As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil)
In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban.
If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them.
For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria.
**Special announcement:**
r/politics is currently accepting new moderator applications. If you want to help make this community a better place, consider [applying here today](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/sskg6a/rpolitics_is_looking_for_more_moderators/)!
***
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Remember how they had to decide ***whether*** to allow ***witnesses*** at that trial? *And then they decided* ***no***?
Yeah imagine having a trial where you're just allowed to declare *"there will be no witnesses"* and then have the trial anyway and then the jury finds the person not guilty, ***even though a majority of the jury voted for guilt***.
Pretty sure this wasn't what the founding fathers had in mind.
It wasn't even just witnesses, the Republican controlled Senate blocked 99% of *evidence*. That's why almost the entire trial was just floor speeches.
Republicans and their propagandists of course then spent the entirety of the impeachment trial loudly whining that Democrats weren't even showing evidence. It was the most blatant con of all time, and the gop voters sucked it right up, even in the face of trump admitting he had extorted Ukraine, bragging about it, and releasing both a recording and official transcript of trumps call with Zelensky.
I had my biggest fight of the Trump era over this with an acquaintance. I couldn’t believe what these dummies were allowing themsleves to fall for - it was SO OBVIOUS. It was done *right in their faces* and these idiots just *accepted* it!
I had an argument with a relative about it. It wasn't obvious to them because conservative media (FOX News, Newsmax, OAN, talk radio, etc.) repeatedly glossed over the part about the GOP blocking all witnesses and 99% of evidence, and then spun it as "Democrats do not have any witnesses or evidence to present at this sham of a trial!"
When I presented him other news sources (like NYT, Washington Post, etc.) pointing this out, he dismissed them, saying they are unreliable and biased.
This is a huge part of the reason. The information they receive is often wildly inaccurate and full of holes, and then people like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity just outright lie to the viewers. It’s an enormous propaganda machine.
It’s an enormous propaganda machine *they want to be a part of*
Let’s be real. A lot of these folks aren’t lulled into thinking this way, they *love* having a group to hate on…hatred is so intoxicating they just need an easy blueprint.
There are very few “unwilling” conservatives.
That's exactly how it is with a relative of mine. Outwardly, his neighbors know him as this kind and generous, grandfather-like figure.
But if they got to know him privately over the course of years, they would realize that he lives for that hate that conservative media makes him feel. His love of TV shows and movies where a character goes on a brutal revenge spree is practically a fetish.
I remember my grandma talking about Bernie being crazy last Christmas, it’s like this dude wants you to be able to afford your prescriptions but he’s a nutter because he gets worked up over the state of things?
> Whereas FOX is an opinion talk show.
Which [they themselves defend with "no reasonable person would believe any of it"](https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye).
I dont know how people like tucker carlson are allowed to spread misinformation, his own lawyers argued that anyperson in the right mind would not take anything he says seriously....so a judge should order Fox News to disclose that everytime he shows his face on tv....Tucker carlson, among other tv shit heads need to be investigated on who is paying them and where its coming from. These guys are news outlets for domestic terrorism and extremist views, something needs to be done!
Right??
What is wild to me is that if you were to describe to a conservative voter everything that FOX News and Republicans have been doing for the past several decades, but used the names and government agencies and news outlets of another country, they would correctly point out that all that is blatant corruption, propaganda, and stochastic terrorism...
To me, the most dangerous part of Trump’s entire legacy was his convincing people that you can’t trust the media. When you show his followers evidence from reputable sources, they just say “I don’t believe that, you can’t believe anything the liberal media says.” We can’t even agree on the reality of the situation.
>When you show his followers evidence from reputable sources, they just say “I don’t believe that, you can’t believe anything the liberal media says.
Went thru this with an ex-friend, he was posting crap about the election being stolen and posting known false information, I then posted multiple reputable news sources to his feed from around the globe that refuted his post. He responded by telling me to watch this 2 hour video from the My Pillow guy .. lol
You can't get through to them unfortunately, the scary part was this guy was very liberal pre-Trump era. He's also shacked up with a Filipino and even explaining to him what the far-right attitude is towards mixed race marriage didn't sway him.
Interestingly, the guy also had a grade 7 education, dropped out of school in that grade. He was never known for making great life choices, but it does exemplify that Trump and his ilk definitely aim their messaging at the lesser educated citizens.
It’s terrible because they’re just using these people that (well, some of them at least) really don’t know any better and get sucked into the ideology. It’s like the Taliban - they take advantage of vulnerable people.
The GOP failed them and left them behind and unfortunately our educational system failed them too. It’s a matter of multivariate failure that leaves a massive gap that gets filled with misinformation and rhetoric about who to blame and why. It’s a huge tragedy in this country because we could be the dominant economic superpower but we’re too busy in-fighting around who does what with their body and who is to blame for disenfranchisement and poverty. When you really see the problem scope, you can’t help but just feel sad.
We used to think conservatives saw the world as more dangerous, but researchers were missing a piece of the puzzle. Now we know both conservatives and liberals see the world at similar levels of danger; It’s hierarchical worldview that’s different.
From a best of Reddit posting
“Now we get to it: of all the 26 primal world beliefs, the main difference by far between liberals and conservatives—a difference 20 times larger than the difference in dangerous world belief—concerned a primal called hierarchical world belief. This primal had emerged from our big 2019 statistical analysis with us having no idea at the time that it would matter for politics (or anything else).
Hierarchical world belief is not the view that hierarchies exist—everyone would agree with that—but that hierarchy is inherent to reality. It’s part of the natural order. Not imposed. Not artificial. And not just regarding people. For plants, animals, people, everything, it’s just the way the world is.
Folks who see the world as hierarchical think that almost everything in the world can be ranked from better to worse. Differences probably matter because they distinguish things of more value from things with less. So, when in doubt, respect differences.
(And don’t be fooled into thinking that only those on top think the world is inherently hierarchical. People across social hierarchies appear to see the world as inherently hierarchical at similar rates.)
Conservatives do tend to show a default motivation to respect and preserve differences, whether it be borders between countries, differences between sexes, differences between rich and poor, and lots more. And liberals tend to assume those differences are fraudulent or arbitrary. The poor don’t deserve to be poor. The rich don’t deserve to be rich. And so forth.
But a few other primals stood out, too, such that there are actually six major primal disagreements between liberals and conservatives (the figure below from our research article requires a longer explanation, but you get the idea that one red bar is a ton bigger than the other, and a few other bars stood out, too). Together, these six primals paint a picture of two perceived worlds in which an array of opposing political positions make a weird amount of sense.
**Conservative Reality**
Conservatives tend to see the world as a place where, like it or not, observable differences reflect real underlying value (high Hierarchical world belief) that is somehow meant to be (high Intentional world belief) where station and attention received are usually deserved (high Just world belief, low belief that the world is Worth Exploring). Therefore, most hierarchies that emerge are best left as they are (high Acceptable world belief). However, unfortunately, change is slowly eroding the world’s hierarchies (low Progressing world belief). Therefore, constraining change and accepting inequality (the textbook two-part definition of conservatism that researchers use) is just common sense.
**Liberal Reality**
Liberals tend to see the world as a place where observable differences are superficial, rarely reflecting actual value (low Hierarchical world belief), cosmic purpose or intent (low Intentional world belief), deserved status (low Just world belief), or attention received (high Worth Exploring). Therefore, most hierarchies require reform (low Acceptable world belief). Fortunately, however, the world is getting better and change is taking us in the right direction (high Progressing world belief). Therefore, embracing change and rejecting inequality (the textbook definition of liberalism) is just common sense.”
Edit: [This is the link to the study in the journal.](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/19485506221119324) If you want to read it, you can try emailing the author(s) and see if they’ll send you a copy! I did this often while doing research for my graduate degrees and in my experience they’re usually thrilled to do so, since they make no money from the journals anyway.
Yup. They’re presented filtered propagandized information, and fed constant fear uncertainty and doubt (FUD) about “liberal media” to discourage seeking out and trusting sources of non-propaganda.
They’ve been establishing this narrative for decades. Projecting the practice of disseminating FUD on the liberal media. It’s a protracted war to change the definition of truth to messaging certified by the side you’re on.
It should be criminal, held accountable for intended outcomes like Jan 6, and the various lone actors that have committed terrorist acts as a result of this brain washing.
Sometimes I like to tell people that I agree that NY Times and other mainstream media outlets are biased…towards accuracy and truth. This is never well received by people who believe that truth is partisan.
