Why Trump was Never the Legitimate President

He does a great job at regurgitating MSDNC talking points.

 

I'm not saying that what Trump has been doing since the election is illegal, I'm saying that certain actions, by him and his subordinates, should be illegal. (Reading comprehension, again. This is a problem for you - for more, see below)

The Constitution makes it clear that the President makes the appointments. The Senate has only a veto on his nominees. The Senate can confirm a nominee, but the President is under so obligation to appoint them. He could drop them and nominate someone else.

"Advise and consent," again, are positive acts (transitive verbs). It entails a positive response (to a nominee) - Yea or Nay. If the Senate could refuse altogether its advise & consent function in the appointments-process, that would short-circuit the entire process. It would be impossible to make any appointments. But it's nonsense to suggest that the language of the text gives the Senate that prerogative - the Section is just for the purpose of making appointments!

Furthermore, the Constitution clearly obligates the President to make appointments; he can't act like McConnell did, and simply refuse to take up a(ny) nominee. Since the Senate's consent is integral to the discharge of the President's power and obligation, the Senate has a derived obligation to act on the President's nominees, with a Yea or a Nay. The Senate's ability to set its own rules for its deliberations doesn't apply here, because the making of appointments is not simply a matter internal to the Senate; they are implicated in the exercise of the President's power and they cannot act in such a way that would put him in violation of his duty to make appointments.

Furthermore, positively acting on a nomination is the precise means by which the Senate can express its dissatisfaction with a nominee; so there is no predicate whatever for them simply refusing to act.

Aside from your standard reading-comprehension problems, here we have an example of an opinion which you can't back up. There are no Senate rules that McConnell could advert to, that would enable him to suspend the appointments-process (and thereby, effectively nullify the President's prerogative obligation to make appointments). Just 'cause you repetitively assert "zero merit," "all legal and constititional," don't make it so.

It was theft. Obama's appointment-power was nullified by McConnell, a power which was delegated to him by the Obama electorate in 2012, for four full years. That (Unconstitutional) nullification prevented Obama from getting his opportunity to place another Justice on the bench, as was his prerogative and his responsibility. The next president,* from the same party as the author of the Senate's obstruction, became the direct beneficiary. Any objective observer would recognize that as theft.

Those facts are all logically entailed by the language of this text. It is also a conclusion compelled by the absurd implications of giving the Senate the power to nullify the President's appointment-power (again, in the very Section whose purpose was for making appointments!).

And again as I said, "consent" is not a verb of omission, like "ignore" or "withhold." The burden instead is all on you to show how my reading of the text fails to establish the obligations of the Senate to positively respond to the President's nominees.

You fail to recognize that the Senate cannot exercise its powers in such a way as to violate the Separation of Powers - which it did, against both the Executive and Judiciary, in this episode. Again, the Senate is never compelled to accept any given nominee the President puts forward; that suffices to retain the Senate's prerogatives as part of a co-equal branch, vis the Executive. But they did not lawfully assert that independence.

You do love that MSDNC (ooh, so clever) talking point, don't you? Lame...

 

You don't have any point that you can rationally support. If you did you would engage the particulars of my arguments.

 

I'm not substituting Mueller's findings (though I think them clearly flawed). I'm simply saying that even though Trump's collusion was not by the letter of the law criminal (in the special counsel's opinion), that doesn't mean it wasn't still (noncriminal) collusion.

- Hah, Nope.

And Yet - he explicitly acknowledged that his report did not exonerate Trump of the obstruction charges. He explicitly deferred to Congress, to make that determination. Mueller here conducted himself with extreme deference in the face of a historically lawless president.* He could have asserted the prerogative to indict Trump. And I figure that, with the facts in evidence, most other prosecutors would have no problem saying that they did have the necessary factual determinations to make an indictment. But as deferential as Mueller was, he made a point of declining for Trump the declaration of innocence that would be due anyone else for whom charges were not brought. Instead he created, specially for Trump, a bizarre "not proven" status for the charges. Which to me looks like an indictment in everything but name. In Mueller's defense, it would have been reasonable for him to suppose that Congress would have promptly impeached Trump, on the findings of his report - at least in a rational universe where the accused was not a Demagogue who had half the Congress as a faction in his pocket.

Uh, no - Trump could still be impeached, on the basis of the findings of the report. He still should be.

Impeached for up to 11 separate counts of obstruction of justice. On the question of whether Mueller had the "factual determinations" to charge Trump, 1) it is evident that there is room for reasonable difference of opinion on that and 2) Impeachment does not have to be predicated on criminal wrongdoing. In a rational universe, Impeachment & removal from office would have been a slam dunk, on the strength of the Mueller report.

