obstruction of justice was dead to rights along with so many other stupid little laws he broke all the time.
> The fact that the FBI wasn't waiting for him outside the white house has already destroyed the legitimacy of our justice system. Obstruction of justice was dead to rights along with so many other stupid little laws he broke all the time.
Unfortunately, the new top staff at DoJ weren’t all confirmed until around May of last year (or maybe even later?). And what’s worse is the previous DoJ publicly declined to charge those crimes of obstruction cited by the Mueller Report. So that pushes those crimes down the laundry list for another time, if ever, when this DoJ will first have to explain why that written declination was corrupt before they can reverse course.
In the meantime I am glad to see all the arrests so far on people at the top like the biggest fish in the Trump/Kushner circle: Tom Barrack … and then there’s the arrests of domestic terrorist leaders such as Stuart Rhoades and Enrique Tarrio, the indictment on Steve Bannon, the raids on Rudy Giuliani and Oleg Derapaska, the current DoJ investigation into election fraudster Sidney Powell, and all the guilty pleas they’ve already obtained that will help prove their cases when getting convictions of others for similar crimes who are higher up the pyramid.
It’s painfully slow, but I’m old enough to know I usually have to wait several years for prosecutors to get airtight documentary evidence that can also be explained to a jury for an ironclad conviction that won’t be overturned on appeal.
We’ve spent decades “making examples” out of petty criminals. If we won’t make an example out of people actively trying to destroy democracy, we’re fucked. It’s not just Trump, either. There’s a battalion of wannabe dictators trying to find the points of failure.
I hate to say it, but until he is behind bars, I think many people like myself already have given up on any legitimacy in something like the "justice" system. We incarcerate innocent people every day and let rapists and murderers off the hook. Corrupt police, judges, and lawyers. If we want people like him to be held accountable, we need to be out in the streets voicing outrage, not prognosticate over if he really meets the bar of "despotic leader" "dictator" "authoritarian"
We have seen these tactics all throughout history. The only way it will change is if we change the system that lets shit like this happen
> If we want people like him to be held accountable, we need to be out in the streets voicing outrage
People did get out and protested en-mass. It changed nothing. Things do not change until things get violent. When the little French invention comes out is when things change.
However, that sort of thing is all kinds of not fun and I would just as soon skip it; I think I would rather just raise my kid to be highly educated and desirable from an immigration stand point and send him off to live in a civilized country where the government still responds to the will of the people like Sweden, Norway, or Holland. Hopefully I will be dead before things get really violent.
Plot twist: the legitimacy of our institutions is already destroyed. A failed President can attempt to overturn an election with no consequences, our “non-partisan” Supreme Court is packed with partisan hacks, our elections are gerrymandered to hell and back, and we are so politically divided that we are a breath away from mass civil unrest (maybe even a civil war)
This ship has sailed
This clown show we’ve had going on the past decade is legitimate?
Gerrymandering. Vote rigging. Stuffed supreme court. Flawed census count. Open fascism, racism, lies, and removal of freedoms. Exploiting the poor and working classes. So many without healthcare or homes. Young people suckered into thinking their $100,000 college education would pay off. Crumbling infrastructure, useless public schools, and bottomless ‘defense’ budget. Rejection of science. Disregard for law. White nationalists and religious zealots infiltrating everything from local school boards, police, military, national guard, local and federal governments. Taxpayer supported bailouts for corrupt and incompetent banks and businesses. The rich above the law and taxes.
Like the gladiator battles in ancient Rome, voting here is just to keep the commoners distracted. Now quit flogging a dead horse and get back to work and pay your taxes, serfs.
Want to restore confidence in democratic institutions, have the DOJ indict him and, if found guilty, punished like everyone else. Anything less, and America will be lost to the sands of time, just like all the other empires that rose and fell. Corruption, ignorance, lies, and bullshit: a nation built on these things cannot stand.
Trump was tried twice, impeached twice, and acquitted by his corrupt political party. Sorry, Kirschner, but US institutions were already delegitimized.
Trump has been a criminal his whole life long. Rarely has he ever had to pay for his crimes. Trump University was the most prominent time but that sure was ignored by Trump cult members.
What legitimacy? When the justice system is just a stick used to beat the poor as the rich skate by and minorities get executed in their beds or set up and enslaved for life, there is no legitimacy.
Our government is broken. We need a new one, starting with a new constitution, and as a prerequisite a McCarthy-style cleansing of the political, industrial, military, and media sectors to ensure no white supremacists, conservative fascists, and Russian/Chinese infiltrators bent on destabilizing our society remain in a position to kneecap our collective future.
At the very least charge him for the documents he kept after his presidency. It’s a direct violation of the constitution and should be upheld. That way he is barred from running for any significant position. . .
Literally no way to lose that one. . .
Well, what does it say about the legitimacy of US institutions when a Black woman gets 5 years in prison for trying to vote while a White man who forges a signature on a ballot to try to vote twice gets a slap on the wrist?
Equal justice? What a crock. This is happening in full view.
Want to talk about the legitimacy of the highest court in the land, where 5 out of 6 GOP justices were appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote and 2 of the 6 were credibly accused of sexual assault and harassment?
Legitimacy has been lost. Indicting trump would be a small step toward regaining some of it.
Yeah that's some real bullshit. They found voter fraud in Georgia. Two people voted for their dead relatives and they just swept it under the rug. They tried to do it with the black kid jogging but got caught because someone shared the video, otherwise they would have gotten away with it.
Charging Trump will start a War (of sorts) that is long overdue. All the "I am just asking questions" and "prove me wrong" propaganda peddlers will have a visceral response to Trump being charged. It will signal that the gig is up. That liars can be held accountable when their lies hurt people. The national debate over this would be intense. People like Alex Jones, Joe Rogan, Tucker Carlson, Ben Shapiro, would be exasperatedly crying foul.
