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@WyIted
Sounds like President Trump did a great job with the economy in 2016Yeah, thanks for pointing it out. In 2016 I was at a bar practically every night in a nice sized house and eating out multiple times a week. I miss it bro
Self own
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@TheUnderdog
The Biden crowd preaches about, "protecting democracy" until it's time to protect democracy by letting 3rd parties and non-establishment candidates debate Biden
Agreeing to debate someone has nothing to protecting democracy.
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@WyIted
I am literally surprised when anyone can speak well. I won't compliment it, but most people are terrible at it and I see nothing wrong with compliments.
You missed the whole point
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@TheUnderdog
The left is anti war funding for Palestine, but not Ukraine. I'm sure their excuses are similar.
The left is against the slaughter of innocent people, which is what both Ukraine and Palestine are experiencing. Except in one case, US finding is assisting the defense, in the other, US funding is assisting the slaughter. That’s why the responses on the left are different. The political right in both cases appears to be pro-slaughter.
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@WyIted
Trump is not perfect, yet he is our only real shot at slowly the destruction of America. I don't know if you were an adult in 2016, but back then rent was affordable and even on a minimum wage job we could afford to eat out a few days a week
Sounds like President Trump did a great job with the economy in 2016
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@Greyparrot
This is such a dumb excuse for any bad president. I am so sick and tire of this inane "dog ate my homework" excuse from both sides. It implies that not only can a president do nothing good for the economy while in office for 4 years, that he could also never do anything bad in 4 years to hurt the economy.
Strawman arguments usually are dumb, that’s why you love to create them. Apparently refuting arguments you made up makes you feel smart.
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@WyIted
If you don't support that you are likely in the wrong party. Remember I actually have debated leftists and have been one. It's no strawman
I don’t support that, and neither does any prominent figure on the political left. This is what we are always talking about when we refer to right wing culture war nonsense. If you take issue with whatever treatment some child out there with gender dysphoria is receiving, take it up with that child’s family and their doctor who made that decision. If you take issue with whatever library decided to carry whatever publication you find objectionable, take it up with the library or if applicable whatever school board member made that decision. But putting these grievances at the forefront of our national politics is just silly.
The left isn’t promoting these things, we’re just rolling our eyes at all the right wing chicken littles running around pretending that this is the issue of our time.
Yes with democrats it is the guy before you if you were a republican who did great, but if you are a Democrat who did bad it was the guy before you.
The difference between democrats and republicans is democrats recognize that reality is far more complicated than “good economy = President good, bad economy = President bad”.
In 2017 Trump took over an economy that had been growing for seven straight years, and in the following years under Trump there was no meaningful change. In fact there were more jobs created in the prior 3 years under Obama than the first 3 years under Trump, so job creation actually slowed down.
Biden meanwhile inherited an economy that had entirely collapsed under Trump to a degree we hadn’t seen in our lifetime. And the biggest talking point against “Biden’s economy” is a global phenomenon that the US happens to be handling better than every other developed nation on earth.
So no, it’s not as cartoonishly simple as you pretend. Moreover, your own argument according to your own logic makes no sense. If your argument is that president’s are responsible for whatever happens during their time in office then you don’t get to pretend “the Trump years” excludes 2020 when the US economy cratered. It’s funny how many right wingers seem to think that Trump gets a pass on Covid while holding Biden responsible for the mess it created.
are you really saying somebody threatening to weaponize the justice system is more of a threat than the people actually doing it?
No one is “actually doing it”. Trump is being held accountable for the obvious crimes he committed, and that effort is going through all of the proper legal channels.
The best argument you have for a weaponized justice system is the NY trial that just ended which I’ve argued it’s legitimacy extensively on this site. The funny thing there is that this trial has absolutely nothing to do with Biden or the federal government. These were state charges brought by a state prosecutor adjudicated by a state judge and decided upon by a state jury, so to claim this as evidence against Biden is just not serious.
But with regards to Trump, yes his threats are absolutely to be taken serious. The president of the United States won’t be the person making prosecutorial decisions, that will be handled by the people he puts in place. And not only are the people Trump would consider explicitly stating their intentions here, but Trump is giving us every queue we could possibly ask for as to what he wants done. They will follow his lead. That’s not speculation, it’s basic human nature and the example set by these two men could not possibly be any different.
Yes, dude literally was charged for calling payments to a lawyer, legal expenses in the quick books drop down menu. If it wasn't Trump you know this prosecution would not happen.
Paying off a porn star to stay silent ahead of an election is not a legal expense, unless you’re about to argue Stormy Daniel’s was performing legal work for Trump.
The reason they went after Trump is because of the seriousness of this crime. The prosecutors allege and the jury agreed that the purpose of this whole scheme was to illegally impact the presidential election, and given the circumstances it might have actually made the difference. If you don’t think that is worth a prosecutors efforts to pursue I don’t know what else can be said to you.
