Category Archives: U.S. Constitution

Day 1 of Impeachment Trial in the Senate

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After many hours, more than 12, the day was over. A long slog it was with summaries presented on each of Senator Schumer’s amendments to the rules. There was only one Republican defection vote on one amendment by Susan Collins of Maine. Even Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah stayed the course with the Republicans with all the votes they cast.

The historic impeachment proceedings against Trump begin ...
Perhaps the reason for full party line votes are as a result of the letter sent to the Senate by 21 State Attorneys General found here. It is a great read even for those on the Democrat/liberal side of the ledger and have already made up their minds to remove Donald Trump from the presidency.

State AG letter to Senate o… by Fox News on Scribd


The House impeachment articles managers/team, led by Congressman Adam Schiff and Gerald Nadler filled the 12 hours with repeated emotional and passionate summaries full of twisted and selectively chosen assertions while negating full truths and context. President Trump’s team did not sway from the initial briefing they filed and made their positions short and cogent on each amendment.
For the most part the day was filled with lawyers of all distinctions warring with each other and the polarization of the Federal government was on full display to only stay with our nation for many years to come.

Adam Schiff introduced Lev Parnas several times in his intense statements when Parnas was not part of the House impeachment inquiry at all. That bit of scandal came after the House voted on the final resolution to impeach. While I am not a lawyer, one must question if that was even a lawful introduction in the first place.

Lev Parnas is a turncoat political opportunist and likely a plant infecting U.S. politics for reasons still being uncovered. Parnas has been injecting himself relationships both in Ukraine and the United States by ingratiating his cunning tactics with people such as Rudy Giuliani, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing, Joe DiGenova, Trump family members and even Yuri Lutsenko, the former Ukrainian prosecutor general. Presently, Parnas and his business partner, Igor Fruman and two others have been charged with conspiring to violate straw and foreign donor bans by the Southern District of New York.

Going forward, the argument to watch for is the matter of ‘executive privilege’. All presidents have this privilege to protect interactions and conversations that involve matters of national security and diplomatic architecture. In a matter of criminal action, privilege cannot be asserted, yet that was in fact the case in the previous scandal of Fast and Furious when President Obama gave AG Eric Holder privilege protection and he was found in contempt of Congress for that. Moving on however…

The embedded message the impeachment managers will continue to use in their summaries will be “corrupt motives”. A president is responsible for foreign policy and is the top steward/protector of taxpayer money, not government money as to where it goes and how it is spent. One question that is not asked and should be is when Congress appropriated and approved the military aid for Ukraine in the NDAA legislation, was there a clause to fully document the status of previous military aid and to make designations of caution and sanction to Ukraine if the equipment and money did not reach or be applied for the intended use. That answer is no. The Congress relied on the Department of Defense to make a statement, which it did but only to declare that the Ukraine military had taken reform steps to address corruption, that is not a certification.

Carry on good and well informed voters.

 

Pelosi Says ‘no war’ but What About the Gerasimov Doctrine?

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The 800 lb. gorilla in the room, meaning in Congress is the 2002 AUMF, Authorization for Military Force. That was 18+ years ago and since that time warfare has changed. No longer will we see convention forces take the battlefield that looks that of Ramadi, North Korea or driving the Taliban from power in Afghanistan.

Modern warfare is best described today by the doctrine developed by Russian General Valery Gerasimov. This site has published several items on Gerasimov in recent years where in summary his military paper lays out theories of modern warfare and the new rules. The strategies include politics, cyber, media, leaks, space, fake news, conventional, asymmetric a tactics of extortion and influence.
The United States does not want war but bad guys do and they often get it.
As long as the United States responds and remains defensive on all fronts, we are in a forever war and the bad guys multiply.

The adversaries of our nation watch us more than we watch ourselves, there are divisions, departments, teams, units and various skill sets that are assigned and dedicated to all things United States all to pinpoint our weaknesses and fractures in our systems. They DO find them.
When third in the line of succession to the presidency, Speaker Nancy Pelosi calls President Trump and ‘insecure imposter’ and an ‘assassin’, it becomes one of many jumping off points for our adversaries to exploit. When the media calls Trump a liar, members of Congress use racist, unfit and unstable, the enemy takes delight.

So, taking out General Soleimani was long overdue and as for bad guys multiplying?

Source IISS report

Enter the cyber trolls, the deep fakes, the false news stories, hacks, ransomware, espionage, theft, plants, drones, terrorists embedded with migrants, illicit transfer of goods including weapons, money and people generated by rogue nations.

