Mr Trump - All discussion here

[trastrick]

Just now, RJRB said:

You would be surprised how little concern there is in the U.K. as to the Trump adventures.

Where have YOU been for the past 7 years?:)

 

Front page of the Guardian almost every day for the last 7 years.

 

It's very own Topic here on SF in backwater swamp country, with your own contributions?

 

Go back to sleep! 

 

[melthebell]

11 minutes ago, trastrick said:

 

If he is found guilty as charged, he'll pay the price! As it should be!

 

 

finally we agree on something

[Guest]

31 minutes ago, trastrick said:

... I see, you're  being a little nicer now! ...

Am I?  I assure you it wasn't intentional.

 

Moving on.

 

An interesting comparison for those interested in a historical perspective is Spiro Agnew, Nixon's vice-president.  He faced a similar array of federal charges (though admittedly not Espionage Act level charges) and, like Trump, spent his time whinging indignantly and windily about how the prosecutors were terrible, vindictive, mad, out to use him to restore their reputations, he wasn't going anywhere, he would not resign etc etc etc.  Days later, he resigned.  He's the subject of Rachel Maddow's podcast, Bag Man, so I won't spoil the details and you should listen to that instead.  While you're there, listen to Ultra too.

[RJRB]

59 minutes ago, trastrick said:

Where have YOU been for the past 7 years?:)

 

Front page of the Guardian almost every day for the last 7 years.

 

It's very own Topic here on SF in backwater swamp country, with your own contributions?

 

Go back to sleep! 

 

It really isn’t.

Probably not on the Dominican Republic Bugle either.

It’s of secondary interest at least after our own political turmoils and Brexit.

However it’s a big part of your life and your posts continue to amuse and bemuse me.

I sleep a steady 8 hours a night and remain fresh and alert in my waking hours thank you.

Keep the thread going though .

Us lefties😁i.e.to the left of the Proud Boys and Kanye West hang on your every word.

Lol

 

[Longcol]

6 hours ago, trastrick said:

Where have YOU been for the past 7 years?:)

 

Front page of the Guardian almost every day for the last 7 years.

 

 

Only on the USA version of the website - and have severe doubts about "every day". Probably got similar coverage in the USA based press - an fawned over several times a day on Fox News.

[RJRB]

33 minutes ago, Longcol said:

Only on the USA version of the website - and have severe doubts about "every day". Probably got similar coverage in the USA based press - an fawned over several times a day on Fox News.

I may have missed this welter of Trumpocentric news over the last 7 years as I have never subscribed to this paper.

My knowledge of Guardian articles is restricted to the second hand posts on here from a few who seem obsessive.

My tendency towards marginally left of centre politics owes more to the actions and views of those on the right.

The Tory politicians that I have had some time for are those that are now despised by the far right.

I suspect that if I were a US citizen then my views have been shaped in a similar way.

[trastrick]

19 hours ago, Hecate said:

Am I?  I assure you it wasn't intentional.

 

Moving on.

 

........ He's the subject of Rachel Maddow's podcast, Bag Man, so I won't spoil the details and you should listen to that instead.  While you're there, listen to Ultra too.

Spiro Agnew? 

 

Thanks, but I'll take a pass! 

 

Moving on!

 

[trastrick]

WALL STREET JOURNAL

Trump’s Boxes and Clinton’s Sock Drawer

A president chooses what records to return or keep and the National Archives can’t do anything about it.

"Although the indictment against Donald Trump doesn’t cite the Presidential Records Act, the charges are predicated on the law. The indictment came about only because the government thought Mr. Trump took records that didn’t belong to him, and the government raided his house to find any such records.

 

This should never have happened. The Presidential Records Act allows the president to decide what records to return and what records to keep at the end of his presidency. And the National Archives and Records Administration can’t do anything about it. I know because I’m the lawyer who lost the “Clinton sock drawer” case.