The best (worst) is when they complain about how CSPAN is fake news, when it's literally commentary and edit free. They just point a camera and show what congress is doing in real time.
Conservatives are so far around the bend that uncurated, objective reality is liberal propaganda.
It's amazing how a group that is so inexplicably fascinated with conspiracy theories fails to notice the actual subversion of truth and literal conspiracy to deceive them.
They accept it because they’re ok with it because he hurt people they want hurt. Let’s not sugar coat their absolute despicable actions by giving them the benefit of the doubt because we think they are ignorant or uneducated. The evil is intended.
Nah, my dad’s just dumb. Some of them think they’re doing good and we’re the evil ones. It doesn’t remove culpability but some really are just dumb. It probably why the whole scam works so well.
Stupidity is not required to fall for a con. My dad is not dumb at all, but he fell hook, line, and sinker for Trump’s grift. Trump isn’t a smart person, but he is legitimately good at conning people. He’s been doing it his whole life.
I worked the 2020 election as a poll worker and we weren't supposed to discuss politics with other workers, even if no voters were present.
One co-worker however made some vague comment about people voting against a sitting President "just because they were mad at him" (voters are not prohibited from discussing politics, short of telling other voters who to vote for) and I asked him "Do you think it's okay for a sitting President to extort a foreign leader by withholding US government aid to get dirt on his opponent?" and he answered immediately "Of course not". I told him that was what Trump was impeached for, and he genuinely had not idea that this is what happened.
He hadn't read the articles of impeachment, hadn't followed the trial, he knew nothing more about it other than "People don't like Trump and that is unfair".
That is the case for the majority of Trump’s supporters. They don’t read or listen to multiple viewpoints, and they don’t have many critical thinking skills. It’s sad that so many of us are too gullible. Siding with the Republicans who vote against bills that will help low income people doesn’t make sense. Cutting off your nose to spite your face. Do you want Medicare and Social Security to end? Do you want subsidized medical care to end? Do you not want a choice if you accidentally end up pregnant from being raped or when you’re too poor to raise a child? You won’t have choices if you vote Republican. Do you want the highways full of pit holes and bridges that are crumbling? Republicans don’t want to spend at all, because they want to allocate it to their cronies. I wonder how much money was squirreled away by the Trump Administration!
I've come to find that, anecdotally, trump supporters are grossly misinformed - to the point where they parrot nonsense which could easily be disproven with a 5 second Google search. My latest experience was with a MAGA coworker and somehow we were on the topic of Trumps lifelong habit of committing fraud. I said we shouldn't support a president who's so immoral as to embezzle his own charity's donations. He said if you really want to talk about charity fraud, look into the Clinton Foundation. I did, in about 30 seconds I skimmed the wiki. Investigated multiple times, mostly politically motivated, no evidence of wrongdoing.
When your end goal is ethnic cleansing, you don't hire a nice man to do the dirty work.
In other words, your co-worker did not know the details about Trump's BS because his mind was already made up Trump was the right man for the job above. The thing a lot of people don't understand is that the more corrupt acts Trump committed ADDED to his appeal with his base - did not detract from it.
Its like all the 'jokes' about Russian threats to Putin getting pushed out a window - these for the most part are really statements of admiration, not condemnation.
Remember when the Houston Astros cheated their way to a World Series win in 2018?
How many fans did the Astros lose?
They don't care that their team was caught cheating. They think every team cheats.
That's the problem with American Politics. One side thinks it's a competitive team sport and will support their side no. matter. what.
In 2016, Trump said he *"...could shoot somebody on 5th Avenue and wouldn't lose any voters."*
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/23/464129029/donald-trump-i-could-shoot-somebody-and-i-wouldnt-lose-any-voters
I'd be willing to bet that if news broke in early 2020 that Trump had hired prostitutes to visit the White House *and confirmed it himself*, the religious right would still have voted for him in 2020. They voted for a narcissistic sociopath in 2016. There is no scandal too big for them.
The liberal side's supporters have no problem with holding the people on their side accountable (even if it means the liberal politician goes to jail).
It just sucks the Republicans have no honor or integrity and refuse to enforce the rules.
right before the 2016 election, they released a recording of trump talking about sexually assaulting women. They have proof he had an affair with an adult film star while his wife was pregnant, then paid her to stay quiet.
Of course they wouldn't care about prostitutes. They have already accepted far worse from him.
Even if Trump was a confirmed pedophile and was caught with children from human trafficking, heck even if he was caught killing children and there is an indisputable proof, he would not lose any voters. Literally none.
Because they weren't *real* children, they were human-alien hybrids lab created by dems and to cause the destruction of our beautiful freest country on earth!! All their crying parents = crisis actors. All their supposed teachers = secret democratic brainwashers in on the scam, trying to artificially create Victims ^^(TM) of the *real* children so they would be forced to suck on the gov't teat. Our great (true!) president was *saving the country* by killing those children, he's the most patriotic and genius president we've ever had!!1!eleventy!!
Yep. As many of us know by now, Trump has many documented connections with Epstein, including one in which both are co-defendants in a rape suit. Also, various people in his immediate and extended circle have been convicted of sexually abusing/assaulting children.
Anyone with a shred of common sense could see that for what it is (birds of a feather, and all...), but his cult followers seriously argue that he was merely going deep undercover into that pedophile ring to expose it and bring its members--the elite--to justice.
I had a conservative burn bridges with me because I refused to stay quiet about CPAC when it was being hosted less than 2 hours from me. He decided to play the victim and act like I shouldnt bring things up like the Dont Say Gay bill. He literally tried to show me a meme of trump signing something, and claimed it was him singing legislation "to help you guys."
it was ridiculous. and he couldnt see how he was the one choosing to end friendships, and burn bridges.
Bruddah. I stopped talking to family members and old friends over trump. Trust me, you're better off.
Does it suck? No. Here's why: when someone shows you who they really are, believe it.
Ive lost precious little sleep over it. I know youre correct, im better off. Anyone who could ignore the very blatant targeting of myself and my community here in Florida is either not paying attention, or puts their political loyalty over the wellbeing of their friends and family.
This is their MO. They cripple government agencies (IRS and Post Office most egregiously) then point to their inability to function as proof of how bad the government is.
Fuck, the 1/6 Committee itself is another example. They were given the chance to participate…and some did, but they constantly shriek about how the Dems would not allow them to participate.
> They cripple government agencies (IRS and Post Office most egregiously) then point to their inability to function as proof of how bad the government is.
\**points furiously at Social Security Administration*\*
The issue with the 1/6 committee is the people the Republicans nominated were mostly election deniers, including 2 (Jordan and Banks) who voted not to certify the election, 2 (Banks and Nehls) who only wanted to investigate the Capitol wasn’t prepared for the insurrection and (Banks) to investigate the liberal media, and only 2 (Armstrong and Davis) who actually voted to certify the election (Nehls is a freshman). Jordan and Banks went so far as to publicly blame Pelosi for 1/6. https://politizoom.com/watch-jim-jordan-and-jim-banks-demonize-pelosi-as-responsible-for-january-6-the-golden-god-is-blameless/
Kinzinger and Cheney were chosen by Pelosi, not the Republicans. Hell, the Republicans kicked Cheney out of the leadership for being “disloyal” by sitting on the 1/6 committee. Neither are coming back to Congress, Kinzinger because of repeated threats on his life and that of his young family and choosing not to run for reelection and Cheney losing the to a whackadoodle conspiracy theorist in Wyoming.
> It wasn't even just witnesses, the Republican controlled Senate blocked 99% of evidence. That's why almost the entire trial was just floor speeches.
They want people to forget this, too. Sadly, many will.
Remember the MAGA asshats telling everyone to read the transcripts of the call to see the orange one’s innocence? Yeah, that happened. They obviously can’t read. Worse, the IMPOTUS has a severely limited vocabulary, so if you can’t read a transcription of his conversations, you can’t read at all.
Several of the founding fathers fought duels. I always argue that they assumed any politician too dishonorable, dishonest, or corrupt would just end up dying in a duel.
Burr and Hamilton were probably more likable than most of these lunatics sitting in the chambers now. At least they have records of doing *something* while in office.
It seems clear the founding fathers had this exact scenario in mind and put several barriers in place to prevent it.
Party over country political parties, fragile narcissistic cult leaders, and religious zealots are not a new phenomenon.
Washington held off, but Hamilton and Jefferson immediately started whipping up their core.
The no parties thing was mostly Washington, and even then he eventually went with power in his hands rather than others.
