Clown Car V: 2020 version!

[Ajidica]

And Rwanda was none of anyone's business. Always how it goes, no limit really.

America was arguably the only Great Power that realized one should feel bad about the Rwandan genocide, and goes a good way towards explaining why we supported Rwanda so much for so long.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Since the coup thread is currently locked and is likely to remain locked
Iam going to post this here before it gets cycled out from the news

Capitol staffer says office panic buttons were "torn out" before riot
https://www.newsweek.com/capitol-hill-riots-panic-buttons-torn-out-staffer-1561191

 

[Takhisis]

Another bites the shaft!

After All That, Trump Told Aides Not to Pay Giuliani for His Legal Services: WaPo
RUDY RIPOFF

The relationship between President Donald Trump and his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani is crumbling. The commander in chief has told aides not to pay Giuliani at all for his legal work attempting to overturn Trump’s loss in the November presidential election, according to The Washington Post. Since November, Giuliani has traveled the country to testify before swing state lawmakers and promote the president’s unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud. Trump told aides he wants to personally review any reimbursement requests from Giuliani. The former New York City mayor also demanded $20,000 per day at one point, reportedly angering Trump. Trump was impeached for a second time Wednesday on charges of inciting an insurrection, the first president in American history to face removal from office twice.

Read it at The Washington Post​

 

[Arakhor]

How's he going to get another lawyer if he's going to refuse to pay his most loyal attack dog?

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

As Trump said about McCain, he doesn't like Losers. He doesn't like losers who 'lost' a battle by getting captured. Doesn't like loser lawyers who don't win court cases. Because he is a winner you see. He won the election, and the only reason Biden will be president is because they cheated, But he still won. In a landslide. Bigly time.

 

[Estebonrober]

Since the coup thread is currently locked and is likely to remain locked
Iam going to post this here before it gets cycled out from the news

Considering the situation, this seems like it should be answerable and it seems like it really needs an answer.

 

[IglooDame]

Since the coup thread is currently locked and is likely to remain locked
Iam going to post this here before it gets cycled out from the news

There's so many individual stories in the overall Capitol breach news thread that it seems impossible to focus on individual ones, and I personally have stopped trying. I'm hoping (and assuming) that it'll all get investigated and 'addressed' eventually.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

That seems unlikely. Inauguration is in a week's time and I can't imagine that Pelosi wants to block the Senate from approving any of Biden's Cabinet choices.

Didn't Biden propose that they could split it halfways: Have the trial in the morning and the confirmation hearings as well as Covid-Relief in the afternoon (and evening)? The trial will take longer though than we normal people assume as the workload is high after how many years of inaction now?



That was the decision between a black dude and a woman, right? See, that's all I took in my superficial reading of the news. I mean, they can do these more controversial nominations later and do the obvious ones first. Every Day counts as they only have 2-4 years (or less if something happens to a Senator).

McConnell can hold the trial whenever he wants and as quickly as he wants - once the House sends him the articles. However, he has said he won't even begin the trial until the 19th at the earliest and would likely slow-walk it and prevent the Senate from confirming any of Biden's Cabinet or voting on Biden's initiatives while the trial is ongoing. Even at this late juncture, and despite everything that has happened, McConnell is putting party before country.

Schumer takes over on or near the 20th and it's an open question of what he will do. They may ask Pelosi not to send the articles until after Biden's first 100 days to give him some room to pass bills and get his cabinet confirmed. They may try and split their days - working half days on the trial and half days on Biden's business - but I think that will take McConnell cooperation so we can be sure it won't happen.

My thoughts exactly. I think the plan must be to swarm out of there like a hive of bees if the MAGA couponauts show up again. I heard on the news that they were handing out weapons to all of the National Guard today. If by "weapons" they mean rifles with live ammo... its going to a miracle if we don't end up with a bloodbath

Maybe the simple show of force will be enough to keep them at bay

Yeah they did give them live ammo. Depressing af

I've been seeing articles and hearing news folks claiming that McConnell actually has the votes to remove Trump if he decides to go that route. I'm highly skeptical of this, but I will admit that if the Republicans turn on Trump, even at this late hour, they are going to have a pretty strong talking point that they took the high road, demonstrated that they could put aside partisanship, put country over party... on-and-on etc. They are also going to use it as an absolute defense against the claim that they are the party of Trump going forward.

