1. Hello,


    New users on the forum won't be able to send PM untill certain criteria are met (you need to have at least 6 posts in any sub forum).

    One more important message - Do not answer to people pretending to be from xnxx team or a member of the staff. If the email is not from forum@xnxx.com or the message on the forum is not from StanleyOG it's not an admin or member of the staff. Please be carefull who you give your information to.


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    StanleyOG.

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  2. Hello,


    You can now get verified on forum.

    The way it's gonna work is that you can send me a PM with a verification picture. The picture has to contain you and forum name on piece of paper or on your body and your username or my username instead of the website name, if you prefer that.

    I need to be able to recognize you in that picture. You need to have some pictures of your self in your gallery so I can compare that picture.

    Please note that verification is completely optional and it won't give you any extra features or access. You will have a check mark (as I have now, if you want to look) and verification will only mean that you are who you say you are.

    You may not use a fake pictures for verification. If you try to verify your account with a fake picture or someone else picture, or just spam me with fake pictures, you will get Banned!

    The pictures that you will send me for verification won't be public


    Best regards,

    StanleyOG.

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  1. thinskin

    thinskin Porn Star Banned!

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    This is funny!



    Thinskin
     
  2. stumbler

    stumbler Porn Star

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    Justice Department asks for Jan. 6 transcripts as investigation widens: report

    Bob Brigham
    May 17, 2022


    [​IMG]
    US Attorney General Merrick Garland (AFP)


    The Department of Justice has requested transcripts of interviews from the Select Committee Investigating the Jan. 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol, The New York Times reported Tuesday.

    "The move, coming as Attorney General Merrick B. Garland appears to be ramping up the pace of his painstaking investigation into the Capitol riot, is the clearest sign yet of a wide-ranging inquiry at the Justice Department," the newspaper reported. "The House committee has interviewed more than 1,000 people so far, and the transcripts could be used as evidence in potential criminal cases, to pursue new leads or as a baseline text for new interviews conducted by federal law enforcement officials."


    The request for transcripts came from Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite Jr.

    "The Justice Department’s investigation has been operating on a separate track from the committee’s work. Generally, investigators working on the two inquiries have not been sharing information, except for at times communicating to ensure that a witness is not scheduled to appear before different investigators at the same time, according to a person with knowledge of the inquiries," the newspaper reported.


    "Thus far, the Justice Department’s investigation has focused more on lower-level activists who stormed the Capitol than on the planners of the attack. But in recent weeks, Mr. Garland has bolstered the core team tasked with handling the most sensitive and politically combustible elements of the inquiry."

    The request for transcripts occurred on April 20.

    The newspaper reported the request for transcripts occurred because the interviews “may contain information relevant to a criminal investigation we are conducting.”



    https://www.rawstory.com/justice-department-jan-6/
     
  3. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

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    They should ask the FBI for their files, eh?
     
  4. thinskin

    thinskin Porn Star Banned!

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    Way to go Gym!



    Thinskin
     
    • Like Like x 1
  5. vincenzz

    vincenzz Porn Star

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    1B94889E-CD23-4358-A8DA-EF24D2046ECB.jpeg
     
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    1. stumbler
      The Nazis are the ones who staged a deadly insurrection and attempted coup. Some of them even wore t shirts saying so. And they were all Trump's "brown shirts" trying to make Trump dictator for life through violence.

      Only treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans try to deny that using psychological projection.
       
      stumbler, May 20, 2022
    2. shootersa
      Only treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans try to deny that using psychological projection.
      Oh, really?

      <iframe width="640" height="360" src="" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

      Only despicables use Hitler to demonize you say?
      Stumbler is a liar and a hypocrite.
      "Even members of the Supreme Court were in on staging a deadly insurrection and attempted coup to try and overthrow a free and fair election and install Trump dictator for life. Just like the Nazis did in Germany."​
       
      shootersa, May 20, 2022
    3. Scotchlass
      We will eventually run out of natural resources, but we have an unlimited supply of stupidity coming from the Democrat Left.
      We need to invent power grids that are fueled by bull$hit.
       
      Scotchlass, May 27, 2022
  6. stumbler

    stumbler Porn Star

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    Even members of the Supreme Court were in on staging a deadly insurrection and attempted coup to try and overthrow a free and fair election and install Trump dictator for life. Just like the Nazis did in Germany.

    Fuck voting, democracy, the rule of law, and the Constitution. Just name Trump the winner and be done with it. My hubby will back you.

