The 2024 Us Presidential Election Thread

[The Mighty Mollusk]

I don't know what happens if he pursues prosecution of, say, Fauci. I mean, I know at the end of it he gets one embarrassment or another. But does he get the embarrassment that there is nothing prosecutable about the guy and a judge has to tell him publicly that he is just weaponizing the court system? Or does he get the embarrassment of his Attorney General telling him he needs to go back and read what a pardon is?

Or he'll just take away Fauci's protection detail and state that he doesn't take responsibility if anything should happen to him. Which is pretty much just telling his cult to go take care of it without directly saying so. Which is what he did.

 

[wonko the sane?]

Trump will go after someone and have at the very least "investigations" going constantly. He needs them, he needs the distraction because if people are paying unilateral attention to what he's doing: they'll hate him and scream about his policies.

The piece of jive has a fine line to walk: his narcissism demands attention, but people generally don't pay attention to politicians because they like them.

 

[Rhinox]

Or he'll just take away Fauci's protection detail and state that he doesn't take responsibility if anything should happen to him. Which is pretty much just telling his cult to go take care of it without directly saying so. Which is what he did.

He did that today.
Never underestimate Trump's pettiness.

 

[G.B.Blackrock]

Which to be honest, I’ve never quite understood the rationale behind.

You think Trump is simultaneously lawless enough that he’ll go after people who haven’t committed crimes; yet still (somehow?) lawful enough that a pardon will stop him?

The difference between "trying" and "succeeding" seems enough to respond to this comment. We've seen that Trump is more than happy to do the very weaponizing of the legal system he accuses his opponents of. A pardon takes out at least some of the tools he has to make things stick. He's left with innuendo only.

But, yes, that's still pretty awful, and will still hurt a lot of people.

 

[MrBlud]

In a “normal” administration sure, but what’s to stop SCOTUS from saying Biden’s pardons weren’t official acts? Or that Presidents have the ability to rescind past Presidential pardons?

Nothing.

 

[Rhinox]

There is no legal recourse as far as presidential pardons. There is no check, no balance. SCOTUS itself has no say whatsoever. Congress doesn't either. Any attempt by any entity to try and claim some authority over that would be a massive overreach with no Constitutional backing. Like, at all.
You are talking more than unprecedented. You are talking about a seizure of power that goes beyond the Constitution. I have less than zero faith in Roberts, but there is no way he'd allow that. He desperately wants the cover of legitimacy, even if it is the thinnest of veils. This would absolutely remove that.

 

[Axaday]

There was a court ruling way back that people point to that says to accept a Presidential pardon you have to admit guilt. I don't know the circumstances. I'll look it up sometime. But that to me feels like a judicial overreach. To me the most sensible understanding of the pardon power is as a check on the judicial branch and that the ability to free someone who was misjudged surely was part of the original intent.

 

[Rhinox]

Yes, you have to admit guilt. There have been a few who've refused Trump's pardon. But the problems, the ones that should have still been behind bars, are like 'hug it' and out. They view it as a badge of honor.

Seriously, can someone tell me who the hug was meeting with Stewart Rhoades? Why is that asshat even allowed in DC?

 

[Pale Rider]

FB friend:

The culture wars were never a "distraction": they were the main event, and those who advocated ignoring them in favour of "substantive" issues failed to read the room.

In politics, what matters is winning elections. It seems absurd to have to point out something so obvious, but there it is: you have to win elections. Downplaying the conservative "war on woke" makes no sense because regardless of whether it's what the GOP is truly thinking, it's what the GOP used to win the election.

For the "anti-woke" crowd, every progressive policy success infuriated them. Years of successive social progressive successes drove them into a blinding white-hot rage. As a result, they don't just want to fight "woke": they want to burn down every social and civil institution which participated in this form of progress.

They don't care if Pete Hegseth does severe damage to the Pentagon, because they would rather sabotage the Pentagon than allow it to go "woke". They don't care if Trump's tariffs cause heavy economic damage, because they would rather lose money than let "woke" win. They don't care when people suffer and die in blue states, because those states are "woke", and anything "woke" must be destroyed.

The "war on woke" was never a side-show. It was always the main event.