This was probably the general thinking before everything went batshit crazy among Republicans realized they could appeal to their voters by going mask-off.

One of the major reasons for the electoral college is because many of the founding fathers thought the people were too stupid to not elect a populist (like Trump) and that Congress should choose the president, but the other side thought it gave Congress too much power. So they compromised with the electoral system.

It’s been well known since day 1 that the people could do a very bad job choosing the president. The problem is that the EC has been so watered down at this point that the only purpose it currently serves is to create a situation where we’re under the tyranny of the minority. And, ironically, it gave us trump and might do so again.

Criminals shouldn’t be barred from running though. In fact, there’s precedent for people running for President from prison, and it should be allowed in order to make sure that the state doesn’t imprison people from jailing political opponents.

What’s concerning is the Dem party leadership is still operating under that assumption…

They’re either that out of touch with American politics, or they’d rather risk the country than risk themselves being held accountable in a hypothetical future.

Either way, I think that’s disqualifing, we need people willing to actually fix shit rather than just attempt to not let things get worse and then use that as a threat to keep getting elected.

We tried that with Obama’s SC seat, using it as a fear motivator to convince people Hillary should be president. The party lost that bet, but didn’t learn a single fucking thing. They just want to double down on the strategy.

If they pass laws limiting the damage a republican president can cause, they’re hurting their own chances since lots of people vote for shitty D candidates only to prevent a Republican from winning.

And sure, there are primary elections. But both parties have went on the legal record saying those are nonbinding and they can nominate anyone they want for the general.

Suspension of the constitution meaning the president can’t say Habeus Corpus doesn’t apply during a state of crisis or some other similar example.

Lincoln did it, so did Wilson, Bush was too stupid to do it so Cheney got the Patriot act passed to do it for him.

The thing is that, largely, government works because people all just kind of agree that it should. If a president says “I’m suspending the Constitution to deal with an emergency”, what happens next? We have a bunch of masked fascists, at high levels in government and in Washington think tanks, who would talk a lot about the unitary executive theory. It would be presented as a done deal, as if there was no question that it was legal. Who would step in to stop it? In the best case scenario, we would have a major constitutional crisis, that would eventually get worked out between the courts, the press, the public, and hopefully some courageous civil servants. In the worst case, it would straight up end our democracy. Somewhere in between lies civil war, and whatever that leads to. If suspension is explicitly forbidden, it gets a lot harder to defend, and makes the best case scenario a lot more likely.

I’m less sure about the value of background checks for presidents. I’m not sure some routine background check would unearth anything that the other side’s oppo-research wouldn’t. But hey, can’t hurt. I’m guessing the intelligence agencies are already digging up everything they can find; making that an official requirement and publicly reported before the election might be really beneficial, not only directly, but also to prevent rogue officials from keeping the dirt to themselves and using it against a sitting president.

There should be background checks for US presidents yes, but also for all congresspersons and Supreme Court Justices. All of their finances should be public information as a matter of course.

This would enable the government to make anyone they don’t like criminals to keep them out of office.

Getting rid of the slavery-era EC would be excellent, that’s for sure. No way the cons will go for that; it’s the only reason they win any presidency since 1988 (W getting popular vote for second term was due to being a “war president” and an incumbent and even then, it was a squeaker - and he would not be in there in the first place if it wasn’t for the EC in 2000).

There’s not a single thing wrong with anything she’s saying, except that she doesn’t go far enough

She’s just spitballing. Making policy isn’t her job, but at least she gave the conversation a nudge in the right direction

Ostensibly there is a background check done on all of those it’s called the vetting process. But up until now it’s only been a voluntary process that virtually all presidents and most senators and congressmen go through.

To use the reverse term to that which Monica Lewinsky did, it took an luddite president like Trump to expose the weakness of not having laws that enforced those vetting processes.

Re conflicts of interest, how is that line drawn?

As an example could Ford have pardoned Nixon?

I think it was a mistake to do so, but I believe he should be able to.