    Newly revealed emails show Ginni Thomas pressuring Arizona legislators to overturn Trump's loss

    Travis Gettys
    May 20, 2022


    [​IMG]
    Ginni Thomas (By Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America - Ginni Thomas, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=56638177)


    Ginni Thomas urged Arizona legislators to reject Joe Biden's popular-vote victory in favor of Donald Trump electors, according to newly revealed emails.

    The Washington Post obtained communications between Thomas and Russell Bowers, speaker of the Arizona House, and state Rep. Shawnna Bolick, who served on the House elections committee at the time and is currently running for secretary of state, showing the wife of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas arguing that legislators had to intervene to counter baseless fraud claims.

    “Stand strong in the face of political and media pressure,” Thomas wrote on Nov. 9, 2020, adding that the responsibility to choose electors was “yours and yours alone ... to fight back against fraud.”

    Thomas sent the message through an online platform that allows users to send pre-written form emails to multiple elected officials at once, and the emails show the conservative activist and outspoken Trump supporter was even more involved in pushing to overturn the former president's election loss.

    READ MORE: Things are 'likely to get ugly' as Madison Cawthorn makes threats after election loss: analyst

    “Article II of the United States Constitution gives you an awesome responsibility: to choose our state’s Electors,” read the Nov. 9 email. “… [P]lease take action to ensure that a clean slate of Electors is chosen.”

    She also signed an email to the same two GOP legislators on Dec. 13, the day before the Electoral College cast their votes to certify Biden's election.

    "Before you choose your state’s Electors," Thomas wrote, "consider what will happen to the nation we all love if you don’t stand up and lead."

    https://www.rawstory.com/ginni-thomas-jan-6-2657361630/
     
    • Winner Winner x 1
  7. thinskin

    thinskin Porn Star Banned!

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    Obviously the forum troll is in favour of only landowners and slaveowners voting!

    Thinskin
     
    • Like Like x 1
    1. stumbler
      Actually the treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans would like to do away with voting and the Constitution all together. Too problematic when it comes to making their Chosen One Trump dictator for life.
       
      stumbler, May 20, 2022
  8. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

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    Stumbler is a liar.
    Despicables are patriots. You don't hear them calling America a "shithole country" do you?
     
    1. stumbler
      You to not care or cherish a single thing about this country and never did. Traitors never do.
       
      stumbler, May 20, 2022
    2. shootersa
      Another lie.
      Shooter has more patriotic fervor in his little finger, on his worst day, than you do in your entire family tree on it's best day.

      "shithole country" indeed.
       
      shootersa, May 21, 2022
    3. anon_de_plume
      Except shooter is a self admitted space alien. He's not an American!
       
      anon_de_plume, May 21, 2022
      stumbler likes this.
  9. pauldz

    pauldz Porn Star

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    The protesters knew what was coming, look at the shit going down now, gas prices, inflation etc,
     
    1. View previous comments...
    2. shootersa
      Traitors.
      Propaganda and lies to deflect from the very real despicable train wreck.
       
      shootersa, May 27, 2022
  10. pauldz

    pauldz Porn Star

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    It was'nt a shithole when trump was in power!
     
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  11. stumbler

    stumbler Porn Star

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    Which is exactly what they are still fighting for. No democracy, no rule of law, no Constitution, no United States of America. That was only well and good until they lost al election.

    That's how you know that if you look really close when they are waving the American Flag you can see the brown stains where they wiped their asses with it.
     
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  12. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

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    stumbler is having a real problem, he's obsessed with people wiping their asses.
    What is it, run out of toilet paper Stumbler?
    Run out of formula?
    Gas too expensive?
    Ask your savior biden to give you gas from his limo why don't you?

    Wasn't a problem when trump was in the whitehouse, was it?
     
    1. anon_de_plume
      Yeah, Trump was too busy ignoring the pandemic!
       
      anon_de_plume, May 21, 2022
      stumbler likes this.
  13. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

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    Oh look!
    The village idiot is taking over replying for his savior stumbler.

    Hey anon!
    Has stumbler showed you his "shit stained American flag" yet?
    Bet you want one, eh?
     
  14. thinskin

    thinskin Porn Star Banned!

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  15. stumbler

    stumbler Porn Star

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    The Chosen One of the treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans. They do not want the United States of America and its Constitution. They want Trump dictator for life.

    Trump considered a military coup: Would he have gotten away with it?

