March 25, 2018

I will do my patriotic duty and offering my legal services to Trump

My qualifications include:
- I don't have a law license, so I don't have to worry about ethics.
-I can pretend to be a lawyer on TV and the Internet.
-I don't have any other clients to conflict with.
-I don't have a reputation to lose.
-My kid's terrible twos were really terrible and lasted four years.
-I charge much less than other lawyers (advance payment only).

So Mr. Trump, if you are reading DU please contact me through this website.

March 18, 2018

Do we have a Constitutional Infection?

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/is-america-on-the-verge-of-a-constitutional-crisis/555860/



Even amid the constitutional degradation of this moment... rejuvenating mechanisms are very much in evidence. On a daily basis, features of our democratic culture look more like antibodies fighting off an illness than like the rot before an inevitable collapse.

Journalists have been relentless and ferocious and effective in unmasking and reporting the truth—and news institutions have developed more committed readership as a result. A broad democratic coalition of citizens is mobilizing against Trumpism—most recently in a Pennsylvania congressional district believed to be so solidly Republican that Democrats let the incumbent run unopposed in recent elections. Other institutions, including the very FBI that Trump is assaulting, are knuckling down and doing their jobs in the face of pressure. This is not the stuff of a rotting democracy.

Trump can whine and he can fire senior FBI officials, but he has been singularly ineffective either in getting the bureau to investigate his political opponents (they have not yet “locked her up”) or in dropping the Russia investigation, which continues to his apparent endless frustration. If this is constitutional rot, it's inspiring a surge of public commitment to underlying democratic ideals—including the independence of law enforcement.

What we are seeing, in other words, is a little more dynamic than rot, a phrase that assumes we know the outcome. It’s more like constitutional infection or injury. The wound may indeed lead to a crisis; it may become gangrenous. But to describe the United States today as facing a constitutional crisis misses the frenetic pre-crisis activity of the antibodies fighting the bacteria, alongside the antibiotics the patient is taking.

We are definitely in a period of sustained constitutional infection. The question is whether we can collectively bring that infection under control before we face an acute crisis.

March 5, 2018

handwritten material is a routine request

So no surprise they would ask. But if it's a witness planning to cooperate, he will turn it over.

March 3, 2018

Proof that Trump can be indicted, courtesy of the State of Missouri

Governor Eric Greitens of Missouri was recently indicted and arrested by local police.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/22/us/eric-greitens-indicted.html

The Missouri Constitution says that the governor can be impeached and would be tried by a Senate-selected panel of judges. Like the US. Constitution, it does not say anywhere that the governor can be indicted, nonetheless, this doesn't seemed to have been a problem.

Of course, we are talking about federal law, which is different, but if there is no applicable federal precedent, federal courts often look to state courts for guidance if there are state-level precedents. The state precedents don't bind the federal courts, but if governors can be arrested based on similarly-worded state constitutions, then it's a good argument that the president can be indicted.

I am sure Mueller noticed this.



Missouri Constitution Article VII:

Section 1. Impeachment—officers liable—grounds.—All elective executive officials
of the state, and judges of the supreme court, courts of appeals and circuit courts
shall be liable to impeachment for crimes, misconduct, habitual drunkenness, willful
neglect of duty, corruption in office, incompetency, or any offense involving moral
turpitude or oppression in office.

Section 2. Power of impeachment—trial of impeachments.—The house of representatives
shall have the sole power of impeachment. All impeachments shall be tried
before the supreme court, except that the governor or a member of the supreme court
shall be tried by a special commission of seven eminent jurists to be elected by the
senate. The supreme court or special commission shall take an oath to try impartially
the person impeached, and no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of
five-sevenths of the court or special commission.