General Trump Administration F**kery Thread

[Secure Da Bag]

I thought NY already passed a law give Trump's state taxes to Congress?

 

[Sohh_lifted]

People are livid about this story of potentiall 1000 immigrants a week being sent down here.

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

People are livid about this story of potentiall 1000 immigrants a week being sent down here.

Trump wants to win Florida?

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

I thought NY already passed a law give Trump's state taxes to Congress?

They’ll only have his state taxes, not his federal

 

[Pressure]

No, they wouldn't. That isn't how wealth nor corruption works. I hate these pieces that attempt to play to the emotions of people who know the rules do not and will not apply to them.

 

[88m3]

The New York Times
31 mins ·
Breaking News: President Trump is showing signs he will pardon several servicemen accused of war crimes. He asked for paperwork to be prepared by Memorial Day.


About this website

BREAKING
31 MINS
NYTIMES.COM

Trump Shows Signs He Will Pardon Servicemen Accused or Convicted of War Crimes

It's coming

@Rhakim @Call Me James @tru_m.a.c

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

fukkery coming

 

[Professor Emeritus]

The New York Times
31 mins ·
Breaking News: President Trump is showing signs he will pardon several servicemen accused of war crimes. He asked for paperwork to be prepared by Memorial Day.


About this website

BREAKING
31 MINS
NYTIMES.COM

Trump Shows Signs He Will Pardon Servicemen Accused or Convicted of War Crimes

It's coming

@Rhakim @Call Me James @tru_m.a.c

This needs to be played up VERY BIG. This should be front page news, no one should let this go. We're talking military trials, military judges, military witnesses, clear-cut evidence, we have his own pre-meditated intentions of exactly what he was doing.

If Trump pardons a murderous war criminal solely because he's a soldier, then he's saying the justice system doesn't matter anymore. He's saying that American soldiers are above the law and war crimes are no longer a thing. This might even violate the Geneva Convention.

The first murder-soldier he pardoned at least had already served his time. This a$$hole hasn't even started yet. It would be a fukking travesty.

 

[ORDER_66]

This needs to be played up VERY BIG. This should be front page news, no one should let this go. We're talking military trials, military judges, military witnesses, clear-cut evidence, we have his own pre-meditated intentions of exactly what he was doing.

If Trump pardons a murderous war criminal solely because he's a soldier, then he's saying the justice system doesn't matter anymore. He's saying that American soldiers are above the law and war crimes are no longer a thing. This might even violate the Geneva Convention.

The first murder-soldier he pardoned at least had already served his time. This a$$hole hasn't even started yet. It would be a fukking travesty.

cacs not giving any fukks to laws, laws only apply to the poor & black people...

 

[88m3]

This needs to be played up VERY BIG. This should be front page news, no one should let this go. We're talking military trials, military judges, military witnesses, clear-cut evidence, we have his own pre-meditated intentions of exactly what he was doing.

If Trump pardons a murderous war criminal solely because he's a soldier, then he's saying the justice system doesn't matter anymore. He's saying that American soldiers are above the law and war crimes are no longer a thing. This might even violate the Geneva Convention.

The first murder-soldier he pardoned at least had already served his time. This a$$hole hasn't even started yet. It would be a fukking travesty.

My thoughts and worries exactly. I'm exhausted so I can't explain it well but there's a clear pattern in the pardons that he's done. I think some of it's done for his base which is completely f'd but there is also a clear underlying pattern to excuse and downplay the crimes that he and his administration has committed.

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

GOP state lawmaker says he misspoke on 'consensual rape'

 

[ORDER_66]

GOP state lawmaker says he misspoke on 'consensual rape'

He MISspoke...

 

[ADevilYouKhow]

He MISspoke...

Yeah, I’m not buying that either. Pretty suspect

 

[Hood Critic]

To call this ridiculous is an understatement

 

[Professor Emeritus]

This is probably worth its own thread but I didn't feel like making it.

What Pleases Trump Has the Force of Law

In my long career as an academic jack-of-all-trades, I sometimes teach law students Jurisprudence—that is, Philosophy of Law. The course begins with the question “What is law?” and its corollary, “What is lawlessness?”

The latter comes in two flavors. The first is anarchy—Hobbes’s “war of all against all,” a Mad Max moonscape in which only stealth and brute force provide even a semblance of safety. Such situations existed for millennia and, though relatively rare, exist in remote parts of the globe today.

But there is an authoritarian lawlessness that is far more common in the 21st century, and next time I teach the course, I will have the most precise example of this second version I have ever seen: the dispute over 26 U.S. Code § 6103(f)(1), which reads: “Upon written request from the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of Representatives, the chairman of the Committee on Finance of the Senate, or the chairman of the Joint Committee on Taxation, the Secretary [of the Treasury] shall furnish such committee with any return or return information specified in such request,” subject only to a requirement that the return be considered in closed session.

