Posted on 10/18/2019 9:17:38 AM PDT by billorites
President Trump won’t budge: He refuses to comply with demands for information because the House has not formally voted to conduct an impeachment inquiry.
House Democrats won’t budge: Speaker Nancy Pelosi says nothing requires the House to vote for an impeachment inquiry before conducting one.
So who is right? They both are.
We are an over-lawyered society that likes to see itself as governed by the rule of law. In truth, our fundamental law, the Constitution, is about the division of political authority — particularly between the Congress and the executive, the federal government’s political branches.
The ultimate check on presidential power is impeachment. Article I vests the sole power over impeachment in the House of Representatives. (The Senate is assigned the sole power to conduct impeachment trials and decide whether the president should be removed from office.)
Often overlooked, though, is a critical constitutional check on Congress: It is powerless to enforce its own laws and demands for information. Only the president can execute. Congress needs the executive branch’s cooperation.
When presidents believe congressional actions are unconstitutional, they often refuse to cooperate. Congress may threaten contempt and impeachment, but it cannot make the president comply. Our brows furrow as we try to sort out the legal ramifications of all this. But in the main, the fallout is not a legal dispute; it is a political contest.
The Constitution is designed to promote both cooperation and competition between the political branches. Often, the judiciary stays out of these duels, prudently reasoning that the Framers endowed the executive and the legislature with powerful tools to confront each other.
The political damage sustained by the side that appears to be acting unreasonably becomes a powerful incentive to compromise. Public opinion is the court that matters here.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Which is to say, "Bite me."
It’s.
A.
Coup.
Pelosi’s impeachment drive is all stop him before we all wind up in prison or worse.
She faked out the entire country that Obama was eligible.
https://canadafreepress.com/article/dnc-failed-to-certify-obama-as-eligible-in-most-states1
It’s been that way since before Trump was elected - when they found out that the Hilldebeeste lost they immediately went into impeachment mode.
The Democrats have been unconcerned with the Law since FDR kicked the Constitution to the curb. That’s when the real coup happened.
“...when they found out that the Hilldebeeste lost they immediately went into impeachment mode....”
*** THE INSURANCE POLICY ***
She may even try to convince RINOs (Romney comes to mind) to gather a like-minded GOPe group to take that slow walk up the the White House driveway to convince Trump to resign.
Ain't gonna happen - but would be VERY entertaining if they try!
Projection is a psychosis brought to a fever pitch within the leftist cohort.
McCarthy always makes the correct, important points.
This impeachment has no basis in facts, it is just a Dem attack.
Impeachment has become a Democrat electoral strategy, not a check on Presidential power. They know they can't beat President Trump with their slate of candidates, so they are abusing their power to try to win another way.
This is essentially one step short of accepting assassination as an electoral strategy.
-PJ
One thing the Democrats have proven over and over again is that they NEVER let long-standing tradition stand in the way of their agenda.
Mark Levin has been reviewing how the Republicans, led by Henry Hyde, tried to follow an impeachment process that showed due respect to the office of the President, while following the precedents set by the Johnson and Nixon impeachment inquiries.
Pelosi has no such respect for the Presidency, and certainly not for President Trump after the SOTU/travel incident from January, and will not let any fealty to past Congressional tradition become a barrier to her objectives.
You can tell they have a losing argument when they respond with a child's reply that "there is no rule that says I can't do it," despite what propriety and common sense says otherwise.
-PJ
Pelosi and pals have been locked in the D.C. bubble so long they have no idea what the real world is like.
They are acting like a dog in a thunder storm.
No, Nancy is still wrong. If the House doesn't vote for an impeachment inquiry, then there isn't a House impeachment inquiry.
They aren't conducting one.
Period.
Justice Antonin Scalia had long been a critic of the independent counsel statute -- even to the point where he was the lone dissenter in a Supreme Court ruling on the matter in one of the Iran-Contra cases from the late 1980s. He always considered the statute to be a blatant violation of the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches under the U.S. Constitution.
Even more interesting ... One of the few notable figures in the Federal government who strongly supported Scalia's position at the time was an Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel.
His name was William Barr.
Thank you for mentioning that. Pelosi & Company don’t want to retire to prison.
The person doing the impeaching is Third in line ,yep it’s a Coup
From the link. Well, phooey - I don’t like this take on the problem but McCarthy knows more about it than the rest of us do...so I guess I can stop complaining about the process - for now anyway! Take some of the stress away...
“”Yet, the Constitution’s commitment of impeachment solely to the House’s discretion is a two-edged sword: Yes, it means the House should act as an institution; but it also means no one — not the courts, and certainly not the president — may dictate to the House whether, when and how to conduct an impeachment inquiry.
There is nothing in the Constitution that says the House must vote, or that it cannot act through such standing committees as Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, Oversight and Judiciary. In fact, nothing in the Constitution directs the creation of committees; they exist because Congress, with nearly plenary power over the way it conducts business, created them.””
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