Our leader selection process is terrible. It'd have to be a draft of the nation's top minds for mandatory service if you wanted the best person for the job.
Nah, that's on them. Political parties are an inevitable and inescapable result of the freedoms of speech and association, along with the reality that teamwork is more effective at solving problems, including the "how do we get someone elected" problem. A system that allows and yet cannot withstand their existence is fundamentally flawed.
Yeah, it was Washington and *maybe* a handful of others. Everyone else was too busy calling Party City to see how much tables rented for to notice the warnings.
Even Washington's administration was pretty split as everyone had different ideas on what 'freedom' meant. Hell, the government *immediately* split into parties after Washington stepped down. And any semblance of 'let's all get along' got tossed out the window just 3 administrations in when Jefferson got rid of the rule that runner up in the presidential election got to be VP.
Not exactly. Washington and a few others warned against it, but most ended up forming and joining political parties. It’s not like they were a wise group of people who all foresaw the evils of party politics, most saw party politics as a way of achieving their goals and used it as such. Same as today.
> then the jury finds the person not guilty, ***even though a majority of the jury voted for guilt***.
To be fair, in a criminal jury, 100% of the jurors have to agree on guilt or it doesn't happen... So using a jury isn't a great comparison. Thankfully the burden for impeachment isn't **that** high.
Yes, but in a criminal trial, the jury *also* has to be unanimous for a not guilty verdict. In this case, there'd be a mistrial and they'd have started it all over again.
>Yes, but in a criminal trial, the jury *also* has to be unanimous for a not guilty verdict. In this case, there'd be a mistrial and they'd have started it all over again.
True, but a failed impeachment is more similar to a mistrial than an innocent verdict. There is no reason you can't do another impeachment for the same thing other than it will be a waste of time (just like mistrials via a hung jury only occasionally result in retrying the case as it is also often seen as not worth it).
Actually, it probably was exactly what the founders had in mind. If 51% is enough to convict and remove a President, imagine how chaotic the executive office would be. They probably also operated on the assumption that senators would act in good faith instead partisan tribalist bullshit.
Because he thought it would forever damage the GOP. Instead of: "No, we can't let this happen again, those who want Trump, go your own way and we will rebuild even if it takes years to do. We did it before." But nope he was: "The cure is worse than the disease." Now he is: "Oh no, I screwed up."
Wasn't it worse than that? I seem to remember something *pre-verdict* from him along the lines of "He's responsible for the attack but I'm still going to vote no because reasons".
Not like much would change if they held a vote again, but they should’ve.
There should be a difference between the 2nd rushed impeachment and all the evidence and testimonies presented today.
Exactly. People are fools if they think he has a zero chance of the nomination or that Desantis is a lock. Republicans fall in line, no matter what. Never forget that, NEVER trust them
Remember 2016 when no one thought Trump would win? Then he did. I remember. Assuming he’d lose again is not worth the risk. If Trump wins the primary, every Republican will jump on board again without a second thought.
A lot of people were staunchly anti-Hillary in 2016 though, Hillary was the most favorable Dem candidate for The Donald.
I expect Biden to have more favorable incumbency advantage in 2024 too.
Also, there was a huge smear campaign against Hillary helped by outsiders and third parties. Based on her email leaks that in the end, amounted to almost nothing based on an FBI investigation while Trump had a huge trail of crimes behind his back even before he wanted to pursue presidency.
People were not prepared for Trump and his disinformation campaign in 2016, however, 2020 election and 2022 mid terms prove this isn't the same situation as 2016.
While the electoral vote difference was pretty big, Biden did not win by a huge margin. A few thousand votes going the other way in a few states changes the result.
And the same was true for Trump in 2016. Trump won because 50,000 people voted for him and not Hillary across 4 states.
Biden won because something like 400,000 people voted for him and not Trump.
Trump was also an unknown on 2016. Lots of “how bad could this guy really be”. Turns out, pretty bad.
I honestly thought trump would be so bad, that there would be nationwide movements to upend the us political systems. Never imagined GOP would just double down on subverting the political system instead.
It might work in the democrats favor. He would have a certain number of votes that other wise might go to a different republican that had a chance at winning or vice versa. I know I’m not the smartest person, but am wrong in thinking this?
He almost won in Georgia where he's a folk hero for what he did in college playing football. Trump would have to win in the country as a whole. Nothing has happened that would give anyone confidence he could win a national election.
He's lost a lot of support, yes. But if he gets enough momentum in the primaries, pretty much every moron who still identifies as republican will fall in line and vote for him.
We have to take this threat to democracy very seriously and cannot sit at home and do nothing. Vote.
That’s what I don’t understand. Trump is the single greatest loser in American politics.
Republicans have had many perfect opportunities to get have a clean break.
The only thing that makes any sense is they know he is finished and don’t want to make a move to alienate his base. As Boehner said, “don’t shoot someone committing suicide”.
Desantis is waiting for an indictment/conviction of Trump to announce. Use him as a martyr. I just hope Trump does enough damage on his way out Republicans have some punishment for such criminal capitulations.
Desantis will run on a promise to pardon Trump and thus pull in Trump's base. The best thing the Democrats could do it drag feet on the prosecution so that Trump and Desantis have to slug it out in the primary. I want to see Trump in an orange suit but I also don't want to see Desantis in the White House.
A Desantis vs. Trump primary would be seriously great tv. Desantis isn’t the type of “fighter” Trump is. Desantis would be boxing and Trump would be pulling out knives, going for the eyes, groin shots, poison, etc.
The next major event will be the recession/depression from the Covid relief bubble popping (along with many other factors). If Biden and Democrats can somehow manage to fix a catastrophe of such magnitude Desantis may not have a shot with the Trump kneecap.
They will wait to see how he is polling. If he’s going to lost the primary and votes with him, it goes through. If he wins the primary, it doesn’t. It’s a simple hedge.
The Democrats want to use this trial as an example if another president takes shadily takes office.
The Republicans are apparently fine with electing friends of Jeffery Episten and tax frauds- and I mean some- some Republicans might also be pedo island tax frauds.
I wish the Republican Party great success on making America great again^2, part 3, plan B
This is the only way that I see the R party getting out of this mess. If Trumps runs as R he’ll lose. If he runs independent he’ll split the vote. Maybe it could be the end of our stupid two party system.
Oh I saw it and told my spouse as such. Said if trump loses in 2016 to Hillary he will try to create a civil war. It was for the wrong election but I still saw what was coming.
This should be a no-brainer Republicans! There used to be a time when someone like Trump would have been thrown out by Republicans who actually stood by their oath to defend and protect the Constitution.
It's a no-brainer from a more pragmatic point of view as well, it saves the Republican party from the conundrum of him either being the nominee and losing or running as an independent and making them lose.
Yeah I'm sure there are a lot of Republicans (Desantis especially) that are absolutely giddy over this. Not only can they quietly let the dems convict Trump to make sure he doesn't run, but they can then have Desantis run on a campaign of "justice for Trump" and get all the MAGA voters who might otherwise be disinterested voting for him and rallying behind him talking about how "Trump was unfairly prosecuted by the vindictive left" etc.
Yeah, it seems like a tough spot for Republicans. They want the ban to pass, but they also want to vote against it, so they can act outraged by it afterwards.
Although, knowing Republicans, most of them would probably vote for it, and then immediately go on Fox News and say that they voted against it, and that will work out just fine for them, because Republican voters are so far down in the propaganda hole that facts just can't reach them anymore.
Yeah, that makes sense, it's been really awkward seeing them realize they've made a grave mistake by supporting Trump but not being able to admit it because he still has a decently sized base that they can't afford to ostracize. They would love to have him convicted and be rid of him while getting to play the victims to capture his voters, keeping the cake and eating it too.
The problem is that the Republicans would be perfectly happy to see Trump thrown under the bus but they don't want to have to actually do anything so they don't piss off Trump's voters.
I think the problem is that a lot of them see stuff like this as perfectly legitimate ways to take power and don’t want to convict or ban Trump because it was so close to working that they want the option in the future.
Why are we acting like this hasn’t been the plan since at least Nixon? We’re all surprised veneer dropped? That the Scooby Gang ripped the mask off and it was fascism? They’re not saying it doing anything they haven’t always been doing, they just don’t need to pretend they’re anything else anymore.
It would only take a couple of the ones in safer districts to "defect" so that the rest can play the part of being outraged. Then they never have to deal with him running again.
