Impeachment trial

[WalkedUp]

So far Trump is taking a battering. The footage is pretty compelling. Especially the bodycam footage of the officer being attacked by the mob two hours after the initial breach of the Capitol following Trump’s incitement. Clearly Trump would have had opportunity to call a halt to it in that period and chose not to. One police man was killed by the rioters. Some had their eyes gouged out, others lost multiple fingers or suffered serious head injuries. Two of the officers have subsequently killed themselves.

It will be interesting to see how the trial progresses. In my opinion treason should be the rope. For all involved and the instigators, but it will never happen. Too soft. 

Edited February 11, 2021 by WalkedUp

[TIGHTCHOKE]

All very strange, but as with everything involving Donald Trump, nothing is straightforward!

[WalkedUp]

Very true! 

[treetree]

1 hour ago, WalkedUp said:

So far Trump is taking a battering. The footage is pretty compelling. Especially the bodycam footage of the officer being attacked by the mob two hours after the initial breach of the Capitol following Trump’s incitement. 

The mob did a disgusting, abhorrent thing, as shown by the footage. Not sure how you make the link to that being Trump's fault.

"March on the capital" type rhetoric and phraseology has been the back bone to most political speeches for the past 200 years. Trump derangement syndrome is still alive and kicking, despite him no longer being President.

[Demonic69]

"I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard."

That's the line his defence will use.

"We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore,"

That's the line the prosecution will use.

While I don't doubt he got people riled up, he never implicitly stated they should attack the capitol building or anyone in it. If they're going after him for this, they'd better be careful; Harris, AOC and other Dems have said much worse, far more direct incitement to violence and got away with it. I can't imaging disgruntled Republicans letting it slide if they set a precedent.

[blackbird]

The US news is way to quiet now with Trump gone I really do miss him, you got to give it to him he was first class entertainment 😀

[Rewulf]

4 minutes ago, blackbird said:

The US news is way to quiet now with Trump gone I really do miss him, you got to give it to him he was first class entertainment 😀

Yes he was, and he wasnt quite the terrible POTUS the media would like us to believe either.

Trump , Farage , its like the audience craves a 'bad guy' , when in reality , they arent really bad.
99.9 % of haters base their entire opinion on the words of some hack or presenter with their own, or bosses political agenda.
Its like 'Dont think for yourself , WE will tell you who to hate !'

[old man]

47 minutes ago, Rewulf said:

Yes he was, and he wasnt quite the terrible POTUS the media would like us to believe either.

Trump , Farage , its like the audience craves a 'bad guy' , when in reality , they arent really bad.
99.9 % of haters base their entire opinion on the words of some hack or presenter with their own, or bosses political agenda.
Its like 'Dont think for yourself , WE will tell you who to hate !'

👍

[chrisjpainter]

52 minutes ago, Rewulf said:

Yes he was, and he wasnt quite the terrible POTUS the media would like us to believe either.

Trump , Farage , its like the audience craves a 'bad guy' , when in reality , they arent really bad.
99.9 % of haters base their entire opinion on the words of some hack or presenter with their own, or bosses political agenda.
Its like 'Dont think for yourself , WE will tell you who to hate !'

There are a fair few indisputable facts that help the narrative though. He really didn't make it difficult for them to paint him as the big bad wolf. 

 

2 hours ago, treetree said:

The mob did a disgusting, abhorrent thing, as shown by the footage. Not sure how you make the link to that being Trump's fault.

"March on the capital" type rhetoric and phraseology has been the back bone to most political speeches for the past 200 years. Trump derangement syndrome is still alive and kicking, despite him no longer being President.

Yup. It won't happen and I don't think it should happen based on the evidence presented. There's not enough of a clear, unequivocal case of a cause and effect chain directly linking the president's words and the attack on the Capitol. Trump's language is too veiled, too ambiguous. I don't think he says anything that can't be equally interpreted as metaphorical, rather than direct. I'm no Trump fan, but this is a weak case. 

The evidence is pretty damning on specific individuals and hopefully the investigative process will find those members and punish them severely, but as insurrections go? It wasn't exactly the sacking of Rome. It's probably quite hard to be an insurrectionist when one hand is taken up with a rather flimsy selfy stick as a few seem to have. 