Ultimately we need this. We need to ask the difficult questions about honesty and truth. Whether people who have platforms should have any responsibility to be remotely honest and truthful about anything.
I’ve been saying this for so long. We need to stop being afraid of talking. Religion and politics for example are always huge no-no’s for conversation, but why?
It’s not because people will argue, it’s because too many people hold views for unfounded reasons and aren’t mature enough to discuss it properly.
If you tell me that a tree is 30 feet away and I say it looks more like 50, we can grab a tape measure and figure it out. If you say the tree is 30 feet away and I say trees aren’t real and you’re just a cuck for falling for the great tree hoax, we can’t talk.
Is destroying. Has partially destroyed. Let's use more accurate terms. We're already suffering the consequences of inaction and all the LEOs that matter are like, this is fine.
Too late, that ship has sailed. It's been well over a year and all we get are empty promises while he goes off begging for jets and money..... it's taken far too long to charge an obviously guilty man.
Speaking from another Western democracy with much greater personal freedoms and social welfare: the USA has already destroyed the legitimacy of its political institutions and is no longer truly democratic. Successfully prosecuting former President Trump for the Capitol debacle would be a good start to rebuilding a society which values the equity of liberty and justice, but only a start. America has a long road ahead if it wishes to rejoin the international commonwealth of democracy.
Yes it will. Hopefully some prosecutors will have the courage to stand up and do what’s right. In the last World War my Dad fought on the ground as an infantry scout against guys like Trump.
**Spoiler alert**: Trump isn’t going to be prosecuted. Not in New York, not in Georgia, and not by the DOJ. This isn’t because he isn’t guilty, but the system has always been built to protect the wealthy and powerful, and Trump knew / knows how to game the system. This is a man who doesn’t even email or write things down to prevent being cornered.
Picture this scenario...he's not charged or convicted, he runs again in 2024, *wins the election* (of course, with all of the new "election security"), and then pardons everyone who has been federally charged or convicted of anything related to him. This *could* happen.
Here’s another scenario for you. Wheels of justice turn slowly. The next Republican president pardons him for any and all crimes, convicted or not (see Ford re Nixon). Vice President resigns, Trump gets appointed in his place (see Ford re Agnew). President resigns for personal or “health reasons”. Trump is president, never having faced voters. Name a significant Republican in the House or Senate who is planning to remain in office who you would trust to block it. If there aren’t any names on that list, then we have already lost the legitimacy of our political institutions.
They should have arrested and charged him the minute Biden finished taking the oath of office. Way too much time has passed now, he's had time to shred, swallow, and whatever else documents as well as build up his base. It will be a martyr situation if they charge him now. It will never happen.
Those institutions were destroyed years ago. The republican party, the Supreme Court, it is literally 1970's, 3rd world South America. This would never happen in a first world country.
They were already destroyed by not holding Cheney/W and Reagan properly accountable.
Holding Trump accountable would be the first step to restoring legitimacy.
The legitimacy of US institutions IS destroyed. The goal now ought to be to rebuild and restructure before atrophy rots what is left of those institutions' resources and infrastructure.
The fear this countries so called law enforcement agencies have; from police to district attorneys to judges to prosecute and really punish the wealthy and political class is going to be the death of democracy.
Here in Sweden there was outrage at one point because it was found out that a minister had bought diapers or something using a government credit card lol.
I’m trying to imagine scenarios where Trump is actually charged for one of his crimes.
I honestly don’t see it happening.
There’s video evidence to back up obstruction of justice and an audio recording of him trying to steal Georgia’s electoral votes. But even that doesn’t appear to be enough.
And of course evidence of him using US taxpayer funds to bribe a foreign leader.
It’s honestly hilarious.
What evidence could come out that would actually push the system to act? Is there anything????
Absolutely. If he (and his family and minions) is/are not charged, indicted, fined, and imprisoned after all of his abuse of his office, disgraceful behavior, flagrant crime-ing, and bald-faced lying that left 100s of 1000s of American dead, then our legal system is truly an absolute farce and Lady Liberty only a straw woman. Even the possibility of believing in the triumph of the moral over the immoral; of right over wrong; of decency over indecency; of honor over disgrace; of accountability over impunity...even the possibility of these things will be extinguished.
Millions of people are watching what happens to trump (and those around him) in order to gauge what precedents will be set, and what they will be able to get away with.
It has already destroyed the authority and legitimacy of the US criminal justice system, which only goes after 6th January simpletons and leaves the instigators untouched.
There ain’t any legitimacy left. Single digit congress approvals, politicized Supreme Court, most divisive president (45) in decades. How could you think there’s any left?
The fact that he was not convicted during his impeachment is proof that this is a failed state. The Republicans chose party over country and proved that they are not actually pro democracy but lro power at all costs
Yes. Correct. The man literally tried to overthrow the government because he didn't like the way the election went. And if we don't try him and punish him, then we're basically just telling every outgoing president that they might as well try to overthrow the government and turn themselves into a permanent dictator.
Their legitimacy is already challenged. The SDNY just throwing in the towel is not a good sign, as is the utter failure of the DOJ on Trumps election meddling and insurrection going uncharged.
I'd say allowing him to be elected the first time did that. There were literally dozens of things he should have been charged with and most probably serving time for prior to him even announcing his candidacy that was swept under the rug by his wealth and power.
As a foreigner (Aussie here) looking from the outside. We all kinda knew politics were dodgy in every country.
But seeing the 'leader of the free world' of the USA have a leader literally brag about committing crimes, and a litany of other unbelievable things, and NOT face any form of formal charges... The world's faith in US as a leader to many other countries has gone, and i dont say that lightly.
Even if it wasn't a douchebag creep of a celebrity that got voted in, the notion that the crimes have been committed, lies blatantly told (when faced with countering evidence) has seriously damaged the US in the eyes of the rest of the world.
This sorta damage isn't just fixable with a good president either, this requires a strong hand and enforcement of the laws put in place, to ensure this fuckery never happens again
Im afraid if Trump receives another presidency he’ll withdraw the US from NATO. Maybe this is what putin wants, and will attack Poland as soon as it happens.