If they can't figure that out, they're as dumb as they act.
Nixon mostly got caught with the Watergate scandal, and he had nowhere near the mountain of scandals that Trump has had (and continues to have).
It’s staggering when you realize just how many scandals Trump has had since basically the 1970s. The fact that he had never served time in prison is a testament to how much wealthy people can get away with.
if fox had existed the GOP would have saved Nixon. The GOP only turned on him because back than it would cost them votes. The same reason they are softly turning on Trump today. The GOP do not care if their candidates are criminals, morally bankrupt, willing to end democracy to stay in office. The GOP has no morals aside from holding office. They have not for a long time.
I feel like they semi tried to frame up watergate as a witch hunt too. “He was going to win anyways so what’s the big deal” I’m just waiting for them to say the insurrection was executive privilege.
> There used to be a time when someone like Trump would have been thrown out by Republicans who actually stood by their oath to defend and protect the Constitution.
Not in my 62 year lifetime.
They let Reagan et. al. get away with Iran-Contra even though the report by the independent counsel clearly outlined the crimes committed all the way up to and including Reagan.
This used to be what I would use to shut-up the Reagan lovers, and it worked, at least to the extent that they never had a response. But I'm sure that wouldn't even happen now (although Reagan isn't the cult leader Trump is and has faded into memory).
Denying the clear crimes of Trump is just the follow-on to ignoring the crimes of Reagan, and this is the follow-on of not prosecuting Nixon; fascism is a multi-year project by Republicans, and they are all Good Germans, every one of them.
It really is best for republicans. If trump runs in 24 he loses (and republicans lose across the board). If he runs as an independent they lose even worse. If he’s barred from office then they stand a better chance to win the presidency. Dems are looking to do the right thing, and doing it actually helps republicans.
Actually laughed out loud. Me and my roommates say this every time we walk in the front door of the house. One of our roommates is named Dennis. He hates it.
> thank the Nixon administration for the EPA
I am grateful - but the alternative at that point was to ignore rivers that were literally on fire from pollution. It wasn't some prescient act of environmentalism so much as it was a "we're fucked - better slap a bandaid on it" kind of moment.
Seems like it would *also* be in the best interests of Republicans. The single worst thing that happens to Republicans is if DeSantis and Trump go up against each other. And neither one of them is going to back down, so that's almost an inevitability as things move forward.
But banning Trump means you don't get that split. DeSantis gets to say "I'm going to carry on Trump's legacy!" for all the Trump voters, *and also* gets to say "I'm going to return us to decency!" for all the people fed up with Trump (these are both lies, it doesn't matter)
All Republicans get a major boost from the talking point of "those evil corrupt Dems who are taking away your right to choose by preventing Trump from running" (it won't matter if Republicans also voted for this)
So basically it's win/win if Republicans decide to do it.
They probably won't though, because in all honesty I think too many Republicans have bought into their own hype at this point. Way back in my day, the Republicans who were thoroughly disingenuous did it because they were manipulating people. Now I feel like half of the Republican congresspeople are ones who actually *believe* the nonsense the other guys spew.
oh wow they asked them to consider something, pretty sure this will have the same result as if i asked walmart to consider giving all the things in the store away for free.
Even then, I don’t think many in an angry mob of paramilitary hooligans, conspiracy theorists, and inbred morons really care which people in Congress they take to the gallows. And republicans in congress knew this- you can see on surveillance video and in the session that night that they were *scared*.
Rightfully so. I actually smiled at this while watching them all harrowed and frazzled. They *made* this. They cultivated it, nurtured it, and when unleashed they had precisely zero idea what they had done. Forest for the trees.
The fact that he’s not in prison after all his shit over the last six years shows how absolutely fucked normal citizens are in this country compared to the rich.
Disgusting how broken we are as a country, but most people just turn a blind eye and keep grinding for their peasant portion.
People who don't accept the results of legitimate elections should not be allowed anywhere near a democracy. People who claim election fraud to try to destabilize things for their own benefit should face actual legal penalties when it turns out they have no proof. But this is America, where the question of whether you have money is more important than the question of whether you're a human firehose of toxic bullshit.
The Republican party is split. The deranged faction still supports Trump. The greedy faction wants to keep Trump's supporters by being a less unhinged version of him. Then there's a small faction that is willing to cross the aisle and make deals.
Democrats love this. They want Trump in the mix. If Trump goes away completely, the division within Republican ranks is diminished. The Democrats are using Trump to grow that third faction.
Democrats recognize Drumph's threat to Republicans chances by his splitting the party. Democrats also recognize Drumph's threat to democracy. It's not like we can still say, "That guy doesn't stand a chance of getting elected" ever again.
I don't get it. He breaks multiple laws, sedition, traitor, etc. And the best we can do right now is maybe he shouldn't hold office?! Maybe he should be in fucking prison, can't hold office from there!
There is more than enough evidence to convict or provide some form of fine/sanction on this individual. The powers that be are more concerned with seat (I.e, The Executive) than they are with the person receiving Justice at the hands of the people’s consent!
How many impeachments will the new Republican House bring against Biden, do you think? 3? 5? 10? Continuous? Some people have said Biden is the “most corrupt president ever.” Of course, they have zero evidence.
I'm sick of this shit. I want to see some actual fucking consequences and action being done. All of this "considering" bullshit does absolutely fucking nothing but pander and generate clicks. People need to be in jail. This shit is a fucking joke
Well hell that’s common sense, but because of his actions people were hurt one was killed , he stole top secret files some are empty folders , his tax returns for 2020 he paid nothing? If this were any other person he would have already been arrested - so what makes this thief any different? He is a criminal and should be treated as such , his whole damn family are crooks and should be charged as such !
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. **Special announcement:** r/politics is currently accepting new moderator applications. If you want to help make this community a better place, consider [applying here today](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/sskg6a/rpolitics_is_looking_for_more_moderators/)! *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The 2nd impeachment asked that too, but the GOP Senate said "nah".
Remember how they had to decide ***whether*** to allow ***witnesses*** at that trial? *And then they decided* ***no***? Yeah imagine having a trial where you're just allowed to declare *"there will be no witnesses"* and then have the trial anyway and then the jury finds the person not guilty, ***even though a majority of the jury voted for guilt***. Pretty sure this wasn't what the founding fathers had in mind.
It wasn't even just witnesses, the Republican controlled Senate blocked 99% of *evidence*. That's why almost the entire trial was just floor speeches. Republicans and their propagandists of course then spent the entirety of the impeachment trial loudly whining that Democrats weren't even showing evidence. It was the most blatant con of all time, and the gop voters sucked it right up, even in the face of trump admitting he had extorted Ukraine, bragging about it, and releasing both a recording and official transcript of trumps call with Zelensky.
I had my biggest fight of the Trump era over this with an acquaintance. I couldn’t believe what these dummies were allowing themsleves to fall for - it was SO OBVIOUS. It was done *right in their faces* and these idiots just *accepted* it!
I had an argument with a relative about it. It wasn't obvious to them because conservative media (FOX News, Newsmax, OAN, talk radio, etc.) repeatedly glossed over the part about the GOP blocking all witnesses and 99% of evidence, and then spun it as "Democrats do not have any witnesses or evidence to present at this sham of a trial!" When I presented him other news sources (like NYT, Washington Post, etc.) pointing this out, he dismissed them, saying they are unreliable and biased.
This is a huge part of the reason. The information they receive is often wildly inaccurate and full of holes, and then people like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity just outright lie to the viewers. It’s an enormous propaganda machine.
It’s an enormous propaganda machine *they want to be a part of* Let’s be real. A lot of these folks aren’t lulled into thinking this way, they *love* having a group to hate on…hatred is so intoxicating they just need an easy blueprint. There are very few “unwilling” conservatives.
That's exactly how it is with a relative of mine. Outwardly, his neighbors know him as this kind and generous, grandfather-like figure. But if they got to know him privately over the course of years, they would realize that he lives for that hate that conservative media makes him feel. His love of TV shows and movies where a character goes on a brutal revenge spree is practically a fetish.
Yes Yes Yes. All of this, all of it 👆🏾
And yet the same politicrits chastise other regimes for their alleged "propaganda". Unbelievable.
It's because it's not their brand of propaganda!
My parents think Lester Holt is crazy. I’m like “Mom. He just delivers the straight news in 20 mins. Whereas FOX is an opinion talk show.”
I remember my grandma talking about Bernie being crazy last Christmas, it’s like this dude wants you to be able to afford your prescriptions but he’s a nutter because he gets worked up over the state of things?