    Chauncey Devega, Salon
    May 23, 2022


    [​IMG]
    President Donald J. Trump, joined by Vice President Mike Pence, pose for photos with Senior Military Leadership Wednesday, April 4, 2019, in the Oval Office of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)


    It is now a public fact that Donald Trump and his cabal, including Republican members of Congress, attempted a coup on Jan. 6, 2021. This de facto conspiracy was sophisticated, multidimensional and nationwide in scale, and included what became a terrorist attack on the U.S. Capitol. We know that Donald Trump was aware of at least some details of this plot and was involved in its planning and execution.

    To deny these obvious facts is to either be a believer in the Big Lie and supporter of Trump and the Republican Party's war on American democracy or to be in an extreme state of willful denial. As a practical matter, it is much the same thing.

    Within a few weeks, the House select committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, 2021, will finally hold televised public hearings. Their primary task will be to explain to the American people how serious the events of that day actually were and to establish a case that Donald Trump and his co-conspirators should be punished for their crimes.

    One question that demands much more public attention than it has gotten is how close Donald Trump came to invoking the Insurrection Act, declaring martial law, or to using other presidential emergency powers in an effort to nullify the 2020 election. In the weeks and days before Election Day, military and other national security leaders publicly sounded the alarm through editorials, interviews and other means that the Trump regime might try to order the armed forces to intervene on his behalf. That such figures would feel the need to declare that they were loyal to the Constitution, and not to a particular political leader, is almost unprecedented in American history.

    Because of a combination of normalcy bias, cowardice, and outright denial about Trump and his cabal's obvious plans, the mainstream news media and most other public voices did not give these unprecedented warnings the sustained attention they merited. As a result, the American people still do not properly understand how close they came to losing their democracy on Jan. 6, 2021. That danger has only increased since then as the Republicans and their larger movement have escalated their plans to overthrow the country's multiracial democracy.

    To discuss this urgent question and others, I recently spoke with Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the Brennan Center's Liberty & National Security Program and a senior practitioner fellow at the University of Chicago's Center for Effective Government. She is an expert on presidential emergency powers, government surveillance and government secrecy. Her writing has been featured in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times, the Atlantic, the New Republic and elsewhere, and she has . She has appeared as a frequent guest on MSNBC, CNN, and NPR.

    In this conversation, Goitein details various scenarios through which Trump could have declared a "national emergency," perhaps including martial law, as a way of remaining in power
    — and discusses whether that gambit would ultimately have worked. The president of the United States, she explains, has access to immense powers in a time of national emergency, many of which are secret and not subject to any effective oversight from Congress or the courts.

    It is also publicly known that Trump wanted the military to use lethal force to suppress the marches and other protests that took place across the country in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. Goitein explores what would most likely have happened if Trump had given such an order. She also shares her concerns about America's current democracy crisis and her perception that the events of Jan. 6 are part of a much larger plan to impose a type of "competitive authoritarian" system in place of genuine electoral democracy.

    This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

    How do you feel about this moment, with America's democracy crisis and all the other challenges facing this country?

    I'm worried, because after the transition to the Biden administration it seemed that people understood there was work to be done before the next presidential election to address some of the weak points in our system that are vulnerable to a leader with autocratic impulses. It also seemed that people understood that what happened with Trump was not necessarily a one-time aberrant occurrence, that there was a real danger of such a movement to undermine democracy trying such things again. Notice I said "movement" and not "moment." We would be seeing it again in future elections.

    There seemed to be a decent level of understanding that meant we had to take steps to shore up the guardrails of democracy. I've heard the phrase "guardrails of democracy" a lot. But I don't see those guardrails being strengthened fast enough. I also don't see the urgency and priority being placed on that by either members of Congress or the Biden administration. That's what worries me, because we are running out of time.

    How do you make sense of that lack of urgency?

    I think there is a theory at work where if the Biden administration shows the American people that democracy can work for them, such an outcome will be the best thing that can be done to push back against anti-democratic forces. Thus, the priority is on laws and policies that will increase the well-being of Americans in their everyday lives. I support that. I believe that is an important part of the equation. I also believe that outcome is worth advancing for reasons totally unrelated to saving our democracy.

    There are people in the United States, especially since COVID, who are in dire need of help from the government and some kind of social safety net. But I do not think that can be a substitute for laws that make it harder for a president, and especially one who is a would-be autocrat, to consolidate power. I think it's a mistake to de-prioritize the latter in favor of the former. I don't know for sure that's what's happening, but it's a theory that would explain what we're seeing in terms of the administration's priorities.

