Donald Trump presidency discussion thread V

jobbridge4life

everlast75 wrote: »

My understanding is that the Senate Republicans went to him and told him to go, as they had no option but to vote to impeach him.

I can see a similar situation here. Granted, the current Reps appear a craven and morally defunct bunch, but Trump effectively lied to him. That must stand for something amongst the better fraction of then.

Mitch is the problem. Someone needs to topple Mitch, before that I can't see anything happen.

SimonTemplar

jobbridge4life wrote: »

Mitch is the problem. Someone needs to topple Mitch, before that I can't see anything happen.

How can that happen? How can the senate majority leader be toppled?

Brian?

SimonTemplar wrote: »

How can that happen? How can the senate majority leader be toppled?

The other GOP senators remove him, afaik. Not going to happen any time soon.

In fact Rand Paul has been tweeting about how proud of Trump he is during the shut down.


Edit: The majority of senators need to call for a recall vote on the Senate Majority leader, if he's recalled then another election takes place. Which in reality would mean a different republican. I can't see it happening

Itssoeasy

A very interesting point from Lawrence o Donnell from his show last night was the leader of the senate isn't the only senator that bring a bill to the floor of the senate for a vote. It seems it's a tradition not a rule that the leader of the senate is the only senator can do it.

Cheerful Spring

FreudianSlippers wrote: »

I know a lot of things have felt like "this is it" but... this was grounds for impeachment of Nixon, so why not Trump?


https://twitter.com/BuzzFeed/status/1086102144929812480


BTW how funny would it be if it was Buzzfeed that brought down Trump.

Nixon knew CIA men broke into the Democratic offices to bug it and steal information for him. That was a big deal. There was no way Nixon could survive this when information came out he was tied to that break-in.

Muller will have to prove beyond all doubt Trump is working for the Russians against supposed US interests. If he can't Trump will remain in office. Everyone knows Trump had business interests before he became President. Did he break US laws making secret deals with Russians before he became President?

Russian collusion only matters if Trump is a double agent.

everlast75

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

Nixon knew CIA men broke into the Democratic offices to bug it and steal information for him. That was a big deal. There was no way Nixon could survive this when information came out he was tied to that break-in.

Muller will have to prove beyond all doubt Trump is working for the Russians against supposed US interests. If he can't Trump will remain in office. Everyone knows Trump had business interests before he became President. Did he break US laws making secret deals with Russians before he became President?

Russian collusion only matters if Trump is a double agent.

No he won't
No he won't
Yes he did
No it doesn't

circadian

Here we go, multiple congressional bodies are setting up to investigate the story of Cohen being instructed to lie under oath.

https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-michael-cohen-buzzfeed-investigate-lie-1297200

jochenstacker

It's true love!
Trump to meet Kim Jong Un again.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46927761

US President Donald Trump is to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un for a second summit by the end of February, the White House says.

The announcement came after Mr Trump met top North Korean negotiator Kim Yong-chol at the White House.

Cheerful Spring

circadian wrote: »

Here we go, multiple congressional bodies are setting up to investigate the story of Cohen being instructed to lie under oath.

https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-michael-cohen-buzzfeed-investigate-lie-1297200

Two Democrats. If the Republicans don't follow nothing will happen
Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, a California Democrat, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, vowed to open congressional investigations.

Micheal Cohen has to provide evidence Trump directed him to lie. His word is not enough. Trump Lawyers will destroy him if it's just him saying it.

Is Cohen lying not necessarily? It matter of proof. Cohen is now claiming negotiations about the Moscow tower were still ongoing when Trump was running for the Republican nomination. He now claiming Trump directed him to lie to Congress about when this negotiation ended.

If there other sources that can confirm this, then Trump will be in deep trouble.

everlast75

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

If there other sources that can confirm this, then Trump will be in deep trouble.

There is proof.
Written proof.
And evidence from trump foundation staff.

duploelabs

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

Two Democrats. If the Republicans don't follow nothing will happen
Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, a California Democrat, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, vowed to open congressional investigations.

