Pelosi Declares Nation Is in a ‘Constitutional Crisis’ - Polidicks

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/09/us/politics/pelosi-constitutional-crisis.html?searchResultPosition=2 is it though?

The most constitutional crisis moment we have had since Watergate, and I would argue that the implications in this situation are greater than Watergate. So, yeah. We are.

It's scary how fragile checks and balances is appearing to be. A lot of concerns people had about Trump early on that were seen as hyperbolic are now coming to fruition.

It started when McConnell refused to even allow Merrick to even be considered tbh

Considering the executive is doing everything it can to hold power and refuses to cooperate with the other two branches, with there actually being a legit possibility that the President will not hand over the reigns of power come election time, yes, yes there fucking is.

We have an executive branch that is refusing to acknowledge the authority of a co-equal branch, and doing everything it can including risking jail to stop important documents from being received. Yea I'd say that's a constitutional crisis.

SO START IMPEACHMENT HEARINGS ALREADY, FUCK

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't an impeachment hearing need 2/3rd's of the senates approval to go through?

for some reason Pelosi seems to want to leverage all this shit into 2020, which is the worst fucking idea in the history of this country because if they lose, they're permanently fucked. We'll all be permanently fucked.

It's because Trump is useful to Pelosi and establishment democrats. If they impeach him, and a few Republicans actually cave and join them, they'll be stuck with Pence and might actually have to work to win 2020. They're so arrogant that they think that their 2020 victory is guaranteed as long as Trump is running for re-election. That's why they're supporting Biden - because he's the most centrist candidate they could find - the one most guaranteed to return us to the pre-Trump status quo and do nothing else. While its true in the most literal sense that the Trump administration is a constitutional crisis, its also true that we really haven't had a functioning democracy since the 2010 Supreme Court campaign finance decision paved the way for corporations to bypass the constitution entirely. Establishment Dems are not our friends anymore, even if they could plausibly have been said to be so at one point. Look how little they give a fuck about the impending ecological disaster that is climate change. Just like rich Republicans, rich Democrats are going to live like kings until they die as long as our sham of our political system's "left" vs "right" is maintained. That's why people like Bernie Sanders and AOC scare them so much.. Because people like them are paving the way for real, meaningful change that will be the end of the corporate hold over politics if they succeed. And establishment Democrats DON'T want that to change any more than the Republicans do. There's way to much fucking money at stake.

What really pisses me off about how the elite are approaching climate change is that there is a substantial group of them that fully plan on everything going to shit. They know civil upheaval is likely. They are preparing for the outcomes where people get desperate and resort to violence in order to survive. The modern day Pinkertons are specifically marketing their services to the elite on the premise that global climate crisis will make them essential. They would rather shell out for private security and doomsday prep than help the public address the issue. They would rather risk losing everything for everyone instead of learn how to adapt and probably make more money in the process.

It's not so much as a crisis as it is an Ehanced 8-Way Clusterfucktastrophe

White House revokes press passes for dozens of journalists despite being ordered to, you know, not deja vu i've been in this constitutional crisis before

2020: President Trum refuses to step down from presidency, elections have been suspended, bill of rights struck down by supreme court supermajority.

this on top of them pushing biden is literally the stupidest fucking idea ever "hmm, Hillary didnt work let's try it again!" its extremely possible we're going to have trump 2020 if these fucking idiots keep this shit up

Superdel's are only barred from the first round of voting. The DNC has learned nothing, Bernie (who I think would flat out win in a battle against Trump, and honestly kinda deserves to run against the guy - assuming, well...) will very likely get snubbed again. GotG will then go pancakeless as history proves itself to be cyclic. Yknow, a lot of Trump's initial curb appeal was that he was seen as an "outsider" who would you know, drain the swamp and BS. Yeah that shit turned out to be political lies, but it's a lot of the same appeal Bernie has (although with this said, I think Bern's more sincere here). You'd think the guys not in power right now would want to capitalize on it. Ended up working wonders for the republicans...

I'd honestly say it started when McConnell declared his goal was to make Obama a 1-term president.