    The Democratic leadership in Congress is not going to prioritize something that isn't a priority for the Biden administration. The Biden administration is not necessarily eager to pass laws that rein in its own powers during a term when there are so many crises. Whether that's COVID, or whether it's Russia's invasion of Ukraine, this is a time when it would take an administration with a very long view to embrace laws that would restrict the president's own power. Very few presidents think that way.

    I do believe that if legislation that reformed emergency powers came onto President Biden's desk, he would sign it. I can't say that for other presidents, certainly not for the last president, Donald Trump. But that is very different from saying that Biden is going to force Congress to pass emergency powers reform. If it is not on the White House priority list, it is going to be very difficult to make that happen in Congress.

    With so much happening in terms of the challenges to American democracy, what advice would you give to people about how to make sense of it all? What should they prioritize?

    It would take an administration with a very long view to embrace laws that would restrict the president's power. Very few presidents think that way.

    I'm an expert on civil liberties and national security, with a specific focus on presidential emergency powers. That is what I spend my time worrying about. That does not mean it's the only thing that anyone should be worried about, by any means. For example, my colleagues at Brennan Center who work on voting rights are being consumed by that work right now, as well they should. That is another area that the American people should be extremely worried about. There is an attack all around this country, by conservatives on the state and local level, on voting rights.

    I understand that with so much going on at the same time, it can be hard to figure out what to make of it all. What I would say is: Do not let the worries become paralyzing. Pick something that you care about. Pick something that you think is important and do something about it.

    Call your congressperson. When someone actually picks up the phone and calls their representatives in Congress, that gets noticed. Even today, with all the big money in politics, phone calls to a congressional office get noticed. Do some googling to see what local organizations are working on the issues that you care about. Try to be a force for preserving our democracy. It can seem overwhelming, but once you start biting off pieces of it and putting one foot in front of the other by taking steps to be part of the solution, that work can be very fulfilling.

    What were you thinking as you watched the events of Jan. 6, 2021?

    I have never been so aware of watching history unfold. As I was watching the events that day, I kept thinking that whatever comes of this, the world and the United States of America are not going to be the same after this. I've never seen anything like what happened on Jan. 6. None of us have in this country. I was in awe. I wouldn't say I was frightened, because I was pretty sure I knew how it was going to end. I was certainly concerned for the safety and well-being of the people inside the Capitol. I was pretty sure that even a few thousand people attacking the U.S. Capitol were not going to keep President Trump in power.

    Perhaps there was a part of me that was thinking, "OK, when people see this, they will understand the threat, and they will reject this. They will reject this anti-democratic movement because they will finally see it for what it is. Democracy means enough to most of us in this country that these people attacking the Capitol will finally be marginalized."

    That really didn't happen. Republicans have embraced these anti-democracy forces.

    It shows how serious the threat is. It also shows that we have to be just as serious in resolving it. Our democracy is under threat. That doesn't mean that our democracy is lost by any means. We should be scared, but as I said before, being scared shouldn't lull us or intimidate us to inaction. It's the opposite. We have to be just as fierce in our defense of democracy as its opponents are in attacking it.

    What would have been the worst-case outcome on Jan. 6, with Trump attempting to stay in power. Could he have invoked the Insurrection Act or perhaps even staged a military coup?

    There was a scenario where Trump tries to construe the transfer of power on Jan. 20 as an insurrection, and invokes the Insurrection Act to stop Biden from becoming president.

    The worst-case scenario has nothing to do with emergency powers. The real worst-case scenario is that the president attempts a military coup, which is not legal. There is no emergency authority that gives the president the power to declare a military coup. We are extremely fortunate that Trump did not have the military on his side. Military leaders, including [acting] Defense Secretary Miller and the chair of the Joints Chiefs, Gen. Milley, were extremely concerned about the potential for misuse of the military around the time of the presidential election and were determined not to let that happen.

    That is one of the country's democratic institutions and guardrails that held: Senior national security officials within the administration retained their loyalty to the Constitution and understood that was their first loyalty. It was a loyalty that went beyond any they might feel toward the president or to their party. That was one of the silver linings of Jan. 6.

    A military coup is the worst thing that could have happened. Short of that, I do believe that President Trump could have invoked the Insurrection Act. In fact, I actually believe that on Jan. 6 there was an insurrection, so the Insurrection Act would have been appropriate if the purpose were actually to suppress the attack on the Capitol. But what might have happened instead is that President Trump could have invoked the Insurrection Act as a pretext to get the military involved for the wrong reasons.