Um, getting majority-electoral support is prima facie conditional for being viewed as a legitimate office-holder, in most any democracy. Even in our own system it is only the President that can be elected with the minority of the votes; and the President yet does not escape the nigh-universal norm of this legitimacy, which applies to all others who run for elective office. Backhanded evidence for this can be seen in Conservatives' hasty assertion, in the wake of Junior Bush's accession with a minority of the ballots, that we were not a democracy after all but a "Republic." All things being equal, it is worse for a popularly elected President to win the presidency but lose the ballots by a lot, rather than by just a little (though I would not call half a million votes "a little").

Further, a bare majority makes a candidate president just as well as a crushing majority; if concerns about legitimacy were simply reducible to whoever had legally won the election, no matter the margin, then people & politicians would pay no mind to the margin of victory. But they obviously do. The same point applies with all the more force in the case of elected officials who are ballot-losers. So, again: if you want to claim that getting the majority of the votes in elections is not necessary for a candidate's political legitimacy, I'd say the burden of proof for that claim is on you. Let's hear it.

 

So you agree:
The Trump campaign -can- take whatever case it wants to court, for whatever reason they choose and it is perfectly legal - and constitutional - for them to do so.
Which of those actions should be illegal, and why?

Ok...and the senate did not grant its consent - consent, or lack thereof, which can take whatever form the senate chooses, not just a yea/nay vote as you fallaciously assert.
What's the problem?

That's not what the constitution says. It says "advise and consent".
Who gets to decide the form of that advise and consent?
The senate - under the rules it made for itself.
Those rules do not require a hearing on a nominee, much less a vote.
Thus, the response of the senate was "nay"
Constitutional duty, discharged.

This has been the case since the ratification of the Constitution, as the senate, even with a full vote, absolutely has the power to refuse to ever approve a nominee.
Thus, your complain holds no water.

The President an the senate majority leader have entirely different powers - one given to him by the constitution, and one given to him the by the rules of the senate, which the constitution says the senate itself can make, however it wants --- those rules are the means by which the senate conducts all of its business, including the confirmation/rejection of nominees.
The rules say the majority leader decides what issues go to committee and/or to the floor, and as such, McConnell was perfectly within his power to table the nomination.
Unconstitutional? As the action was completely within the rules of the senate, not in the slightest.

You have no constitutional basis for your opinion, as the constitution does not define "consent" as a yea/nay vote.

Senate rules
XXXI

EXECUTIVE SESSION - PROCEEDINGS ON NOMINATIONS
When nominations shall be made by the President of the United States to the Senate, they shall, unless otherwise ordered, be referred to appropriate committees;
Who had the authority to "otherwise order?
Under the senate rules, the majority leader.
Your argument has zero merit.

Just 'cause you repetitively assert "theft" don't make it so.
Fact remains: you cannot steal something form someone that does not belong to him; a vacant seat on the USSC does not belong to the President.
Feel free to redefine "theft" to your liking - it does not change the above fact.

Done.

Absolute absurdity - the Senate is never compelled to accept any given nominee the President puts forward; that suffices to retain the Senate's prerogatives as part of a co-equal branch. The senate acted within its power; it has the constitutional authority to take up an nomination in whatever manner it deems appropriate, and generate whatever result it desires. The senate has the plenary power to choose to not grant its assent; in not doing so, it is no way violates the separation of powers.

You cannot cite any such law to that effect.

Given your argument consists --entirely-- of talking points found on MSDNC over four years ago, the shoe fits.

 

"Non criminal collusion"?

What's the penalty for that?

Compelling. To a 8 year old.
I accept your concession of the point.

It wasn't Mueller job to exonerate him, so the fact he didn't means nothing.
It WAS his job to determine if Trump committed obstruction. He didn't.

Cite, copy, paste.

Your unsupportable opinion, in bold.

Given that Mueller was unable to make the factual determinations necessary for a charge of obstruction, why would he do this, knowing he could not present sufficient evidence for whatever charges he sought in said indictment?

As we saw, Trump could be impeached for the legal exercise of executive privilege.
The issue is not what Crazy Nancy"could " impeach him for the question is why she didn't -- especially if Mueller's report lays out a slam-dunk case of obstruction.

Sure - so long as you change the definition of "obstruction of justice" as found in the criminal codes.

If true,then the Democrats were derelict in their duty to the people if the United States, and should all be run from office - by other Democrats.
Why didn't that happen?

Prima facie, eh?
That is, "based on the first impression; accepted as correct until proved otherwise"
You then agree - Bill Clinton was not viewed as legitimate office holder, and, had Hillary managed a handful of votes in a coupe states, she too would not have been viewed as a legitimate office holder.
Same for Gore in 2000.
Right?
Remember: "prima facie"

False. Somewhere in the process, a person must win a majority of votes to win election as President.