Served with a proper demand by Representative Richard Neal, the Ways and Means Committee chair, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin responded, “I have determined that the Committee’s request lacks a legitimate legislative purpose,” and that he therefore would not comply.

Let’s begin at the beginning: To paraphrase Joe Pesci in My Cousin Vinny,Section 6103 is what we lawyers call a “statute.” It was adopted by Congress as part of the Tax Reform Act of 1976. The final Senate vote on the bill was 81–1; in the House, it was 405–2. It was signed by President Gerald Ford (for those scoring at home, a Republican). Under the United States Constitution, Article VI, Section 2, it, like all statutes, is “the supreme law of the land.” It contains no provision requiring a “legislative purpose” at all. That’s not an oversight. Congress isn’t always legislating. It has other functions; one of them is to investigate officials and even private citizens, which has been part of Congress’s mission since its 1790 inquiry into the financier Robert Morris’s management of federal revenue during the Revolution.

I can’t find any mention of “legislative purpose” in the statute’s legislative history; the Senate report notes only that congressional committees “would continue to have access to returns and return information.” Nor is “legislative purpose” mentioned in the two Office of Legal Counsel opinions I have found that deal with disclosure of returns to congressional committees. “While Congress was concerned about the citizens’ right to privacy, it was also concerned about the Government’s need for the tax information, and was very much aware of its own needs,” an opinion stated in 1977. “The legislative reports, in addressing this issue, simply state that the committees will have access to tax information ‘upon written request of their respective chairmen.’”

Finally, the text contains no provision empowering the secretary of the Treasury to determine whether such a request is “legitimate.” It says “shall furnish.” The lawful response is, “Here they are.” The lawless answer is, “I personally don’t think you have a good reason to ask.” A private citizen who gave such an answer to a lawful order would be headed for jail.

Mnuchin’s defiance is of a piece with the administration’s utterly unprecedented claim that “executive privilege” permits it to refuse to provide documents or testimony whenever it suits the president. Though not mentioned in the Constitution, executive privilege over the years has evolved to protect a few classes of information—military and law-enforcement secrets, for example, specific advice provided by officials directly to the president, and certain internal deliberations over policy.

But except in those limited cases, the executive is expected to provide information at the request of Congress and the courts. Sometimes these disputes require negotiation to reach a balance between what Congress seeks and what the president feels able to reveal. Since the George Washington administration, the most common result has been compromise; though sometimes the fight turns ugly, as former officials such as Attorney General Eric Holder and White House Counsel Harriet Miers found out when different Congresses held them in contempt for defying subpoenas.

No president I know of has asserted a blanket power to reject any request that doesn’t suit him—until Donald Trump. No president I know of has rejected requests on the grounds that the committee requesting is controlled by Democrats—until Donald Trump. The ongoing battle between this administration and the House committees is not, at heart, a legal dispute at all; it is an assertion by a president that the law and the Constitution are simply irrelevant when they conflict with his will.

The administration’s contempt for statutes is not limited to its disputes with Congress. Statute 8 U.S.C. § 1158(a) states: “Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been indicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum … ” Critics often rightly criticize congressional draftsmanship as unclear—but this particular provision isn’t. “Any alien … whether or not at a designated port of arrival.”

And yet the Trump administration’s new asylum regulations say that any alien not at a port of entry may not receive asylum. Congress said “may apply”; Trump said “may not.”

This is the climate of law in 2019. If a president obstructs justice, it’s not illegal—because, you see, he doesn’t like being investigated. If Congress refuses to appropriate funds for a border wall, build it anyway. If the Posse Comitatus Act forbids use of the military in immigration enforcement, urge soldiers to shoot migrants anyway. If the Administrative Procedure Act requires a notice-and-comment procedure before changing regulations, skip the procedure and announce it anyway. If a racist sheriff gets caught harassing Latinos, pardon him. Urge police to beat suspects; urge crowds to shoot immigrants. If a federal trial court rules against a Trump business, attack the judge as “Mexican”; if a federal judge rules against the “travel ban,” attack the “so-called judge.” If a Court of Appeals agrees about the travel ban, threaten to abolish it. If another judge halts the asylum rules, call him an “Obama judge.” If the chief justice mildly protests that the judiciary is independent, tell him he’s wrong.

The Trump administration aspires to be the first of the post-legal era. It lives by a principle enunciated 2,000 years ago by the Roman jurist Ulpian and relied upon by tyrants ever since: Quod principi placuit, legis habet vigorem. What pleases the prince has the force of law.

It goes on from there but you get the idea.