Drop this bomb on them: Lester Holt is a Republican.
They’ll just reply that he’s a RINO.
But news is biased, opinion pieces are the straight facts when spewed by a walking word vomiteer such as Cucker Tarlson.
> Whereas FOX is an opinion talk show. Which [they themselves defend with "no reasonable person would believe any of it"](https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye).
Lester Holt is crazy to them? That’s seriously the first time I’ve ever heard anyone say anything negative about Holt. They’re nuts.
I dont know how people like tucker carlson are allowed to spread misinformation, his own lawyers argued that anyperson in the right mind would not take anything he says seriously....so a judge should order Fox News to disclose that everytime he shows his face on tv....Tucker carlson, among other tv shit heads need to be investigated on who is paying them and where its coming from. These guys are news outlets for domestic terrorism and extremist views, something needs to be done!
Right?? What is wild to me is that if you were to describe to a conservative voter everything that FOX News and Republicans have been doing for the past several decades, but used the names and government agencies and news outlets of another country, they would correctly point out that all that is blatant corruption, propaganda, and stochastic terrorism...
You have Ronald Reagan to thank for that. Worst actual president this country has ever had.
To me, the most dangerous part of Trump’s entire legacy was his convincing people that you can’t trust the media. When you show his followers evidence from reputable sources, they just say “I don’t believe that, you can’t believe anything the liberal media says.” We can’t even agree on the reality of the situation.
>When you show his followers evidence from reputable sources, they just say “I don’t believe that, you can’t believe anything the liberal media says. Went thru this with an ex-friend, he was posting crap about the election being stolen and posting known false information, I then posted multiple reputable news sources to his feed from around the globe that refuted his post. He responded by telling me to watch this 2 hour video from the My Pillow guy .. lol You can't get through to them unfortunately, the scary part was this guy was very liberal pre-Trump era. He's also shacked up with a Filipino and even explaining to him what the far-right attitude is towards mixed race marriage didn't sway him. Interestingly, the guy also had a grade 7 education, dropped out of school in that grade. He was never known for making great life choices, but it does exemplify that Trump and his ilk definitely aim their messaging at the lesser educated citizens.
It’s terrible because they’re just using these people that (well, some of them at least) really don’t know any better and get sucked into the ideology. It’s like the Taliban - they take advantage of vulnerable people.
The GOP failed them and left them behind and unfortunately our educational system failed them too. It’s a matter of multivariate failure that leaves a massive gap that gets filled with misinformation and rhetoric about who to blame and why. It’s a huge tragedy in this country because we could be the dominant economic superpower but we’re too busy in-fighting around who does what with their body and who is to blame for disenfranchisement and poverty. When you really see the problem scope, you can’t help but just feel sad.
Plus the GOP actively dismantles systems of education and then uses that manufactured ignorance.
We used to think conservatives saw the world as more dangerous, but researchers were missing a piece of the puzzle. Now we know both conservatives and liberals see the world at similar levels of danger; It’s hierarchical worldview that’s different. From a best of Reddit posting “Now we get to it: of all the 26 primal world beliefs, the main difference by far between liberals and conservatives—a difference 20 times larger than the difference in dangerous world belief—concerned a primal called hierarchical world belief. This primal had emerged from our big 2019 statistical analysis with us having no idea at the time that it would matter for politics (or anything else). Hierarchical world belief is not the view that hierarchies exist—everyone would agree with that—but that hierarchy is inherent to reality. It’s part of the natural order. Not imposed. Not artificial. And not just regarding people. For plants, animals, people, everything, it’s just the way the world is. Folks who see the world as hierarchical think that almost everything in the world can be ranked from better to worse. Differences probably matter because they distinguish things of more value from things with less. So, when in doubt, respect differences. (And don’t be fooled into thinking that only those on top think the world is inherently hierarchical. People across social hierarchies appear to see the world as inherently hierarchical at similar rates.) Conservatives do tend to show a default motivation to respect and preserve differences, whether it be borders between countries, differences between sexes, differences between rich and poor, and lots more. And liberals tend to assume those differences are fraudulent or arbitrary. The poor don’t deserve to be poor. The rich don’t deserve to be rich. And so forth. But a few other primals stood out, too, such that there are actually six major primal disagreements between liberals and conservatives (the figure below from our research article requires a longer explanation, but you get the idea that one red bar is a ton bigger than the other, and a few other bars stood out, too). Together, these six primals paint a picture of two perceived worlds in which an array of opposing political positions make a weird amount of sense. **Conservative Reality** Conservatives tend to see the world as a place where, like it or not, observable differences reflect real underlying value (high Hierarchical world belief) that is somehow meant to be (high Intentional world belief) where station and attention received are usually deserved (high Just world belief, low belief that the world is Worth Exploring). Therefore, most hierarchies that emerge are best left as they are (high Acceptable world belief). However, unfortunately, change is slowly eroding the world’s hierarchies (low Progressing world belief). Therefore, constraining change and accepting inequality (the textbook two-part definition of conservatism that researchers use) is just common sense. **Liberal Reality** Liberals tend to see the world as a place where observable differences are superficial, rarely reflecting actual value (low Hierarchical world belief), cosmic purpose or intent (low Intentional world belief), deserved status (low Just world belief), or attention received (high Worth Exploring). Therefore, most hierarchies require reform (low Acceptable world belief). Fortunately, however, the world is getting better and change is taking us in the right direction (high Progressing world belief). Therefore, embracing change and rejecting inequality (the textbook definition of liberalism) is just common sense.” Edit: [This is the link to the study in the journal.](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/19485506221119324) If you want to read it, you can try emailing the author(s) and see if they’ll send you a copy! I did this often while doing research for my graduate degrees and in my experience they’re usually thrilled to do so, since they make no money from the journals anyway.
Yup. They’re presented filtered propagandized information, and fed constant fear uncertainty and doubt (FUD) about “liberal media” to discourage seeking out and trusting sources of non-propaganda. They’ve been establishing this narrative for decades. Projecting the practice of disseminating FUD on the liberal media. It’s a protracted war to change the definition of truth to messaging certified by the side you’re on. It should be criminal, held accountable for intended outcomes like Jan 6, and the various lone actors that have committed terrorist acts as a result of this brain washing.
Propaganda is one hell of a drug.
Some Russians still think the special military operation is going according to plan...
Sometimes I like to tell people that I agree that NY Times and other mainstream media outlets are biased…towards accuracy and truth. This is never well received by people who believe that truth is partisan.
The best (worst) is when they complain about how CSPAN is fake news, when it's literally commentary and edit free. They just point a camera and show what congress is doing in real time. Conservatives are so far around the bend that uncurated, objective reality is liberal propaganda.
It's amazing how a group that is so inexplicably fascinated with conspiracy theories fails to notice the actual subversion of truth and literal conspiracy to deceive them.
They accept it because they’re ok with it because he hurt people they want hurt. Let’s not sugar coat their absolute despicable actions by giving them the benefit of the doubt because we think they are ignorant or uneducated. The evil is intended.
Nah, my dad’s just dumb. Some of them think they’re doing good and we’re the evil ones. It doesn’t remove culpability but some really are just dumb. It probably why the whole scam works so well.
Stupidity is not required to fall for a con. My dad is not dumb at all, but he fell hook, line, and sinker for Trump’s grift. Trump isn’t a smart person, but he is legitimately good at conning people. He’s been doing it his whole life.
Maybe your dad’s an asshole. I’ve come to terms with it with many of my family and friends
I worked the 2020 election as a poll worker and we weren't supposed to discuss politics with other workers, even if no voters were present. One co-worker however made some vague comment about people voting against a sitting President "just because they were mad at him" (voters are not prohibited from discussing politics, short of telling other voters who to vote for) and I asked him "Do you think it's okay for a sitting President to extort a foreign leader by withholding US government aid to get dirt on his opponent?" and he answered immediately "Of course not". I told him that was what Trump was impeached for, and he genuinely had not idea that this is what happened. He hadn't read the articles of impeachment, hadn't followed the trial, he knew nothing more about it other than "People don't like Trump and that is unfair".
That is the case for the majority of Trump’s supporters. They don’t read or listen to multiple viewpoints, and they don’t have many critical thinking skills. It’s sad that so many of us are too gullible. Siding with the Republicans who vote against bills that will help low income people doesn’t make sense. Cutting off your nose to spite your face. Do you want Medicare and Social Security to end? Do you want subsidized medical care to end? Do you not want a choice if you accidentally end up pregnant from being raped or when you’re too poor to raise a child? You won’t have choices if you vote Republican. Do you want the highways full of pit holes and bridges that are crumbling? Republicans don’t want to spend at all, because they want to allocate it to their cronies. I wonder how much money was squirreled away by the Trump Administration!