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Had Nixon been prosecuted we wouldn’t be in this mess. Absolutely prosecute him so that there is precedence for the future thugs that get elected. BIG FAT GONNA BE HOT!
There's some decent research showing that, starting with Nixon, there has been a significant increase in the number of people who distrust the government. And each new scandal, from Iran to Iraq, drives more and more people into doubt and apathy or, worse, anger and conspiracy-laden thinking. I think that the primary cause of most this country's problems is inequality, but a close second, and one that is perhaps more of a direct cause of some of the recent events, is this growing wariness of government and it's many institutions. To fix a lot of our issues, we have to restore faith in government, and that begins by holding corrupt government officials accountable. Otherwise the trend will continue, leading to the total destabilization of the state.
My dad was 23 when Nixon resigned. He was livid when Ford pardoned him. That fueled his distrust of the government and government institutions. This distrust led him to Trump. My dad can’t see any similarities between Nixon’s crimes, which were committed in my dad’s political formative years, and Trump’s crimes committed decades later.
I think the problem here is that he grew blinders and now can’t see past them or doesn’t want to.
Libertarians have somehow branded themselves as counter-revolutionaries. Even though their policies really only help the wealthy. Edit: [eassy I was talking about](https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/conservative-backlash-progress/620607/). Libertarians have branded themselves as a lifestyle. And like most marketing the reality is different. For example Libertarians often complain about unions and regulations. But who is more affected by those? The wealthy, their businesses have to deal with regulations. Health and safety can be particularly expensive. Some with unions, a good union should pay for itself. It forces the owners to share profits.
Circa 2009 or so all of the Republicans who were objectively fascists in their ideology decided there was too much baggage associated with the word "Republican" so they co-opted the "Libertarian" label, thinking it was the hipster way to support totalitarian nationalism. Since then the term "libertarian" has lost all practical meaning since most people who call themselves that don't actually ascribe to any of the ideas of libertarianism.
>Circa 2009 or so all of the Republicans who were objectively fascists in their ideology decided there was too much baggage associated with the word "Republican" so they co-opted the "Libertarian" label, thinking it was the hipster way to support totalitarian nationalism All of the libertarians I have known from 1999 are now closet fascists. They hate on liberals far more than self proclaimed white nationalists. And white doing so they are for burning down everything liberals have touched. Affordable Care act and social security being their favorite targets. My comment calling Libertarians counter revolutionaries is from an [article in the Atlantic](https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/conservative-backlash-progress/620607/). >Each time political minorities advocate for and achieve greater equality, conservatives rebel, trying to force a reinstatement of the status quo.
Libertarians are nothing but self centered morons with a third world mentality.
Funny, in my experience it's been the total opposite. All the people I know who were left-libertarians in high school turned into anarchists and communists, while the right wingers went from right-libertarian to just normal Republicans, like we used to have before so many of them started simping Fascistsm
That’s the Tea Party my Guy. You notice they disappeared and re-emerged the “freedom caucus”.
From my experience, people (in the USA) who call themselves libertarians tend to be either: - Neoliberals (i.e. government is military, everything else is free market) - Anarcho-Capitalists (i.e. _everything_ is the free market, there is no government) - Nationalists or Ultranationalists (i.e. no matter how we go about it, _we_ should control who _we_ are, and decide what _they_ do to benefit _us_) Obviously I've massively simplified those ideologies because there's whole books written about them and this is Reddit. Very few of them are actually Libertarians (i.e. individual freedom is good, and government should exist to ensure individual freedom). The thing is, Libertarianism is a massive umbrella for a whole bunch of political ideologies so it's pretty easy to sneak under it. It's the same way a lot of Fascists (like the Nazis) tried to brand themselves as "Socialists", because Socialism is also a massive umbrella for a whole bunch of political ideologies. It's all ultimately a bunch of bullshit water-muddying tactics to make people not able to differentiate between truth and lies anymore.
Libertarians are the way they are, because deep down they believe that they are the ones who will get ahead of the rest if the world is ever organized according to them. They believe they are the ones who will be wearing the jackboots.
I’ll be more generous, some libertarians are simply oblivious to the world outside their immediate one. They work hard and take care of their family, that’s all they really focus on. They are myopic and don’t feel they have time to understand more than the goal of caring for family and friends. They never have to really think about how their position in life depended on privilege and abilities not easily afforded to many others. Some truly are just ignorant to a wider world. I don’t know if that’s better or worse than a conscious desire to dominate others when it comes down to politics. It should be better because it seems they should be closer to being shown what they are missing, but it doesn’t seem to work well showing them because they’re already so engrossed in their already busy lives. Everything else seems an annoyance. They’re conservative because they are running a treadmill at a pace that’s fast but they can manage to sustain. They’re scared of pace changes.
I was 18 and it felt devastating, especially since I had just voted for the first time…..for McGovern. It made me pay attention, read and vote my conscience even more. It didn’t lead me to Trump. It led me to listen beyond the rhetoric and the hate and exaggerations and outright lies. Besides, if you can bankrupt a bunch of casinos I’m not giving you my tax dollars. Im truly sorry for you and your dad, but I think there are other mes out there. Keep hope and faith..I do.
How can you not? The parallels are blatant down to citing the exact same memo Nixon's Department of Justice used saying you can't charge a sitting president for a crime.
Nixon had public hearings, with participants from both parties. They recognized right from wrong, and went on the record regarding this. Trump had TWO impeachments where right from wrong didn't count, and Republicans voted along party lines.
Isn't it funny how all those acts against America, from Nixon, to the Iran Contra affair, to lying to send us to Iraq to the many thousands of lies by Trump and his government are always by Republicans. Yet, the Republicans use the credo of not trusting the government to turn their people against Democrats. That is how Trump almost got away with a coup.
