Shocked, shocked, shocked
The constitutional crisis rolls on, with Congressional Democrats being irritatingly feeble.
Donald Trump has blocked the former White House counsel Don McGahn from testifying before Congress about special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian election interference.
Donald Trump can’t “block him” from testifying. It’s just a power play and McGahn should ignore it, but he’s not, he’s said he’ll obey this arbitrary demand from someone he no longer works for.
In a legal opinion released on Monday, the justice department said lawmakers on Capitol Hill cannot compel McGahn, who was subpoenaed by the House judiciary committee, to answer their questions under oath.
Because “the justice department” is wholly in the bag for Trump. It’s not a justice department, it’s just a branch of the Trump operation.
The White House’s intervention was condemned by Jerry Nadler, the Democratic chairman of the judiciary committee. “The Mueller Report documents a shocking pattern of obstruction of justice,” he said in a statement. “The President acted again and again – perhaps criminally – to protect himself from federal law enforcement.
“Don McGahn personally witnessed the most egregious of these acts. President Trump knows this. He clearly does not want the American people to hear firsthand about his alleged misconduct, and so he has attempted to block Mr McGahn from speaking in public tomorrow.”
The move is the latest example of the Trump administration’s “disdain for the law”, added Nadler, who said the committee will meet as planned on Tuesday morning and still expects McGahn to appear.
Yes, groovy, but what are they going to do? Anything?
McGahn was subpoenaed by Nadler last month and, under instruction by the White House, failed to meet an initial deadline to appear before the committee. Nadler threatened to hold McGahn in contempt of Congress if he did not meet a second deadline of 21 May.
So do it. Don’t threaten; do it.
Laurence Tribe, a constitutional law professor at Harvard, tweeted on Monday: “This WH position can’t POSSIBLY be the law when the House is exercising its power to investigate whether the president has committed impeachable offenses. The OLC [Office of Legal Counsel]/ Cipollone view would rip the Impeachment Power root and branch out of the Constitution.”
And the Dems will just stand around and watch, looking pained.
An American stand-up comic once had a line about how UK police, being often (?) unarmed, must have to shout things like “Stop! Or I’ll say ‘stop’ again!”
That’s what the Democratic leaders in Congress remind me of.
Screechy, the vast majority of UK police are never armed. Each force has its own Armed Response Units plus a small number of firearm-trained officers who only carry arms in emergency situations. There’s very little chance of *BANG! BANG!* ‘Stop!’ incidentts this way.
Many officers do carry TASERs, but they can only be used to subdue violent or dangerous suspects, not to bring down runners.
If memory serves, the shout isn’t just wishful thinking, it’s so a runner can’t dodge charges of evading or resiting arrest on the technicality that nobody told them to stop running. ‘So you see, m’lud, my client thought it a mere coincidence that he and the officer were running in the same direction.’
Screechy – ha!
AoS you – uncharacteristically – kind of ruined the joke there. You sound more like Skeletor than like yourself.
Agh! I’m sorry. I interpreted the (?) in Screechy’s comment as a request for clarification.
Maybe we could equip the Democrats in the House with tasers. Then they’d be effective?
It’s the 21st tomorrow. They’d better follow through.
https://www.facebook.com/144310995587370/photos/a.271728576178944/2465322176819562/?type=3&theater
AoS,
You weren’t wrong, or at least not far off. The question mark was just my way of saying “I’m not vouching for the accuracy of this statement, I’m just repeating a joke.” I wasn’t necessarily asking for confirmation, but I’m always happy to get information.
Heh. Quite all right, Ac – as I said: uncharacteristic.
I had one of those days yesterday where everybody around me was wanting to pick my brain for one reason or another. I must have still been in automatic answer mode because I saw the question mark and just began answering.
I’ve had a much quieter day today so normal service has been resumed.
My bet is Trump is getting the advice from Putin to just refuse to obey norms and see what the Dems do. And so far the Dems are unwilling to actually break out the handcuffs and arrest any of the people they could charge for refusing to come in. The Dems seem unwilling to break up what has always been a practice of treating other members of Congress or fellow politicians with kid gloves (the kind of treatment that average criminal on the street does not get). If the Dems are too afraid to do what they have the legal power to do, they are lost and we may well see a Trump second term.