[QuickTidal]

Here's a great, short 99% Invisible episode about the "statues".

http://99percentinvi...magined-plaque/

[Tiste Simeon]

Robert Mueller has eliminated Trump's trump card...

http://nymag.com/dai...trump-card.html

[QuickTidal]

Tiste Simeon, on 31 August 2017 - 04:13 PM, said:

Robert Mueller has eliminated Trump's trump card...

http://nymag.com/dai...trump-card.html

I saw this and it made me smile. Because if Manafort wasn't sweating things before...he will be now. If your new choices are: Go down for a state crime with no chance of a pardon...or cooperate with Mueller for some sort of deal....you take the deal.

Unless Manafort is stupid enough to go down for Trump....I doubt he is.

[Macros]

I still don't really get these presidental pardons.
How are they anyway legal?

[QuickTidal]

Macros, on 31 August 2017 - 05:28 PM, said:

I still don't really get these presidental pardons.
How are they anyway legal?

It's in the Constitution that the President is able to pardon people at the federal level.

Verbiage:

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.

This does not apply, however, to the state level. If you are charged with a State crime, then the president can't interfere and pardon you.

It should be noted that this power has been controversial ever since it was initially created. It has been used in exactly the wrong way many times, including the pardoning of Nixon after he left office.

For a better explanation, I highly recommend this episode of Roman Mars's side project podcast "What Trump Can Teach Us About Con Law" which as a show explores all the unorthodox shit he's been puling to test his constitutional authority. This episode is all about his Pardon Power. It's not too long an episode if I recall...about 15-20 minutes.

[Macros]

But surely they are so easily abused they have to be done away with in his day and age

[QuickTidal]

Macros, on 31 August 2017 - 05:53 PM, said:

But surely they are so easily abused they have to be done away with in his day and age

I think we are seeing MANY cracks on the things the Constitution says and "allows" with the Trump Admin...and as such, the US government system of checks and balances as a whole.

So yes I agree, but I doubt you'll ever see it done away with.

[worry]

Here's the thing about the people who wrote the Constitution -- and you can see this in men who interpret it the way Antonin Scalia did: they enshrined the country's "right" to destroy itself, and held that as sacrosanct as any other right. There's a very smartypants element to the document (or what is absent in it) that basically insists on citizens remaining civically vigilant or reap the repercussions, almost as an ultimatum. I mean there's checks and balances and what have you, and methods of correction (like impeachment) -- and obviously there's a logic to wanting people to participate in the democracy -- but ultimately there was a very libertarian, scolding "you get the country you deserve" attitude in the intelligentsia among the founding fathers. An "if millions are hurt, so be it, they should have been more invested" perspective you'd expect from the blithest modern pundits -- it really is there in some of the founders too. And that's kinda why even though I fundamentally oppose textualists like Scalia, I don't think their POV is baseless -- it's just so (deliberately) agnostic to human suffering, to nuance of language, to social evolution, that it doesn't really serve a non-theoretical country, and actually does grave material harm.

[QuickTidal]

Wow, here is Trump & Russia explained in layman's terms.

https://twitter.com/...743751243784193

[worry]

He's both stupid and cruel.

https://twitter.com/...617923452981248

[worry]

What do kids know about Melania Trump?

[Malankazooie]

Kids probably think it's cool and amazing you can order a wife in the mail.

[worry]

I don't think that's the case.

[HoosierDaddy]

To be fair, BK: most kids enjoy having strangers wave at them. It's the parents that might mind.

[Malankazooie]

I remember going to a parade with my family and seeing the Shriner's Club old guys in the small cars. At the time I thought it was the greatest thing.


I probably then ate my boogers and got in a fight with my brothers later that day. So yeah.

[worry]

I guess so, but there are parents on the board who could probably provide more definitive answers (including BK). It just seems like MT's one campaign, cyber-bullying, has already fizzled out. First Spouses going back at least to Reagan have had such a public presence with kids, and MT just seems like a non-entity. What do kids learn about her aside from her existence?


Anyway, on a whole other note, Border Patrol agents are waiting like vultures outside a major Houston flood shelter. https://twitter.com/...199766501969920
I've been dreading the DACA decision all week, and now it looks like Tuesday is gonna be the big announcement day, and I'm feeling hopeless.

[Nicodimas]

Not directly related , but NK is going to be on top of the news on this one .... The new test went as a 6.3 point earthquake .. Which would put it in the very base of a thermonuclear, hydrogen bomb size...a megaton.

(A 5 megaton bomb released by the US had a 6.9 on the scale in the history books..in my not so scientific way of going about it I found a earthquake conversation calc and did the difference in energy release which calculated 633 KT)

This is a calculator that can show effects and casualties

http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/


Now who's to say that's the minaturized one? And we don't even know if they have rockets capable of re-entry..but troubling indeed if they have this tech. It's going to be interesting if they downplay this, or react outright ...

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 03 September 2017 - 06:52 AM

[Mezla PigDog]

The first rule of parenting - don't put your kids in situations where they might get waved at.

I don't think we can judge Melania for a lack of campaigns. I doubt she was ever asked if she wanted to be first lady.

[HoosierDaddy]

Honey Cups, on 03 September 2017 - 06:20 AM, said:

I'm on ambien now so I'm hoping I'm reading this wrong and not getting called a bad parent.

I don't know many 13 yr olds who are to into politics(know they out there).I can't tell you what she knows about her other then she knows she is 1st Lady or what she is aware of that she has/hasn't done.

As I said last page. Small town. Rare event. Quick in and out, no speech. A 13 yr old girl got happy a famous person waved at her in the motorcade. Why the fuss? Did I read wrong? Ambien. I'll say I'm sorry in the am.

Err, yes. You are reading it wrong.

I didn't know she was that old, either. She might have some ideas. Anywho, mostly this is about dissing Melania as a worthless first lady, but as Mez said, don't think she signed up for that gig.

[worry]

None of my curiosity had anything to do with dissing Melania Trump, and I think my question was pretty straightforward. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