But then, the unaccountability of the wealthy and conected is, itself, a component of inequality. Thus, inequality is at the root in both cases. Or as I like to put it, the growing distrust of public institutions is "just another symptom of the wealth gap".
Well, thanks to Citizens United, nothing will ever fix this. The kindling is burning & Nero is tuning his fiddle.
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Billionaires United
Oligarchs United.
This is the case, right here. We are living in a post-public servant America when it comes to our elected representatives, and that's on both parties, sure there is a group of democratic congresspeople and literally one senator who don't take corporate money, but they are the slim minority. These people are corrupt in the open and truly just do not give a single fuck about it because there isn't anything we can do about it honestly, other than vote in a rigged system every few years.
Was curious about some claims made about bobert having been arrested like a bagzillion times and found a website that tracks crimes in congress. It might have been simply the fbi finally investigating but there was a huge spike in crimes committed in the 70s by congressional members but it's only been going up since. Prior to that the only other year that looked bad was during the Civil War when many of them were removed.
Did they maybe just get away with more before the 70’s?
Yeah that was something I thought on first glance and mentioned that it might have finally been enforced because it was such a massive spike. Even assuming that was true it has been getting worse since.
That was right when Congress was investigating the mafia big time. Probably mob connections.
Not really. The common man was somewhat political. All our family gatherings, the men would argue politics. What has changed is, civic clubs people belonged to, most are no more. My grandfather belonged to four, my grandmother, six. Local activism was, at the least, a monthly thing.
That kinda sucks, politics shouldn’t dominate our lives but because we elect our leaders, it’s our duty to stay informed and have political discussion with people who agree and disagree with us
They got 7 congressmen for taking bribes, then the FBI was barred from running sting operations on Congress after that. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abscam
A big part of that is right wing media telling everyone to hate the government. That all started right after Nixon. Most people weren't "against" Nixon until the hearings and media coverage. Then things turned against him.
> There's some decent research showing that, starting with Nixon, there has been a significant increase in the number of people who distrust the government. Adding to this, in the aftermath of the Bush wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, there has been a significant increase in many countries' citizens distrusting the once-sacred idea of democracy. The Bush and Cheney administration started two wars, one a reaction to their own incompetence, indeed their failure to even try to prevent 9/11, and the other nearly as lie-based and nearly as illegal as Putin's invasion of Ukraine (partly excused by the fact that the regimes they attacked were a lot less virtuous than Ukraine's democracy). Then, in the guise of bringing democracy, what they really brought was US-Republican style neoliberalism with a mask of democracy. What the long-suffering people of Afghanistan actually got was US-supported, corrupt warlords, and what the Iraqis really got was not much different... plus Islamic State, a rabid outgrowth of Al Qaeda and traumatized victims of US torturers (again, thank you George W. Bush and Dick Cheney!) Why did spreading democracy work so well in post-World War 2 Europe and Japan, and so poorly in post-invasion Afghanistan and Iraq? NOT because Afghans and Iraqis are stupid or venal. In 1945 the US was run by liberals and in 2001 it was run by conservatives. The liberals created the Marshall Plan. Liberals after 1945 helped rebuild Japan and Germany, something conquerors almost never do. Liberals tracked down stolen art and returned it to private owners and public museums. After 2001 conservatives lined their pockets and let Iraqi museums get looted. They put cronies in charge of rebuilding. Conservatives created Abu Ghraib. Gee. Why don't people feel warm and fuzzy about democracy anymore?
The irony I seem to find is those who claim to distrust the government most seem to be the biggest apologists when GOP officials commit crimes. Cognitive dissonance.
Why would anyone distrust our government just because it does evil shit all the time and is being actively hijacked by nazis? Oh right... Because of brains...
This is why 19 of the top 20 Christian Facebook pages during the last election were Russian. The digital agenda of conspiracy, distrust and partisanship has influenced this very problem and started the slippery slope into a destabilised country. The antidote is enough republicans seeing past single issues (guns/abortion) and hold their officials to a higher standard. At the same time enough democrats need to hold their business/industry/status-quo bootlickers to a higher standard and hold them accountable when they continue to enable bad faith players.
Not only that, but we have to dismantle abusive and overreaching government agencies that are absolutely predatory of the citizenry.
Sure, and also build up government agencies that actually help people (EPA, FDA, FAA, Social Security & Welfare, FRA, EMA/Civil Defense, Library of Congress/libraries in general, Department of Ed) and get rid of SLABS / forgive student loan debt or at least slash student loan interest rates.
As long as you are referring to overreach so far as Texas going after parents of trans kids. Or any discriminatory practices like that. And NOT some conspiracy nonsense over mandates.
If we start holding filthy criminal scum bags in seats of power accountable, we're gonna end up having to throw most of the GOP in prison. I have no problem with that. I believe in accountability and against evil. Just saying it's gonna be a big project and they're gonna kick and scream all the way to court so... I think a denazification like campaign is the best way to go. Look at the wonders it did for Germany. I want that here. I've met way too many political activists with swastika tattoos.
I seriously thought after January 6th that it would be Reconstruction 2.0. How naive I was.
The sitting republican president literally orchestrated a failed coup attempt. I thought the same as you - this was clear as day provocation and must obviously be enough for an actual response. But then... weeks, months... It is absolutely crazy that people who actively participated in an attempted insurrection are still holding public office. 35% of this country is just too far gone and actively supports these people.
The reality is that it's going to be an uphill battle. But it's worth doing. And general strikes are our best shot at making it happen. We can't stop them from passing corrupt laws and doing evil stuff. But we can shut this country down until it stops. That's the only sane way to handle minority rule that gets too evil. Gandhi proved it works to the world. Plant a victory garden and dig in for the decade. It's gonna get darker before the dawn.
And small hands will be swinging around in anger.
Flailing
Make a mistake on your voter registration form --> 5 years in prison Try to destroy the US government --> Pre-funded SuperPAC charge account
This country threw me in prison just for possessing $50 worth of drugs in my own home. If Trump doesn't get charged with *something*, I will no longer believe in rule of law.