So, while there is little debate about the AUMF, there is a past due need to update and define all lanes of modern warfare and for a full new unanimous vote on military force which does now include cyber and space.
When Speaker Pelosi announced last week ‘NO WAR’ and the House passed a non-binding resolution to limit President Trump’s war powers against Iran, you can bet Russia was listening as were North Korea, Syria, China and even Iran.

This is a pre-911 mentality regarding foreign policy, United States doctrine and national security. Such was the case several days ago when Iran launched their cyber operation to begin brute force attacks against several targets inside the United States. The Department of Homeland Security’s CISA division (Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency) sent out several advanced warnings nationally for state and local governments as well as private business and corporations to be on the ready and harden systems with robust firewalls. They are asked for information regarding intrusions and attacks, Well, Texas Governor Abbot did respond. A few Texas state systems were the victims of of brute force cyber hits. The extent of that action appears to be rather minimal but no computer system network ever wants to reveal the damage such that it would or could invite more resulting in more ransomware.

Noted in the Gerasimov Doctrine, hard and soft power across many domains, past and over any boundaries, Russia collaborating with China, Iran and North Korea counter-balance conventional warfare with hybrid tactics and it is cheaper and often missed by experts and media until the real damage is noted.

Congress has held many hearings on what is an act of war against the United States and yet, here we are with a tired and outdated AUMF that does not address gray zone operations. Just ask Ukraine, East Europe and Crimea how Russia was successful in applying hybrid warfare tactics. Maybe we should just rename the Gerasimov Doctrine civilian military operations, perhaps the Democrats and Pelosi would better understand the burdens of the Commander in Chief and that of the Secretary of Defense along with the intelligence agencies. It is an ugly world.

Hey Hollywood/Democrats, Killing Soleimani was Legal

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Quds force commander, Qassim Soleimani death by drone strike approved by President Trump is legal. That decision was not a decision to go to war or launch additional military conflict(s) with Iran. How about referring to General David Petraeus confirming that killing Soleimani is more significant and consequential that taking out Osama bin Ladin and al Baghdadi.

Image result for Kata'ib Hezbollah

Former Department of Homeland Security Secretary and lawyer, Jeh Johnson also confirmed the order/approval to kill Soleimani by President Trump is legal without Congressional knowledge or approval.

 

Revised in 2016, from the Judge Advocate General, the laws of armed conflict defines the rules.

AFD-160210-019  (2 pages) During a time of conflict, you may only attack lawful targets, which include certain people, places, and things. Combatants are lawful targets. A combatant is anyone engaging in hostilities in an armed conflict on behalf of a party to the conflict. All members of the military are combatants except for medical personnel, chaplains, POWs, wounded and sick, shipwrecked, and parachutists escaping disabled aircraft.

Further: The War Powers Resolution requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours of committing armed forces to military action and forbids armed forces from remaining for more than 60 days, with a further 30-day withdrawal period, without a congressional authorization for use of military force (AUMF) or a declaration of war by the United States. The resolution was passed by two-thirds each of the House and Senate, overriding the veto of the bill by President Richard Nixon.

Further to the media, the Democrats and to Hollywood –>

THE PRESIDENT’S CONSTITUTIONAL AUTHORITY TO CONDUCT MILITARY OPERATIONS AGAINST TERRORISTS AND NATIONS SUPPORTING THEM

       The President has broad constitutional power to take military action in response to the terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001. Congress has acknowledged this inherent executive power in both the War Powers Resolution and the Joint Resolution passed by Congress on September 14, 2001.

The President has constitutional power not only to retaliate against any person, organization, or State suspected of involvement in terrorist attacks on the United States, but also against foreign States suspected of harboring or supporting such organizations.

The President may deploy military force preemptively against terrorist organizations or the States that harbor or support them, whether or not they can be linked to the specific terrorist incidents of September 11.

It cannot be understated that the United States under President Trump and in collaboration with U.S. Treasury and the U.S. State Department which hold the terror list along with the Department of Defense that there are more targets, least of which is al Shabab, al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Islamic State.

For exact reference, was listed as a FTO, Foreign Terror Organization on July 2, 2009. Click here for the FTO list.

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Meanwhile:

Abu Ali al Askari’s Twitter statement calling for volunteers for suicide operations in Iraq.