Micheal Cohen has to provide evidence Trump directed him to lie. His word is not enough. Trump Lawyers will destroy him if it's just him saying it.

Is Cohen lying not necessarily? It matter of proof. Cohen is now claiming negotiations about the Moscow tower were still ongoing when Trump was running for the Republican nomination. He now claiming Trump directed him to lie to Congress about when this negotiation ended.

If there other sources that can confirm this, then Trump will be in deep trouble.

No he doesn't. It's already been said that Mueller has corroborated evidence supporting Cohen's claims from multiple sources

prawnsambo

jochenstacker wrote: »

It's true love!
Trump to meet Kim Jong Un again.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46927761

Any chance he'll stay there? You'd actually wonder will he leg it if the vultures get too close.

Gbear

Another in the litany of problems with the two party system is how when you have one party behaving illegally, the only ones left to investigate them are the opposition, who can't claim to be impartial.

It's obvious to anyone not being intellectually dishonest that the Republicans are obstructing efforts to investigate issues such as the infiltration of the NRA by Russian intelligence, the hacking of emails, and any and all other efforts by Russia to interfere with American democracy.
Whether or not it's happening isn't the question that needs to be asked. When all the apparatus' of state intelligence gathering are telling you it is, you must, at the very least, check.

There is no plausible reason for them to be doing this in good faith. They can only be hiding issues that would implicate their own party to some degree.

Tactically, it seems unlikely that sticking by Trump forever would be a winning strategy. The electorate has already delivered a historic rebuke to the Republican platform, and there's no evidence things are going to improve for them.

The platform as a whole needs to, at some point, create the impression, whether it's true or not, that Trump was an outsider and thus his criminal activity was isolated to him and his inner circle.

If they fail to do that, I can't see any other reason, beyond pure stupidity, that they would remain loyal to Trump other than there being significant numbers of them that will be implicated as part of the Mueller investigation.

A televised impeachment process where all the details are revealed openly would not, I think, go well for the Republicans, and if some of their number are indicted, it might even cause a shift in power to a sufficient degree where they have little choice but to endorse the impeachment.

Quin_Dub

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

Two Democrats. If the Republicans don't follow nothing will happen
Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, a California Democrat, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, vowed to open congressional investigations.

Micheal Cohen has to provide evidence Trump directed him to lie. His word is not enough. Trump Lawyers will destroy him if it's just him saying it.

Is Cohen lying not necessarily? It matter of proof. Cohen is now claiming negotiations about the Moscow tower were still ongoing when Trump was running for the Republican nomination. He now claiming Trump directed him to lie to Congress about when this negotiation ended.

If there other sources that can confirm this, then Trump will be in deep trouble.

According to the Buzzfeed story , Cohen was the last person they spoke to. Multiple sources gave evidence that Trump had given Cohen instructions about his testimony and Mueller only questioned Cohen to see if he would confirm the story that they'd gotten from elsewhere..

So , this is not a "Cohen claim" , it's a "lots of other peoples claim that Cohen confirmed"

Quite a different thing... No prosecutor is going to use Cohen in a "he said, she said" scenario..

Anything that is brought forward in regards to Cohen will be backed up with other evidence possibly recordings, as that was a habit of Cohens..

Quin_Dub

Just on the likelihood of impeachment. I just can't see it happening to be honest.

The GOP are to far in at this stage , remember that there was evidence of Clinton trying to get Lewinski to alter her story to protect him and the Democrat controlled Senate of the time declined impeachment , so even though the Cohen story seems like a smoking gun I don't think they'll impeach him for that alone.

My view of it is that the next 2 years will just be an utter s**t show of story after story coming out and various "Trump adjacent" characters getting convicted - Don Jr and Kushner for perjury potentially, with the various House Democrat committees just hounding Trump and everyone close to him relentlessly..

For me , the only way Trump leaves office is by losing the 2020 election.