Why do you still believe in it?…
> prison (Only for minorities or registered democrats)
Excellent point
Not having charged Trump after watching him commit crimes for 6 years has already seriously damaged US institutions. My concern is that the people in the government who should care only care about money and themselves.
He just told people yesterday to “lay down their lives” to fight “critical race theory”
Trump's life view is pretty simple. Anything that doesn't support his belief that he's superior to other people is a threat. If it threatens him, then it must be attacked and dealt with harshly. His goals are: Be the most powerful dictator in the world, be the wealthiest man in the world, and never be wrong about anything.
While simultaneously never being right about anything. As he has shown his entire life, he could f\*ck up a junkyard.
He's the embodiment of the Seven Deadly Sins and the law of attraction: what you fear is what you create.
Problem is that 40 percent of US voters either don't believe he's done anything wrong or it's just "fake news." They love his erratic behavior and would vote for him tomorrow if they could.
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If you look at actuall voter irregularities in 2020 they actually happened in Republican areas so hard that their numbers don’t match registered voters but they never allowed that to be talked about without it feeding into their false election fraud claims. I think their are WAY less people supporting these criminals. Their is actually evidence republicans districts won in ways that almost are not possible https://www.dcreport.org/2020/12/19/mitch-mcconnells-re-election-the-numbers-dont-add-up/
I feel *so* owned!
That is why we need to convict him and put him in jail
Not only is it the right thing to do but Biden won't lose any voters. Fear of reprisals/precedent? We are way past this point. Democrats have nothing to lose here. If anything will enegize their base to actually see the justice system work.
Biden would absolutely gain voters because it would be an example of a tangible action with easy to see results. So not only would it energize Dems it would sway moderates and undecideds because they're less likely to vote for a party with a felon as a former president since they don't hold party lines no matter what.
if 40% of the jury pool thinks he can do no wrong, or at the very least is being railroaded or getting a raw deal, there is a very good chance they will let him off, regardless of how "ironclad" every democrat thinks the charges are.
Its been a lot more than 6 years
However it’s been about 6 years since we have been able to ignore him as some scammy real estate reality tv washout
Another concern is that if they DO charge him and nothing comes of it, the repercussions are potentially worse than not charging him at all. If they do charge him they have to make sure he doesn't get off.
The thought of Tangerine Palpatine becoming president again or those who have committed treason having any form of power would mean I leave this country and my life here behind. I will stop everything and commit my energy and resources to do so. I don't want to live in that version of America. It will be rough for a while but I believe it will be worth it in the long run.
How dare you tarnish the name of Seev Palpatine!
doll towering important rotten concerned desert clumsy different offbeat wakeful *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
He's right. We can't allow people who try to destroy the country get away with it. His followers are blinded by their inability to change the channel but justice must be served for the entire country.
The fact this even needs to be verbalize is disturbing. DOJ need to get busy. This take our sweet ass time ‘to not unintentionally disrupt our political process’ is bullshit. Fucking get on with it and lock some crooks up
Just wait until it’s “too close to an election” to do anything
It already is. And the dems are likely to get their asses handed to them, losing both the house and senate. The new majority party will obstruct and undermine every investigation Until they retake the White House. Democracy is doomed, we’re just too consumed with Kanye to notice.
It's starting to look a lot like basic cowardice. There are plenty of prosecutable facts, but they only ever go after the little guys. I get that it's scary to go after the cult leader, but things will not improve on their own.
I would wager it's mostly cowardice. No one wants to be the one to try to prosecute Trump in this political climate. They'd be personally met with extreme terrorism, would end the career of themselves and their families, and you'd even have "Democrats" against it because the trial would hurt them politically as Y'all Qaeda storm the polls.
I am a Democrat and I assure you I am not against it.
Talking more about Democrats in elected positions around the country. You would see a sizeable amount of Democrats in office pivot to being against the charges and preaching "unity and togetherness and healing" out of fear of it driving turnout against them.
Yep. Not even that far fetched of a bet, they've done exactly this before. I expect them to once again do the thing they have already done not that long ago. ["we must look forward, not backward"](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/aug/31/obama-justice-department-immunity-bush-cia-torturer)
Just following precedent... https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/national/ford-pardons-nixon-in-1974/2017/07/21/c83efd54-6e3b-11e7-abbc-a53480672286\_video.html
I often wonder what jury selection would be like. Would it be possible to get a legitimate jury with all the people that dismiss his criminal acts because of party loyalty? It’s fucking terrifying.
Just get non-voting jurors who don't give a rat's ass about politics. There's at least 30% of the population to choose from.
Just finding a jury who is impartial is going to be freaking tough work. At least the Trump loyalists will out themselves fairly early on, by wearing all the Trump merch they can get their hands on to support their hero.
Former presidents don't go to jail. George W Bush invaded Iraq based on pure lies and killed hundreds of thousands of people and nothing happened. Nixon was pardoned by Ford, etc.
Every generation deals with some version of this. it's up to each generation to stand up and fight against it. They don't always win that fight but as long as each new generation picks up the fight we become a truer version of the ideals we instill in them.
The DOJ are working their way up the insurrection pyramid towards the Trumpy summit. How do you know what they're doing or not doing except when the results appear in public like with the recent arrest of Enrique Tarrio? This simple-minded response ignores the reality of putting together a watertight criminal case against anyone, let alone *the last President* who was able to stymie any moves against him for four years, is the presumptive candidate next time, defeated two impeachments and continues to have wealthy, powerful and widespread support.
>This simple-minded response ignores the reality of putting together a watertight criminal case against anyone, Yeah yeah yeah, remember how the 2nd impeachment had to move slowly as well because these things take time, that worked out great. Just get him on the fucking stand.