Abu Ali al Askari, the security official for Iraq’s Hezbollah Brigades (or Kata’ib Hezbollah, KH), purportedly released a statement earlier today calling for volunteers for suicide bombings against US forces in Iraq.

On Askari’s Twitter account, which has been utilized in the past to distribute KH statements, the official says that “I call for the opening of the door of registration for the lovers of martyrdom, to conduct martyrdom operations [suicide bombings] against the foreign Crusader forces.”

This short statement was then republished by social media channels affiliated with KH on both Twitter and Telegram. In addition, a Lebanese Hezbollah-affiliated Telegram account has also republished the statement.

No official word has been made on KH’s website as of the time of publishing, however.

The US-designated Hezbollah Brigades were led by Abu Mahdi al Muhandis until his death by a US drone strike yesterday alongside Iranian Qods Force commander Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad

 

Did Pelosi, Schiff and Nadler Read Federalist No. 65?

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While Nancy Pelosi has been ‘prayerful’ during this impeachment inquiry process, Congressman Adam Schiff, HPSCI Chairman has been touting the Constitution and poor old Congressman Jerry Nadler, Chairman of the House Judiciary remains lost as he was forced to give up control of the impeachment process after the stupid hearing with Corey Lewandowski. Meanwhile.

Whitaker will testify before House panel after tense back ...

Nadler, a lawyer himself has previously railed against impeachment during the Clinton scandal, has invited 3 Constitutional lawyers as witnesses for his first impeachment hearing and the Republicans were only granted 1 witness. Seems Nadler needs several law classes and he and the others meaning Pelosi and Schiff should actually read Federalist No. 66. More on that later.

Nadler has called: Noah Feldman, a Harvard Law professor. His position on impeachment and argument is that President Trump can be impeached even without evidence of a crime. He published an article in The New Yorker in May of 2017 stating his argument which is all the actions of the president are a pattern and can be collectively be used in sum as impeachable. Feldman has also called for Special Counsel to be assigned to investigate Rudy Giuliani and AG William Barr.

Another Nadler witness is Pamela Karlan, a law professor at Stanford. Her concentration including being on the faculty at Stanford is voting rights and political processes. Karlan was on the Obama short list to be a Supreme Court Justice while her resume includes being an attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and was a commissioner on the California Fair Political Practices Commission. Outside of being known as snarky, she often quotes poetry in her classes. Karlan was one of the 42 legal scholars that signed a letter before Trump took office urging him to change his views on several issues and was very critical of his rhetoric.

The last Nadler witness is Michael Gerhardt, a law professor at the University of North Carolina. Gerhardt penned an article in the Atlantic stating that impeachment proceedings are fully legitimate. Gerhardt is also a CNN legal analyst and was once the deputy media director for Al Gore’s senate campaign. Further, Gerhardt counseled Clinton on judicial selections and was special counsel to Senator Patrick Leahy on the nominations to the Supreme Court of Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor.

The only witness the Republicans were allowed to invite was Democrat and George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley. Turley appears to be an okay feller when it comes to Constitutional law. He has provided testimony often on The Hill. He is often the ‘go-to’ person for being a Constitutional originalist and protector of separation of powers within government. Turley has called out the Democrats several times including over the Russia investigation. In a recent interview, Turley had this summary on the impeachment:

The fact is I think that this is the – well certainly the shortest investigation, it’s certainly the thinnest evidentiary record, and it’s the narrowest impeachment ever to go to the Senate, if they were to go on this record….did they prove something was contemptible or impeachable? Contemptible is not synonymous with impeachable. The President does set policy. They have three conversations, two of them directly, one with Senator Johnson, one with Ambassador Sondland, where Trump denies a quid pro quo….so you have a conflicted record. And the question is what do you need to remove a sitting president?…

Whether this is intentional or not, it seems designed to fail in the Senate.

Meanwhile back to Federalist No. 65:

Hamilton argued that the Senate was the body to hold the impeachment trial and not the Supreme Court where evidence of misconduct of public men was a violation of public trust, meaning that society is a victim of that violation. That misconduct would contain injuries to society itself. In Federalist No. 66, Hamilton went on to further argue that the impeachment proceedings would seldom fail to agitate the passion of the whole community and divide parties into less friendly factions stating it would become a condition and test of political strengths between warring political tribes.

It is no wonder that President Trump reminds the nation often of his accomplishments as they are hardly injurious to society, in fact just the opposite.