I just don't see a scenario where the GOP Senate pull the trigger on him , regardless of what Mueller finds..

MadYaker

It’s been drip by drip from the special council and we don’t have enough info yet to say that trumps a goner for sure. Does it look any more likely now than it did 6 months ago? I’m not sure it does. Us saying he’s finished is like the Trumpists saying that the investigation is a witch hunt and they’ve found no evidence of collusion between trump and Putin. The reality is none of us have enough info to definitively call it. Yet at least. I think an economic downturn is probably on the horizon though and that’s not going to do him any favors. If he doesn’t get his wall and he doesn’t have a strong economy to point to then he’d be in a much weaker position. That combined with a damning report from mueller could flip the senate against him but can all that happen before 2020? I have no idea.

L1011

Quin_Dub wrote: »

For me , the only way Trump leaves office is by losing the 2020 election.

Or he resigns in the hope of a pardon from Pence

I had originally thought there was a chance he'd resign because he got bored; particularly if he'd got to the midterms and a similar result ensued but he didn't have the same overriding reason to stay there (namely not getting indicted)

Itssoeasy

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

Two Democrats. If the Republicans don't follow nothing will happen
Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, a California Democrat, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, vowed to open congressional investigations.

Micheal Cohen has to provide evidence Trump directed him to lie. His word is not enough. Trump Lawyers will destroy him if it's just him saying it.

Is Cohen lying not necessarily? It matter of proof. Cohen is now claiming negotiations about the Moscow tower were still ongoing when Trump was running for the Republican nomination. He now claiming Trump directed him to lie to Congress about when this negotiation ended.

If there other sources that can confirm this, then Trump will be in deep trouble.

:D Rudy and Jay ? They are the keystone cops of lawyers and the fact they are the best Trump could get says it all.

VonZan

Calina wrote: »

The shutdown is Donald Trump's fault, caused by his childish demands for a wall any wall. If we were talking about some reasonable policy here you might have a point. But you don't. There is only one politician acting like a child here and it is Donald Trump. He couldn't get the wall built when his own party were in charge, he shutdown the government in petulance.

This is not on Pelosi. Her delay of the SOTU is not unreasonable when Trump is refusing to pay government employees including security staff. Writing to the services concerned is not productive. Writing to the person whose decision the shutdown is on the other hand should be productive.

I never said the shutdown wasn't Trump's fault; Of course it is, he's grandstanding over the wall. That doesn't distract from the fact that it was childish from both of them. I'm not sure why you felt the need to strawman me. Nobody is without blame here.

Saying Pelosi is without blame is bizarre even CNN and WP have had negative coverage of Pelosi over the past few days. You're entrenched if you think she's blameless.

MadYaker

I know it probably wouldn’t be justice but I’d like to see him voted out in 2020 rather than removed by other means. It would be cleaner and the American political environment is already toxic enough. Impeachment or resignation to avoid impeachment would only contribute to the massive divisions that already exist.

listermint

MadYaker wrote: »

I know it probably wouldn’t be justice but I’d like to see him voted out in 2020 rather than removed by other means. It would be cleaner and the American political environment is already toxic enough. Impeachment or resignation to avoid impeachment would only contribute to the massive divisions that already exist.

100% it's better for someone to walk off into the sunset rather than face the music for breaking multiple laws and consorting with a foreign power to rig the presidential race. Yep that's a great outcome for the system and for divisions.

aloyisious

Aaah, CNN breaking news. Mueller spokesman: Buzzfeeds "characterization of documents and testimony" in report is that Trump directed Cohne to lie is "not accurate". Buzzfeed reported as making a clarification of it's report. SHS outside White House giving response to buzzfeed report was almost exuberant. Maybe some-one jumped the gun, also that Mueller is not happy with the chance there's a leak from his team.

