All that matters is what basis Trump has to think hes corrupt and all that information can be acquired without Biden testifying.

because the senators are the representatives of the american public, not a reigning oligarchy.

and if you think the american people don't support impeachment at a decent percent i think you're nuts. my guess is we'd get about 50% for, 30% against, and 20% unsure, as rough numbers.

Majority rules, America, Fuck Yeah.

Yep.

They represent their constituents in red states that overwhelmingly oppose impeachment.

The general public is evenly split, if polls are any indication. "No" is beating "Yes" by about a percent.

I never claimed that?!?!?!?!?!

Bolton is an arch-conservative neocon hawk and a lifelong Republican and has no love lost for the Democrats. Nonetheless, he's a very different breed of conservative than Trump, so he also feels no sympathy or loyalty towards him, or to Trumpism in general. What's clear, however, is that Bolton holds a gigantic grudge against Trump for the way he was fired by him, and probably for the disagreements they had which led to him getting the boot in the first place.

This grudge plus the obvious financial interest with his upcoming book make it very obvious that Bolton would love to plunge the knife in as deep as he can - without being a "willing operative of the democratic party" or any shit like that.



If it's so unclear what happened in Ukraine, then how could the House come to the conclusion that these unclear events are reason enough to impeach the president?
I still havent heard a compelling argument why the evidence which was good enough for the House to come to a conclusion should not be good enough for the Senate.

The point about Trump deserving to be taught a lesson is true though. He deserves an emphatic slap on the wrist. Unfortunately, neither removal from office nor a partisan circus are adequate for this purpose.






Are you fucking kidding me? Biden's son was sitting on the board of a highly corrupt Ukrainian company without any qualification while his father was a key figure in devising US policy towards Ukraine, AND Biden bragged in public about using his influence as the American VP to get the guy fired who was investigating the company of his son. It's on video:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/09/27/flashback_2018_joe_biden_brags_at_cfr_meeting_about_withholding_aid_to_ukraine_to_force_firing_of_prosecutor.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXA--dj2-CY&t=17s

Biden: "I said 'I'm leaving in 6 hours - if the prosecutor is not fired by then, you're not getting the money.' Oh son of a bitch."


Thor: "... conspiracy theory (that the Bidens did anything shady)"
"calling in Biden as a witness would be like calling in an abuse victim"

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jan 30 2020 10:07am

a far more impeachable offense than what the (D)s put forth in the House which they voted to impeach on. hotboxing like that is just plain old mean.

What is relevant is what Trump had to base his accusation of corruption on and that doesn't require Biden to testify. Biden could have been having a secret love affair for ten years with Putin and the Ukrainian prime minister and it wouldn't be relevant because Trump had no basis to think it was happening. Biden isnt on trial. If you want to put him on trial do an actual investigation through the justice department instead of waiting 3 years until hes a major political opponent and extorting a foreign government for a political favor.

This post was edited by Thor123422 on Jan 30 2020 10:15am

To repeat the point I made earlier: if the Democrats were genuinely more concerned with protecting the nation from an abusive president than with scoring political points, they would happily agree to a "Bolton for Biden"-deal. So at the very least, both sides are acting in bad faith.




This point cant be stressed enough. If there are credible reasons to suspect that a high-ranking and still influential politician has committed crimes or grossly abused his powers abroad, then it MUST be legitimate for the current executive to look into this case and to request the indispensable assistance from this foreign country's law enforcement. If there are no credible reasons and a president bullies the foreign country into fabricating dirt on his political rival out of thin air, that's a huge abuse of power and impeachment-worthy.

How good or legitimate the reasons to request an investigation into the Bidens were is THE key question of this whole impeachment process. I've already said that months ago, on the early pages of the original impeachment thread.

Fair enough. I dont necessarily agree, but that's a reasonable point of view.

However, you were also talking about Trump acting on a conspiracy theory, insinuating that his desire to have Biden investigated was baseless. And you also compared Biden to a poor, battered abuse victim which is needlessly dragged to court. Those were statements I had to push back against.

I don't think the majority really applies for US, considering all the vote suppression & electoral stuff, more likely the rule of the strongest than the rule of the majority.

but well hmm hmmm


since a while already.

This post was edited by Saucisson6000 on Jan 30 2020 10:33am