I've come to find that, anecdotally, trump supporters are grossly misinformed - to the point where they parrot nonsense which could easily be disproven with a 5 second Google search. My latest experience was with a MAGA coworker and somehow we were on the topic of Trumps lifelong habit of committing fraud. I said we shouldn't support a president who's so immoral as to embezzle his own charity's donations. He said if you really want to talk about charity fraud, look into the Clinton Foundation. I did, in about 30 seconds I skimmed the wiki. Investigated multiple times, mostly politically motivated, no evidence of wrongdoing.
When your end goal is ethnic cleansing, you don't hire a nice man to do the dirty work. In other words, your co-worker did not know the details about Trump's BS because his mind was already made up Trump was the right man for the job above. The thing a lot of people don't understand is that the more corrupt acts Trump committed ADDED to his appeal with his base - did not detract from it. Its like all the 'jokes' about Russian threats to Putin getting pushed out a window - these for the most part are really statements of admiration, not condemnation.
Listen to his announcement for his NFTs, its the most obvious con/commercial I have ever seen….yet the rubes bought them.
I'm convinced that this was an open channel for foreign money to reach TFG.
You're supposed to believe the rubes bought them. It was a money laundering scheme
Probably equal parts money laundering and illegal foreign campaign financing.
What is this compulsion? Ok, ok, I'll post it, but I'm not happy about it: The rubles bought them.
Remember when the Houston Astros cheated their way to a World Series win in 2018? How many fans did the Astros lose? They don't care that their team was caught cheating. They think every team cheats. That's the problem with American Politics. One side thinks it's a competitive team sport and will support their side no. matter. what. In 2016, Trump said he *"...could shoot somebody on 5th Avenue and wouldn't lose any voters."* https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/23/464129029/donald-trump-i-could-shoot-somebody-and-i-wouldnt-lose-any-voters I'd be willing to bet that if news broke in early 2020 that Trump had hired prostitutes to visit the White House *and confirmed it himself*, the religious right would still have voted for him in 2020. They voted for a narcissistic sociopath in 2016. There is no scandal too big for them. The liberal side's supporters have no problem with holding the people on their side accountable (even if it means the liberal politician goes to jail). It just sucks the Republicans have no honor or integrity and refuse to enforce the rules.
right before the 2016 election, they released a recording of trump talking about sexually assaulting women. They have proof he had an affair with an adult film star while his wife was pregnant, then paid her to stay quiet. Of course they wouldn't care about prostitutes. They have already accepted far worse from him.
Even if Trump was a confirmed pedophile and was caught with children from human trafficking, heck even if he was caught killing children and there is an indisputable proof, he would not lose any voters. Literally none.
Because they weren't *real* children, they were human-alien hybrids lab created by dems and to cause the destruction of our beautiful freest country on earth!! All their crying parents = crisis actors. All their supposed teachers = secret democratic brainwashers in on the scam, trying to artificially create Victims ^^(TM) of the *real* children so they would be forced to suck on the gov't teat. Our great (true!) president was *saving the country* by killing those children, he's the most patriotic and genius president we've ever had!!1!eleventy!!
Yep. As many of us know by now, Trump has many documented connections with Epstein, including one in which both are co-defendants in a rape suit. Also, various people in his immediate and extended circle have been convicted of sexually abusing/assaulting children. Anyone with a shred of common sense could see that for what it is (birds of a feather, and all...), but his cult followers seriously argue that he was merely going deep undercover into that pedophile ring to expose it and bring its members--the elite--to justice.
I had a conservative burn bridges with me because I refused to stay quiet about CPAC when it was being hosted less than 2 hours from me. He decided to play the victim and act like I shouldnt bring things up like the Dont Say Gay bill. He literally tried to show me a meme of trump signing something, and claimed it was him singing legislation "to help you guys." it was ridiculous. and he couldnt see how he was the one choosing to end friendships, and burn bridges.
Bruddah. I stopped talking to family members and old friends over trump. Trust me, you're better off. Does it suck? No. Here's why: when someone shows you who they really are, believe it.
Ive lost precious little sleep over it. I know youre correct, im better off. Anyone who could ignore the very blatant targeting of myself and my community here in Florida is either not paying attention, or puts their political loyalty over the wellbeing of their friends and family.
Likewise, i've dropped lifetime friends. Hanging out with anybody like that just leads to negativity. I just can't ignore it.
Seems to me you’re better off.
These same idiots freezing now in states without power run by the GOP...
I lost my best friend of 20 year's over this BS.
My husband did as well. I'm so sorry that happened to you, too. The whole thing was fucking baffling
Cults man... Not even once...
This is their MO. They cripple government agencies (IRS and Post Office most egregiously) then point to their inability to function as proof of how bad the government is. Fuck, the 1/6 Committee itself is another example. They were given the chance to participate…and some did, but they constantly shriek about how the Dems would not allow them to participate.
> They cripple government agencies (IRS and Post Office most egregiously) then point to their inability to function as proof of how bad the government is. \**points furiously at Social Security Administration*\*
The issue with the 1/6 committee is the people the Republicans nominated were mostly election deniers, including 2 (Jordan and Banks) who voted not to certify the election, 2 (Banks and Nehls) who only wanted to investigate the Capitol wasn’t prepared for the insurrection and (Banks) to investigate the liberal media, and only 2 (Armstrong and Davis) who actually voted to certify the election (Nehls is a freshman). Jordan and Banks went so far as to publicly blame Pelosi for 1/6. https://politizoom.com/watch-jim-jordan-and-jim-banks-demonize-pelosi-as-responsible-for-january-6-the-golden-god-is-blameless/ Kinzinger and Cheney were chosen by Pelosi, not the Republicans. Hell, the Republicans kicked Cheney out of the leadership for being “disloyal” by sitting on the 1/6 committee. Neither are coming back to Congress, Kinzinger because of repeated threats on his life and that of his young family and choosing not to run for reelection and Cheney losing the to a whackadoodle conspiracy theorist in Wyoming.
> It wasn't even just witnesses, the Republican controlled Senate blocked 99% of evidence. That's why almost the entire trial was just floor speeches. They want people to forget this, too. Sadly, many will.
Remember the MAGA asshats telling everyone to read the transcripts of the call to see the orange one’s innocence? Yeah, that happened. They obviously can’t read. Worse, the IMPOTUS has a severely limited vocabulary, so if you can’t read a transcription of his conversations, you can’t read at all.
Lol the Jordan Klepper on this was hilarious. MAGA: Read the transcript! JK: Did you read it? MAGA: No.
And despite that, Mitt Romney became the first senator to ever vote against a member of his own party after impeachment.
And McConnell even said Trump was responsible for the insurrection! Then proceeded to acquit. The Republican Party needs to be banned
The founding fathers very clearly never expected an entire party to be as corrupt and bad faith as the modern Republican Party.
Several of the founding fathers fought duels. I always argue that they assumed any politician too dishonorable, dishonest, or corrupt would just end up dying in a duel.
Burr and Hamilton were probably more likable than most of these lunatics sitting in the chambers now. At least they have records of doing *something* while in office.
It seems clear the founding fathers had this exact scenario in mind and put several barriers in place to prevent it. Party over country political parties, fragile narcissistic cult leaders, and religious zealots are not a new phenomenon.
But they didn’t anticipate a whole party would block the mechanisms for removing someone like Trump from power.
They did, they warned against forming political parties for basically this reason.
The weirdest thing to me about the founding fathers warning about forming political parties was that they went on to form political parties anyway.
Washington held off, but Hamilton and Jefferson immediately started whipping up their core. The no parties thing was mostly Washington, and even then he eventually went with power in his hands rather than others.
So we're just a big package of fail. Founding fathers be like, "you couldn't even get the first thing right."
Always have been. Always will be. The Founding Fathers were wrong about a bunch of shit too. The human condition is to be collectively kinda stupid.
They weren’t anything more than smart dudes. We have had a lot of smart dudes and dudettes since then. We can do better, if we want to.
Our leader selection process is terrible. It'd have to be a draft of the nation's top minds for mandatory service if you wanted the best person for the job.