If a President campaigned on marijuana reform and pardons, could they pardon folks for marijuana related crimes.

I am ok with having some restrictions, maybe a review board or clearly defined method for legal challenges, but I think generally ok with the pardon power being fairly broad.

The bit you quoted said no constitutional suspensions

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You forgot the /s

A lot of people admire her for not hiding what happened at all and being unapologetic about it because it wasn’t her fault. She was a young intern and he took advantage of her. Only the asshole Republicans still victim-blame her. Meanwhile, she has shown to be an extremely thoughtful woman who has a lot of very good political points to make and they wouldn’t let her make them on Vanity Fair if she didn’t have any political capital left.

The only issue I see here is that she’s basically preaching to the choir.

She handled a bad situation with grace and dignity. Also, it bears repeating that the same people who want to ban books are the ones who are most willing to make sure that blowjobs are mentioned in history books.

I think she has more social capital now than ever before. She’s a well-respected activist working on important issues. Her willingness to speak openly and honestly about her experience, as well as her willingness to joke about it, and frankly to be in the public spotlight at all after what the media did to her, is downright inspiring.

I recommend checking out some interviews she’s done over the last few years. She has a uniquely relatable way of discussing huge societal issues. I’m genuinely impressed any time I hear her talk.

If you hadn’t seen John Oliver’s interview with her I recommend it

This woman became a white house intern cause in all likelihood she wanted to become a politician, and the Clinton thing just turned her into a late night talkshow joke

She had a brief resurgence around the time of the “me too” stuff, and was vindicated for a lot of the things that happened to her. A lot of people view her (and that overall situation) very differently now given how our culture has changed.

I believe she’s an activist of sorts now? I could be misremembering.

Americans are such pearl clutching hypocrites. They hate women for having any sexuality, unless it means they get to fuck her. She gave Clinton a bj, and somehow that makes her a terrible person. Who would ever want a woman to give them a bj? Shes sick in the head, I tell you!

Turns out most of the US government relied on norms, traditions, and basic human decency, but very little of it was actually codified into law. Which in this day and age is like having no rules at all since no one has any shame anymore

Weve never had to worry about it before, there’s no precedent

The rules around pardons are incredibly vague. Presidents have typically treated them vary seriously and used them sparingly. Then Trump saw it as an opportunity to make some cash and do favors for his cronies who committed crimes to help him.

The legal consensus is that they can’t, but it’s never been tested --nor did anyone ever seriously conceive of it as a possibility-- so it’s theoretically possible as a matter of law.

Only works on Federal crimes the state and local ones that he committed will still stick. So that Georgia election will not be going away

You seriously haven’t heard any discussion about a president potentially pardoning himself? Where have you been the last 6 years

Just say you don’t want Biden to pardon himself for his crimes and let the GOP go wild and vote it in.

That’s actually not the only route to getting a constitutional amendment. If 2/3 of the state legislatures in the country call a constitutional convention they can amend the Constitution independently of the Congress.

Though the likelihood of that is also very slim.

There is a 0% chance red states support any positive amendment to the Constitution, so any amendments are immediately dead in the water.

May you live in interesting times 😢

Essentially Trump pardoning himself for all his thousands of crimes.

It’s an American thing, kind of like having the power of a ruling king, because President is stronk. Americans love that kind of stupid symbolism.

Mr. President, pardon yourself.

Yeah, but with the shit show of a SCOTUS we have now, there are no guarantees. It’d be better to have a guarantee.

The position of a president needs to be held accountable on a higher moral ground then that of ordinary citizens and not the other way around.

If you did shit that would land you in prison, then this needs to be the place where you’re at.

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That’s not the system of Government we have in the United States and no one proposing to tear up the Consitution to start a new Government.

This idea is outdated by 150 years. The Civil War clearly established that the United States is no longer a Confederation of individual states, it’s a Union. We literally say “indivisible” in the Pledge of Allegiance.

The Senate doesn’t need to exist. Unicameral legislatures are very common in the world today, and they work.