Quote (cambovenzi @ Jun 11 2022 05:13pm)
Wanting to stay president and contesting the results is normal, legitimate and not a crime. Democrats contest election results all the time.
The overt censorship and secrecy involved and the hostility to election integrity should sketch out anyone.
The system is evil and corrupt and should be abolished.
None of this has any bearing on whether or not it was a show trial consisting of what I outlined in my previous post. It clearly was.
I think everyone agree that you can use the legal system to contest legitimate claims. No one worth their salt will dispute that. However, Trump went FAR beyond that. He attempted to use multiple agencies (DOD, DHS, and DOJ) to seize voting machines, enact martial law, etc. We have tons of evidence from members of his administration who can corroborate those claims. Do you think that's "normal" and "legitimate?" I don't and I don't think you do either since you're an extremely principled anti-authoritarian. Whether or not it's a crime is up to the DOJ. At the end of the day though, we should all be glad that he failed and that certain people did the right thing.
No one is hostile to election integrity...where are you getting this from? Who is against free and secure elections? If people can't distinguish between bullshit claims and legitimate ones as it relates to a particular state's system, then that's on them. It takes a lot of work to educate yourself but your state's secretary of state office would be more than willing to help.
Again, this isn't a trial. This is showmanship. That's literally part of the job of EVERY committee. When AOC, Matt Gaetz, Rand Paul, or any other legislature is talking, they are talking to US.
Quote (bogie160 @ Jun 11 2022 08:24pm)
There was bipartisan action within a week on Jan 6th to tamp down some of the loopholes, including clarifying the constitutional significance of the certification. There was no need for a strictly partisan committee.
The decision to form a partisan committee presents a view problems. It's ineffective, because large tracts of the population will simply write it off as a political stunt. But it also leaves unanswered the question of why this attack was possible in the first place. Was Nancy Pelosi just personally incompetent? And it would be incredibly inappropriate if the FBI were involved in any form with something this sensitive. Convincing sole attackers to participate in manufactured schemes is one thing, but if FBI informants were involved in part for encouraging violence during a sensitive transition of power, then pretty severe repercussions are in order.
Is Nancy Pelosi in charge of Capitol security? I'm pretty sure has no authority in that regard. I know that the Capitol Police Chief resigned the day after and he absolutely should have. Big miss by him!
I agree that a partisan committee presents problems but it's a gamble the GOP decided to make by not taking the committee seriously. Now, the GOP has no control over the narrative and you have to pray that Cheney and Kinzinger are good counter- balances to folks like Schiff. Large swaths of the country wrote it off the day it occurred and even larger swaths wrote it off before there was any talk of the committee being formed. It's just the state of our country and there is no getting around it. Most of the people on the committee are pretty fair though but you'll have to judge the merits of their findings yourself. I think it's probably better than they do a proper investigation that's slightly partisan than not do anything at all.
Quote (bogie160 @ Jun 10 2022 05:03pm)
I didn't know that they had upgraded the charges this past January. That said, the "seditious conspiracy" charge refers to an intent to obstruct a ceremony, not to the overthrow of the government. It will be interesting to see if they can prove it in court, given that he never actually entered the Capitol grounds. For my part, I see him as a LARPer. If not for the riot itself, no Oath Keeper would have entered the building, and they did nothing of note once there. I would have him plead guilty to a lesser crime and be done with it.
Bold - They should have dedicated some of the Jan 6th's time to considering that. Why was the Capitol so poorly guarded? Why did they refuse help the day of? There's a lot of incompetence to go around.
Re: certification, they probably should. I wouldn't change the faithless elector law, though, that's for individual states to judge.
Yea, I don't think many people know this unless your plugged into this specific topic. Having said that, I think we need to establish that come coups are just flat out pathetic and have zero chance of success. As it relates to Jan 6, even if they killed Mike Pence, several members of Congress, etc. Biden would still be President and America would move on. Even if Pence magically sent "votes back to the states," it wouldn't have changed the fact that Biden would have been inaugurated. That doesn't mean their intent WASN'T seditious. For example, look at what happened to Kavanaugh recently. That was literally one of the most pathetic assassination attempts in the history of this country. It doesn't matter though because it exposed a vulnerability and it's clear that SCOTUS justices need more protection. Just because it failed then, doesn't mean it can't be successful in the future. The same principle applies to the incompetent, misguided, seditious pieces of shit who made up <1% of the people there that day.
As for the bold, the committee will eventually make recommendations. From what I've read, the Republican members and some Democrats want to have a more unified approach whereas some of the Dems like Raskin want to take a more radical approach as it pertains to our elections. Remember, this is ongoing and it will probably continue to do work until McCarthy abolishes the committee in 2023.