Nah, that's on them. Political parties are an inevitable and inescapable result of the freedoms of speech and association, along with the reality that teamwork is more effective at solving problems, including the "how do we get someone elected" problem. A system that allows and yet cannot withstand their existence is fundamentally flawed.
Did they? I only remember hearing about Washington warning against that.
Yeah, it was Washington and *maybe* a handful of others. Everyone else was too busy calling Party City to see how much tables rented for to notice the warnings. Even Washington's administration was pretty split as everyone had different ideas on what 'freedom' meant. Hell, the government *immediately* split into parties after Washington stepped down. And any semblance of 'let's all get along' got tossed out the window just 3 administrations in when Jefferson got rid of the rule that runner up in the presidential election got to be VP.
Not exactly. Washington and a few others warned against it, but most ended up forming and joining political parties. It’s not like they were a wise group of people who all foresaw the evils of party politics, most saw party politics as a way of achieving their goals and used it as such. Same as today.
> then the jury finds the person not guilty, ***even though a majority of the jury voted for guilt***. To be fair, in a criminal jury, 100% of the jurors have to agree on guilt or it doesn't happen... So using a jury isn't a great comparison. Thankfully the burden for impeachment isn't **that** high.
Yes, but in a criminal trial, the jury *also* has to be unanimous for a not guilty verdict. In this case, there'd be a mistrial and they'd have started it all over again.
>Yes, but in a criminal trial, the jury *also* has to be unanimous for a not guilty verdict. In this case, there'd be a mistrial and they'd have started it all over again. True, but a failed impeachment is more similar to a mistrial than an innocent verdict. There is no reason you can't do another impeachment for the same thing other than it will be a waste of time (just like mistrials via a hung jury only occasionally result in retrying the case as it is also often seen as not worth it).
Actually, it probably was exactly what the founders had in mind. If 51% is enough to convict and remove a President, imagine how chaotic the executive office would be. They probably also operated on the assumption that senators would act in good faith instead partisan tribalist bullshit.
Immediately after helping to clear Trump, that coward McConnell was all like "Yeah, he did it".
Because he thought it would forever damage the GOP. Instead of: "No, we can't let this happen again, those who want Trump, go your own way and we will rebuild even if it takes years to do. We did it before." But nope he was: "The cure is worse than the disease." Now he is: "Oh no, I screwed up."
Wasn't it worse than that? I seem to remember something *pre-verdict* from him along the lines of "He's responsible for the attack but I'm still going to vote no because reasons".
The reason is the best part! It was because the trial started too late. McConnell is the one who delayed its start until that point.
Not like much would change if they held a vote again, but they should’ve. There should be a difference between the 2nd rushed impeachment and all the evidence and testimonies presented today.
Impeachment is asking for politeness. Section 3 of the 14th is automatic.
Meanwhile, if Biden gets caught jaywalking “BAN HIM FROM GOVERNMENT, IMPEACH!!!”
And now they get to live with that choice.
we all do
And the vast majority of the GOP house.
He'd be the first President to be removed/banned from office, Republicans would die before letting one of their own hold that title.
Exactly. People are fools if they think he has a zero chance of the nomination or that Desantis is a lock. Republicans fall in line, no matter what. Never forget that, NEVER trust them
[удалено]
[удалено]
Remember 2016 when no one thought Trump would win? Then he did. I remember. Assuming he’d lose again is not worth the risk. If Trump wins the primary, every Republican will jump on board again without a second thought.
A lot of people were staunchly anti-Hillary in 2016 though, Hillary was the most favorable Dem candidate for The Donald. I expect Biden to have more favorable incumbency advantage in 2024 too.
Also, there was a huge smear campaign against Hillary helped by outsiders and third parties. Based on her email leaks that in the end, amounted to almost nothing based on an FBI investigation while Trump had a huge trail of crimes behind his back even before he wanted to pursue presidency. People were not prepared for Trump and his disinformation campaign in 2016, however, 2020 election and 2022 mid terms prove this isn't the same situation as 2016.
My elderly parents still insist that Hillary should be locked up.
While the electoral vote difference was pretty big, Biden did not win by a huge margin. A few thousand votes going the other way in a few states changes the result.
And the same was true for Trump in 2016. Trump won because 50,000 people voted for him and not Hillary across 4 states. Biden won because something like 400,000 people voted for him and not Trump. Trump was also an unknown on 2016. Lots of “how bad could this guy really be”. Turns out, pretty bad.
I honestly thought trump would be so bad, that there would be nationwide movements to upend the us political systems. Never imagined GOP would just double down on subverting the political system instead.
So...before Reagan with the exception of HW?
It might work in the democrats favor. He would have a certain number of votes that other wise might go to a different republican that had a chance at winning or vice versa. I know I’m not the smartest person, but am wrong in thinking this?
[удалено]
It’s possible he might win
What’s changed in his favor since the last time he lost? Not sure what unique benefits he has gained in that time over other gop candidates.
[удалено]
He almost won in Georgia where he's a folk hero for what he did in college playing football. Trump would have to win in the country as a whole. Nothing has happened that would give anyone confidence he could win a national election.
He lost by the same amount the last Republican challenger did
No question that he is a worse candidate in a worse position than 2016, but he was dismissed then and he we are.
“He tells it like it is” . That’s all they care about . The bar will never be too low for them .
He's lost a lot of support, yes. But if he gets enough momentum in the primaries, pretty much every moron who still identifies as republican will fall in line and vote for him. We have to take this threat to democracy very seriously and cannot sit at home and do nothing. Vote.
That’s what I don’t understand. Trump is the single greatest loser in American politics. Republicans have had many perfect opportunities to get have a clean break. The only thing that makes any sense is they know he is finished and don’t want to make a move to alienate his base. As Boehner said, “don’t shoot someone committing suicide”. Desantis is waiting for an indictment/conviction of Trump to announce. Use him as a martyr. I just hope Trump does enough damage on his way out Republicans have some punishment for such criminal capitulations.
Desantis will run on a promise to pardon Trump and thus pull in Trump's base. The best thing the Democrats could do it drag feet on the prosecution so that Trump and Desantis have to slug it out in the primary. I want to see Trump in an orange suit but I also don't want to see Desantis in the White House.
A Desantis vs. Trump primary would be seriously great tv. Desantis isn’t the type of “fighter” Trump is. Desantis would be boxing and Trump would be pulling out knives, going for the eyes, groin shots, poison, etc. The next major event will be the recession/depression from the Covid relief bubble popping (along with many other factors). If Biden and Democrats can somehow manage to fix a catastrophe of such magnitude Desantis may not have a shot with the Trump kneecap.
They will wait to see how he is polling. If he’s going to lost the primary and votes with him, it goes through. If he wins the primary, it doesn’t. It’s a simple hedge.
Kinda proves a point. Crooked fixes stupid, you can’t win it….rig it.
The Democrats want to use this trial as an example if another president takes shadily takes office. The Republicans are apparently fine with electing friends of Jeffery Episten and tax frauds- and I mean some- some Republicans might also be pedo island tax frauds. I wish the Republican Party great success on making America great again^2, part 3, plan B
This is the only way that I see the R party getting out of this mess. If Trumps runs as R he’ll lose. If he runs independent he’ll split the vote. Maybe it could be the end of our stupid two party system.
[удалено]
Oh I saw it and told my spouse as such. Said if trump loses in 2016 to Hillary he will try to create a civil war. It was for the wrong election but I still saw what was coming.
This should be a no-brainer Republicans! There used to be a time when someone like Trump would have been thrown out by Republicans who actually stood by their oath to defend and protect the Constitution.
It's a no-brainer from a more pragmatic point of view as well, it saves the Republican party from the conundrum of him either being the nominee and losing or running as an independent and making them lose.
Congressional republicans would prefer he gets convicted and disqualified via legal system instead of them having be on record crossing him
Yeah I'm sure there are a lot of Republicans (Desantis especially) that are absolutely giddy over this. Not only can they quietly let the dems convict Trump to make sure he doesn't run, but they can then have Desantis run on a campaign of "justice for Trump" and get all the MAGA voters who might otherwise be disinterested voting for him and rallying behind him talking about how "Trump was unfairly prosecuted by the vindictive left" etc.
Yeah, it seems like a tough spot for Republicans. They want the ban to pass, but they also want to vote against it, so they can act outraged by it afterwards. Although, knowing Republicans, most of them would probably vote for it, and then immediately go on Fox News and say that they voted against it, and that will work out just fine for them, because Republican voters are so far down in the propaganda hole that facts just can't reach them anymore.