 

 

 

 

 

Your Forced RSVP to the Cancel Party

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This list is hardly a complete list but it should stimulate some critical thought when it comes to Progessives attempting to run our lives and force law and policy upon us. The Progressives equal the Democrats, the Socialists, the Liberals. The notion of civil society is fading fast.

The Fight Doesn’t End With Kavanaugh | Earthjustice

Consider the following:

  1. The impeachment inquiry consuming Washington DC is effectively cancelling not only the vote for Trump to drain the swamp but to undo and redo past administration(s) actions.
  2. Cancelling history, changing the education syllabus on civics, monuments and principles.
  3. Cancelling the protections of the Bill of Rights, mostly all of them forcing government, state and federal to dispense their own versions of protections.
  4. Democrat organizations conspiring with media to cancel real news and facts with opinion.
  5. Cancelling and omitting law for protests, demonstrations, gang violence and shame.
  6. Cancelling new life for late term abortions while opposing the death penalty.
  7. Cancelling public safety and sovereignty by enabling homelessness, sanctuary cities, and legal challenges on immigration law.
  8. Cancelling self-governance for full reliance on government(s).
  9. Cancelling access to health treatment(s) and medicines with overwhelming costs, deductibles and policy restrictions.
  10. Cancelling any privacy protections when it comes to banking records, healthcare records, personal habits, buying trends, education, travel and homelife.
  11. Cancelling consequences for unlawful acts while selectively applying consequences for others, application of indictments and sentencing is subjective.
  12. Cancelling constituent access and legislative input.

Each of these items require the reader to apply real events to prove the points. Admitting the truths is the first step to seeking solutions, importance and call to actions by voters.

In this fractured and separated landscape, hate and apathy prevail such that any notion of recovery is fleeing. We have class warfare, fake news, deep fakes, shadow operations, new definitions and promoted manufactured dangers.

We have lost confidence in enforcing law, statesmenship, leadership, trust where it has been replaced by distrust, fear, self-censorship and isolation.

Pew Research this past June published a fascinating study.

Many Americans see declining levels of trust in the country, whether it is their confidence in the federal government and elected officials or their trust of each other, a new Pew Research Center report finds. And most believe that the interplay between the trust issues in the public and the interpersonal sphere has made it harder to solve some of the country’s problems. This research is part of the Center’s ongoing focus on issues tied to trust, facts and democracy.

The first item in the study:

Three-quarters of Americans say that their fellow citizens’ trust in the federal government has been shrinking, and 64% believe that about peoples’ trust in each other.

When asked a separate question about the reasons why trust has declined in the past 20 years, people offer a host of reasons in their written answers. Those who think there has been a decline of trust in the federal government over these two decades often see the problem tied to the government’s performance: 36% of those who see the decline cite this. Some worry the government is doing too much, others say too little, and others mention the government doing the wrong things or nothing at all. Respondents also cite concerns about how money has corrupted it and how corporations control the political process. President Donald Trump and his administration are mentioned in 14% of answers, and a smaller share lays the blame on Democrats. Additionally, 10% of those who see decline lay fault at the feet of the news media.

Those who think interpersonal trust has declined in the past generation offer a laundry list of societal and political problems, including a sense that Americans on the whole have become more lazy, greedy and dishonest. Some respondents make a connection between what they think is poor government performance – especially gridlock in Washington – and the toll it has taken on their fellow citizens’ hearts. Overall, 49% of adults think interpersonal trust has been tailing off because people are less reliable than they used to be.

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2 Nearly two-thirds (64%) say that low trust in the federal government makes it harder to solve many of the country’s problems. About four-in-ten (39%) who gave follow-up answers on why this was the case cite domestic concerns, topped by immigration and border issues, health care, racism and race-related issues, or guns and gun violence issues. Some also cite environmental issues, tax and budget matters, or political processes like voting rights and gerrymandering.

Another 70% of Americans believe that citizens’ low trust in each other makes it harder to solve problems. (They were not asked a follow-up question to explain their answer.)

3 Most think the decline in trust can be turned around. More than eight-in-ten Americans (84%) believe it is possible to improve the level of confidence people have in the government. Their written responses about how to make headway on trust problems urge a variety of political reforms, starting with more disclosure of what the government is doing, as well as term limits and restrictions on the role of money in politics. Some 15% of those who answered this question point to a need for better political leadership, including greater honesty and cooperation among those in the political class.

Read the full study here.