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@WyIted
The left is looking to cut the dicks off of kids and put porn in elementary school libraries
This is the cartoonification of politics. No serious person on the left is looking to do any of these things, this is the absurd depiction of the left fed to you by right wing propaganda. If this is the demon you plan to battle then we can’t have a conversation because you’re battling your own imagination.
Yes, I would like to be able to afford to eat out again like I could when he was in office
Yes, Obama’s economy which Trump inherited was great.
am not a fan of weaponizing the Justice system. There is nothing more anti democratic than that.
Agreed, that’s why one would think we could all agree that the guy threatening to weaponize it, the guy who said he plans to be a dictator on day one, the guy who has made explicitly clear that he plans to use his second term to seek retribution, the you who mused about locking up Hillary Clinton just a few weeks ago despite her having absolutely nothing to do with anything going on… is the guy we would all point to and say that guy shouldn’t be president.
Instead you pretend that someone being held accountable for obvious crimes that he did commit is “weaponization” of the law. It’s a flagrant inverse of reality.
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@WyIted
Doubt, if you are really getting your policy from your emotions, rather than logic
Says someone who would vote for Donald Trump
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@WyIted
This myth that rednecks in Walmart are looking to shoot random black people is silly.
So is the myth that people in “the ghetto” are looking to shoot random people.
Second, what was supposed to be your point? Trans rights and science have nothing to do with each other.Correct, a lot of the science it is founded on was debunked in the 60s.
Trans rights isn’t a science issue. It’s about respecting people for who they are. This framing by the political right of trans rights conversations as some denial of empirical reality is just plain stupid.
Also I am not sure what you mean by Trans rights, I assume you mean what your average democrat means, which is a mother with manchausens is celebrated as a hero for mutilating her 9 year old, or that feminine gay boys are now girls because their mom is a limousine liberal and wants to seem posh.
Let me know when you’d like to have a serious conversation.
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@WyIted
If somebody is sticking their dick in black chick's they more than likely like black chicks
Men stick their dicks in plastic toys, that doesn’t have anything to do with how they feel about them.
Moreover, you are deeply confused about what racism is. We’re not talking about cross burning and lynching people just because they black. It’s not about the individual, it’s about your feelings towards the group. Anyone can like a black person and still feel negatively towards black people.
But it can also be much more subtle than that. Have you ever heard a black person speak and think “wow, he speaks so well”? What made you think that, would you have thought the same if it were a white person or would you have just expected it? Not being racist doesn’t mean you have the ability to look past someone’s skin color, it means you don’t need to.
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@TheUnderdog
He got kissed by a black woman
How exactly does this lead us to “he is not racist”?
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@WyIted
You guys are literally cutting your dicks off and saying "look I trusted the science"
First of all, who is “you guys”? My dick is doing just fine, thank you.
Second, what was supposed to be your point? Trans rights and science have nothing to do with each other.
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@WyIted
I think you know walking through the ghetto is more dangerous than walking through a Walmart in rural Alabama and seeing a hunch of rednecks with guns on them.
Sure… when you’re white.
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@TheUnderdog
I don’t think it’s that they don’t agree with it, it’s that they don’t benefit from it. RCV would make it more so that candidates have to appeal to moderate voters, which is not how most of them got elected. It’s not realistic to expect that the people who benefit from a system will advocate to change that system.
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@Greyparrot
I have been warning you for years what would happen when the shoe goes on the other foot. Now both glass houses come crashing down.
No idea what you are talking about. There is no shoe on the other foot, there is no equivalence to the detachment from reality on the right vs the left.
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@TheUnderdog
Politicians have to know more about current issues than people not trusted to make policy decisions. Just like I would expect a pilot to be more up to date with flying rules than non-pilots.
I’m talking about what is, not what it should be. You’re having a different conversation.
If they will play conspiracy games, then they will, but unless you act brute force with MAGA world, then you will never get what you want. MAGA is in the minority, but they have a majority of the political energy.
They are a minority but they have enough representation to ensure RCV never happens.
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@TheUnderdog
the right won't get away with claiming Barack Obama looks like he has dementia; Obama doesn't give off dementia vibes; Biden does.
They’ll just find something else to make up. Propagandizers know what they’re doing, and what they know is that the best lies are the ones that contain an element of truth. Biden is old, that’s obvious, so they play on people’s reservations by saying he’s senile. Hillary Clinton came off as calculated, so they used every lie and exaggeration in the book to make her seem deeply untrustworthy. Everyone has some flaw somewhere, once they find out they’ll beat the hell out of that hoarse.
None of this is new, it’s politics 101. What’s new is the utter shamelessness and lack of accountability on the right. What republican politicians have figured out is that their base not only doesn’t care about reality, they want to be lied to.
Both sides do this (Catholic Church, Matt Gaetz).
The left does it but the shamelessness and lack of accountability is no where near the same. Gaetz was indicted for trafficking and having sex with a minor, it is not a stretch to call him a pedophile. It’s a very different thing when it’s done indiscriminately with no evidence.
