Can the Constitution be Used to Get Rid of Trump?

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  • vaggar99vaggar99 Posts: 3,427
    Yes
    i'm a smart guy and probably already know whats in this, so i haven't read it. someone do me a favor and read and then you brief tomorrow morning if i decide to log on.
    https://brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/gs_121616_emoluments-clause1.pdf
  • benjsbenjs Posts: 9,144
    vaggar99 said:

    i'm a smart guy and probably already know whats in this, so i haven't read it. someone do me a favor and read and then you brief tomorrow morning if i decide to log on.
    https://brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/gs_121616_emoluments-clause1.pdf

    Let me try to play devil's advocate (because Trump's lawyers certainly will).

    The paper you linked to defines what an emolument is, what 'offices' are affected by it, and which foreign entities transacting would define a breach of the clause. People in the US government regularly attempt to work with foreign entities, and the public encourages them: trade deals, cooperative relationships, alliances, military aid. Supposedly, the US government is meant to speak for the people, and to treat them favourably over all other nations - so one would hope that they are making international negotiations which provide advantages and benefits (in other words, emoluments) to Americans, which includes those same people making the policies or deals themselves (who are then stakeholders, rather than sole proprietors, in these transactions).

    In this sense, most international agreements could be seen as breaches of the emoluments clause, unless one admits that being a stakeholder while holding office is not direct enough of receipt of emoluments from foreign entities (which, clearly, is implicitly admitted by the fact that these types of deals occur regularly). Trump is expected to go one step further, and to remove himself from these businesses (legally), and will be nothing more than an incidental beneficiary (an indirect stakeholder with no legal connection to the receiving groups of said emoluments - namely, his family and other Trump business shareholders). Precedence is important if you're to claim a legal violation of a Constitutional law, and America has absolutely shown precedence that an indirect receipt of emoluments from foreign entities is insufficient grounds for impeachment. Further precedence is set through Cheney's indirect compensation from his ties with Halliburton, and he wasn't impeached.
    '05 - TO, '06 - TO 1, '08 - NYC 1 & 2, '09 - TO, Chi 1 & 2, '10 - Buffalo, NYC 1 & 2, '11 - TO 1 & 2, Hamilton, '13 - Buffalo, Brooklyn 1 & 2, '15 - Global Citizen, '16 - TO 1 & 2, Chi 2

    EV
    Toronto Film Festival 9/11/2007, '08 - Toronto 1 & 2, '09 - Albany 1, '11 - Chicago 1
  • the constitution?
    how many executive orders?
    how many backroom deals?
    biggest NSA spy ring in history?
    just imagine if they covered bho like they do trump
    Randall's Island 9-29-1996, MSG 9-10/11-1998, Meadows, CT 9-13-1998, Sacramento 10-30-2000, Bridge School 10-26-2002,MSG 9-8/9-2003, Hartford 2013, Amsterdam 2014(2), Memphis 2014, MSG 5-1/2-2016, Fenway 8-7-16, Fenway 9-2/4-18 MSG 9-11-22
  • JC29856JC29856 Posts: 9,617

    the constitution?
    how many executive orders?
    how many backroom deals?
    biggest NSA spy ring in history?
    just imagine if they covered bho like they do trump

    They can't, they will be called names.
  • vaggar99vaggar99 Posts: 3,427
    Yes

    the constitution?
    how many executive orders?
    how many backroom deals?
    biggest NSA spy ring in history?
    just imagine if they covered bho like they do trump

    woah..obama is done. we are talking about the next guy
  • josevolutionjosevolution Posts: 29,535
    Well we all know Bafoon getting elected is Obamas fault , who are you guys going to blame after 1/20/17 when King Bafoon takes office ?
    jesus greets me looks just like me ....
  • vaggar99vaggar99 Posts: 3,427
    Yes

    Well we all know Bafoon getting elected is Obamas fault , who are you guys going to blame after 1/20/17 when King Bafoon takes office ?

    if you call being black a fault, then yes, he deserves part of the blame. its hilarious to hear so many people hate on a guy who graduate Magna Cum Laude from Harvard and still put up with a DOE secretary nominee who could barely pass a class called 'Meats'.
  • benjsbenjs Posts: 9,144
    edited December 2016
    vaggar99 said:

    Well we all know Bafoon getting elected is Obamas fault , who are you guys going to blame after 1/20/17 when King Bafoon takes office ?

    if you call being black a fault, then yes, he deserves part of the blame. its hilarious to hear so many people hate on a guy who graduate Magna Cum Laude from Harvard and still put up with a DOE secretary nominee who could barely pass a class called 'Meats'.
    Seriously? You don't think any of Obama's actions or inactions could've contributed to disdain with the DNC? I don't care where he graduated from - he was not perfect.

