...I still would love to be educated on just how allowing Biden to win the election results in a clear conscience. There was no doubt the nation would suffer under the "leadership" of a guy who's never accomplished anything during almost 50 years in politics. As shocked as I was how well Trump did as president, my shock at how badly this asshole is harming the nation is far greater, and I'm under no delusion we've seen the worst of it.
Now, it's one thing for some dumbass from Louisville to go on in his stupidity about how we'll be better off than another four years of Trump. Such abject idiocy is a given. The sad thing is finding out how many were foolish enough to presume it wouldn't be noticeably worse than even the Obama years, and that's without needing to know how bad it actually has been. When even Obama was said to have expressed words to the effect that one shouldn't under estimate Biden's ability to f**k things up, it would seem that those who insist they are keen on doing God's will would not move in a manner which allows such great harm to befall their fellow citizens. How is letting such a moron win the presidency be a manifestation of serving God? I'm no genius, but few things seemed more likely than that this schmuck would muck things up royally, and he's surpassed my greatest fears. No doubt the best is yet to come, particularly if we can't take either, if not both, Houses of Congress.
One fellow seems to think I'm criticizing those who didn't vote as I did, as if that's the point. It isn't. The point is that if we are truly to serve our fellow man as Christians, that can't include allowing someone like Joe Biden to be president just because Trump isn't a freakin' Apostle of Christ. It's absurd and a clear conflict if one wishes to strut as following one's Christian conscience. While our duty is first to God...obviously...that duty includes our service to others. And while Trump's first try might have come with more justification for rejecting him, his second followed four years in which he proved himself as not only capable of being president, but of being a good one.
Then there are others who almost seem to look for reasons not to vote for Trump if he manages to be the GOP candidate for 2024. Too much baggage....too old...too likely to have another four years of constant conflict and obstruction...yada, yada, yada. It's all bullshit. All we need to know is that he did good and that means he's likely....not guaranteed, as there can be no such thing...to do well again and damn it if we don't need a proven commodity at this stage of the game.
So at the point, I am under no compulsion to act nice to those who make no sense about something which has had such weight. The suffering of so many are at the feet of ALL who chose not to vote for Trump in 2020. Each such person is complicit in increasing speed at which we are descending. And when I think of all the many ways things have devolved into absolute shit, I am most disappointed with those who stand on empty piety and sanctimony...empty for the harm which has resulted, despite the intentions. This is no freakin' game. This is serious shit. We are all in greater jeopardy because Biden won the election and one doesn't serve God by pretending rejecting an imperfect man does the trick when so much is on the line.
You know, when I voted for Trump, I wasn't voting for adultery, crass talk or any of the other unimportant possibilities which never manifested anyway. I was voting for things like lower taxes and fewer crippling regulations, a strong border with improved enforcement of immigration law, a strong military, a growing economy, more Constitution loving judges and justices on the courts, safer streets and things like that. I've been told that there's no one who can make the nation more Christian and yet because Trump wasn't a decent example of a Christian, all those other things which are within the duties of a president are apparently worthless and unimportant in choosing between candidates most likely to be elected.
I guess those who have made their choice must stand firmly behind the poorly explained reasons why they made it. Fine. Just don't try to tell me God is in any way pleased with that choice given all the data available before making it. It just doesn't wash.
17 comments:
"I'm under no delusion we've seen the worst of it."
Yep. They have become completely unhinged. They will ignore violence against pregnancy centers. They practically begged someone to kill a Supreme Court Justice. They are weaponizing against half the country. And it is all brought to you by the Left -- including the "Christian" Left.
I have to agree with you here; there was absolutely NO reason for Christians to NOT vote for Trump when they knew Biden would destroy this nation. I don't want to hear crap about 3rd party voting because they never win and just take votes away from the good guy. If personal morality was used to decide who to vote for, a good percentage of presidents wouldn't have made it. Just look at Kennedy.
I still would love to be educated on just how allowing Biden to win the election results in a clear conscience.
You still need to be educated about the rule of law and the basic workings of a democratic republic. Biden wasn't allowed to win. He won. There is no legal or constitutional basis to disallow his election after the fact. My conscience is perfectly clear accepting that simple reality.