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@TheUnderdog
For your normie grandparent that spends her time watching Family Fued, this is a good reason. For politicians, this is not.
Irrelevant. This is basic human nature and has nothing to do with your question.
Are you seriously denying that the MAGA right would not play their conspiracy games with this?They might play conspiracy games
No, they will. No reasonable person would pretend otherwise, and it absolutely matters to the question of whether this will happen anytime soon.
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@TheUnderdog
Why would they treat Obama differently then vs now?
Because the propaganda is way worse now than it was then. Trump has changed the culture. Back in those days, republicans were scared to get caught in a lie. Now all they do is cry “fake news” and face no accountability for their lies whatsoever. Obama’s birth certificate was controversial back then, it took a lot of balls to claim that the president of the United States wasn’t elected legitimately. Now republicans regularly accuse democrats of being groomers and pedophiles with no evidence whatsoever and no one cares. With Trump came the death of decorum, irony, shame, and any regard for reality. It’s not the same world.
Wait, are you saying that Biden was talking to skydivers instead of to himself? If so, then can you send the video link to the real video?
FLRW just posted it, but the fact you had to ask makes my point. They would have done this to anyone.
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@SocraticGregarian96
But trump is better because my quality of life was better when he was POTUS.
Correlation =/= Causation
All Trump did was ride Obama’s wave. Nothing was better because of him, he just happened to be the beneficiary of a what would have been great years under any president.
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@SocraticGregarian96
America is a constitutional republic. In other words, he hates the constitution and he hates America and what we stand for.
Since when did “it’s only legitimate if my candidate wins” become “what America stands for”?
You didn’t give any reasons that you dislike trump as POTUS, or why you like biden as POTUS; you just insulted trump and praised biden, not what they each accomplished.
I gave you plenty of reasons why I dislike Trump. I prefer that my president act like an adult. I prefer that my president knows something about the major decisions he is tasked with deciding upon for all of us. I prefer that my president care about not only respecting the will of the voters, but recognizes his place in protecting that right of all of us to have a voice in self governance. If you think pointing these things out are just insults, perhaps you should look at the person you’re advocating for and ask why such simple and undeniable facts about him register to you as insults.
And no, I didn’t praise Biden. Calling him a normal human being is not praise. Understanding how government works is not praise. Valuing democracy (please stop with your semantic BS) is not praise. These are all bare minimums that every president should meet to even be considered a viable candidate.
I know you want to talk about policy but in this context when the choice is between these two individuals, that conversation is kind of pointless. If you are willing to overlook the fact that this man incited an attack on the US Capitol and is now promising to pardon the attackers, we’re way past talking about tax policy or foreign aid. No sane country would even consider such an absurd proposition.
Was your quality of life better under Trump or Biden?
Apples to oranges.
First of all, if you’re asking me this question honestly, then you’re including 2020 when the economy was cratering, businesses were shutting down left and right, I couldn’t find a role of toilet paper, hospital emergency rooms were filled, and freezer trucks were suddenly in demand because they were needed to store dead bodies since the morgues were all full. Well in that case my quality of life was way better under Biden.
But most Trump supporters seem to have amnesia about that. The logic is that 2020 for Trump doesn’t count because that wasn’t his fault, but 2021 and the years afterward spent cleaning up Covid’s mess is absolutely Biden’s fault, which is of course brazen hypocrisy.
So with all that said, perhaps you can clarify why you’re asking.
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@TheUnderdog
How would the GOP propagandize against someone like Obama? Obama was very well liked by normies.
Obama’s unapproval ratings were very high when considering how scandal free his administration was compared to his predecessors. But at that time there was no OANN or News Max and Fox News wasn’t anything like it is today. I can only imagine the filth those networks would broadcast if he were to somehow serve another term.
How can the video show it was a lie?
By showing the skydivers whom he was talking to instead of cropping them out to make it look like a lost senile old man.
Are you saying that video was a hoax?
No, I’m saying he wasn’t doing what the propagandists claim he was doing. He wasn’t shaking hands with anyone, he was making a hand gesture towards the crowd he was facing. I remember watching that video and instantly remembering him making that exact same hand gesture towards the crowd before his first debate with Trump in 2020.
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@TheUnderdog
It’s a relatively new thing, so as with anything new it’s show to catch on.
Are you seriously denying that the MAGA right would not play their conspiracy games with this? They can’t even handle mail in voting and that’s been around for decades.
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@TheUnderdog
Any generic democrat would be able to beat Trump easily.
Generic candidates always do better in polls, because it’s far more difficult to propagandize against a faceless individual.
The problem isn’t Biden, the problem is a media ecosystem that is designed to destroy whomever sits in power, regardless of whether those attacks are at all truthful. Look at the Biden video that went viral of him “wandering off” when the full video shows it was all a lie. The MAGA faithful will be lying about that incident through election day and beyond. They’re still talking about him “shaking hands with thin air” even though that was a lie as well.