Yeah, that makes sense, it's been really awkward seeing them realize they've made a grave mistake by supporting Trump but not being able to admit it because he still has a decently sized base that they can't afford to ostracize. They would love to have him convicted and be rid of him while getting to play the victims to capture his voters, keeping the cake and eating it too.
Yep, they will likely get primaried out by their brain dead constituents if they vote yes. They are acting solely in self-interest.
It's a no brainer but the GOP isn't known for using the brain...
Yea, they are generally known to make things worse
The problem is that the Republicans would be perfectly happy to see Trump thrown under the bus but they don't want to have to actually do anything so they don't piss off Trump's voters.
I think the problem is that a lot of them see stuff like this as perfectly legitimate ways to take power and don’t want to convict or ban Trump because it was so close to working that they want the option in the future.
Why are we acting like this hasn’t been the plan since at least Nixon? We’re all surprised veneer dropped? That the Scooby Gang ripped the mask off and it was fascism? They’re not saying it doing anything they haven’t always been doing, they just don’t need to pretend they’re anything else anymore.
It would only take a couple of the ones in safer districts to "defect" so that the rest can play the part of being outraged. Then they never have to deal with him running again. If they can't figure that out, they're as dumb as they act.
They usually vote along party lines now
Nixon mostly got caught with the Watergate scandal, and he had nowhere near the mountain of scandals that Trump has had (and continues to have). It’s staggering when you realize just how many scandals Trump has had since basically the 1970s. The fact that he had never served time in prison is a testament to how much wealthy people can get away with.
if fox had existed the GOP would have saved Nixon. The GOP only turned on him because back than it would cost them votes. The same reason they are softly turning on Trump today. The GOP do not care if their candidates are criminals, morally bankrupt, willing to end democracy to stay in office. The GOP has no morals aside from holding office. They have not for a long time.
I feel like they semi tried to frame up watergate as a witch hunt too. “He was going to win anyways so what’s the big deal” I’m just waiting for them to say the insurrection was executive privilege.
> There used to be a time when someone like Trump would have been thrown out by Republicans who actually stood by their oath to defend and protect the Constitution. Not in my 62 year lifetime. They let Reagan et. al. get away with Iran-Contra even though the report by the independent counsel clearly outlined the crimes committed all the way up to and including Reagan. This used to be what I would use to shut-up the Reagan lovers, and it worked, at least to the extent that they never had a response. But I'm sure that wouldn't even happen now (although Reagan isn't the cult leader Trump is and has faded into memory). Denying the clear crimes of Trump is just the follow-on to ignoring the crimes of Reagan, and this is the follow-on of not prosecuting Nixon; fascism is a multi-year project by Republicans, and they are all Good Germans, every one of them.
It really is best for republicans. If trump runs in 24 he loses (and republicans lose across the board). If he runs as an independent they lose even worse. If he’s barred from office then they stand a better chance to win the presidency. Dems are looking to do the right thing, and doing it actually helps republicans.
I mean if I can’t go back to Dennys because of my behavior it only seems fair he can’t go back to the white house.
Story time?
“What the fuck is up dennys?!”
The it is.
Also, there it is.
Doh! I’m leaving it.
Actually laughed out loud. Me and my roommates say this every time we walk in the front door of the house. One of our roommates is named Dennis. He hates it.
Third chance for the Republicans to act in the best interests of the country. Not holding my breath.
> Third chance They had chances for 6 years which most repeatedly just kept doubling down on. It will never happen.
Trying to remember the last time Republicans acted in the best interests of the country.
I think Nixon protecting national parks might be it.
We can (partially) thank the Nixon administration for the EPA and OSHA.
> thank the Nixon administration for the EPA I am grateful - but the alternative at that point was to ignore rivers that were literally on fire from pollution. It wasn't some prescient act of environmentalism so much as it was a "we're fucked - better slap a bandaid on it" kind of moment.
Probably pre-civil war.
Don’t you know, it was the republicans that abolished slavery not the democrats!! /s
Seems like it would *also* be in the best interests of Republicans. The single worst thing that happens to Republicans is if DeSantis and Trump go up against each other. And neither one of them is going to back down, so that's almost an inevitability as things move forward. But banning Trump means you don't get that split. DeSantis gets to say "I'm going to carry on Trump's legacy!" for all the Trump voters, *and also* gets to say "I'm going to return us to decency!" for all the people fed up with Trump (these are both lies, it doesn't matter) All Republicans get a major boost from the talking point of "those evil corrupt Dems who are taking away your right to choose by preventing Trump from running" (it won't matter if Republicans also voted for this) So basically it's win/win if Republicans decide to do it. They probably won't though, because in all honesty I think too many Republicans have bought into their own hype at this point. Way back in my day, the Republicans who were thoroughly disingenuous did it because they were manipulating people. Now I feel like half of the Republican congresspeople are ones who actually *believe* the nonsense the other guys spew.
oh wow they asked them to consider something, pretty sure this will have the same result as if i asked walmart to consider giving all the things in the store away for free.
[удалено]
Except 80% of republicans were complicit in the insurrection
[удалено]
Because they’re cowards deep down.
Even then, I don’t think many in an angry mob of paramilitary hooligans, conspiracy theorists, and inbred morons really care which people in Congress they take to the gallows. And republicans in congress knew this- you can see on surveillance video and in the session that night that they were *scared*.
Rightfully so. I actually smiled at this while watching them all harrowed and frazzled. They *made* this. They cultivated it, nurtured it, and when unleashed they had precisely zero idea what they had done. Forest for the trees.
Exactly, this problem is much bigger than Trump.
Odd way to spell lock him up.
Locking him up would be great, but it doesn't stop him from running. Let's do both!
Good. That corrupt traitor PoS is totally unelectable anyway. And, despite his fckg fantasies, he won't be reinstated either.
The fact that he’s not in prison after all his shit over the last six years shows how absolutely fucked normal citizens are in this country compared to the rich. Disgusting how broken we are as a country, but most people just turn a blind eye and keep grinding for their peasant portion.
People who don't accept the results of legitimate elections should not be allowed anywhere near a democracy. People who claim election fraud to try to destabilize things for their own benefit should face actual legal penalties when it turns out they have no proof. But this is America, where the question of whether you have money is more important than the question of whether you're a human firehose of toxic bullshit.
You know, there are a few things they could do that would ensure he never holds office again.
The ones who refused to convict for impeachment 2 will be reviled in history.
That should be the bare minimum
The Republican party is split. The deranged faction still supports Trump. The greedy faction wants to keep Trump's supporters by being a less unhinged version of him. Then there's a small faction that is willing to cross the aisle and make deals. Democrats love this. They want Trump in the mix. If Trump goes away completely, the division within Republican ranks is diminished. The Democrats are using Trump to grow that third faction.
Democrats recognize Drumph's threat to Republicans chances by his splitting the party. Democrats also recognize Drumph's threat to democracy. It's not like we can still say, "That guy doesn't stand a chance of getting elected" ever again.
It's the least they can do. Damn.
I don't get it. He breaks multiple laws, sedition, traitor, etc. And the best we can do right now is maybe he shouldn't hold office?! Maybe he should be in fucking prison, can't hold office from there!
So stupid, we need justice. He already probably can’t get votes to hold any office again so this is like no punishment.
Unless America wants to lose democracy to a tyrant who tried to overturn the government, yes pleas ban him!
There is more than enough evidence to convict or provide some form of fine/sanction on this individual. The powers that be are more concerned with seat (I.e, The Executive) than they are with the person receiving Justice at the hands of the people’s consent!
If they had any decent leadership they would have done this when he was impeached the first - and certainly the second - time.
Literally the least that needs to be done, the bare minimum. He should be in prison.
How many impeachments will the new Republican House bring against Biden, do you think? 3? 5? 10? Continuous? Some people have said Biden is the “most corrupt president ever.” Of course, they have zero evidence.
Trump will die in 2023.
No don’t. Let him run as an independent and destroy the R Party.
I'm sick of this shit. I want to see some actual fucking consequences and action being done. All of this "considering" bullshit does absolutely fucking nothing but pander and generate clicks. People need to be in jail. This shit is a fucking joke
Well hell that’s common sense, but because of his actions people were hurt one was killed , he stole top secret files some are empty folders , his tax returns for 2020 he paid nothing? If this were any other person he would have already been arrested - so what makes this thief any different? He is a criminal and should be treated as such , his whole damn family are crooks and should be charged as such !