18 U.S.C. § 1503 defines "obstruction of justice" as an act that "corruptly or by threats or force, or by any threatening letter or communication, influences, obstructs, or impedes, or endeavors to influence, obstruct, or impede, the due administration of justice."
Sounds like Trump committed a crime and it is recorded on video. Charge him.
1) There are a fair number of people that are qualified (at least on paper) to sit on the Supreme Court... probably numbering in the thousands;
2) One of the reasons that the appointment process is controlled by the politicians is because the Court and the law and the administration of justice is, despite our pretentions and ideals, political. Thus people are appointed to the court for political reasons, not for reasons of qualification or competence;
3) Choosing a black woman is a political choice to place a particular perspective on the Court in the hopes that it will help advance certain liberal political objectives--just as appointing white Catholics of a particular doctrinal bent and political/judicial philosophy is the same thing by the GoP... IOW, all the possible candidates are pre-sorted and selected for political reasons;
4) I believe that, as long as the person meets minimum competency, it is important to choose a person that answers or addresses the political concerns of the appointer and their constituency. This is probably more important than differences in perceived qualification.
The SCOTUS appointment and Democrats' oft-misplaced priorities converged for me in this: I doubt the promise of a black female Justice got Biden a single vote, but it has brought him grief- and were he to break it, it would lose him a lot of votes
Think Carville's got it right. Too bad he's not callin' the shots on this issue for the D's. Are these guys ever, ever gonna' wake up to what's actually going on in red states and statehouses around the country? Considering the hour and the evidence so far in hand, I think the answer to that is no.
Yeah, there's been a word or two muttered about the ECA of late. But that's not enough. There is more than one front in this battle. Considering that the R's have shown they have no real respect for the rule of law and the practice of practical norms, if they have their hands on the right levers of power at the state level and don't like the result of a federal election, what are the odds they're just gonna' roll over, even if the ECA is properly reinforced. And WTF does that leave those of us who value our liberties, do not take them for granted and realize the best guarantor of those liberties' continuance is a functioning liberal democracy that's as well protected from election fraud as it can possibly be. If protections on this front were as staunch and wide reaching as those for voter fraud, I'd be breathin' a bit easier. But I don't think the damned D's even know the difference between the two. And I won't be holdin' my breath waiting for them to figure it out, because, well...you know...
"There was nothing veiled about his suggestion that he would hand out get-out-jail-free cards to the rioters — and, by implication, to anyone held legally accountable for his attempted coup. "
There are three:
1. The Democrat political establishment that includes billionaire-funded professional activists, the campuses, the media and the primary hive of trial attorneys. They have managed to fake out the kids that the primary political issue is encased in both the climate change and woke alarmist calling. Their COVID alarmist calling is only a temporary distraction.
2. The Republican establishment that is silent, complicit or just useless in opposition to the former.
3. Trump
The first has become so inebriated on their advantages that they have shed all reasonable self-awareness for their blatant hypocrisy.
They explicitly scream at people challenging vaccination, masks and social distancing but explicitly support BLM and Antifa protests.
They explicitly scream about foreign forces influencing elections by digging up dirt on the Clinton campaign, and explicitly support the Clinton campaign paying for a fake dossier done by foreign forces and then using Obama plants in the FBI to use it to get FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign to dig up dirt.
They explicitly scream at Trump and his supporters over the protestors on Jan-6 as trying to violently overthrow the government (right), while both denying and supporting the rights of BLM and Antifa protestors who violently burn down neighborhoods and take control of them and demand sovereign and autonomous rights to govern themselves.
And now they explicitly scream that Trump would say he would pardon Jan-6 protestors after they explicitly posted bail for, released and failed to prosecute the violent BLM and Antifa protestors.
You see, one thing that voters hate more than anything, is a blatant hypocrite. The Democrats are doing their best to make Trump look like a completely authentic and transparent angel in comparison.