If not Biden they’ll just do it to someone else. So while I understand the appeal a new face may have had, I think Biden was ultimately the best choice to beat Trump. Anyone else would have been too great a risk.
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Ranked choice voting is clearly better in every way. People can make their voices heard without the threat of their vote being wasted, spoiler candidates would no longer be a thing resulting in the most popular candidate actually winning, and it would reduce extremism since candidates would be greater incentivized to reach everyone.
It won’t happen anytime soon though because the MAGA right wouldn’t be able to handle it. Imagine the stolen election conspiracies that would prop up after that…
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@SocraticGregarian96
Name three reasons why you like Biden and three reasons why you dislike Trump.
I’ll start with Trump.
1. He’s a narcissistic, childish, vile, petty, woefully ignorant, pathological lying conspiracy theorist.
2. He’s the world biggest crybaby. Nothing is ever his fault, he’s always treated so unfairly, he’s always the victim.
3. He’s an existential threat to democracy and the rule of law.
Things I like about Biden.
1. He’s a normal human being
2. He understands how government works
3. He values democracy
1. His economy (more jobs, price of groceries, market rate, etc.)2. Less inflation (as noted above)3. NO wars, whereas Biden created THREE wars4. His Border5. His intolerance for crime
1. There was nothing special about Trump’s handling of the economy. The economy had already been growing for seven straight years, all he did was ride Obama’s wave. In fact there were more jobs created in the last 3 years under Obama than the first 3 years under Trump.
2. Comparing Biden’s inflation to Trump’s is brazenly dishonest. Inflation is a worldwide phenomenon mostly due to the aftermath of Covid.
3. Correlation is not causation. It’s hilarious how you guys blame Joe Biden because Vladimir Putin decided to invade Ukraine. You do know the president of the US =/= the king of planet earth right?
4. I’ll give you my thoughts on Biden’s handling of the border after you acknowledge that Trump is single-handedly responsible for stopping a bipartisan border deal that fixes many of of our problems at the border all just that he could use it as a campaign issue (which you are playing right into)
5. Silly and irrelevant
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@SocraticGregarian96
Perhaps I should use your own quote on you,"Do you have facts to back up any of these examples?"
So here are multiple examples:
I didn’t ask for multiple examples, I asked for one, because I’m not about to sit here digging through an entire list of BS just to be told that the one I didn’t respond to or missed something on proves I’m wrong. I’ll just address your first point:
Instead of becoming broke and relying on oil from Iran, Biden should have drilled the f’ing coal mines
This is just a lie like pretty much everything else you’ve had to say. US oil production is up last year more than ever before and the gap between US oil production vs Russia vs Saudi Arabia has only grown under Biden. Try again.
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@SocraticGregarian96
You reason with them, but you’re also stern with them. That’s what trump did and there were no wars.
Donald Trump wouldn’t even read his intelligence briefings unless his name was mentioned numerous times. Correlation =/= causation.
Biden is a weak fool who bashes Putin, xi, iran, etc. but when push comes to shove, he caves in and does nothing about the wars.
Please provide one example of a reasonable action Biden should have taken but didn’t to prevent or respond to a war.
stopped drilling oil, strikes a deal with the worst possible country to give billions of dollars to for oil. Then, he gives them billions more for free in hopes that they would become better people.
Do you have facts to back up any of these examples?
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@3RU7AL
have you ever been accused of malice when you intended no malice ?
Yes, your point?
we're talking about the definition of "defrauding voters"
So google “defraud” and then apply that to voters.
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@Greyparrot
Maybe world leaders are not as susceptible to propaganda as you are... maybe "OMG TEH NUKLEAR CODEZ" propaganda doesn't actually work for intelligent world leaders...
Or maybe MAGA voters are just too stupid to tell that the guy standing in stage going “duh I just asked Putin if he’s interfering in our elections and he said he isn’t so I don’t see why I should believe my own intelligence agencies” is not the guy Putin fears.
Can you name a single time Trump has ever spoken disparagingly about Putin? Ever?
No, of course you can’t. But you sit here and pretend I’m the one towing the propaganda line. Just stop.
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@3RU7AL
i believe every violation should be punished equally regardless of "intent"
That’s an absurd proposal. Intent isn’t just the most basic element of most crimes, it it also the central notion that we assess in everyday life as we determine whether someone’s actions are morally wrong. Intent is the difference between a mistake and malice. It’s the difference that tells us whether someone is trustworthy vs untrustworthy. It is the difference between someone who is a danger to society vs someone who is not.
If you really don’t think intent should be an element of our laws then forget the Trump trial, we need to start at the very beginning. Perhaps the question of how you go about teaching your kids right from wrong and how you assess whether they are leaning those lessons is a more appropriate conversation.
It is, by definition, when the money was spent in order to conceal information from the voters.can you please post a link to that definition ?