I think this is more than just a constitutional crisis. I'm starting to think that the end of American democracy isn't just possible, but probable. Consider, if you would, the end of the Roman republic. It was marked by many things that sound oh-so-familiar today: Complete breakdown of governmental norms, the unwritten codes that make everything work in practice Outright flouting of the law by politicians going unpunished because they're sufficiently popular Government frequently paralyzed and unable to deal with issues until they reach crisis state Growing partisan divide within government, ultimately reaching a state of inter-party "total war" where any option that hurts the enemy is on the table Public funds increasingly being used for private benefit, either of politicians directly or of their sponsors Direct disruptions to the electoral system, votes being massaged or delayed until they give the "right" results Popular animus against government and status quo at all-time highs, but "populist" candidates are either ineffective, or merely using movement for their own promotion Increasingly brazen corruption, both in politicians representing the highest bidder, and offices themselves going to whoever spends the most money Political violence on upswing, directly instigated by leading politicians Emergency legal measures utilized more and more frequently I can see the parallels. I can see that, even if Trump gets impeached, the problem will persist - this is a failure of the system, not of any one person. We are on the road to a tyrant - they need not be named Trump to destroy our existence as a free nation. After all, we were checking many of the above boxes well before 2016. Unfortunately, I don't see any way to avoid this fate. Electing a populist candidate and empowering them to "clean house" is exactly the wrong move - that's the last step on the tyrant's path, get into office with a mandate to reform it, use special powers to purge any enemies and rebuild government as a monarchy or oligarchy or whatever brand of not-democracy they feel like. Bad enough election results for the party moving fastest towards a dictatorship might stave it off - but I neither expect that to happen, nor think it would do more than buy us time. So would a harsh legal response - but the DOJ has been neutered and Congress cannot be relied on to impeach because half of them probably plan to form a new noble class once the takeover is complete. Assassination would just galvanize the popular support for the supposed-reformer/wannabe-king (and there's too many involved to get rid of them all one at a time). For the same reason electing someone to reform the system would not work, neither would a military coup or a revolution be a reliable response - it would be just as likely that whoever is temporarily given power will find a way to make it permanent. Those might be used as a last-ditch attempt to stave off a tyrant but that's just re-rolling the dice, with higher penalty for a failed roll. I hate to say it, but I don't see a good way out of this. I think we're just fucked. I really wish I had some advice for how to get off the road we seem to be on, but it seems inevitable at this point. I would absolutely love to be proven wrong. By all means, if anyone has any better ideas, or can argue that we're not mere steps away from the downfall of democracy, I want to be wrong about this. There are, I think, two bright spots in this otherwise bleak vision of the future. First, if we're using the end of the Roman Republic as a guide, we may have more time than might be thought. We might be coming up on a Sulla, not a Caesar. The system might be primed for takeover but democracy has inertia, it takes time for people to accept this as a new norm, if the next few presidents manage to not be evil, we can move the clock back to where it was in 2015... still uncomfortably close but not directly imminent. Second, Trump is undeniably a fucking idiot - if he manages to botch a takeover hard enough, fires it off prematurely, that might trigger a response that not only stops him, but disrupts any other plans that may be laying in wait. He does seem to be moving for checkmate before setting up all his pieces - his own incompetence and blind ambition might be what saves us.

When the only (realistic) opponent and alternative to Trump and Republicans are the Democratic party, you've got a problem.

Luckily, this is one of those crises that the political establishment are apparently okay with ignoring, just like Climate Change. If my head isn't totally submerged and there is still some form of life on the planet, it's fine. /s

I feel like the problem is that the establishment can't really do anything about the two party system directly. The republicans would never go out of their way to do so, and even if there were democrats in the establishment who wanted to solve this, it's would be counterproductive to work against the establishment and their own party. Change would have to come externally, from the people, but the people aren't conscious enough of this huge issue with the political system. It seems like there's no good solution to this.

Maybe those second amendment people can do something about this.

About 840 days late there, Pelosi.

It happens over here in Europe as well if that comforts you

Lets not get ahead of ourselves here. If he attempted to do that, this will be the moving towards checkmate before setting up all his pieces that gman003-main was talking about, because at that point Civil War 2.0 is officially on, and all bets are off as to who lives and who dies. It'll be messy, but Trump is going to have a hell of a hard time setting up his dictatorship once all blue states have secceeded from the union, and a huge portion of the US military has rebelled against the capitol.

Because it's Biohazard and he's only paying lip service there. He'll turn around and support Trump the next chance he gets because he has no integrity.

I know he's on the right side of the spectrum but I think we should probably rate posts based on what is said rather than our assumptions of intent.

Maybe he should quit being disingenuous then? He has nobody to blame for his bad reputation here other than himself. And he has a history of paying lip service in posts like that and then turning around and acting like a hypocrite so it's not exactly easy to blame people for believing he's once again being disingenuous.

guess we're doomed then

And no place is safe from American influence so just do what you can to mentally prepare yourself for a future straight out of the worst written dystopia. On the bright side, at least we’ll have some interesting memes.