    There's also a scenario where the president, with or without an attack on the U.S. Capitol, could have somehow construed the transition of power on Jan. 20 itself as an insurrection. Trump could have said, "I won the election despite Congress' certification. Therefore any attempt by Joe Biden to take office is in fact an insurrection. I'm going to declare the Insurrection Act to put down the insurrection."

    Obviously, that would have been a clear abuse of the Insurrection Act, and I believe the courts might well have put a stop to it. In any event, it wouldn't have worked in the sense that on Jan. 20, under the Constitution, Trump was no longer president. Even if he somehow managed to prevent President Biden from walking into the White House, he still would not have been president himself. At that point, Nancy Pelosi, as speaker of the House, would have been next in line.

    My ultimate point is that there are no emergency powers, and certainly the Insurrection Act is not one of them, that would allow the president to remain in power when there's been an election and someone else has been elected.

    Trump was attempting a "self-coup" or "legal coup." But by definition, a leader like Donald Trump does not respect the rule of law. The scenarios you outline seem to assume that the law holds, and that the president and his administration respect it.

    It is entirely true that the rule of law means absolutely nothing to an autocrat. It matters in the sense that they need to keep in mind what they can get away with in the courts. They also need to keep in mind what they can get away with politically. If for no other reason than those, I think that the reason why Trump didn't do some of the things that were urged by people such as Michael Flynn was, at least in part, because those actions were so plainly unlawful.

    There were various people who were urging Trump to invoke emergency powers to seize the voting machines. If there was in fact an emergency power that authorizes seizure of voting machines, do you think for a second that President Trump wouldn't have exercised it? Of course he would have. The reason he didn't is because there isn't any such power, and he didn't think he could get away with doing it. The other possibility is that there were people, high up in his administration, who knew that they could not get away with seizing the voting machines. Therefore, Trump and his administration did not try it.

    What if Trump had ordered the military to seize the voting machines? Or if he had invoked the Insurrection Act? What do you think would have happened?

    If Trump had ordered one of the senior officials in his administration to do something that was blatantly illegal, and potentially unconstitutional at the level of preventing a peaceful transition of power, I believe someone like Gen. Milley probably would have refused or resigned. Alternatively, he would certainly have refused, and possibly then been fired.

    If there was in fact an emergency power that authorizes seizure of voting machines, do you think for a second that President Trump wouldn't have exercised it?

    A future president might be a little more crafty than Trump about putting people in place ahead of time who would be willing to execute such unconstitutional and illegal orders. Ultimately, if Trump had ordered such measures, he would have faced resistance from within his administration. He would have to fire people and then get some other person in an acting position to implement the order, and then it would have gone to the courts.

    I think the courts would have stopped a blatantly unlawful power grab. Yes, I know many people are skeptical about that. They will say, "These are Trump judges, and they'll do anything Trump wants them to do." But we know that's not true because after the 2020 election, Trump and his supporters filed upwards of 60 lawsuits in an attempt to invalidate the results in various places around the country. Every judge but one rejected those lawsuits. That includes not only many judges appointed by Republican presidents but several Trump appointees as well.

    The courts would have stepped in. At that point, when the courts have said, "You can't do this, you have to stop," if the president continues it is no longer a legal coup. Then it is just a plain coup, meaning potentially a military coup, and then we're back to the fact that the people who were in charge of the military were not willing to go along with such a plan.

    What emergency powers does a president actually have?

    There are two categories of powers. The first are statutory emergency powers. These are the emergency powers that Congress has delegated to the president. These are public. You can read them and know what is permitted and what is not permitted. They're limited. The president, when he declares a national emergency, can avail himself of these statutory powers, but he can't do anything that's outside of those powers. This is particularly true in the national emergency context, which is governed by the National Emergencies Act. When the president declares a national emergency, that action unlocks powers that are contained in more than 120 different provisions of law. They all say some variation of: "In a national emergency, the president can do X." That means the president can do X, but not Y or Z.

    That having been said, some of those powers available in an actual emergency are pretty alarming. They include the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, which is what some Trump supporters suggested could authorize the seizure of voting machines. That law allows the president to essentially freeze any assets or prohibit any financial transactions in order to address a foreign threat. While the threat has to be at least partly coming from overseas, the assets that the president freezes can be assets held by Americans.

    The IEEPA is extremely powerful because it basically allows the president to freeze any American's bank accounts and prohibit anybody else from engaging in transactions with that person. The president can do this simply by saying, "I think this person is associated with a foreign threat."