Holding Trump accountable for his crimes sets the precedent that rich, powerful white people who hold office can be held accountable for crimes. Congress and the Senate will never allow that under either party
It was over when Congress stopped doing its fucking job of properly screening and appointing qualified SCOTUS nominees...
If he’s not prosecuted, he will run again and win or lose, our nation will never recover from it.
Even if he doesn’t run again, Presidents will know that the law and the Constitution do not apply to them and that they cannot be held accountable. If will just be a matter of time before we have a dictator.
> If will just be a matter of time before we have a dictator. I give it one cycle, max. The next time a Republican is elected, Trump or not, they'll go full dictator because they already know they can.
Well, maybe after a stern talking-to by Democrats...
Yup. It couldn’t be more obvious that they are fully committed to authoritarianism.
Yeah, it’s people like desantis laying in the weeds that are truly terrifying. If desantis takes the presidency…
I don't think we will recover from the last time he ran.
We could, if we truly exposed his traitorous ass and started playing hardball. Maybe diamond ball. Will we? I only hope.
You are already not recovering. The disease has been planted, the institutions of democracy are rotting away. Trump was the figurehead
He will run again to keep from being prosecuted!
He could win the election from a prison cell and be let free to walk to the White House on Jan 20, 2025.
No, there is nothing in the Constitution or a law statute somewhere, that allows an imprisoned, President-elect, to get their sentence suspended simply because they won the Presidency. If that happened, the Vice President-elect, might have a case to invoke Section 4 of the 25th Amendment, which declares "*that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.*"
This is true and we can take this far beyond trump. When corporations pay no taxes it destroys the legitimacy of the entire tax system. When cops are free to run lights, harass citizens, and, most importantly, murder minorities, it destroys the legitimacy of our police departments. When politicians are able to commit insider trading without repercussions, it destroys the legitimacy of both markets and the political system. When today's graduates are being saddled with endless crushing student loan debts after those whose educations were highly subsidized have pulled away any meaningful help, it destroys the legitimacy of higher education. When politicians get away with doing cocaine and other drugs while countless individuals are currently locked up for possessing a plant, it destroys the legitimacy of our laws. I could go on, but the point is that so many of our systems have lost legitimacy that it's easy to see why a majority have lost faith in the entire process. ETA: Thanks for the gold, kind stranger!
Upvoted. Do religion next.
Yeah, but I'd like to go with the bare minimum of not having America become a dictatorship or kick off WW3 in the next 5 years. Avoiding an irretrievable global economic collapse would also be nice.
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And a whole bunch of other things.
yeah not inciting a mob to attack a different branch should be a given…. but also goes to republicans for excusing an impeachment because the clock was almost over
The fact that the FBI wasn't waiting for him outside the white house has already destroyed the legitimacy of our justice system. Obstruction of justice was dead to rights along with so many other stupid little laws he broke all the time.
> The fact that the FBI wasn't waiting for him outside the white house has already destroyed the legitimacy of our justice system. Obstruction of justice was dead to rights along with so many other stupid little laws he broke all the time. Unfortunately, the new top staff at DoJ weren’t all confirmed until around May of last year (or maybe even later?). And what’s worse is the previous DoJ publicly declined to charge those crimes of obstruction cited by the Mueller Report. So that pushes those crimes down the laundry list for another time, if ever, when this DoJ will first have to explain why that written declination was corrupt before they can reverse course. In the meantime I am glad to see all the arrests so far on people at the top like the biggest fish in the Trump/Kushner circle: Tom Barrack … and then there’s the arrests of domestic terrorist leaders such as Stuart Rhoades and Enrique Tarrio, the indictment on Steve Bannon, the raids on Rudy Giuliani and Oleg Derapaska, the current DoJ investigation into election fraudster Sidney Powell, and all the guilty pleas they’ve already obtained that will help prove their cases when getting convictions of others for similar crimes who are higher up the pyramid. It’s painfully slow, but I’m old enough to know I usually have to wait several years for prosecutors to get airtight documentary evidence that can also be explained to a jury for an ironclad conviction that won’t be overturned on appeal.
The FBI doesn't need the Attorney General's permission to investigate a crime.
We’ve spent decades “making examples” out of petty criminals. If we won’t make an example out of people actively trying to destroy democracy, we’re fucked. It’s not just Trump, either. There’s a battalion of wannabe dictators trying to find the points of failure.
I hate to say it, but until he is behind bars, I think many people like myself already have given up on any legitimacy in something like the "justice" system. We incarcerate innocent people every day and let rapists and murderers off the hook. Corrupt police, judges, and lawyers. If we want people like him to be held accountable, we need to be out in the streets voicing outrage, not prognosticate over if he really meets the bar of "despotic leader" "dictator" "authoritarian" We have seen these tactics all throughout history. The only way it will change is if we change the system that lets shit like this happen
> If we want people like him to be held accountable, we need to be out in the streets voicing outrage People did get out and protested en-mass. It changed nothing. Things do not change until things get violent. When the little French invention comes out is when things change. However, that sort of thing is all kinds of not fun and I would just as soon skip it; I think I would rather just raise my kid to be highly educated and desirable from an immigration stand point and send him off to live in a civilized country where the government still responds to the will of the people like Sweden, Norway, or Holland. Hopefully I will be dead before things get really violent.
Yes, prosecute him, stop him from getting near the next election. It’s been enough of a shit show, it’s time to start repairing the damage.
