Trampled by Trump Tuesday 2020

[bodysong]

"Tuesday was a nightmare for justice in the United States of America"

- Laura Clawson

Daily Kos

Post -Constitution Wednesday 2/ 12/ 2020

Trump takes post-impeachment reckoning to next level

The president bashed prosecutors, attacked a judge
overseeing high-profile cases, and suggested the
military could discipline a star impeachment
witness

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/...-backs-away-stiff-sentence-roger-stone-114006

 

[bodysong]

bodysong comment

Welcome to Barter Town!
Could someone find the Aunty Entity costume
for King Donald to wear for the celebration of his
Ascension to the Gold Plated Throne ?

Salon Opinion

- Digby Parton
February 12, 2020

AG Bill Barr follows orders —
and turns the Justice Department into Trump's protection racket

On Tuesday, Trump indicated that the military may punish
Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman for what the president called
"a false call," meaning that Vindman supposedly lied about
Trump's call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
There was a time not too long ago when everyone would have
assumed that Trump was just blowing off steam and that no
one would take those comments seriously. After what happened
with the Roger Stone case, no one can take such things for
granted.

Trump tweeted, and Bill Barr saluted smartly and did just
as he was told. There is little reason to believe the military
brass will do any less. If they don't toe the line they will be
out.

This is perhaps best illustrated by case of Elaine McCusker,
the acting comptroller at the Pentagon who had resisted the
White House orders to withhold the congressionally mandated
military aid to Ukraine last summer. According to the N Y Post,
(Is Salon suggesting that readers take the NY Post's announcement
with a grain or two of salt, or a couple of turns of the salt grinder ?)
the White House now plans to withdraw her nomination as comptroller
and chief financial officer of the Pentagon, telling the paper:
"This administration needs people who are committed to implementing
the president's agenda, specifically on foreign policy, and not trying to
thwart it."

Elaine McCusker wasn't trying to thwart the president's agenda.

She was trying to avoid breaking the law, which is now
a firing offense in the Trump administration.

https://www.salon.com/2020/02/12/bi...ice-department-into-trumps-protection-racket/

 

[bodysong]

bodysong comment- "Fuckin' YIKES on a silver platter"

The reason why evidence is irrelevant to Trump’s trial-

(in Trump's Alternative World of No Reality)

is not just that the evidence itself is inconveniently damning.
It is that this doctrine of the president’s will as the source of
all authority must not be undermined by the manner of the trial.

At the heart of Trump’s defense is the justification that underlies
all authoritarian rule.

The leader is special. He is not like us because he has unique
instincts. His gut (or divine inspiration or mystical ability
to discern the true will of the people) leads him to make
the right call. And the gut cannot be questioned:

the job of everyone else in government is to accept
what the leader does first

and find the reasons for it later….

The Senate is supposed to be acting as a kind of court.
But it is showing itself to be a court in a different sense:
almost all Republican senators are now quite openly
behaving as courtiers….

O’Toole then previews where King Trump’s coronation
may lead the country, observing that Republicans
“cannot question what the president has done
because that would violate the principle t
hat his reasons are unquestionable”:
What is lost for them and for Trump in this process
is any possible claim that the president has been vindicated
by a genuine trial of the evidence against him.

What is gained is the assurance that, if Trump wins
a second term, he can indeed do whatever he wants.

On the same day as Trump’s coronation in the Senate,
Attorney General William Barr announced a new policy
under which all investigations of alleged criminal behavior
by presidential candidates or their senior staff members
are prohibited, except with his personal approval.
As a practical matter this means that Trump is free
to break the law with impunity and that the
Department of Justice has been weaponized
against the Democratic Party and Trump’s
other “enemies.”

https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/tr...-destruction-hes-causing-behind-closed-doors/