    The president also has broad powers to shut down communications as well. Correct?

    That would be the Communications Act, which allows the president to take over or shut down radio communications facilities during a national emergency. If a president declares a threat of war, he can go further and he can take over or shut down wire communications facilities. The Communications Act could conceivably be interpreted to allow the president to take over or shut down U.S.-based internet traffic. There are also emergency powers that allow the federal government to control domestic transportation.

    There are also powers that do not require the declaration of an emergency. This would be the Insurrection Act, which gives the president very broad discretion to deploy federal military forces as a domestic police force. This law is dangerously broad and outdated. The whole concept of using military troops as a domestic police force is really contrary to the principles of the U.S. Constitution and to the traditions of this country. In general, using the military as a domestic police force is prohibited by the Posse Comitatus Act. But the Insurrection Act is an exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, and it is written in such a broad and frankly confusing way that it gives the president a dangerous amount of power.

    I grew up during the 1980s and the end of the Cold War and read a great deal about what would happen in the aftermath of a nuclear war. One of the things that was often referenced during movies and books about nuclear war were the secret emergency powers that a president has. These powers are very ominous and most American have no idea about them.

    What you're worried about are the "claimed inherent emergency powers." Presidents for decades have claimed that the Constitution gives them all manner of inherent powers that are not spelled out, by virtue of them being deemed the commander in chief of the armed forces. There are supposedly these broad inherent powers, established and detailed for the most part in Department of Justice memos, many of which have never been seen. We don't actually know the full scope of what presidents believe their emergency powers to be.

    Presidents for decades have claimed that the Constitution gives them all manner of "inherent powers" that are not spelled out. We don't actually know the scope of what presidents believe their emergency powers to be.

    There are a set of documents known as Presidential Emergency Action Documents. These are drafts, directives and orders that are prepared in advance of a range of potential worst-case scenarios. They are ready for the president's signature if one such event was to happen. None of these Presidential Emergency Action Documents, these drafts, directives or orders, has ever been leaked or released. The only way we know what's in them is by secondary sources, including some official sources such as FBI memos and things of that nature which describe their content.

    From those secondary sources, we know that, at least in the past, some of these documents purported to implement martial law and purported to suspend habeas corpus unilaterally. Some of them provided for the roundup and detention of Americans who were on a list of so-called subversives. Some of the actions contemplated in these documents are blatantly unconstitutional, but presumably somebody at the Department of Justice who rubber-stamped them was taking the position that there are inherent constitutional powers that the president has under Article 2 [of the Constitution] to take such measures.

    To me, these unknown secret claims of emergency power are in some ways the scariest, because we have no idea how far they go. Even Congress doesn't have access to these documents.

    It has been confirmed that Trump wanted the military to shoot protesters during the George Floyd protests. What would such an order have looked like? How would it have been translated down to troops on the ground?

    I highly doubt that there's any Presidential Emergency Action Document that gives a president authority to order protesters to be shot. I do not believe there's even any claim to some sort of legal authority to do something like that. Essentially, if the president ordered the military to shoot protesters in the legs, that would clearly be an illegal order and members of the military would have an obligation to disobey it. These people aren't posing any threat, they're not being shot in self-defense. We should not imagine that emergency powers are so capacious that they would ever encompass something so blatantly unlawful. That's an order from the president that the troops would have to disobey.

    I'm more worried about a scenario in which, let's say, there are Presidential Emergency Action Documents that provide for the imposition of martial law in a scenario where there is an insurrection. The term "insurrection" is in the eye of the beholder. If the beholder in that scenario is a president who believes that he is entitled to stay in power no matter what, at that point a declaration of martial law would enable the military to take the place of civilian government.

    Now, that's very different from what's in the Insurrection Act. The Insurrection Act allows the military to act in support of civilian authorities in order to suppress an insurrection or to quell domestic violence. The military remains subordinate to civilian authorities in that scenario. A scenario in which the military takes over the functions of civilian government is what would be commonly referred to as martial law.

    What worries me is that there is no single statute that flatly prohibits martial law. In its absence, I could see a president and the Justice Department arguing that he has that inherent constitutional authority.

    The Brennan Center has analyzed this question and has concluded that the president actually has no authority to invoke martial law. That's because Congress has ruled it out by virtue of enacting an extensive network of laws governing domestic deployment of the military. Martial law would be inconsistent with this network of laws. That said, there is no single statute that flatly prohibits martial law, and in its absence, I could see a president and a Department of Justice taking the position that the president has an inherent constitutional authority to declare martial law.