Charlie, it is middle of the road politics as the reason I'm a subscriber. My sanity depends on it. One request though: can you please turn on commentary for all Bulwark articles? These days readers' thoughts are as essential as the articles themselves
Charlie, really appreciate you pulling in intellectually honest viewpoints different from yours —and for Will’s encouragement to do the same. Perhaps this could be a regular feature in the Bulwark or your newsletter: “Views from someone I respect, that differ from mine” (with a catchier name). Loved the dialogue with Rich Lowry on Jane Coaston’s pod.
The SCOTUS is plenty inbred without making a virtue of institutional incest. It wasn't always so. Hugo Black was a Senator. Earl Warren was a Governor. (And BTW, neither had had either moral or scholastic records to be especially proud of.) William O. Douglas was chairman of the SEC.
John Marshall was an envoy to France, a Congressman and Secretary of State.
Add the fetish of narrow educational credentialism (in an era of steadily declining overall academic standards, no less) and the Court is arguably as parochial as it has ever been.
Under the circumstances the problem is not that Biden wants to nominate a black woman, but that he'll probably choose exactly the kind of person that presidents have been robotically nominating for decades.
Seems like an odd time for the Orange Menace to start dangling prospective pardons for seditionists. It would make more sense for him to have done this 9+ months ago or during his 2024 campaign. Unless the real purpose is to embolden MAGA fanatics toward injuring or killing MoCs and prosecutors.
I spent the last few hours on my tractor moving the snow out of our big horseshoe driveway, built back when I still needed to get big trucks in and out. Now, It's like plowing a parking lot with a dinky toy.
As I went back and forth I considered my reading of the Trump pardon ploy and wondered whether this was a good or a bad move on his part. I gave a lot of thought to his supporters who, in my mind are largely blue collar, high school educated people who already had the feeling that they had gotten a rotten deal out of life. You could pile up the reasons, they all have variations, but they are for the most part things that wound up separating them into classes that met in bars to have four or five beers. The other aspect of the MAGA crown is the politicians who feed off of discontent or the wealthy who see opportunity to become wealthier.
The wealthy used to be the backbone of the party. The blue-collar bunch, perhaps what were called Reagan Democrats were lulled into the culture wars and those wars have been expanded in the public eye and now say the quiet part said out loud. Those MAGA guys really do feel that their lack of status is because of Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians. If those guys weren't around, things would be really great!. Then the income disparities would disappear, and they could feel at home with the wealthy republicans. 1932-38 Germany really said the same thing to a disaffected populace that had been experiencing the great depression. They needed a scapegoat and those Damn Jews had snuck up and stolen the show. The populace looked the other way, -kind of ,as Hitler exterminated them.
I don't think I need to go further in the comparison really. What is discouraging for me is watching the Jeff Flakes, the Bob Corkers, the Jeb Bushes see that the fascist tide was high and they put out to sea. The resistance in the GOP is hard to find. Bulwark, the Lincoln project and a few others have waved objections but no where near enough to change much.
The ones who have to change are before us. Not the MAGA hat crowd, you'll never change them. It's the independents- the ones with a conscience who have to turn their backs on the planned move into authoritarianism. I really don't know if they will at this point. What Trump does is to pre-poison the well letting the red hats run wild. I do hope that the Jan 6th committee and the DOJ can act quickly enough to secure prosecution for Trump. No one else can do quite what he does, really a perfect grifter mafia figure who is pretty sure he has figured out how to game the system. Hopefully, like Eugene McCarthy, he will be ultimately puked out of the public view. I don't think amateurs like DeSantis will ever replace him. Weak Tea. These people want blood.
Umm Charlie, you missed Progressives’ angry daddy (aka James Carville) also being very unhappy with Kyrsten Sinema. Not to be a total mean gurl, but like, nobody wants to eat lunch with her.