You don’t need me to explain to you what “fraud” means, you are capable of googling that yourself.
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@ILikePie5
Let’s see Putin’s history. Obama presidency, takes Crimea. Trump presidency, takes nothing. Biden presidency, invades Ukraine. Putin can do whatever he wants, but he knows Trump isn’t weak like the other two clowns.
Right. The guy who stood on the world stage and coward to Putin taking his word over that of US Intelligence, and the guy who is more aligned with Russia than any US politician since before WW2, the guy who gushes over Putin every single time his name comes up… that’s the guy Putin fears.
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@ILikePie5
So you’re admitting the Dems are breaking the rule of law and there shouldn’t be consequences for it.
No, I’m pointing out the absurdity of your logic.
Well I think the people ought to know if the President is mentally competent.
They’ve been watching him for 8 years, they’ve seen him give speeches, they’ve seen him debate, and they’ll see it all again. This tape will change nothing. It’s a pathetic excuse to carry on with the witch hunt they love to pretend the democrats are the ones engaging in.
And the method to know that is via their representatives in Congress who issued a lawful subpoena that Garland is ignoring.
So all of a sudden subpoenas must be followed… is that right?
A 110 year old could have said what’s on a transcript, but are they competent to be the President? I don’t think so.
The DOJ has no interest nor obligation to play your silly political games.
Hur basically said Biden is not mentally stable. Biden and Garland deny that. Release the tapes to prove who’s right or wrong.
The DOJ has no interest nor obligation to play your silly political games.
Lol there’s no conspiracy here
It’s nothing but. You were concerned about Biden’s mental competency so you demanded the transcripts. You got them. It doesn’t show, so now you want the tapes. When you get the tapes and it doesn’t show, you’ll claim it was doctored or that Biden is on drugs. There is no bottom to this hole.
Conspiracy 101 - demand evidence, then when you get it, use it as a predicate to demand more evidence. Repeat the cycle until further evidence is denied, then claim the denial of evidence is reason to suspect foul play, which itself becomes evidence.
The DOJ has no interest nor obligation to play your silly political games.
Remember what happened to Nixon?
Yes, he was forced out of the White House because of his unacceptable conduct. What’s your point?
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@Swagnarok
Weighing the above, it seems that in a fair world, America's most influential figures should've been split, with some supporting Trump and others opposing Trump. Instead, they nigh-unanimously opposed him and did everything in their power to keep him from getting elected. This mass collusion, and cynical weaponization of every institution the public once trusted to tell them the truth against Donald Trump, reveals the existence of a vast politico-social machinery in America.
If the above was all there was to the story then perhaps you’d have a point, but you neglected to mention the fact that Trump was the most ignorant, narcissistic, petty, vindictive, childish, conspiracy theorist liar we have ever seen run for office, and it isn’t even close.
He said he would wipe out the national debt in 8 years. He asked why nuclear proliferation would be a bad thing. He declared his intention to ban Muslims from entering the United States. He told his rally crowds to beat up protesters. And that’s just off the top of my head.
The fact that anyone in this country took him seriously is something historians will be studying for centuries. What the reaction against him amongst the overwhelming majority of people who know better shows is that back in 2015/2016 we had at least a base level of standards for the person we hand the nuclear codes to. That is now gone.
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@Greyparrot
It's too bad the DOJ never charged Trump for that crime then
Agreed. It’s too bad that the DOJ was stuck with longstanding policy that they are not allowed to indict a sitting President, and by the time he was no longer the sitting President that means he gets to claim that any prosecution against him is the weaponization of the justice system to lock up political opponents. Heads I win, tails you lose.
This is why people like myself warned in 2016 that Trump was such a danger to the country. For all of Nixon’s egregiousness, at least when push came to shove he knew when to quit and put the well being of the country first. Donald Trump is incapable of that.
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@3RU7AL
doesn't that make the payment a de facto trump to trump "campaign contribution" making it no longer "excessive" ?
If it were disclosed in accordance with the law then probably. Too bad they decided to hide the payment with the clear intention of ensuring no one finds out they were violating campaign finance laws.
Do you believe people who knowingly violate the law should be punished?
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@3RU7AL
the plea included "for the express purpose of influencing the outcome of an election"which is obviously the goal of every campaign dollar spent
Which is why we have campaign finance laws that tell candidates what they are and are not allowed to do.
"for the express purpose of influencing the outcome of an election"is not "defrauding voters"
It is, by definition, when the money was spent in order to conceal information from the voters.
and if it is somehow "defrauding voters" in this specific casethen why wasn't michael cohen charged and convicted of "defrauding voters" ?
You’d have to ask the DOJ that. I don’t see how that’s relevant here.
I would point out to you that the charge against Trump for defrauding voters came from NY election law, so of course the feds were not going to charge Cohen for that.