    PS, Do you have any comment on what I wrote above? I took a good ten minutes of effort to debunk why your hopes and dreams are just hopes and dreams and not valid strategy.
    '05 - TO, '06 - TO 1, '08 - NYC 1 & 2, '09 - TO, Chi 1 & 2, '10 - Buffalo, NYC 1 & 2, '11 - TO 1 & 2, Hamilton, '13 - Buffalo, Brooklyn 1 & 2, '15 - Global Citizen, '16 - TO 1 & 2, Chi 2

    EV
    Toronto Film Festival 9/11/2007, '08 - Toronto 1 & 2, '09 - Albany 1, '11 - Chicago 1
  • vaggar99vaggar99 Posts: 3,427
    Yes
    benjs said:

    vaggar99 said:

    Well we all know Bafoon getting elected is Obamas fault , who are you guys going to blame after 1/20/17 when King Bafoon takes office ?

    if you call being black a fault, then yes, he deserves part of the blame. its hilarious to hear so many people hate on a guy who graduate Magna Cum Laude from Harvard and still put up with a DOE secretary nominee who could barely pass a class called 'Meats'.
    Seriously? You don't think any of Obama's actions or inactions could've contributed to disdain with the DNC? I don't care where he graduated from - he was not perfect.

    PS, Do you have any comment on what I wrote above? I took a good ten minutes of effort to debunk why your hopes and dreams are just hopes and dreams and not valid strategy.
    Magna Cum Laude!! That is hard shit. I could have never done that. Yes, I plan to respond. I still need to read the document thouroughly. Give me till the weekend. Work is a little too busy right now...thanks for following up. Somehow I knew you would!
  • benjsbenjs Posts: 9,144
    vaggar99 said:

    benjs said:

    vaggar99 said:

    Well we all know Bafoon getting elected is Obamas fault , who are you guys going to blame after 1/20/17 when King Bafoon takes office ?

    if you call being black a fault, then yes, he deserves part of the blame. its hilarious to hear so many people hate on a guy who graduate Magna Cum Laude from Harvard and still put up with a DOE secretary nominee who could barely pass a class called 'Meats'.
    Seriously? You don't think any of Obama's actions or inactions could've contributed to disdain with the DNC? I don't care where he graduated from - he was not perfect.

    PS, Do you have any comment on what I wrote above? I took a good ten minutes of effort to debunk why your hopes and dreams are just hopes and dreams and not valid strategy.
    Magna Cum Laude!! That is hard shit. I could have never done that. Yes, I plan to respond. I still need to read the document thouroughly. Give me till the weekend. Work is a little too busy right now...thanks for following up. Somehow I knew you would!
    There's this Mitch Hedberg routine where he talks about how in comedy, they hear that you're good at one thing and assume you'll be good at something related - like saying to a cook "you're a great cook - can you farm"? Sure, there are transferrable skills between strong academic abilities and leadership in government, but to write off the possibility for wrong decisions based on doing well in college 25 years ago is ludicrous.

    And I'm glad you plan on responding - do you often post links to articles and papers which you haven't read yourself?
    '05 - TO, '06 - TO 1, '08 - NYC 1 & 2, '09 - TO, Chi 1 & 2, '10 - Buffalo, NYC 1 & 2, '11 - TO 1 & 2, Hamilton, '13 - Buffalo, Brooklyn 1 & 2, '15 - Global Citizen, '16 - TO 1 & 2, Chi 2

    EV
    Toronto Film Festival 9/11/2007, '08 - Toronto 1 & 2, '09 - Albany 1, '11 - Chicago 1
  • vaggar99vaggar99 Posts: 3,427
    Yes


    .
    benjs said:

    vaggar99 said:

    i'm a smart guy and probably already know whats in this, so i haven't read it. someone do me a favor and read and then you brief tomorrow morning if i decide to log on.
    https://brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/gs_121616_emoluments-clause1.pdf

    Let me try to play devil's advocate (because Trump's lawyers certainly will).