Your statement is comical - anyone who passed 8th grade US history knows the US is a republic.

I don't recall anyone questioning Bill Clinton's political legitimacy, or his position to pursue his agenda, when 57% of those who voted did not vote for him.

Done.

 

If Biden succeeds in this fraudulent election, 72,000,000 will say the same thing about him for four years.

 

I doubt it. Republicans are clearly split on this question - not a good strategy if you want to hold up an illegitimacy narrative. However; if you are able to push successfully push your narrative that Biden is illegitimate (like the way that the Resistance established that Trump is illegitimate), that does affirm the distinction I'm making in the OP.

 

The point is that we're talking about conduct that should be codified as illegal.

Why then, did he openly make provision for Trump's not being cleared? You can't answer that, can you?

Nice effort at gaslighting... Off the top of my head: misappropriating funds for a purpose that he could not get legislative support for. Pretty much lawless by definition. The use of federal stormtroopers in broad daylight to violently disperse protestors, in Lafayette Square. His open defiance of the Emoluments clause. His leaking of state secrets to the Russian foreign minister, in the Oval Office itself. His quid pro quo pardon of Roger Stone. Again, that's just for starters. And as he was not cleared of obstruction charges in the Mueller investigation, I'm at liberty to enter all those into the ledger; and we haven't even started on all his actions in association with the Ukraine scandal (both in his participation in the actual plot, and his refusal to cooperate with legally mandated Congressional requests for documents). Maybe his Sun-King declarations in the midst of the Covid-crisis that his authority over governors is "total" would pass muster for you, if the same remark had come from a President Hillary Clinton? Oh I forgot, hypocrisy is one of your core values; you don't have a problem with any of this stuff, unless a Democrat does it.

They're separate issues. Though in the event, I don't think they were, in Mueller's mind. He seems to have gone into the investigation with the thought that he did not have the writ to indict Trump; and working backwards from that, he failed to find evidence that mandated an indictment. (Now this, by the way, is an opinion. You still don't seem to grasp the difference between that and a warranted assertion.) It's worth mentioning that important members of his team dissented on that point.

It would be, in an ordinary law court. A trial following impeachment is not an ordinary law court.

Nope. There is ample reason for second-guessing Mueller's determination that he did not have the goods on Trump. Certainly, looking at the instances of potential obstruction, I can't figure out how they weren't actionable.

Because we don't live in a rational universe - obviously. But the truth will out. With Trump and his crew cleared out, every act of malfeasance that his regime stuck under a rock is all going to come to light. Historians of this period will have access to the full record (possibly including knowledge of what the Russians were up to, from their side), and I reckon it will only be the more damning - for Trump and all his hangers-on, yourself included.

I am not going to try to decipher your cryptic ver-bage....

Clearly not. An EC majority is predicated on a popular vote minority, making the latter the more fundamental poll.

Nope. I saw no such argument... Try again.

 

It should be illegal for the President or his surrogates to allege fraud in public, that they are not alleging in the courtroom. This because equivocating in this way directly attacks public trust in the institution of elections itself - the sort of disinformation that is so damaging to the body politic, that it should be legally proscribed. Further, much of Trump's tweeting post-election can be viewed as a pressure-campaign against those counting and certifying in contested states - a form of direct interference in the election that clearly should be made illegal. In this connection, there was also his summoning to the WH officials who were crucially involved in the Michigan certification - again a bald form of pressure that is unacceptable in a country with the rule of law (btw, that can be considered yet another instance of Trump's lawlessness).

My whole argument, which you are failing to address, refutes your claim above. Try again or forfeit the point.

For starters, the text of the Constitution itself, which we refer to when there are disputes about the interpretation of these terms and their import for the Section. I've given my warrants for why what McConnell's Senate did was in no sense a fulfillment of their obligations. Still waiting on your rejoinder.

Within the limits of their obligations, as laid down in the sum total of Article II Sec. 2. So yes, if they wanted to determine who the nominee is by séance or by inspecting the entrails of an animal sacrifice in the well of the Senate, that would be their prerogative. But it has to be some sort of positive decision-procedure. What they can't do, is pretend like a nominee has not been presented to them, for the reasons I've outlined. If you disagree, say why. Otherwise just shut up and cede the point. No point in prolonging this.

Pure unsupported assertions. Failure of rejoinder noted.

Yes, they have the power to not approve any given nominee, but refusing to exercise that power is pretty much by definition not a rejection of the nominee. This can have quite unintended consequences, see below.