There are of course legal bases for not allowing someone to be elected—such as a felony conviction for stealing classified documents—which will hopefully preclude Trump from running again.
Neil,
Unfortunately, it was brought as well by too many on the Christian right.
I would be remiss if I didn't add the likely reality that some of what we've seen since that fateful day would have come to pass regardless. We saw all manner of criminality during Trump's years, such as the "summer of love" in 2020. But the harm done directly resulting from allowing Biden to win is another story.
Glenn,
I have no problem considering character in my voting decisions. The problem here is whether or not to make it a priority which ignores that which was not even in question...Biden's incompetence and the likely harm a moron in charge would bring about. Again, it was really just a question of how bad it might get. And of course, the stark difference in competence between him and Trump was also without question to anyone who cared to pay attention and who cared about one's fellow Americans. I don't see how one's conscience could possibly be clear when faced with that reality. It's one thing to defend one's choice...for whatever reasons that choice was made...versus deflecting one's complicity in the harm which resulted from that choice. At the same time, given the stark realities of Biden v Trump, it's impossible for me to accept any cold claim to have made their choice to reject Trump in "good faith".
Vinny,
You clearly miss the point. Those who rejected Trump did most certainly allow Biden to win. It has nothing to do with "the rule of law and the basic workings of a democratic republic". It has to do with the intelligence of those who would not cast their vote for Trump leaving Biden to remain as the winner, and the bullshit arguments for having done so. They chose a known incompetent over a proven commodity and there's no excuse for that.
"There is no legal or constitutional basis to disallow his election after the fact."
That depends upon what "fact" you're referencing. There is indeed the ability to disallow electors which can alter the outcome. Once the process interrupted by the Jan 6 fracas comes to completion, it becomes pretty much impossible without rock solid proof of illegality in the election process...a high bar to clear.
"My conscience is perfectly clear accepting that simple reality."
I question the existence of conscience in any leftist as a general rule. Too much harm has befallen the nation because of them.
"There are of course legal bases for not allowing someone to be elected—such as a felony conviction for stealing classified documents—which will hopefully preclude Trump from running again."
The only way this will ever happen is if a Trump hating judge rules against Trump to an extent the current Supreme Court can't overcome...which is unlikely. It is impossible for a sitting president to steal classified documents, since he has full authority over all of them. "Rule of law", remember? Your dumbassed choice could "re-"classify any of them, but that still wouldn't mean Trump stole a damned thing. Whatever conscience one has would have to be completely ignored to make that crap work.
It is impossible for a sitting president to steal classified documents, since he has full authority over all of them.
A sitting president has authority over a lot of things. That doesn't give him the right to claim them as his personal property.
I assume that you are referring to a sitting president's authority to declassify information, which is indeed quite broad. Even assuming that Trump had declassified the information contained in the documents (an assumption unsupported by any evidence), that wouldn't give him the right to take the documents themselves.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/trump-has-constitutional-authority-to-declassify-anything-he-wants-mike-davis_4665471.html
The above speaks to arguments regarding Trump's authority as president as concerns documents. It states a secure facility is required for storage and one was apparently set up at his Mar-A-Lago location. To the extent such an arrangement is legit also seems to fall under his Constitutional authority as president and Commander-In-Chief. Thus, despite some acts stemming from the Watergate situation, it seems there exists nothing which overrides this Constitutional authority he had as president. And while these docs might not be his "personal property"...a claim I've not heard him make...it does seem they are under his personal control.
So the question remains, what takes priority...his Constitutional authority or some act which seeks to put that authority elsewhere, such as in the hands of the National Archive? A 1978 SCOTUS ruling seems to suggest the former.
You've missed the point again. The point isn't that Trump couldn't have declassified the documents before he left office had he wanted to do so. (As I noted, a sitting president has broad authority to declassify information.) The point isn't even that he did not actually declassify the documents before he left office. (He didn't, though.) The point is that declassifying the documents wouldn't have given him the right to take them. The only reason these documents "seem [to be] under his personal control" is because he stole them.
BTW, that Epoch Times article requires a subscription to read, and while I am happy to read any right-wing jackass you care to cite, I'm not going to pay to do so.