    The paper you linked to defines what an emolument is, what 'offices' are affected by it, and which foreign entities transacting would define a breach of the clause. People in the US government regularly attempt to work with foreign entities, and the public encourages them: trade deals, cooperative relationships, alliances, military aid. Supposedly, the US government is meant to speak for the people, and to treat them favourably over all other nations - so one would hope that they are making international negotiations which provide advantages and benefits (in other words, emoluments) to Americans, which includes those same people making the policies or deals themselves (who are then stakeholders, rather than sole proprietors, in these transactions).

    In this sense, most international agreements could be seen as breaches of the emoluments clause, unless one admits that being a stakeholder while holding office is not direct enough of receipt of emoluments from foreign entities (which, clearly, is implicitly admitted by the fact that these types of deals occur regularly). Trump is expected to go one step further, and to remove himself from these businesses (legally), and will be nothing more than an incidental beneficiary (an indirect stakeholder with no legal connection to the receiving groups of said emoluments - namely, his family and other Trump business shareholders). Precedence is important if you're to claim a legal violation of a Constitutional law, and America has absolutely shown precedence that an indirect receipt of emoluments from foreign entities is insufficient grounds for impeachment. Further precedence is set through Cheney's indirect compensation from his ties with Halliburton, and he wasn't impeached.
    I understand your point. But T.'s conflicts are entirely different. He has hotels and perhaps even more important proposed real estate projects across the globe. In the paper, the author makes clear that T. will need to completely remove himself and his family from all of his businesses in order to avoid the kind of impropriety the founders feared. In other words, we can't have a situation in which foreign leaders/govts and their citizens can manipulate the US through actions related to T's businesses in that country.

    And so he will never be just a incidental beneficiary of compensation. His actions already suggest that he is willing to use his new clout to further not only his own businesses also to aid his children's side aspirations.

    Thanks for making me finally read something of journalistic value, although perhaps minor. So much crap out there these days. Now gotta wrap presents for the kiddos. I am sure this debate will continue for months/years.
  • benjsbenjs Posts: 9,144
    vaggar99 said:



    .

    benjs said:

    vaggar99 said:

    i'm a smart guy and probably already know whats in this, so i haven't read it. someone do me a favor and read and then you brief tomorrow morning if i decide to log on.
    https://brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/gs_121616_emoluments-clause1.pdf

    Let me try to play devil's advocate (because Trump's lawyers certainly will).

    The paper you linked to defines what an emolument is, what 'offices' are affected by it, and which foreign entities transacting would define a breach of the clause. People in the US government regularly attempt to work with foreign entities, and the public encourages them: trade deals, cooperative relationships, alliances, military aid. Supposedly, the US government is meant to speak for the people, and to treat them favourably over all other nations - so one would hope that they are making international negotiations which provide advantages and benefits (in other words, emoluments) to Americans, which includes those same people making the policies or deals themselves (who are then stakeholders, rather than sole proprietors, in these transactions).

    In this sense, most international agreements could be seen as breaches of the emoluments clause, unless one admits that being a stakeholder while holding office is not direct enough of receipt of emoluments from foreign entities (which, clearly, is implicitly admitted by the fact that these types of deals occur regularly). Trump is expected to go one step further, and to remove himself from these businesses (legally), and will be nothing more than an incidental beneficiary (an indirect stakeholder with no legal connection to the receiving groups of said emoluments - namely, his family and other Trump business shareholders). Precedence is important if you're to claim a legal violation of a Constitutional law, and America has absolutely shown precedence that an indirect receipt of emoluments from foreign entities is insufficient grounds for impeachment. Further precedence is set through Cheney's indirect compensation from his ties with Halliburton, and he wasn't impeached.
    I understand your point. But T.'s conflicts are entirely different. He has hotels and perhaps even more important proposed real estate projects across the globe. In the paper, the author makes clear that T. will need to completely remove himself and his family from all of his businesses in order to avoid the kind of impropriety the founders feared. In other words, we can't have a situation in which foreign leaders/govts and their citizens can manipulate the US through actions related to T's businesses in that country.