Cheerful Spring

aloyisious wrote: »

Aaah, CNN breaking news. Mueller spokesman: Buzzfeeds "characterization of documents and testimony" in report is that Trump directed Cohne to lie is "not accurate". Buzzfeed reported as making a clarification of it's report. SHS outside White House giving response to buzzfeed report was almost exuberant. Maybe some-one jumped the gun, also that Mueller is not happy with the chance there's a leak from his team.

Media ran a story that was unverified, no surprise really.

Cheerful Spring

duploelabs wrote: »

No he doesn't. It's already been said that Mueller has corroborated evidence supporting Cohen's claims from multiple sources

Maybe not after all. Mueller team would have to come out and refute this claim by Buzzfeed if it was fake.

Ultros

everlast75 wrote: »

Now we know why Trump went quiet on Twitter for 24 hrs.

Buzzfeed contacted the WH for comment and gave them 5 hours notice.

Eric Swalwell confirmed that Cohen took an oath. He said he was questioned for 8 hours on multiple topics. So lying in relation to Trump Tower Moscow won't be the only incident of "suborning". There will be multiple counts.

He also confirmed that there were other folk, members of Trump's family who may be in the barrel here for lying under oath to congress.

It still amazes me the stranglehold grip the media has on people even after all the botched bombshells, it's at least half a dozen now. When all these stories that turn out untrue only go in one direction, there clearly is serious bias and a lack of professionalism. The truth matters not, only sensationalism for revenue.

Ozymandius2011

The fact Mueller is calling the Buzzfeed story "inaccurate" will no doubt slow the drive towards a successful impeachment. It is open to interpretation though.

Is Mueller saying that Trump did not order Cohen to lie to Congress? If that's true and Cohen sticks to his admission of lying to them about the Trump Tower deal being over by the time Trump took office, then that could mean Cohen is lying about lying to Congress, or that he lied to Congress on his own volition.

Ultros

Ozymandius2011 wrote: »

The fact Mueller is calling the Buzzfeed story "inaccurate" will no doubt slow the drive towards a successful impeachment. It is open to interpretation though.

Wishful thinking. They wouldn't have released a statement if it wasn't to strongly deny the claims.

"The story had claimed Cohen had acknowledged to Mueller’s prosecutors that the president directed him to deceive Congress about key facts linking the president to the proposed Trump Tower project in Moscow. BuzzFeed also said Mueller learned about the directive to lie from “interviews with multiple witnesses from the Trump Organization and internal company emails, text messages, and a cache of other documents.

Mueller’s denial, according to people familiar with the matter, aims to make clear that none of those statements in the story are accurate."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/2019/01/18/b9c40d34-1b85-11e9-8813-cb9dec761e73_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.1e1c6326b5e1

Leroy42

Ultros wrote: »

It still amazes me the stranglehold grip the media has on people even after all the botched bombshells, it's at least half a dozen now. When all these stories that turn out untrue only go in one direction, there clearly is serious bias and a lack of professionalism. The truth matters not, only sensationalism for revenue.

Change the word media for Trump and you multiply it again. AS Jake Tapper said in a reply to a tweet from Don JR, when the WH and the Trumps stop consistently lying they can start to take offence when others do it.

Trump wants the game played only his terms, the rules only apply to others.

It is not good when the media get stuff like this wrong, but CNN for example, have from the very start detailed how this story seemed to be without hard evidence and based on hearsay.

So if one is going to ignore the media as fake based on a number of stories that have turned out to be wrong, surely one then has to take the same view from Trump and ignore everything he says as fake. You cannot have it both ways (the better way of course being both offer more truth)

spacecoyote

Leroy42 wrote: »

It is not good when the media get stuff like this wrong, but CNN for example, have from the very start detailed how this story seemed to be without hard evidence and based on hearsay.

The MSNBC clip talking about it was similar really. They stated that buzzfeed claimed to have evidence but that NBC hadn't verified any of it, so most of their statements were started with "if true..." or something to that effect

everlast75

Trump supporters complaining about fake news whilst believing Fox News makes my "ironymeter" explode...