Actually, he did indeed declassify all docs in his possession which had been classified. The fact is that he could simply throw one out the window without a word and it would then be declassified. There's no expressed procedure he's required to follow in order to declassify anything. That's what his Constitutional authority provides for him and all presidents in that regard.
"BTW, that Epoch Times article requires a subscription to read, and while I am happy to read any right-wing jackass you care to cite, I'm not going to pay to do so."
I totally get that, as I do not pay to read lefty sites like WaPo and others. I don't even pay for right-wing sites which require a subscription to read, unless I really want access to a particular site. But I don't read jackass right-wingers and am not aware of any. Indeed, I don't know why you'd believe I'd offer ANY "jackass" sources. I mean it's not like I offered the NYT, WaPo or even your blog. I prefer intelligent, fact-based sources.
In any case, you seem to miss the point regarding Constitutional authority and whether or not that authority supersedes any subsequent legislation. After all, we're talking about the US Constitution, which is commonly regarded as the overriding law of the land. What follows are salient points from the non-jackass source I provided above...a source you'd profit greatly through a subscription:
"The documents seized by the FBI from Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort have already been declassified under the president’s “inherent constitutional power,” according to Mike Davis, a former clerk for Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch.
“[President Trump] has the constitutional authority to declassify anything he wants,” Davis said in an Aug. 12 interview with NTD. “And so, when he sent boxes out of the White House, he declassified them.”"
---snip---
"Files that contain sensitive compartmentalized information (SCI), a classification above top secret (TS), may only be stored, handled, or discussed in designated secure facilities. Such a facility had been set up at Mar-a-Lago during the first term of Trump’s presidency.
It’s constitutionally sound for a president to decide which information is classified and which is not, said Davis, citing the Supreme Court decision in the 1987 case known as Department of the Navy v. Egan.
“The president, after all, is the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, according to Article II of the Constitution,” the high court’s 5–3 majority opinion reads. “His authority to classify and control access to information bearing on national security … flows primarily from this constitutional investment of power in the president, and exists quite apart from any explicit congressional grant.”
“That means that he [President Trump] has inherent constitutional authority under the Commander-in-Chief Clause in the Constitution, and neither Congress nor bureaucrats can take that authority away from him through statute or regulations,” Davis explained."
more from the article follows...
"Davis also took issue with the Justice Department’s handling of the FBI raid. He noted that Attorney General Merrick Garland apparently did not consult the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), which serves as the de facto general counsel for the executive branch, before greenlighting the operation.
“I’ve seen zero evidence that [Garland] sought an opinion from the OLC,” he told NTD.
When asked about an affidavit that supposedly contains a probable cause for the raid, Davis said the Justice Department should have already released it, but will likely try to “hide it as much as they can.”
“They’re going to try to hide behind classification,” he added. “The Justice Department already misrepresented to the American people that Attorney General Merrick Garland did not authorize this warrant, when in fact he admitted that he did. They also likely misrepresented that President Trump had highly confidential, nuclear secrets.”"
Your attitude, Vinny, would be far more credible if it didn't need the enabling of bad behavior by Garland, Biden and his DOJ in order to disparage Trump. I find it incredible how desperate you people are to find fault in Trump that you'll indulge in so much "fault" to do so.
As the appellate court noted when ruling against Trump: "the declassification argument is a red herring because declassifying an official document would not change its content or render it personal." Trump took things that didn't belong to him. That's called "stealing," and it's something that decent people find objectionable. Even Trumpers find it objectionable when someone other than Trump does it.
Nice try. It still avoids the real issue of who has control of what is or isn't to be designated...or continued to be so..."classified". The executive has plenary power here, not any appellate court or other agency, department or official of government not given that power by the one person who has exclusive authority...the president.
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/09/the_eleventh_circuits_unconstitutional_ruling_against_trump.html
Thus, there's no "theft" except in the desperate imaginings of Trump-haters. Such people are not "decent" in any measure of the term due to their deranged disdain for one who turned out to be far better than those he replaced and as well as defeated in legitimate contest.
It still avoids the real issue of who has control of what is or isn't to be designated...or continued to be so..."classified".
I know you would like that to be the real issue because you imagine that you have a colorable argument on that point, but, as the appellate court wrote, it's a red herring. Whether Trump had the authority when he was president to declassify documents isn't an issue at all. That he did is not disputed.