But that leads to another problem for the Dems: Why wasn't it worse? Trump's most vocal supporters tend to be the ones who are most heavily armed. Why wasn't the Capitol burned to the ground, or attacked by a well organised armed militia? I can think of three reasons:

A) They're actually all cowards and don't want to make a fuss. That seems...unlikely

B) Trump doesn't have enough supporters to make it worse. He might have got battered in an election, but millions still voted for him

C) The vast majority took his language to be rhetoric, not a direct call to insurrection. 

Given that this vast majority didn't descend on the Capitol on the president's words, it's going to be hard to convict the president on the basis of the tiny minority that did. 

[Rewulf]

3 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

C) The vast majority took his language to be rhetoric, not a direct call to insurrection. 

This is the correct answer.

 

5 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

There are a fair few indisputable facts that help the narrative though. He really didn't make it difficult for them to paint him as the big bad wolf. 

Bad for who? America (or the World in general) or the democratic party and associated left wing media ?

What did he actually do that was so bad?
If you cast your mind back to when he won in 2016, he was painted as the harbinger of doom !
WW3 would surely follow , after he had deported all the Mexicans, and sent the entire LGBT community to the gas chambers.
But in reality, nothing of the sort happened, he spent a good deal of his presidency fighting off baseless allegations launched by the left.
He started no wars, reduced unemployment , and increased prosperity, but when do you hear about that ?

To listen to the rhetoric on MSM these days, its like the US narrowly avoided some apocalyptic scenario directly caused by Trump ?

Too many blinded to the truth by irrational hate.

[Dave-G]

I reckon it will all boil down down to fake news - proof wise.

[chrisjpainter]

34 minutes ago, Rewulf said:

This is the correct answer.

 

Bad for who? America (or the World in general) or the democratic party and associated left wing media ?

What did he actually do that was so bad?
If you cast your mind back to when he won in 2016, he was painted as the harbinger of doom !
WW3 would surely follow , after he had deported all the Mexicans, and sent the entire LGBT community to the gas chambers.
But in reality, nothing of the sort happened, he spent a good deal of his presidency fighting off baseless allegations launched by the left.
He started no wars, reduced unemployment , and increased prosperity, but when do you hear about that ?

To listen to the rhetoric on MSM these days, its like the US narrowly avoided some apocalyptic scenario directly caused by Trump ?

Too many blinded to the truth by irrational hate.

I agree.

Plenty to his detractors, it's just that his supporters will disagree that it's that bad. The building of the wall was always hated - and by millions living along the border. If you're that way inclined, you're going to be enraged by a president promising to build it. He then failed to do it anyway, so he sort of hacked off both sides there. 

Obamacare. He cancelled millions of people's healthcare. Obamacare wasn't perfect, by any stretch. I disagreed he should cancel it, but that's fine. What I can't condone is cancelling it, but have nothing in its place. All this talk of delivering something better came to nothing.

Israel. Strengthening ties across the area was great, I'm not denying that, but moving the embassy to Jerusalem and ? That is a terrible terrible idea - and geopolitically, pretty unnecessary. All that will do is force Palestinians to feel ever more devalued, incarcerated and forgotten, which will make them ever more desperate, which will prolong the violence. Kushner's plan for peace is taken by Palestinians and many in the west (including American voters, but not the voters Trump cares about) as 'give Israel everything they want, and if you say no we'll blame you for everything.' It was made without consultation with the Palestinians and ratifies the settlements that break international law. He closed the Palestinian diplomatic in Washington and cancelled millions of dollars in aid that was going to starving people. 

Then there's North Korea. So much talk about how much good he was going to do! He met Kim! He got those nuclear establishments closed down! He...got completely played. Their weapons programme is now more advanced than ever and they're working on miniaturisation to put nukes on subs. 

Added to the plethora of day-to-day incompetency that became so typical of his presidency and to many you get a picture of a very bad president. The revolving door of government and political appointments are a joke, the finest of which was John Bolton. So many senior voices in the party and in the pentagon said 'don't hire this crazy person.' So he hires him, then has to fire him after a year of a combustible relationship and then launches into a character assassination of his own appointment. But that happened a fair few times. 'Terrific guys' becomes 'useless' the moment they disagree with Trump. He needs yes men 'when I want your opinion, I'll give it to you'. For someone who was touted as not part of the trough and would bring a different kind of politics, he sure learnt quickly how to backtrack, change what he meant, and disregard prior statements to fit his current truth.

I could go on...but it boils down to the simple fact that if your political opinions fall on the wrong side of many or all of them, you're going to say he's a terrible president and you will have plenty of justification. You could list his achievements (I've never denied he has some), but they  don't deny the factual realities of the negatives, it just means you count them for more in your estimation of his presidency. 

