The Trump whistleblower story is finally being mentioned on TheMotte for the first time. As OP notes:
We have yet to discuss the Biden-Trump-Ukraine story, I thought maybe because it doesn’t lend itself well to becoming a scissor statement. Biden is on tape declaring that he told Ukraine to cancel their investigation, Hunter Biden was making 0k/month for an oil-gas job he had little experience for, and I have yet to see this contention in dispute. There is heavy debate over what Trump did and whether it was appropriate, but the only story so far is media characterization of a whistleblower report where the whistleblower in question didn’t hear the actual phone call. I figured this was blowing over.
It is odd that a Trump scandal dominating the news hasn’t been discussed on a forum where both left and right views are fairly argued and discussed such as themotte, isn’t it?
My of-course-they-killed-Epstein-level cynical view. The primary purpose of politics is to enrich yourself and your family subject to the constraint that you have to do this without getting voters too upset. One easy way is to get foreigners to hire your not-very-bright relatives. By questioning this practice (for what I grant are self-serving political ends) Trump unites both parties against him and so really does risk impeachment.
That certainly explains the Rational view of politics.
Is “family members being given positions they are totally unqualified for and seemingly only to enrich themselves” a card that Team Trump really would want to play?
.
Yeah of course. Jared isn’t being paid 0k per month.
Because the controversy around Jared is about his salary.
Well impeaching POTUS would be only the first step out of two in removing him from office. First step is likely according to betting markets, but the second one is not. I’d say the chances of Senate getting 60 votes in the election year would be impossible. They probably wouldn’t be able to even get 50 votes since there are some Dems in tossup states that wouldn’t want to rock the boat.
Nothing could stop him from running next year even if they do somehow manage to remove him. And if it is not a clear case I think his chance of winning would be much higher then normal.
Removing Trump from office would actually help his chance of winning reelection. That’s not a galaxy brain take; that’s an observable universe take.
Yeah, I don’t doubt that Trump has done (and will do, and even craves doing) several things that, I think, make him unfit to hold the office of the president. The problem is, they are the same things that presidents of all parties have been doing for decades, and what we’re seeing here is a selective call for enforcement that unlikely to be applied to any future Democrat president. My preference would be for Trump and all the other dirty politicians to end up in jail or permanent disgrace. However, in the current circumstances, I see him as a necessary bulwark against a tide of lunacy, and object to this singling out of him as uniquely problematic.
A commenter asks “What other president gave aid conditional on a foreign country creating a problem for a domestic opponent?”, and the responses he receives in defense of Trump are Nixon and Reagan delaying the release of the Iranian hostages.
Add in calling NPR pravda and the classic “Trump has been the most anti-Russian president since Lyndon Johnson” and you have a classing rationalist political discussion.
And in case you thought the title was hyperbole, the full quote is:
Trump is actually fucking with my head now. I don’t understand this. They wait and wait and wait on actual impeachment proceedings, and then finally go forward on this? Not only does this not sound like it will stick, it it ALSO may implicate Biden. How the hell does this happen? How on earth do Trumps enemies seem to just keep falling over on their own faces over and over and over again?
Of course now discussion has moved to the “not a verbatim” transcript. Reading through that thread and comparing it to the Republican talking points about the transcript is left as an exercise to the reader.
Maybe this person is being sarcastic but the Saudi’s bailed kushner out to the tune of a billion dollars. MBS bragged about Jared being in his pocket.
if you deplatform trump you will only make him stronger
This is a pretty typical take from the so-called rationalists. They assume they’re smart because they are cynical.
It’s amazing how the same people who would describe themselves as “liberals” or “centrists, who just hate how the SJW’s have radicalized everything” have responses that are basically the same as right wingers.
Hell, David French is more upset about this than they are.
Except Article I, section 3, clause 7 in the US constitution which states:
Unrelated to this the motte post. (It is all too tl;dr for me atm). My fave post on the impeachement stuff was somebody basically going ‘if trump goes down for this, biden also goes down for this, checkmate libtards!’. Which is a bit ‘checkmate, if you take my king, I will take your pawn, you lose!’.
Can we denote an “arrogant teenager explains shit they have no grasp of” wing of internet rationalism? Or this that too broad of a characterization?
this is true tho
The motte is full of dummies, but no one should doubt Schumer+Pelosi’s ability to pull defeat from the jaws of victory.
Having a normal one…
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TheMotte is awful, but on a purely cynical political level I agree that the politics of impeachment are terrible, Ukraine or not. I get that the left is happy to offer Biden on the altar for their own reasons, but I still don’t see how this advances the goal of removing Trump from office. Removal via impeachment would require a GOP with non-cowards.
Can’t BELIEVE anybody would suggest that the Bidens are cynical and greedy!
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Bro Trump is going to be impeached this time bro this is different that was Russia this is Ukraine bro it’s a different strain bro you have to believe me bro different strain