    And so he will never be just a incidental beneficiary of compensation. His actions already suggest that he is willing to use his new clout to further not only his own businesses also to aid his children's side aspirations.

    Thanks for making me finally read something of journalistic value, although perhaps minor. So much crap out there these days. Now gotta wrap presents for the kiddos. I am sure this debate will continue for months/years.
    I'm not disputing the intentionality of the Emoluments Clause; what I'm disputing is solely the Clause's applicability to Trump and Trump's businesses when he takes office. Regrettably, as I outlined above, the impropriety the founders feared is not adequately prevented through the Clause.

    What the Emoluments Clause prevents is a legal transaction between the US and a foreign entity, which directly profits the/those American office-holder(s) responsible for the design of a deal - 'direct' being the operative word, as I showed above how 'indirect' profiting has historically been insufficient to prove a breach. If an indirect stakeholder has historically not been persecuted for breach of the Emoluments Clause, then I'd have to assume that to persecute for breach of the Emoluments Clause would have to be done by proving the directness of the profiting of Trump or Trump's administration (since the article above does a decent job of defining the stakeholders and the definition of emolument). I don't know that it would be deemed 'directly profiting' if Trump's children profited off of actions designed by Trump: I'd be surprised if a great lawyer couldn't argue the fact that there's no issue. If Trump is then gifted millions of dollars from his children (birthdays, holidays, etc.), he would certainly be an incidental beneficiary of compensation. It's good to be discussing this, as this Clause could be one of the few ways to hold the Trump administration accountable for their actions. Thanks for engaging in solid discussion, vaggar :)

    Happy holidays!
    '05 - TO, '06 - TO 1, '08 - NYC 1 & 2, '09 - TO, Chi 1 & 2, '10 - Buffalo, NYC 1 & 2, '11 - TO 1 & 2, Hamilton, '13 - Buffalo, Brooklyn 1 & 2, '15 - Global Citizen, '16 - TO 1 & 2, Chi 2

    EV
    Toronto Film Festival 9/11/2007, '08 - Toronto 1 & 2, '09 - Albany 1, '11 - Chicago 1
  • Go BeaversGo Beavers Posts: 9,085
    JC29856 said:

    the constitution?
    how many executive orders?
    how many backroom deals?
    biggest NSA spy ring in history?
    just imagine if they covered bho like they do trump

    They can't, they will be called names.
    Like "journalists".
  • Not sure yet.
  • vaggar99vaggar99 Posts: 3,427
    Yes
    are you creating a poll of polls?
  • ^^^
    We need Bpops opinion on this.

  • KatKat Posts: 4,871
    Donald J. Trump Verified account @realDonaldTrump
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    Falling down,...not staying down
  • PJ_SoulPJ_Soul Posts: 49,950
    ^^^ Hahaha. Let's hope so!
    With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be careful. Strive to be happy. ~ Desiderata
  • unsungunsung Posts: 9,487
    vaggar99 said:

    the constitution?
    how many executive orders?
    how many backroom deals?
    biggest NSA spy ring in history?
    just imagine if they covered bho like they do trump

    woah..obama is done. we are talking about the next guy
    And when Obama became President you all blamed Bush.
  • unsung said:

    vaggar99 said:

    the constitution?
    how many executive orders?
    how many backroom deals?
    biggest NSA spy ring in history?
    just imagine if they covered bho like they do trump

    woah..obama is done. we are talking about the next guy
    And when Obama became President you all blamed Bush.
    Comparing what President Obama inherited and what President Trump inherited is asinine. We were in the toilet in January 2009 on so many fronts.
  • mfc2006mfc2006 Posts: 37,447
    Yes
    Obama inherited a nightmare.
    I LOVE MUSIC.
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  • g under pg under p Posts: 18,196
    No
    From the New New York Times an article by Nicolas Kristof on How To Get Rid Of Trump

    https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/18/opinion/sunday/how-can-we-get-rid-of-trump.html?_r=0

    Peace
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    .....song_Music & Politics....Michael Franti

    *The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite INSANE*....Nikola Tesla(a man who shaped our world of electricity with his futuristic inventions)


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