ok, let's just "agree" that this was legal and the only way for Trump to pursue justice against Biden.

1. if it's not a crime for Trump nor Biden, what is trump pursuing justice for? if there was no crime, either in biden's diplomacy nor trump's responsorial diplomacy, then trump is only left with attacking a political rival. that's how canceling out works in 5th grade math.

2. if no crime is required to impeach, and it isn't required, then it can be both Trump's only way to punish biden and 100% legitimate to impeach over. Trump made a judgement call to go after biden, that judgement slices in the direction of potential impeachment also, as all actions both personal and professional by a POTUS do.

This post was edited by thesnipa on Jan 27 2020 01:18pm

Also asking for a TV announcement from Ukraine prez that an investigation on Biden started. Lets fight corruption...

So much good faith

Its still a crime within Ukrainian jurisdiction and its still clear corruption within the top eschelons of both law enforcement and the economy of a country we are trying to provide foreign aid to. Just because Biden is beyond domestic law enforcement shouldn't mean he's above diplomatic, foreign and political repercussions. Trump is taking the same step Biden did, to counter what Biden did. That's proportional.



If a crime is required to impeach, and its sure being argued its required right now on the senate floor, then that's a moot issue.
But if we understand impeachment and removal to be what they actually are: Political powers, subject to the arbitrary whims of the house and senate and accountable only to the people and not restricted by any sense of jurisprudence, then removal is only reserved for the powerless. Trump and Biden are only as guilty and removable as the case to be argued to the voters who elect the house, senate and president.

so if Mayor Pete felates his husband in a saudi hotel room, should trump fight to bring him to justice? honestly the "trump is standing up for Ukrainian justice" might be the most hilarious take yet. something you boys never seem to be able to answer is why trump isnt fighting corruption generally, just in china and where ever Biden has been. and further why that shouldnt factor in to counter the "hes fighting corruption" narrative. like if i "stand up for women" when i think it can get me laid one time im not exactly a feminist.

as to the latter, i agree. its a political check and balance with no legal requirement for lawbreaking. they can argue the color of the sky in the legislature if they're bored, wtf does that mean to me? the congress debates the legality of their own powers, will rule on their own powers and how powerful those powers should be. as if that means anything lmao.

really we're left with trump did an oopsie to try and fix a biden oopsie, and no law breaking in either case, and no law breaking req'd for impeachment. if there were someone could simultaneously be a stand up citizen in america and a mob boss in panama and be POTUS, with no legal recourse to the citizens. thats fucking dumb to even consider.

Sure Trump could. And he'd face the political backlash at home over trying to get Mayor Pete's head lopped off for a blowie. And congress could impeach him and remove him if they wanted to do so, because that's their political recourse against a toxic president.
How many countries was America basing its foreign policy aid around fighting corruption? Eastern european bloc seems to be the only place I can name offhand. In asia and africa, America has been angling to soften its position on corruption to allow American corporations to compete with corrupt Chinese firms who grease palms we can't touch. In Ukraine, we're fighting a proxy cold war against Russia over the ostensible cause of corruption and overthrew their elected government with a coup 'because it was corrupt'.



Pretty much. Its just a political calculation. And you have to convince people to sway politics, and the arguments against Trump aren't particularly convincing. Trump did the same thing Biden did, in order to get Biden held accountable for it? Why should American voters be swayed by that? If they want to look at the relative moral culpability, Trump withheld non-lethal aid for a few weeks and did an oopsie and Ukraine didn't even care, but Biden was covering for his son who was exfiltrating millions of dollars of embezzled state funds from a corrupt country. What's more damning, a minor geopolitical kerfuffle or a serious personal scandal?

The FBI would work with their Ukrainian counterparts. This was mentioned MULTIPLE times in the testimony and happens often...even if the crime is strictly a violation of Ukrainian law. I'm not a lawyer so I don't understand why that's the case, I'm just going by what people have said under oath.

It's kind of amusing how clumsy the Trump administration is. The only reason the Mueller investigation lasted as long as it did is because Trump didn't listen to his lawyers and kept opening his mouth. If he shut the fuck up, it would have been over months earlier. Hell, if he shut the fuck up about why he fired Comey and just stuck with the talking points, there probably wouldn't have been a Special Counsel. If he actually wanted to pin Biden down, he could have come up with a much more believable excuse. Only the most gullible people are buying what Trump is selling.

Work with who? The prosecutors office that Joe Biden was micromanaging with his foreign aid extortion?
The FBI cannot enforce Ukrainian law and their counterparts are the same people Joe Biden was manipulating. If the Ukrainians quash the investigation because of political pressure from America, the FBI has no recourse.



The democrats might be impeaching Trump right now for 'putting kids in cages' for all it matters and in all rank hypocrisy it would entail. It was always political, and they'd always find an excuse. Most likely, they'd impeach him on the grounds of 'obstruction of justice of the Mueller investigation', after Mueller said he didn't collude with Russia. They decided they wanted to impeach Trump before he even opened his mouth about Ukraine, and those events really didn't have a bearing on the political calculation of Nancy Pelosi when weighing the threat of her far-left radicals against the vulnerability of her red-state moderates. If she didn't want it politically, it never would have happened. When she did, they conjured up a complaint from a guy who Schiff's office already knew was a reliable anti-Trump leaker with an axe to grind.

We've withheld aid from south american countries based on corruption and them being owned by drug cartels, we've withheld aid from north korea and kept it at a stalemate for decades for the same reason, many places in africa see no aid due to warlords coming in at taking the air drops before people get them, etc. i think corruption is always calculated in aid or dont aid situations, we just typically dont ask them to oust a single corrupt politician because the corruption runs too deep for that to have an effect worthy of giving aid for.



the truth is that if the democrats actually listed all of their grievances that led to impeachment they'd be called idiots for having a 327 item long list ranging from serious potential abuses to minor gripes. the house trial was quicker than the number of days it took Pelosi to file it. that's pretty damn good work for congress. in this respect the democrats deserve a modicum of respect for not impeaching in year 1 based on the first whim, they "built a case" for 4 years and let Mueller do his work.

This post was edited by thesnipa on Jan 27 2020 02:32pm

Um...Joe Biden isn't micromanaging anything right now lol. The Trump administration has been running things since 2017 so Joe Biden can't really be the boogeyman that you want him to be.

What's your point regarding impeachment? That it's political and the Trump administration did something bad enough that a majority of the public wanted impeachment? Well color me surprised...

We have means of deciding what the public wants, and its done via elections for the house, senate and presidency. The people elected Trump, the house majority decided they wanted impeachment, a senate majority told them to bugger off.