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@thett3
As I see it you’re just changing what the alleged offense is, but either way it’s federal and not state. Increasing the severity of a state charge because of a federal crime that’s never been proven at trial isnt right.
Well now we’ve gotten to the heart of the debate.
Let me start by just saying that neither I nor NY changed anything, these are the laws and these are Trump’s actions, not our fault that it seems to fit.
The jurisdictional issue is a reasonable legal debate to be had to which neither of us are qualified to weigh in on any further and neither of us really seem interested in. It makes perfect sense to me legally and you don’t seem to think so. I’m fine with that.
Now whether it’s right… that’s a much deeper and politically relevant question. There are many ways to look at this. At the outset I will just acknowledge that we both know what happened here… the feds passed on prosecuting Trump for this and NY prosecutors decided that it was incumbent on them to take it up. Maybe they thought so for the right reasons, maybe it was pure politics. Neither of us know so that’s a useless conversation. We will both view this through our own moral/ethical lenses, so let’s just focus on that.
To me, I think the facts of the matter here are beyond clear - no honest person can claim Cohen did this on his own. We know Trump was involved and we know why. What I find absolutely amazing is the idea that Trump’s personal attorney would serve three years in jail for a crime he committed “in coordination with and at the direction of” Trump, while Trump doesn’t even get charged. At the outset, I wonder why the morality/ethics of this trial is even in dispute?
Moreover, you continue to float as an argument that Trump wasn’t charged, as if that supprts your point. I think it makes the opposite point. The DOJ obviously thought Trump was a co-conspirator or they wouldn’t have put it in their charging documents, so the fact that they didn’t charge him speaks to the DOJ making political decisions… in Trump’s favor.
It is also notable that the federal prosecutors who were originally working on this case resigned in protest because they had the evidence but the lead prosecutor refused to act. The decision to not charge Trump itself was clearly political, so I am hardly sympathetic to those who claim it was political to indict him. It’s Trump, no decision involving him could possibly be about anything other than politics. That’s Trump’s explicit strategy, so it’s infuriating to watch it work over and over again as if we as a country are just too dumb to see what he’s doing here.
So anyway, my position on this trial is actually that I wish it was never brought. Not because I don’t think he should be put in prison for his flagrant violations of the law and his ability to walk through the raindrops for years, but because of all the charges against him these were by far the least serious and easiest to obfuscate and manipulate people with, and it’s clearly working. The J6 cases and the Mar-a-Lago cases are far more serious and far more clear, but by the time anyone hears those cases (if anyone ever will) they will already have been propagandized to believe the justice system has been weaponized against him and will tune out, which would be a shame.
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@thett3
you’ve been arguing this whole time that Trump is definitely guilty because Cohen pled guilty.
Let’s start from the beginning. Micheal Cohen is the one who took out a personal loan from his house, then created a shell company to put those funds in, and then used those funds to pay off Stormy Daniel’s. Cohen was then charged by the DOJ who determined that this was an illegal campaign contribution. Cohen then plead guilty to it.
At this point it is Cohen and Cohen alone that is guilty. Donald Trump as far as the federal government is concerned is considered innocent.
The indictment did of course list “Individual 1” whom we all know for a fact to be Donald Trump as a co-conspirator in this crime, but that fact is only useful as a data point in a moral/ethical discussion about this, so for the sake of the legal debate that is set to the side as irrelevant.
What the Cohen plea establishes legally, is that the actions of Micheal Cohen were as a matter of fact, criminal.
That fact, and that fact alone is what gets carried over to the state trial. So far none of this has to do with Donald Trump.
In the state trial, Trump is accused of falsifying his business records with an intent of aiding or concealing the commission of a crime.
Did he falsify his business records? Yes, according to the jury.
Did he do so with the intent of aiding or concealing another crime? That’s what the trial was about.
The trial then puts forward the case by examining Trump’s role in this scheme which did by the way, take place almost entirely in NY. Through the evidence established in the trial, the prosecution proved that Trump was in fact, at the very least, involved in Micheal Cohen’s scheme.
So to recap, since Micheal Cohens scheme was in fact illegal, and since Donald Trump was found via the evidence presented at trial to be involved in it, that proves to the jury that when Donald Trump falsified his New York business records, that he did so with the intent to (at the very least) conceal another (Micheal Cohen’s) crime.
That is not an adjudication of federal law. That is not a determination of Donald Trump’s guilt in committing a federal crime. It is a determination as to what Donald Trump’s intentions were while he was violating NY criminal law. Because the reason you violate a law is relevant to how severe your violation is.
So do you understand how Cohen pleading guilty =/= Trump is guilty? Do you understand that Trump’s role in this scheme had to be proven at trial (the opposite of assumed) in order for that connection to be made? Do you understand how this is very different from “Cohen plead guilty, therefore you must all accept as fact that Trump is guilty”???