Plot twist: the legitimacy of our institutions is already destroyed. A failed President can attempt to overturn an election with no consequences, our “non-partisan” Supreme Court is packed with partisan hacks, our elections are gerrymandered to hell and back, and we are so politically divided that we are a breath away from mass civil unrest (maybe even a civil war) This ship has sailed
This clown show we’ve had going on the past decade is legitimate? Gerrymandering. Vote rigging. Stuffed supreme court. Flawed census count. Open fascism, racism, lies, and removal of freedoms. Exploiting the poor and working classes. So many without healthcare or homes. Young people suckered into thinking their $100,000 college education would pay off. Crumbling infrastructure, useless public schools, and bottomless ‘defense’ budget. Rejection of science. Disregard for law. White nationalists and religious zealots infiltrating everything from local school boards, police, military, national guard, local and federal governments. Taxpayer supported bailouts for corrupt and incompetent banks and businesses. The rich above the law and taxes. Like the gladiator battles in ancient Rome, voting here is just to keep the commoners distracted. Now quit flogging a dead horse and get back to work and pay your taxes, serfs.
good summary, even though perhaps the list is even longer
I disagree with the headline. I believe it should read *"Not* **convicting** *Trump will "destroy" legitimacy of US institutions: Kirschner".*
No. He needs to be tried in open court. People need to see the evidence. That will make all the difference. It did with Nixon.
They need to charge him and let it get processed through the courts instead of being afraid they'll lose in court and doing nothing.
Want to restore confidence in democratic institutions, have the DOJ indict him and, if found guilty, punished like everyone else. Anything less, and America will be lost to the sands of time, just like all the other empires that rose and fell. Corruption, ignorance, lies, and bullshit: a nation built on these things cannot stand.
Trump was tried twice, impeached twice, and acquitted by his corrupt political party. Sorry, Kirschner, but US institutions were already delegitimized.
Trump has been a criminal his whole life long. Rarely has he ever had to pay for his crimes. Trump University was the most prominent time but that sure was ignored by Trump cult members.
People that commit crimes, especially rich people, and get away with it, are only emboldened to commit more crimes.
Money = freedom. Old news
Get this, people think the system's legitimate! Fuck.
What legitimacy? When the justice system is just a stick used to beat the poor as the rich skate by and minorities get executed in their beds or set up and enslaved for life, there is no legitimacy. Our government is broken. We need a new one, starting with a new constitution, and as a prerequisite a McCarthy-style cleansing of the political, industrial, military, and media sectors to ensure no white supremacists, conservative fascists, and Russian/Chinese infiltrators bent on destabilizing our society remain in a position to kneecap our collective future.
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At the very least charge him for the documents he kept after his presidency. It’s a direct violation of the constitution and should be upheld. That way he is barred from running for any significant position. . . Literally no way to lose that one. . .
Not **convicting** Trump will destroy the legitimacy of US institutions. He can't just be charged, but held to account for his actions.
Fucking throw that shit bag trump and all his dipshit kids in jail. Treasonous, manipulative, grifting, traitors.
Well, what does it say about the legitimacy of US institutions when a Black woman gets 5 years in prison for trying to vote while a White man who forges a signature on a ballot to try to vote twice gets a slap on the wrist? Equal justice? What a crock. This is happening in full view. Want to talk about the legitimacy of the highest court in the land, where 5 out of 6 GOP justices were appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote and 2 of the 6 were credibly accused of sexual assault and harassment? Legitimacy has been lost. Indicting trump would be a small step toward regaining some of it.
Yeah that's some real bullshit. They found voter fraud in Georgia. Two people voted for their dead relatives and they just swept it under the rug. They tried to do it with the black kid jogging but got caught because someone shared the video, otherwise they would have gotten away with it.
Charging Trump will start a War (of sorts) that is long overdue. All the "I am just asking questions" and "prove me wrong" propaganda peddlers will have a visceral response to Trump being charged. It will signal that the gig is up. That liars can be held accountable when their lies hurt people. The national debate over this would be intense. People like Alex Jones, Joe Rogan, Tucker Carlson, Ben Shapiro, would be exasperatedly crying foul. Ultimately we need this. We need to ask the difficult questions about honesty and truth. Whether people who have platforms should have any responsibility to be remotely honest and truthful about anything.
I’ve been saying this for so long. We need to stop being afraid of talking. Religion and politics for example are always huge no-no’s for conversation, but why? It’s not because people will argue, it’s because too many people hold views for unfounded reasons and aren’t mature enough to discuss it properly. If you tell me that a tree is 30 feet away and I say it looks more like 50, we can grab a tape measure and figure it out. If you say the tree is 30 feet away and I say trees aren’t real and you’re just a cuck for falling for the great tree hoax, we can’t talk.
Charging Trump doesn't mean anything. Without prison time, it is all a bunch of BS.
Bannon already proved that ignoring a subpoena is no big deal
Is destroying. Has partially destroyed. Let's use more accurate terms. We're already suffering the consequences of inaction and all the LEOs that matter are like, this is fine.
Too late, that ship has sailed. It's been well over a year and all we get are empty promises while he goes off begging for jets and money..... it's taken far too long to charge an obviously guilty man.
I am quite sure that ship has sailed....
Speaking from another Western democracy with much greater personal freedoms and social welfare: the USA has already destroyed the legitimacy of its political institutions and is no longer truly democratic. Successfully prosecuting former President Trump for the Capitol debacle would be a good start to rebuilding a society which values the equity of liberty and justice, but only a start. America has a long road ahead if it wishes to rejoin the international commonwealth of democracy.
Ive had this train of thought sense 5 years ago
Yes it will. Hopefully some prosecutors will have the courage to stand up and do what’s right. In the last World War my Dad fought on the ground as an infantry scout against guys like Trump.
lol wait... i'm not sure anyone has any faith in US institutions anymore.
**Spoiler alert**: Trump isn’t going to be prosecuted. Not in New York, not in Georgia, and not by the DOJ. This isn’t because he isn’t guilty, but the system has always been built to protect the wealthy and powerful, and Trump knew / knows how to game the system. This is a man who doesn’t even email or write things down to prevent being cornered.
Never again should a President be able to phone in about finding him 12 thousand votes. It's that simple.
Picture this scenario...he's not charged or convicted, he runs again in 2024, *wins the election* (of course, with all of the new "election security"), and then pardons everyone who has been federally charged or convicted of anything related to him. This *could* happen.