"She's not going to win a primary against Rep. Ruben Gallego, I'll tell you that damn much," he told the publication. "And I will personally volunteer to help him fundraise because I think we can keep that seat if he runs." - Dem Daddy James Carville
Has anyone considered the possibility that Biden, who spent many years on the Judiciary Committee as Chair or Ranking Member, already knew whom he wanted to appoint on merit, and as it was a Black woman he just decided to get political credit for that?
Who among the folks who are complaining about Biden's promise to appoint a Black woman to the Supreme Court also called out the promises of Reagan and Trump to appoint a woman to the court.
Did anyone complain about Eisenhower appointing William Brennan to improve his standing with Catholics, or Nixon appointing Lewis Powell because he desperately wanted a Southerner and a Corporate lawyer? (Nixon didn't vet Powell very well. Powell was a Democrat who supported Civil Rights. Powell is the last person to be appointed to the Court by a President of the opposite party. In the 20th century, Taft, Wilson, Harding, Hoover, FDR, Truman, and Eisenhower had also appointed justices who were from the opposite party.)
I don't know whom Biden will appoint but the credentials of the people that are being passed around by the media as possibilities look at least as impressive as did O'Connor and Barrett.
What in the world is wrong with a black female on the court? Even Sen Graham says it will better reflect the make up of the country. Then you have Collins of Maine lying about what Ragen said before naming the first female. Actually it makes no difference in the decisions for years to come.
Last week we had International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Along with the gut wrenching documentaries were newspapers from that time. One that struck me was a front page from 1933 where Hitler was running for election again. It reminded me of Donald Trump. This weekend Trump called for violence against anyone who might indict him. His unhinged rants and lies were meant to stoke hate and violence. We had a taste of this on January 6. In essence Trump has his own stormtroopers who will menace and carry out violence. We minimize this at our own risk. He is the Republican party, supported by the GOP and spawning people like Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Green.
18 U.S.C. § 1503 defines "obstruction of justice" as an act that "corruptly or by threats or force, or by any threatening letter or communication, influences, obstructs, or impedes, or endeavors to influence, obstruct, or impede, the due administration of justice."
Sounds like Trump committed a crime and it is recorded on video. Charge him.
1) There are a fair number of people that are qualified (at least on paper) to sit on the Supreme Court... probably numbering in the thousands;
2) One of the reasons that the appointment process is controlled by the politicians is because the Court and the law and the administration of justice is, despite our pretentions and ideals, political. Thus people are appointed to the court for political reasons, not for reasons of qualification or competence;
3) Choosing a black woman is a political choice to place a particular perspective on the Court in the hopes that it will help advance certain liberal political objectives--just as appointing white Catholics of a particular doctrinal bent and political/judicial philosophy is the same thing by the GoP... IOW, all the possible candidates are pre-sorted and selected for political reasons;
4) I believe that, as long as the person meets minimum competency, it is important to choose a person that answers or addresses the political concerns of the appointer and their constituency. This is probably more important than differences in perceived qualification.
Russ Feingold! You helped defeat Russ Feingold and elect Ron Johnson! OMG Russ Feingold was great. WTF
The SCOTUS appointment and Democrats' oft-misplaced priorities converged for me in this: I doubt the promise of a black female Justice got Biden a single vote, but it has brought him grief- and were he to break it, it would lose him a lot of votes
Think Carville's got it right. Too bad he's not callin' the shots on this issue for the D's. Are these guys ever, ever gonna' wake up to what's actually going on in red states and statehouses around the country? Considering the hour and the evidence so far in hand, I think the answer to that is no.
Yeah, there's been a word or two muttered about the ECA of late. But that's not enough. There is more than one front in this battle. Considering that the R's have shown they have no real respect for the rule of law and the practice of practical norms, if they have their hands on the right levers of power at the state level and don't like the result of a federal election, what are the odds they're just gonna' roll over, even if the ECA is properly reinforced. And WTF does that leave those of us who value our liberties, do not take them for granted and realize the best guarantor of those liberties' continuance is a functioning liberal democracy that's as well protected from election fraud as it can possibly be. If protections on this front were as staunch and wide reaching as those for voter fraud, I'd be breathin' a bit easier. But I don't think the damned D's even know the difference between the two. And I won't be holdin' my breath waiting for them to figure it out, because, well...you know...