The real issue is that Trump had no right to take documents that contained national security secrets when he left office. (Those national security secrets were the reason that the documents were classified in the first place. Even if Trump had declassified the documents before he left office—a claim completely unsupported by any evidence—that wouldn't change the sensitivity of the information in the documents or the importance of keeping it secret.) They were not Trump's personal property. Taking them is the dictionary definition of “theft.”
Even if it were true that Trump issued a standing order declassifying any document that he took from the Oval Office to the White House residence—again, a claim completely unsupported by any evidence—it would just be further evidence of his gross incompetence and unfitness for office. Sensitive national security secrets—such as the identity of clandestine foreign agents—do not become less sensitive simply because Trump carries a document from one room in the White House to another. That Trump would declassify national security secrets on such a ludicrous basis is just more evidence that he should never be let anywhere near one again.
First of all, you seem to think an appellate court has more authority than the Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the president having plenary power and authority with regard to what is or isn't classified. Thus, it doesn't matter what an appellate court says if it is in conflict with an already expressed ruling by the Supremes on a given matter.
You also seem to think that this plenary power has some limitation, which is in abject conflict with the definition of plenary power. Worse, de-classifying a document means there's nothing within it which must be prohibited viewing by anyone, and thus on what grounds would Trump be incompetent in taking such documents anywhere? So long as noon on Inauguration Day hasn't come and gone, on what grounds can you insist his plenary authority over any document of the government over which he has that authority is limited to that which you claim here?
Even as regards "evidence" for when and how he de-classified anything, please cite the established ultimate rule one with plenary power and authority is required to follow? Thus far, I've read of none.
It is said that the government classifies all sorts of things which don't truly require such a status, and that they do so as a matter of routine just to play it absurdly safe...which I don't necessarily oppose in principle. But you, given your TDS, presume that Trump would play fast and loose with that which would put us at risk, which is rather hilarious given those you support and the high rate of risk at which they routinely put this country.
What you're doing here is no different than your ilk in the Dem party, which is to grasp at straws and scrape barrels in order to find fault enough to deny Trump the presidency...which is what you people do because you lack real ideas and track records which can persuade a majority to your cause.
First of all, you seem to think an appellate court has more authority than the Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the president having plenary power and authority with regard to what is or isn't classified. Thus, it doesn't matter what an appellate court says if it is in conflict with an already expressed ruling by the Supremes on a given matter.
No. That is absolutely not what I think.
Perhaps you are not familiar with the phrase “red herring.” A “red herring” is “something that distracts attention from the real issue.” There is no conflict between the appellate court's ruling and Supreme Court precedent because the appellate court did not rule on a sitting president's authority to declassify documents. As the court stated, “even if we assumed that [Trump] did declassify some or all of the documents, that would not explain why he has a personal interest in them.”
[D]e-classifying a document means there's nothing within it which must be prohibited viewing by anyone.
This is a pretty silly statement, even for a MAGA-hatted Trumper.
Let's try putting the shoe on the other foot: suppose that Biden declassified a document that contained the identity of an undercover CIA agent operating in Iran, leading the Iranian authorities to arrest and execute him. Would the fact that Biden declassified the document mean that nothing in it should have been kept secret?
You are reversing cause and effect. If there is no information in a document that needs to be kept secret, it should be declassified, but the fact that a document is declassified doesn't render the information in it benign.
Even as regards "evidence" for when and how he de-classified anything, please cite the established ultimate rule one with plenary power and authority is required to follow?
As far as I know, there is no ultimate rule. There are, however, practices based on common sense. One such practice is to notify any agencies with an interest in the matter that documents or information have been declassified. In my example with Biden, before declassifying the identity of the CIA agent, Biden should have notified the CIA so that it could extract its agent before he was killed. This just illustrates the absurdity of Trump declassifying documents by carrying them from one room to another or simply by thinking it.
It is said that the government classifies all sorts of things which don't truly require such a status, and that they do so as a matter of routine just to play it absurdly safe...which I don't necessarily oppose in principle.
I suspect that this is true, and it's possible that all the information in the documents Trump stole was benign. That would not make the documents any less stolen, though. It would just mean that that Trump stupidly stole worthless documents.
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