 

In 2009, historian Taylor Branch published “The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History With the President.” The book is based on recordings of Mr. Branch’s 79 meetings with Bill Clinton between Jan. 20, 1993, and Jan. 20, 2001. According to Mr. Branch, the audiotapes preserved not only Mr. Clinton’s thoughts on issues he faced while president, but also some actual events, such as phone conversations. Among them:

• Mr. Clinton calling several U.S. senators and trying to persuade them to vote against an amendment by Sen. John McCain requiring the immediate withdrawal of troops from Somalia

 

• Mr. Clinton’s side of a phone call with Rep. William Natcher (D., Ky.) in which the president explained that his reasoning for joining the North American Free Trade Agreement was based on technical forecasts in his presidential briefings.

• Mr. Clinton’s side of a phone conversation with Secretary of State Warren Christopher about a diplomatic impasse over Bosnia.

• Mr. Clinton seeking advice from Mr. Branch on pending foreign-policy decisions such as military involvement in Haiti and possibly easing the embargo of Cuba.

The White House made the audiotapes. Nancy Hernreich, then director of Oval Office operations, set up the meetings between Messrs. Clinton and Branch and was involved in the logistics of the recordings. Did that make them presidential records?

 

The National Archives and Records Administration was never given the recordings. As Mr. Branch tells it, Mr. Clinton hid them in his sock drawer to keep them away from the public and took them with him when he left office.

My organization, Judicial Watch, sent a Freedom of Information Act request to NARA for the audiotapes. The agency responded that the tapes were Mr. Clinton’s personal records and therefore not subject to the Presidential Records Act or the Freedom of Information Act.

We sued in federal court and asked the judge to declare the audiotapes to be presidential records and, because they weren’t currently in NARA’s possession, compel the government to get them.

In defending NARA, the Justice Department argued that NARA doesn’t have “a duty to engage in a never-ending search for potential presidential records” that weren’t provided to NARA by the president at the end of his term. Nor, the department asserted, does the Presidential Records Act require NARA to appropriate potential presidential records forcibly. The government’s position was that Congress had decided that the president and the president alone decides what is a presidential record and what isn’t. He may take with him whatever records he chooses at the end of his term.

Judge Amy Berman Jackson agreed: “Since the President is completely entrusted with the management and even the disposal of Presidential records during his time in office,” she held, “it would be difficult for this Court to conclude that Congress intended that he would have less authority to do what he pleases with what he considers to be his personal records.”

Judge Jackson added that “the PRA contains no provision obligating or even permitting the Archivist to assume control over records that the President ‘categorized’ and ‘filed separately’ as personal records. At the conclusion of the President’s term, the Archivist only ‘assumes responsibility for the Presidential records.’ . . . PRA does not confer any mandatory or even discretionary authority on the Archivist to classify records. Under the statute, this responsibility is left solely to the President.”

I lost because Judge Jackson concluded the government’s hands were tied. Mr. Clinton took the tapes, and no one could do anything about it.

The same is true with Mr. Trump. Although he didn’t keep records in his sock drawer, he gathered newspapers, press clippings, letters, notes, cards, photographs, documents and other materials in cardboard boxes. Then Mr. Trump, like Mr. Clinton, took those boxes with him when he left office. As of noon on Jan. 20, 2021, whatever remained at the White House was presidential records. Whatever was taken by Mr. Trump wasn’t. That was the position of the Justice Department in 2010 and the ruling by Judge Jackson in 2012.

A decade later, the government should never have gone searching for potential presidential records. Nor should it have forcibly taken records from Mr. Trump.

 

The government should lose U.S. v. Trump. If the courts decide otherwise, I want those Clinton tapes".

 

Mr. Bekesha is a senior attorney at Judicial Watch.

 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/clintons-sock-drawer-and-trumps-indictment-documents-pra-personal-files-13986b28?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

Edited June 15, 2023 by trastrick

[Guest]

I know this will come as a shock (I for one was simply astonished), but:

 

'Wrong in the very first sentence': Conservative shreds WSJ editorial declaring Trump innocent

 

 

And, an extremely rare statement from the National Archives, such has been the absolute tidal wave of bullcrap around this sorry issue.

[melthebell]

Lmao, when in doubt blame the clintons