“Jurisdiction” “juror unanimity” “a fair an impartial judiciary” …an individual not being ASSUMED to have committed a crime without his day in court. These are not my “opinions” or “technicalities”, its basic process
Legal arguments, such as ‘the state must ignore what is established at the federal level to be a crime’ is not a moral/ethical argument sufficient to substantiate being for or against a moral/ethical charge (such as the justice system is being weaponized against Trump). That is the legal game attorneys must play to defend or convict a defendant through our system of rules that were put in place to protect the innocent.
If you want to keep playing that game that’s fine, but don’t confuse these two very different conversations.
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@3RU7AL
accused ofnot convicted
Irrelevant. You asked me why I thought the DOJ passed on charging Trump. My answer was a response to that question.
Read the exchange in context.
What do you think transparency means?the primary aim of "transparency" isto identify sources of fundingto insure a candidate is not a proxy for a foreign or criminal powerin this trump casethe source of funding in questionwas trumpeveryone agrees on this
Correct, we agree on this… now… because Trump got caught. So the aim of the law - transparency - was purposefully defied. That makes his actions illegal.
Whether the primary concern that the law aimed to address (which I would argue this falls into) is irrelevant. It is up to the public to decide whether these are legitimate concerns. The assurances the public demands through campaign finance laws cannot be had when the funding is itself illegally concealed.
what do you think "defrauding voters" means ?
It means using large sums of money to conceal information from them which they might have found relevant to deciding whether they should hand over to you the nuclear codes.
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@3RU7AL
mafioso is convicted but says "my boss made me do it"the prosecutor neglects to file a charge against the bosswhy ?
Do you think the fact that the boss was the president is the United States might have something to do with that?
Or do you think that someone who coordinates with and directs the primary actor in a crime is not by definition guilty of taking part in that crime?
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@3RU7AL
the "reason" we have campaign finance laws"to prevent corruption and ensure transparency in political funding"these "reasons" don't apply to this casethis case hinges on the charge of "defrauding voters"
What do you think transparency means?
which boils down to"lying to voters"which has absolutely nothing to do with money
What do you think political funding means?
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@thett3
Here is what you are saying:Individual X pled guilty to a crime in jurisdiction A. Individual Y was possibly implicated in that crime, and a complaint was lodged against him. The relevant authorities in jurisdiction A performed an inquiry and determined that no further investigation into individual Y was warranted.
No, this is your position, not mine. I’ve already corrected you more than once as to who the relevant authorities are and what they determined. At some point when being corrected as to what the other person is saying and continuing to put forward the same misrepresentations of it, it becomes clear you aren’t looking for a good faith conversation.
Because individual X pled guilty to a crime in jurisdiction A, jurisdiction B can use a crime that individual Y was never charged with much less convicted of as a predicate for their own charge in a different jurisdiction.
This is mostly accurate. We agree that a state cannot adjudicate federal law, therefore in order to use a federal crime as a predicate for increased severity of a state crime, the legality of that crime must have already been adjudicated at the federal level. What you are claiming is that this adjudication can only take place in the form of a conviction, I reject that position.
If the defendant pleads guilty there will never be a conviction because a jury at that point is not necessary. I find it absurd to suggest that the illegality of an act is established when the defendant declares they are innocent and fights the charges and loses, but not when the defendant himself, with advice of counsel says ‘don’t even bother, I’m guilty’.
Their prosecutors can tell jurors as a statement of fact that individual Y was guilty of a crime in jurisdiction A even though he was never even charged with a crime there.
The prosecutors made the case that he was guilty of that crime. Big difference.
Action X occurred and is a crime =/= Individual Y is guilty of crime X
The former is what the jury was instructed to accept as fact, because that had already been adjudicated in federal court. So what was left to adjudicate in state court is not whether Trump committed a federal crime, but whether Trump’s intent when falsifying his business records was to aid or conceal the commission of that crime.
In order to accomplish this they had to show that the crime (which did legally occur according to federal court), occurred at the very least with Trump’s knowledge and that he had a hand in falsifying his records, and they accomplished that via a unanimous jury verdict.
That’s what the trial was about. If you are going to continue arguing as to why the trial was inappropriate or worse, refute it for what it actually was.
Yeah they locked up Michael Cohen…and they determined that no investigation into Trump was needed. What it sounds like is that you disagree with that decision because you believe your interpretation of campaign finance law in superior to that of the FEC commissioners.
If that is seriously what you heard then you aren’t even trying to pay attention.
My point here had absolutely nothing to do with my interpretation of campaign finance laws and I couldn’t have made that any clearer. I even linked you to the commissioners statement of reasons where they explained exactly why they did what they did and I used their own words to make my point.
This is narrative is suspect due to your own extreme partisanship and your lack of expertise in the subject.
My lack of legal expertise and/or perceived partisanship has no bearing on the validity of my arguments. The fact that you assert this in the first place shows which one of us is being biased here.
you can be right that the decision not to go after Trump was an error, but that isn’t an error that’s reversible by New York!