    To me, that is a more realistic fear and a major potential concern, one that could be alleviated by Congress.

    How do we find that balance, between making sure that a president has the necessary power and latitude to act in response to an emergency, and preventing the abuse of those powers by an autocratic leader?

    Checks and balances. It is appropriate to give the president much more flexibility in times of crises, but that flexibility can't be boundless. It should be time-limited, and it should have checks built in to address instances of overreach. Those checks, for the most part, are the other branches of government, the courts and Congress. Any extension of emergency powers to the president should come along with the potential for meaningful judicial review, which means there have to be standards articulated that the court can look to. In my expert opinion, saying that the president can declare a national emergency whenever he wants is problematic. What one can do is come up with a basic definition of what an emergency is, and what an emergency isn't. That definition should not constrain or micromanage the president, but still give the courts some ability to step in.

    If the president invokes the Insurrection Act or declares a national emergency and abuses that authority, right now the only way for Congress to stop the president is to pass a law by veto-proof supermajority. When you're talking about powers that are so potent and so vulnerable to abuse, there needs to be a more meaningful check than that. One of the reform proposals that has gained traction in Congress is to require a declaration of national emergency to terminate automatically after 30 days, unless Congress votes to approve it. That would give the president lots more flexibility when he needs it most in the immediate aftermath of a crisis, but then would allow Congress to step in and serve as a check against presidential overreach if the president takes things too far.

    When I warn people about how dangerous Donald Trump was and is, and the extreme nature of the country's democracy crisis more generally, I inevitably receive emails and messages telling me to stop scaring people, that this is too frightening and is somehow counterproductive. Given what you have explored in this conversation and your work, what would you say to those people?

    If they're scared by what I've said, I take that as a good sign. I don't want anyone to feel hopeless, and I think the trick to taking the edge off the fear is to take action. As I said before, I think when there is a problem that's frightening, as soon as you start doing something about that, it takes the fear and turns it into intention. I think that's a better solution than simply hiding your head in the sand. If you do that, you're going to find out that a lot more scary things happen when you do nothing than when you tackle the problem.

    What is your diagnosis of American democracy right now?

    I've never seen anything quite like this before. I can tell you what I've seen happen in other cases, but I cannot predict the future. The truth is, we haven't seen something like this in this country before. We know it's serious. We know that the patient requires immediate help, but we just don't know how it's going to end. That's up to us.


    https://www.rawstory.com/trump-coup-2657371279/
     
  16. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

    Joined:
    Dec 28, 2010
    Messages:
    84,743
    Oh goody!
    Nancy Antoinettes star chamber cabal finally bothered to run down the street to the FBI and got their files, did she?
    Oh.
    She didn't!
    Then what the fuck, over?

    Ah.
    The Nancy Antoinette star chamber cabal was never interested in the truth, just the propaganda.
     
    • Like Like x 1
  17. stumbler

    stumbler Porn Star

    Joined:
    Oct 10, 2006
    Messages:
    106,322
    Mark Meadows burned papers in his office after meeting with Republican election denier: report

    Sky Palma
    May 26, 2022


    [​IMG]
    Shutterstock


    According to testimony given to the Jan. 6 committee by one of his aides, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows burned papers in his office after meeting with a House Republican who was working to overturn the 2020 election's results, POLITICO reports.

    "Cassidy Hutchinson, who worked under Meadows when he was former President Donald Trump’s chief of staff, told the panel investigating the Capitol attack that she saw Meadows incinerate documents after a meeting in his office with Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.). A person familiar with the testimony described it on condition of anonymity," POLITICO's report stated.

    It’s not known if Hutchinson told the committee anything specific about the papers that were burnt.

    "Meadows’ destruction of papers is a key focus for the select committee, and the person familiar with the testimony said investigators pressed Hutchinson for details about the issue for more than 90 minutes during a recent deposition," the outlet reported.

    Read the full report over at POLITICO.

    According to the Guardian's Hugo Lowell,

    According to Lowell, "the select committee intends to hold six hearings, with the first and last in prime time, where its lawyers will run through how Trump’s schemes took shape before the election and culminated with the Capitol attack."

    The Guardian report adds, "the June public hearings will explore Trump’s efforts to overturn the election, starting and ending with prime-time hearings at 8pm on the 9th and the 23rd. In between, the panel will hold 10am hearings on the 13th, 15th, 16th and 21st."



    https://www.rawstory.com/meadows-burned-papers/
     
  18. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

    Joined:
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    Messages:
    84,743
    The desperation builds.
    Despicables knew months ago that midterms would be a disaster for them.
    And every day biden creates more problems for them.
    Desperation.
     