"There was nothing veiled about his suggestion that he would hand out get-out-jail-free cards to the rioters — and, by implication, to anyone held legally accountable for his attempted coup. "
There are three:
1. The Democrat political establishment that includes billionaire-funded professional activists, the campuses, the media and the primary hive of trial attorneys. They have managed to fake out the kids that the primary political issue is encased in both the climate change and woke alarmist calling. Their COVID alarmist calling is only a temporary distraction.
2. The Republican establishment that is silent, complicit or just useless in opposition to the former.
3. Trump
The first has become so inebriated on their advantages that they have shed all reasonable self-awareness for their blatant hypocrisy.
They explicitly scream at people challenging vaccination, masks and social distancing but explicitly support BLM and Antifa protests.
They explicitly scream about foreign forces influencing elections by digging up dirt on the Clinton campaign, and explicitly support the Clinton campaign paying for a fake dossier done by foreign forces and then using Obama plants in the FBI to use it to get FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign to dig up dirt.
They explicitly scream at Trump and his supporters over the protestors on Jan-6 as trying to violently overthrow the government (right), while both denying and supporting the rights of BLM and Antifa protestors who violently burn down neighborhoods and take control of them and demand sovereign and autonomous rights to govern themselves.
And now they explicitly scream that Trump would say he would pardon Jan-6 protestors after they explicitly posted bail for, released and failed to prosecute the violent BLM and Antifa protestors.
You see, one thing that voters hate more than anything, is a blatant hypocrite. The Democrats are doing their best to make Trump look like a completely authentic and transparent angel in comparison.
Charlie, it is middle of the road politics as the reason I'm a subscriber. My sanity depends on it. One request though: can you please turn on commentary for all Bulwark articles? These days readers' thoughts are as essential as the articles themselves
Charlie, really appreciate you pulling in intellectually honest viewpoints different from yours —and for Will’s encouragement to do the same. Perhaps this could be a regular feature in the Bulwark or your newsletter: “Views from someone I respect, that differ from mine” (with a catchier name). Loved the dialogue with Rich Lowry on Jane Coaston’s pod.
The SCOTUS is plenty inbred without making a virtue of institutional incest. It wasn't always so. Hugo Black was a Senator. Earl Warren was a Governor. (And BTW, neither had had either moral or scholastic records to be especially proud of.) William O. Douglas was chairman of the SEC.
John Marshall was an envoy to France, a Congressman and Secretary of State.
Add the fetish of narrow educational credentialism (in an era of steadily declining overall academic standards, no less) and the Court is arguably as parochial as it has ever been.
Under the circumstances the problem is not that Biden wants to nominate a black woman, but that he'll probably choose exactly the kind of person that presidents have been robotically nominating for decades.
Seems like an odd time for the Orange Menace to start dangling prospective pardons for seditionists. It would make more sense for him to have done this 9+ months ago or during his 2024 campaign. Unless the real purpose is to embolden MAGA fanatics toward injuring or killing MoCs and prosecutors.
I spent the last few hours on my tractor moving the snow out of our big horseshoe driveway, built back when I still needed to get big trucks in and out. Now, It's like plowing a parking lot with a dinky toy.
As I went back and forth I considered my reading of the Trump pardon ploy and wondered whether this was a good or a bad move on his part. I gave a lot of thought to his supporters who, in my mind are largely blue collar, high school educated people who already had the feeling that they had gotten a rotten deal out of life. You could pile up the reasons, they all have variations, but they are for the most part things that wound up separating them into classes that met in bars to have four or five beers. The other aspect of the MAGA crown is the politicians who feed off of discontent or the wealthy who see opportunity to become wealthier.