That’s your opinion and is supposed to be the topic we are debating. But all you’ve offered are legal arguments based on legal technicalities, so if that’s all you’re going to offer that what I’m going to respond to. But then you scoff at me when I use legal technicalities to make my point.
So again, we can debate the legality of this trial or we can debate the morality/ethics of this trial. Pick one, but stop with this standard where you only need to present legal technicalities while I have to argue the legal and the moral/ethical at the same time leaving you with every opportunity to jumble them together to strawman my position, which is exactly what you’ve been doing this whole time.
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@3RU7AL
The law. There is a reason we have rules governing campaign finances.that's like saying murder is ONLY a crime if you pay someone to murder
No, it's saying that there is a reason why we have campaign finance laws, so when you break them you will be held legally liable. Not that complicated.
You're not arguing against prosecutors, the judge, or anyone else here. You're arguing that campaign finance laws shouldn't exist in the first place. Well you're entitled to that opinion, but that has little to nothing to do with any of the arguments I've made or the central point of this thread.
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@Greyparrot
OJ was charged with murder. Trump wasn't charged of rape.
Ah, so merely being charged for a crime is enough to substantiate further action taken by another legal entity.
Where were you for the past week? Oh that's right, you were busy cheering on all the people arguing that a conviction is the only thing that matters.
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@thett3
You’re literally pointing to someone else pleading guilty to a crime as legal proof “beyond a reasonable doubt” that a different person is guilty of a crime.
What an egregious lie. I did not argue anything close to this.
What I pointed out was that Cohen is officially, legally, guilty of committing a federal crime, and that per the evidence established through the trial, Trump at minimum, worked to conceal that crime by falsifying his business records.
These facts satisfy every element of the crime as charged and does not require NY to adjudicate federal law, which is what you argued as your major concern here.
The federal government didn’t pursue any charge against Trump, probably because the relevant authorities understand campaign finance law better than you do
Micheal Cohen spent three years in prison in part because he pleaded guilty to the illegal campaign contribution as charged by the DOJ. So yes, I do think they understand campaign finance law better than I, and they locked someone up over it.
The fact that the DOJ locked up Cohen for this crime but not the same guy who in their own charging documents stated that Cohen worked "in coordination with and at the direction of" when he committed it, if you were being honest, would tell you clearly that the decision to not charge Trump had nothing to do with whether the contribution was a campaign finance violation or whether Trump was involved in it. It was and he was. That is a fact according to the federal government that you've been appealing to as the authority this whole conversation.
There really isn’t a point in moving forward on this.
Agreed. I was more than willing to engage on the central question regarding whether this action taken by NY prosecutors substantiates the concern that the justice system has been weaponized against Trump, but if you can't admit that the guy who, according to the DOJ and established in the trial in question, orchestrated the very crime Cohen spent 3 years in prison for should also be held legally liable for it... Well, I don't see how this goes anywhere.
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@ILikePie5
So it’s not okay to call out the Barbarians for breaking into Rome, and we should just sit here and do nothing. Gotcha.
What do you think the term "ensure it (as in the rule of law) stays protected"... Means?
The fact that you gloss right over that and have no other concept of a response other than to abuse the rule of law yourself only makes my point that much clearer. You do not value the rule of law, period. So when you claim the democrats weaponized the rule of law, you have nothing to be upset about other than your own perceived failure to do it first.
There is a direct reason—whether Biden is the feeble old man that Hur said he is. Biden denies it. The tape either proves him right or wrong. Americans deserve to know.
Well thank you for admitting that this has no legitimate legal or legislative purpose but is purely political.
Biden willingly already released the transcript and there is nothing of harm there. So why not the tape?
Same question to you, since you're the one asking for it. If the transcript reveals the substance of the matter why do you need the tapes? Oh that's right, because this is purely political.
Or is Biden and the DoJ guilty of altering the transcript and tapes, just like Nixon?
The refusal of the DOJ to play your conspiracy theory games is not evidence of conspiracy.
Moreover, this is self defeating logic. If the DOJ was willing to put out doctored transcripts then there is no reason to believe they would not do the same with regards to the tapes. This is the problem with going down the conspiracy theory rabbit hole, there is no bottom to it.
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@Greyparrot
I wonder how you will feel when the Ukraine peace deal is signed under Trump.
...
This is ridiculous fanfiction of the highest hyperbole.
Agreed.
Let me know what you think the Russian people see as actual existential threats to their homeland.
They think the US is their greatest threat, because we're all itching to wipe them off the face of the earth. Luckily, they have their superhero Putin to protect them against our evil empire.
This is how dictators work, and they have to work overtime to control every piece of information their people have access to. But reality does have a way of coming through, that's why Alexie Nevalny became popular. Turns out there are some Russians aware of this thing we call democracy and would love to give it a try. If only those pesky democracies could all go away and stop inspiring people to rise up.
but a second Trump presidency would almost guarantee it.Which might not be a bad thing.
Because you value democracy right?
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