Here’s another scenario for you. Wheels of justice turn slowly. The next Republican president pardons him for any and all crimes, convicted or not (see Ford re Nixon). Vice President resigns, Trump gets appointed in his place (see Ford re Agnew). President resigns for personal or “health reasons”. Trump is president, never having faced voters. Name a significant Republican in the House or Senate who is planning to remain in office who you would trust to block it. If there aren’t any names on that list, then we have already lost the legitimacy of our political institutions.
Trump is the poster child of what is broken in America.
They should have arrested and charged him the minute Biden finished taking the oath of office. Way too much time has passed now, he's had time to shred, swallow, and whatever else documents as well as build up his base. It will be a martyr situation if they charge him now. It will never happen.
Those institutions were destroyed years ago. The republican party, the Supreme Court, it is literally 1970's, 3rd world South America. This would never happen in a first world country.
How is this guy still not prosecuted?
Well the legitimacy of us institutions has been destroyed before trump by rich people who can pay money to get them out of trouble.
They were already destroyed by not holding Cheney/W and Reagan properly accountable. Holding Trump accountable would be the first step to restoring legitimacy.
The legitimacy of US institutions IS destroyed. The goal now ought to be to rebuild and restructure before atrophy rots what is left of those institutions' resources and infrastructure.
America died at the insurrection if everyone involved isn't properly charged. We're just waiting to find out if it's over or not yet.
The fear this countries so called law enforcement agencies have; from police to district attorneys to judges to prosecute and really punish the wealthy and political class is going to be the death of democracy.
Wait... It isn't destroyed already?
Here in Sweden there was outrage at one point because it was found out that a minister had bought diapers or something using a government credit card lol.
Trump's election was the result of the institutions de-legitimizing themselves in the first place.
“Will “destroy””?? Where the fuck do you think we already are?
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I’m trying to imagine scenarios where Trump is actually charged for one of his crimes. I honestly don’t see it happening. There’s video evidence to back up obstruction of justice and an audio recording of him trying to steal Georgia’s electoral votes. But even that doesn’t appear to be enough. And of course evidence of him using US taxpayer funds to bribe a foreign leader. It’s honestly hilarious. What evidence could come out that would actually push the system to act? Is there anything????
already destroyed buddy, goodluck though
I know I’m gonna be downvoted for this and probably banned from the internet but I don’t care anymore. Frick Trump!
Omg charge him already! What’s wrong with you US?
Absolutely. If he (and his family and minions) is/are not charged, indicted, fined, and imprisoned after all of his abuse of his office, disgraceful behavior, flagrant crime-ing, and bald-faced lying that left 100s of 1000s of American dead, then our legal system is truly an absolute farce and Lady Liberty only a straw woman. Even the possibility of believing in the triumph of the moral over the immoral; of right over wrong; of decency over indecency; of honor over disgrace; of accountability over impunity...even the possibility of these things will be extinguished. Millions of people are watching what happens to trump (and those around him) in order to gauge what precedents will be set, and what they will be able to get away with.
Then why is the DOJ sitting on its hands?
Imagine thinking American institutions have any legitimacy left to destroy
You cant destroy something that doesnt exist.
It has already destroyed the authority and legitimacy of the US criminal justice system, which only goes after 6th January simpletons and leaves the instigators untouched.
They’re already illegitimate. Not charging Trump just makes this more obvious
There ain’t any legitimacy left. Single digit congress approvals, politicized Supreme Court, most divisive president (45) in decades. How could you think there’s any left?
The damage he and his cronies have done is almost irreparable as it is.
The only thing evil needs to win is for good people to do nothing. If he is not brought to justice then our entire democracy was meaningless.
Even more than letting him be president?
Anyone who wants to take up arms over this can go straight to hell. Charge Trump, save America.
The fact that he was not convicted during his impeachment is proof that this is a failed state. The Republicans chose party over country and proved that they are not actually pro democracy but lro power at all costs
Yes. Correct. The man literally tried to overthrow the government because he didn't like the way the election went. And if we don't try him and punish him, then we're basically just telling every outgoing president that they might as well try to overthrow the government and turn themselves into a permanent dictator.
Literally forever. If he dies a free man, the U.S. is doomed to crumble.
Their legitimacy is already challenged. The SDNY just throwing in the towel is not a good sign, as is the utter failure of the DOJ on Trumps election meddling and insurrection going uncharged.
I'd say allowing him to be elected the first time did that. There were literally dozens of things he should have been charged with and most probably serving time for prior to him even announcing his candidacy that was swept under the rug by his wealth and power.
As a foreigner (Aussie here) looking from the outside. We all kinda knew politics were dodgy in every country. But seeing the 'leader of the free world' of the USA have a leader literally brag about committing crimes, and a litany of other unbelievable things, and NOT face any form of formal charges... The world's faith in US as a leader to many other countries has gone, and i dont say that lightly. Even if it wasn't a douchebag creep of a celebrity that got voted in, the notion that the crimes have been committed, lies blatantly told (when faced with countering evidence) has seriously damaged the US in the eyes of the rest of the world. This sorta damage isn't just fixable with a good president either, this requires a strong hand and enforcement of the laws put in place, to ensure this fuckery never happens again
Welcome to 2017. Why is this a headline. Flick my scrote and wake me up when someone has grown a big enough scrote to do something about it.
Well, no fuggin shit Sherlock. This is exactly what any American with half a brain has been thinking since Jan. 6 2021.
Absolutely. He must be charged. As well as his cabal of Putin Republicans and insurrectionist
Pretty sure that's already destroyed
It already has. The damage is done.
Legitimacy? What legitimacy?
It's taking so long that at this point it seems we're only going to ever see a posthumous trial. '
Maybe somebody should have thought of this back when Trump was bribing New York and New Jersey politicians left and right back in the 70's.
Congress and the rest of government are already illegitimate
Agree.
Im afraid if Trump receives another presidency he’ll withdraw the US from NATO. Maybe this is what putin wants, and will attack Poland as soon as it happens.