The wealthy used to be the backbone of the party. The blue-collar bunch, perhaps what were called Reagan Democrats were lulled into the culture wars and those wars have been expanded in the public eye and now say the quiet part said out loud. Those MAGA guys really do feel that their lack of status is because of Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians. If those guys weren't around, things would be really great!. Then the income disparities would disappear, and they could feel at home with the wealthy republicans. 1932-38 Germany really said the same thing to a disaffected populace that had been experiencing the great depression. They needed a scapegoat and those Damn Jews had snuck up and stolen the show. The populace looked the other way, -kind of ,as Hitler exterminated them.
I don't think I need to go further in the comparison really. What is discouraging for me is watching the Jeff Flakes, the Bob Corkers, the Jeb Bushes see that the fascist tide was high and they put out to sea. The resistance in the GOP is hard to find. Bulwark, the Lincoln project and a few others have waved objections but no where near enough to change much.
The ones who have to change are before us. Not the MAGA hat crowd, you'll never change them. It's the independents- the ones with a conscience who have to turn their backs on the planned move into authoritarianism. I really don't know if they will at this point. What Trump does is to pre-poison the well letting the red hats run wild. I do hope that the Jan 6th committee and the DOJ can act quickly enough to secure prosecution for Trump. No one else can do quite what he does, really a perfect grifter mafia figure who is pretty sure he has figured out how to game the system. Hopefully, like Eugene McCarthy, he will be ultimately puked out of the public view. I don't think amateurs like DeSantis will ever replace him. Weak Tea. These people want blood.
Pete VanderLaan
Umm Charlie, you missed Progressives’ angry daddy (aka James Carville) also being very unhappy with Kyrsten Sinema. Not to be a total mean gurl, but like, nobody wants to eat lunch with her.
"She's not going to win a primary against Rep. Ruben Gallego, I'll tell you that damn much," he told the publication. "And I will personally volunteer to help him fundraise because I think we can keep that seat if he runs." - Dem Daddy James Carville
https://news.yahoo.com/james-carville-says-kyrsten-sinema-212503639.html
Has anyone considered the possibility that Biden, who spent many years on the Judiciary Committee as Chair or Ranking Member, already knew whom he wanted to appoint on merit, and as it was a Black woman he just decided to get political credit for that?
Who among the folks who are complaining about Biden's promise to appoint a Black woman to the Supreme Court also called out the promises of Reagan and Trump to appoint a woman to the court.
Did anyone complain about Eisenhower appointing William Brennan to improve his standing with Catholics, or Nixon appointing Lewis Powell because he desperately wanted a Southerner and a Corporate lawyer? (Nixon didn't vet Powell very well. Powell was a Democrat who supported Civil Rights. Powell is the last person to be appointed to the Court by a President of the opposite party. In the 20th century, Taft, Wilson, Harding, Hoover, FDR, Truman, and Eisenhower had also appointed justices who were from the opposite party.)
I don't know whom Biden will appoint but the credentials of the people that are being passed around by the media as possibilities look at least as impressive as did O'Connor and Barrett.
What in the world is wrong with a black female on the court? Even Sen Graham says it will better reflect the make up of the country. Then you have Collins of Maine lying about what Ragen said before naming the first female. Actually it makes no difference in the decisions for years to come.
Last week we had International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Along with the gut wrenching documentaries were newspapers from that time. One that struck me was a front page from 1933 where Hitler was running for election again. It reminded me of Donald Trump. This weekend Trump called for violence against anyone who might indict him. His unhinged rants and lies were meant to stoke hate and violence. We had a taste of this on January 6. In essence Trump has his own stormtroopers who will menace and carry out violence. We minimize this at our own risk. He is the Republican party, supported by the GOP and spawning people like Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Green.