Of course, I'm not convinced that any of this would be fair or accurate, but I am damn sure that they are going to claim it, and a lot of people are going to buy it. There's no denying that ousting their own party's POTUS when they have the majority would be an unprecedented display of bipartisanship. So maybe they (McConnell) wants to grab that brass ring while its there?

I doubt there will be more than 3 or 4 GOP votes to convict. Graham is already working hard to lobby his caucus to not convict and McConnell himself says he isn't even sure he will personally convict. With Trump off Twitter, there is also less chance he'll say something inflammatory to piss off GOP senators into voting to convict.

Ironically, having Trump off Twitter also gave the GOP cover to impeach/convict him because it means he doesn't have a platform to call them traitors and whip up his base against them. Despite that fact, they are still choosing party over country.

It's a disgrace that 140 congresscritters voted to overturn the EC and only 10 GOPers voted to impeach. None of this bodes well for conviction.

 

[Estebonrober]

There's so many individual stories in the overall Capitol breach news thread that it seems impossible to focus on individual ones, and I personally have stopped trying. I'm hoping (and assuming) that it'll all get investigated and 'addressed' eventually.

Remember when we could get online in forums and argue about how like communists and libertarians were all insane and argue the value of low taxes vs social spending? and stuff, maybe the war crimes committed by certain individuals and things. . .and then the likes of Fox News, Limbaugh, Beck and others decided to feed the right wing the Alex Jones Kool Aid for five years? Now we have probably 50 million legitimately insane people running around.

With great power comes great responsibility, maybe they should not have fed the outrage machine at the expense of the social fabric jsut to increase quarterly revenue by .5%

 

[AmazonQueen]

McConnell can hold the trial whenever he wants and as quickly as he wants - once the House ends him the articles. However, he has said he won't even begin the trial until the 19th at the earliest and would likely slow-walk it and prevent the Senate from confirming any of Biden's Cabinet or voting on Biden's initiatives while the trial is ongoing. Even at this late juncture, and despite everything that has happened, McConnell is putting party before country.

Schumer takes over on or near the 20th and it's an open question of what he will do. They may ask Pelosi not to send the articles until after Biden's first 100 days to give him some room to pass bills and get his cabinet confirmed. They may try and split their days - working half days on the trial and half days on Biden's business - but I think that will take McConnell cooperation so we can be sure it won't happen.




Yeah they did give them live ammo. Depressing af



I doubt there will be more than 3 or 4 GOP votes to convict. Graham is already working hard to lobby his caucus to not convict and McConnell himself says he isn't even sure he will personally convict. With Trump off Twitter, there is also less chance he'll say something inflammatory to piss off GOP senators into voting to convict.

Ironically, having Trump off Twitter also gave the GOP cover to impeach/convict him because it means he doesn't have a platform to call them traitors and whip up his base against them. Despite that fact, they are still choosing party over country.

It's a disgrace that 140 congresscritters voted to overturn the EC and only 10 GOPers voted to impeach. None of this bodes well for conviction.

What do you expect from politicians?
This 2nd impeachment is still the most bipartisan impeachment in history even with only 10 Republicans voting to impeach.
Mitt Romney is the only senator to ever vote to convict a President against the party line.

 

[Samson]

Sacked over the capital riot: Microsoft-owned GitHub has fired a Jewish employee for warning colleagues in Washington DC to “stay safe homies, Nazis are about,” complete with sad emoji during the ransacking of the US Capitol last week

Human resources reprimanded the employee for using the word “Nazi.” Then, two days later, last Friday, he was fired with GitHub citing "patterns of behavior,".

GitHub’s own CEO had also pointed out that there were neo-Nazis at the Capitol riot (which there were) and has not been sacked.