  19. stumbler

    stumbler Porn Star

    Joined:
    Oct 10, 2006
    Messages:
    106,322
    Treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans knew President Biden won a free and fair election but tried to steal it for Traitor Trump. And when that didn't work they staged a deadly insurrection and attempted coup. The first in American history. Which is why they are traitors to the United States of America and everything it has ever stood for. That is both despicable and deplorable.

    FBI questioning Republicans in battleground states over Trump's attempt to overturn 2020 election: CNN
    Tom Porter
    Tue, May 31, 2022, 4:52 AM


    [​IMG]
    Hundreds of Trump supporters and gather near the Capitol Building for the Stop the Steal Rally in Atlanta, GA, on November 21, 2020.Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

    • FBI agents interviewed GOP officials about attempts to overturn the 2020 election, CNN reported.

    • Agents are said to be interested in certificates meant to wrongly declare Trump the winner.

    • The investigators, per CNN, are trying to establish how involved the Trump campaign was.
    FBI agents have questioned Republican officials in battleground states over their contacts with the Trump campaign about documents falsely claiming Trump won the 2020 election, CNN reported.

    According to the report, federal investigators spoke to GOP officials in Georgia and Michigan. It also said that grand-jury subpoenas had been issued requesting documents.

    Per the report, the FBI appears to be investigating to what extent the Trump campaign was involved in the production of fake election certificates meant to declare Trump the winner.

    These were produced by state Republican lawmakers and officials in an attempt to alter the results.

    Patrick Gartland described his conversations with the FBI to CNN. He was appointed as a so-called fake elector in Georgia but pulled out.

    Joe Biden won Georgia, but some Republicans there attempted to subvert the process by certifying their own electors, in the hope of delivering the states electoral college votes for Trump instead.

    Gartland told CNN: "They just asked who talked to me. If anyone from the Trump campaign had been in touch with me. Did Giuliani talk to me? Did Trump talk to me?"

    He said he had no contact with Trump or those close to him.

    Insider has contacted a Trump spokesman and the FBI for comment.

    The documents were produced late in 2020 by GOP officials in Georgia and Michigan and other battleground states and submitted to the National Archive.

    They appointed an alternative slate of electors to submit their votes not for Joe Biden, in line with the actual election result, but for Donald Trump, who lost the election in the states. The officials who signed the certificates cited Trump's baseless election fraud claims as grounds for ignoring the actual results.

    The fake certificates were obtained by watchdog group American Oversight in January.

    The FBI is, according to the report, seeking to establish what role, if any, the Trump campaign had in the production of the fake certificates and what relation their production had to Trump's wider campaign to overturn his 2020 defeat.

    The federal investigation is separate to one being conducted in Fulton County, Georgia, by District Attorney Fanni Williams, who is probing whether Trump and his allies broke the law as they sought to overturn Biden's victory in Georgia in 2020.

    The fake certificates are also being investigated by state authorities and the House commission investigating the insurrection of January 6, 2021.

    Read the original article on Business Insider


    https://www.yahoo.com/news/fbi-questioning-republicans-battleground-states-105231739.html
     
  20. shootersa

    shootersa Frisky Feline

    Joined:
    Dec 28, 2010
    Messages:
    84,743
    OH MY GOD!! THEY HAVE TRUMP NOW!!
    JUST YOU WAIT AND SEE!!
    THAT TRUMP IS IN TROUBLE NOW BY GOD!!
    JUST YOU WAIT!!
    YOU'LL SEE!!

    ALL YOU TRAITORS AND DEPLORABLES AND DOUBTERS!!
    JUST YOU WATCH!!
    THAT TRUMP!! HE'S GOING DOWN!! AND ALL OF YOU WILL GO WITH HIM!!
    JUST YOU WAIT AND SEE!!

    Is it that Trump is truly that innocent, or is it that his pursuers are that incompetent, @stumbler ?
     
    1. Scotchlass
      @shooter, you forgot two.
      Democrats Pounce, and
      The Walls are closing in!

      By the way, I was just re-reading this page beginning at the top and I was shocked at how ideologically demented and flat out insulting @stumbles posts have become since his return.
      Honestly, I mean, the stuff he posts and the comments he makes? He's not well.
      Talk about needing a psychological intervention.
       
      Scotchlass, May 31, 2022