I have given the Constitutional basis for my opinion. You are simply aren't addressing it. I don't care what the rules of the Senate are - whatever they are, they can't violate the Constitution. Nullifying the President's appointment-power? Yeah, that's violating the Constitution.

Here, you're too clever by half. Yes, while technically consent does not have to be a vote, it does have to be some sort of positive decision-procedure. You have an obvious problem, if the consent-function (Yea or Nay on the nominee) does not require a positive response. The President, again, is obligated to make appointments. What would be the next step best in accord with the Constitution, if the Senate meets the nominee with silence? Silence can indeed be a form of consent, the President could argue - since the Senate is not bothering to reject the nominee, the President could take it as tacit consent, and fulfill his Constitutional responsibility by appointing the nominee directly. In fact Obama should have threatened to do just that. What could McConnell do about it? How many legions does he have? McConnell would know he had no hand, and would have been forced to man up and simply vote down Garland.

I have no problem appealing to a disinterested audience, to decide whether my assessment of the matter is correct.

I'm citing the Basic Law of the United States - The Constitution.

Still lame, buddy. And - actually paying attention to your snark here - a pretty low-rent lie, even from you...

 

Criminal collusion is already illegal.
"Non-criminal collusion" - whatever that is is - isn't illegal because it doesn't rise to the level of a crime.

Given the purpose, scope and findings of his investigation, there's no rational reason whatsoever for him to add that commentary.
That he included it in no way changed the fact that he was charged with making the determination if Trump actions rose to the level of obstruction of justice, and did cnof reach the conclusion that he did.

Speaking of which,
Still waiting for you tot cite/copy/paste the text there Mueller "He explicitly deferred to Congress, to make that determination."

Cite the laws broken here, and demonstrate that the law was indeed broken.

Wait.
He -chose- to not find evidence in relation to Trump's possible obstruction of justice?

Simple.
You aren't aware of the three components to a charge of obstruction of justice, and oof which must be oro9ven for the charg to stick.
If a prosecutor has not made, or does not believe he can make the factual determination that a person's actions satisfies all three components, he will, assuming he's not some partisan hack, not take the case to a grand jury.
This is why Mueller did not conclude Trump obstructed justice.

Good to see you believe the Democrats as a whole, are irrational.

 

Look at you, suddenly aware of the fact your "getting majority-electoral support is prima facie conditional for being viewed as a legitimate office-holder, in most any democracy" argument holds no water.

You must be ignorant of election law.
A person must win a majority of the EC or a majority of the state delegations to the house to win the Presidency.

You lie to yourself.

 

Wait... you believe it should be illegal - that is subject to criminal penalty - for politicians to spread disinformation for political gain?

It -could- be, but not by anyone who wants to be taken seriously.

No.
My claim refutes your argument.
Try again or forfeit the point.

The text says an appointment requires the advise and consent of the senate.
Where does the text describe the form of that advise and consent?

There is no obligation laid upon the senate here, and as such there is no limit on the means through which it issues or withholds its advice and consent.
In requiring the consent of a senate to appoint a justice, Article II does not require the senate to act, as the senate, a co-equal branch of the government with the plenary power to implement its on rules and procedures., gets to decide what it does and does not do.
That is, the term "shall" applies to the President, not the senate.

You should then be fully satisfied -- the senate did not pretend the President did not make a nomination, and that nomination was, in accordance with the rules of the senate, subject to a procedure that led to a decision.

Please cite the senate rules and copy/paste the text where they require a hearing on a nominee, or a vote with respect to same.

I'm not sure even you think your response, above, makes sense.
The senate refusing to grant its consent to a nominee, in whatever form it chooses, is unarguably a rejection of that nominee.

Yes. And it fails miserably.

You're lying to yourself.

As the power to appoint is in every way reliant upon and subject to the advice and consent of the Senate, refusal of the senate to grant consent is not a nullification of said power -- and is in every way constitutional.

You should then be fully satisfied -- the senate did not pretend the President did not make a nomination, and that nomination was, in accordance with the rules of the senate, subject to a procedure that led to a decision.

Grant of consent is a positive act; you positively grant consent with a "yes", else consent is withheld.
Ask a feminist - she'll explain it to you.

Just so long as you understand there's no rational basis for your assertion that something that did not belong to Obama could be stolen from him.

As we see here, nothing in the constitution supports the argument you make.
The compulsion you claim the constitution lays upon the senate to act in response to a nomination by the President -- even if said compulsion actually exists - was fully met and discharged, in accordance with the rules of the senate.

Well, your argument -is- from MSDNC, so lameness is to be expected.
What's -more- lame is your inability to argue the issue beyond the tripe they laid out, 4+ years ago.