The axed employee, meanwhile, has given his version of events, including copies of internal messages. “I did not know that, as a Jew, it would be so polarizing to say this word,” he wrote in a Slack group for Jewish employees, it was reported. "We grew up saying [Nazi]. It was a story we told because we had to – the decimation of whole lines of ancestry were at the hands of people who went by that title.” He also said he wouldn't work in the tech industry again thanks to its "toxic" culture.

That he was apparently fired for “patterns of behavior,” which some suggest is deliberately vaguely incriminating, and that he is Jewish, are the sort of details that spark speculation yet are likely to have little to do with the actual reason to fire him.

 

[EnglishEdward]

None of this bodes well for conviction.

Some interesting analysis there.

Is there a hard constititional date by which an impeachment by the House must be tried by the Senate; OR; can it be dragged out and along indefinitetly?

 

[stinkubus]

I think the second impeachment of Trump will just keep him in the news longer. Does it really serve any purpose? (and that is assuming it will actually have a different result from last time).
I hope it's not just a fear of a ridiculous 80 year old Trump in 2024 running again (his supporters wouldn't shy away from voting for his daughter or other Trumps even if Don is removed)

There is historical precedent for holding an impeachment trial after someone has left office. If convicted at trial the Senate can hold a second vote which would bar Trump from ever running for federal office again.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Some interesting analysis there.

Is there a hard constititional date by which an impeachment by the House must be tried by the Senate; OR; can it be dragged out and along indefinitetly?

Unclear

 

[Farm Boy]

America was arguably the only Great Power that realized one should feel bad about the Rwandan genocide, and goes a good way towards explaining why we supported Rwanda so much for so long.

Well, that is depressing.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

What do you expect from politicians?

Act like rational, conscientious human beings?

If this isn't impeachable, then nothing is. I also dislike using "because they're politicians" as an excuse for immoral and/or treasonous actions.

 

[EnglishEdward]

Unclear

Thank you.

Then the senate trial merely provides a free opportunity for the Donald Trump to rant on and be rude about everybody.

His lawyers may well have success in arguing that the senate trial should take precedence thereby stalling other court cases.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Act like rational, conscientious human beings?

If this isn't impeachable, then nothing is. I also dislike using "because they're politicians" as an excuse for immoral and/or treasonous actions.

It isn't an excuse, just a realistic assessment of how they are likely to behave.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Thank you.

Then the senate trial merely provides a free opportunity for the Donald Trump to rant on and be rude about everybody.

His lawyers may well have success in arguing that the senate trial should take precedence thereby stalling other court cases.

No one is stepping up to defend him or represent him in a trial at the moment - his lawyers all quit. Its unclear they will even have a lengthy trial. This is a political process, not a legal one, so they need not go through all the motions. As some lawmakers have said, (paraphrased), we heard he said to that crowd and we lived through the attack, we don't need to do a bunch of fact finding.

It's also annoying that people keep saying that basically Trump will do something bad if we don't let him get away with doing something else bad as an excuse for why no one should hold him to account.

It isn't an excuse, just a realistic assessment of how they are likely to behave.

We should have higher expectations then. Those low expectations I think are partly to blame for 4 years of Trump imo because it's a handy excuse for the bad guys to do whatever the hell they want.

-------

There are indications that this all was in fact coordinated and not just a mob of malcontents. If coordination, planning and execution are proven, will @Traitorfish drop objections to the use of the word coup or are we still just hyper-online liberals self-congratulating?

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/13/politics/capitol-riot-investigation/

 

[Sommerswerd]

Delta puts customers who harassed Romney, Graham on no-fly list: CEO

Delta Air Lines has placed the customers who harassed GOP Sens. Mitt Romney (Utah) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.) on its no-fly list, company CEO Ed Bastian told Reuters.

The senators were seen in viral videos being heckled by supporters of President Trump after both expressed opposition to challenging the Electoral College certification of President-elect Joe Biden's victory last week.

https://thehill.com/policy/transportation/534199-delta-bans-customers-who-harassed-romney-graham-ceo