But he still shouldn't be found guilty of what he's accused of. The Dems had a chance to bring back some common sense. and blew it. Again. I really wish the Dems would replace Pelosi - she's as guilty as Trump in many of the sins of sowing seeds of division. A plague on both their houses. 

 

[Rewulf]

39 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

Plenty to his detractors, it's just that his supporters will disagree that it's that bad. The building of the wall was always hated - and by millions living along the border. If you're that way inclined, you're going to be enraged by a president promising to build it. He then failed to do it anyway, so he sort of hacked off both sides there. 

He couldnt win either way then?
If anything , the wall was symbolic, it was more about an attitude, one where something was actually going to be done about the 100s of 1000s of illegals that streamed across the border every year, and still are.
Failing to build it wasnt really his fault though , it needed money , and that just wasnt available when other more important things came first.

43 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

Obamacare. He cancelled millions of people's healthcare. Obamacare wasn't perfect, by any stretch. I disagreed he should cancel it, but that's fine. What I can't condone is cancelling it, but have nothing in its place. All this talk of delivering something better came to nothing.

Agreed on that, but to plenty of working Americans who were paying for Obama care , it was very unpopular.

45 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

Israel. Strengthening ties across the area was great, I'm not denying that, but moving the embassy to Jerusalem and ? That is a terrible terrible idea - and geopolitically, pretty unnecessary.

Lets be honest here, It was all a bit of a storm in a teacup, and highly likely not Trumps idea anyway .
He maybe signed it off, but the intent had likely been there for some time...
What the Israelis do to the Palestinians is disgusting, that Trump did no more than any other POTUS to help them is hardly a black mark ?

49 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

Then there's North Korea. So much talk about how much good he was going to do! He met Kim! He got those nuclear establishments closed down! He...got completely played. Their weapons programme is now more advanced than ever and they're working on miniaturisation to put nukes on subs. 

Conjecture, the MSM said fatty was dead not so long ago, and they got that completely wrong.
I will say this , if NK had ballistic missile capable subs, ever...they wouldnt have them very long.

52 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

Added to the plethora of day-to-day incompetency that became so typical of his presidency -snip-

The job of POTUS is more of a figurehead than an actual , real dictatorship.
Yes he messed up a few times, perhaps took the helm when he shouldnt have done ?
He rarely read from a prepared speech or teleprompter , so made mistakes, there have been far worse world leaders than Trump, and it certainly doesnt make him a bad person.
Wait till uncle Joe gets detached from 'oratory support' and has to think on his feet, you will notice he very rarely ad libs, and even press questions are normally answered by a lackey.

58 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

I could go on...but it boils down to the simple fact that if your political opinions fall on the wrong side of many or all of them, you're going to say he's a terrible president and you will have plenty of justification.

What youve said about him  hasnt really been that bad though has it ?
You say plenty of justification for calling him a 'terrible president, but youve not really delivered here.
I suspect when youve thought about it , and no disrespect here, but you found yourself at a bit of a loss finding the smoking gun ?

 

1 hour ago, chrisjpainter said:

But he still shouldn't be found guilty of what he's accused of. The Dems had a chance to bring back some common sense. and blew it. Again. I really wish the Dems would replace Pelosi - she's as guilty as Trump in many of the sins of sowing seeds of division. A plague on both their houses. 

Absolutely , in fact , I would say the dems have done a masterpiece of sowing division in the last few years.

[Zapp]

28 minutes ago, Rewulf said:

 

I will say this , if NK had ballistic missile capable subs, ever...they wouldnt have them very long

By that logic the US would be preparing to go to war when the NK ICBM reaches operating capability, which given that it has done lofted flight tests will happen before the SLBM.  Land based missiles are much easier to develop and deploy in numbers,  can carry more reentry vehicles and have much longer range than SLBM (where you need to develop the missile AND the boat to launch it from).  If the US strategy for ICBMs is containment then it would make no sense for it to be different for SLBMs.

[Rewulf]

22 minutes ago, Zapp said:

By that logic the US would be preparing to go to war when the NK ICBM reaches operating capability, which given that it has done lofted flight tests will happen before the SLBM.  Land based missiles are much easier to develop and deploy in numbers,  can carry more reentry vehicles and have much longer range than SLBM (where you need to develop the missile AND the boat to launch it from).  If the US strategy for ICBMs is containment then it would make no sense for it to be different for SLBMs.

