Trump has done plenty to warrant impeachment. But the Ukraine allegations are over the top.
Among the most delicate choices the framers made in drafting the Constitution was how to deal with a president who puts himself above the law. To address that problem, they chose the mechanism of impeachment and removal from office. And they provided that this remedy could be used when a president commits Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.
That last phrase high Crimes and Misdemeanors was a historical term of art, derived from impeachments in the British Parliament. When the framers put it into the Constitution, they didnt discuss it much, because no doubt they knew what it meant. It meant, as Alexander Hamilton later phrased it, the abuse or violation of some public trust.
Simply put, the framers viewed the president as a fiduciary, the government of the United States as a sacred trust and the people of the United States as the beneficiaries of that trust. Through the Constitution, the framers imposed upon the president the duty and obligation to take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed and made him swear an oath that he would fulfill that duty of faithful execution. They believed that a president would break his oath if he engaged in self-dealing if he used his powers to put his own interests above the nations. That would be the paradigmatic case for impeachment.
Thats exactly what appears to be at issue today. A whistleblower in U.S. intelligence lodged a complaint with the intelligence communitys inspector general so alarming that he labeled it of urgent concern and alerted the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Though the details remain secret, apparently this much can be gleaned: The complaint is against the president. It concerns a promise that the president made, in at least one phone call, with a foreign leader. And it involves Ukraine and possible interference with the next presidential election. The complaint is being brazenly suppressed by the Justice Department in defiance of a whistleblower law that says, without exception, the complaint shall be turned over to Congress.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-has-done-plenty-to-warrant-impeachment-but-the-ukraine-allegations-are-over-the-top/2019/09/20/51eff90c-dbf1-11e9-bfb1-849887369476_story.html
This article was co-written by Kellyanne's husband George Conway. It must be really weird to live in that house.
Zorro
(15,730 posts)duforsure
(11,885 posts)Of what Putin has said to him ,and him to Putin behind closed doors. like from Putin , where's my payment, when will the sanctions be lifted, and threatened by Putin with being compromised by him and the Russian mafia now. The worst is yet to come .
Skittles
(153,138 posts)silly me