Agreed, I was being very subjective.
I dont believe for one minute NK has 'developed' or miniaturised warheads for SLBMs , they have launched short ranged ballistic missiles , but so have Iran ?
IF , and its a very big if, they were seriously considering , or more importantly , allowed to develop real offensive ICBM tech, surely they would just buy it from China ?

More likely its a publicity stunt, a bargaining chip, its also a virtual certainty China wouldnt let them have the tech .... Unless China felt threatened by the West.

What I was alluding to was, no Western power , and likely not any Eastern power either , would let Kim get within a country mile of any real nuclear capability.

[chrisjpainter]

34 minutes ago, Rewulf said:

 

What youve said about him  hasnt really been that bad though has it ?

I suspect when youve thought about it , and no disrespect here, but you found yourself at a bit of a loss finding the smoking gun ?

 

It's not that, it's just you don't accept them. You're happy to excuse it because, for example, you didn't have your health insurance taken from you...Your argument's boiling down to 'he's not that bad because...I say it isn't'. We could go tit for tat over and over again, you say, 'Trump did this', I say 'Trump did that', but we're never going to agree. All I've done is show you there are plenty of reasons that could validate someone thinking he's a terrible president. Just because you don't agree doesn't make them any less valid for them. 

I will say this though. The largest margin of defeat in the popular vote in history. An electoral college landslide defeat. he lost control of the house (twice). He lost control of the lost Senate. Trump was running against 'Sleepy Joe;' hated on the right, not universally popular on the left and yet Trump got dumped in a landslide, losing states that prior to his term would have been unthinkable to lose. He wasn't unlucky. He wasn't a victim of the mainstream media or a mass fraud. His country decided he didn't deserve another term. He then spent weeks throwing his toys out of his pram and shouting 'I WON (BY A LOT)!' and making more and more absurd claims as he went along, exasperating the left, the right, the house, the senate; even Fox News! He summoned his inner Kevin the Teenager, shouted 'IT'S SO UNFAIR!' and stormed off. Such integrity in a world leader...

 

[Rewulf]

36 minutes ago, chrisjpainter said:

I will say this though. The largest margin of defeat in the popular vote in history. An electoral college landslide defeat. he lost control of the house (twice). He lost control of the lost Senate. Trump was running against 'Sleepy Joe;' hated on the right, not universally popular on the left and yet Trump got dumped in a landslide, losing states that prior to his term would have been unthinkable to lose.

You could say the American electorate hated Trump so bad, they not only decided not to vote, but they got up and voted for the other guy, whether they liked him or not !

But that isnt actually what happened, Trump increased his vote share by 11,000,000 votes, and increased his percentage by 1 % on 2016.
The only problem was , sleepy Joe found 15,000,000 more votes (than Hilarys 2016 tally) from the sleepy dems who never voted before 

Biden won 81,283,098 votes, or 51.3 percent of the votes cast. He is the first U.S. presidential candidate to have won more than 80 million votes. Trump won 74,222,958 votes, or 46.8 percent of the votes cast. That’s more votes than any other presidential candidate has ever won, with the exception of Biden. (Third-party candidates picked up 1.8 percent of the votes cast.)

More than 159 million Americans voted in 2020: 159,633,396 to be exact. That’s the largest total voter turnout in U.S. history and the first time more than 140 million people voted. Voter turnout in 2020 was the highest in 120 years when measured as a percentage of the voting-eligible population: 66.7 percent. You have to go back all the way to 1900 to find a higher percentage turnout (73.7 percent). The election of 1876 holds the record for highest turnout: 82.6 percent. That, of course, was also one of America’s most controversial and consequential elections—and not in a good way.

So Biden wasnt as hated as you thought , or Trump was a lot more hated than you thought ?

Funny old world eh ?  

[chrisjpainter]

2 minutes ago, Rewulf said:

Funny old world eh ?  

Yes

Edited February 11, 2021 by chrisjpainter

[saddler]

Sometimes, NOT funny "ha ha" - as can be seen on Sky News Australia:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Nhm6VAIc90

[johnphilip]

9 hours ago, saddler said:

Sometimes, NOT funny "ha ha" - as can be seen on Sky News Australia:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Nhm6VAIc90

Sad we have to go to the other side of the world to here what is going on . There is another  Australian  news reporter  , dont know his name , but enjoy his reports and his professional  way of reporting  the news .