seen from Russia
seen from United States
seen from Saudi Arabia
seen from United States
seen from Germany
seen from Pakistan
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Japan
seen from Germany
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from Canada
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United Kingdom
seen from China
seen from United States
seen from Germany
Puns usually just make people groan. But this one makes a solid point.
Trump is acting like he IS the government rather than the head of one branch of it.
While the judiciary occasionally shows some signs of life, the Republican Congress has completely failed to live up to its constitutional responsibilities. It is acting like a lawn ornament at Mar-a-Lago.
House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., told "Hannity" Friday that proxy voting was "unconstitutional" after the House passed a resolution permitting its use during the coronavirus pandemic.
Democrats illegally vote to do away with Article I of the Constitution in the House.
In the news that you won’t hear if you’re a Democrat, because you live in a fantasy world where if the Senate kills this bill on the floor that they’re a bunch of rich meany bastards; your Democrats have just nullified your vote.
Imagine a world where you’re a typical Democrat. You believe everything the party says and yet you want to vote for more housing in your area for the homeless. In this world, you live in Bumptown, California just outside of a major metropolis known as Los Angeles. Your State Legislator, whom you write and talk to, agrees with you.
And then that motherfucker doesn’t go to work. Instead, that person lives up the party life in Beverly Hills and tells Nancy Pelosi to vote for him on the House floor.
Nancy goes off to Congress and votes against Bumptown’s need for homes for the homeless. Instead, stating that San Francisco has a higher need for homes for the poor working class, and a new park with her name on it is able to attract more wealthy rich liberal white folk to donate to the DNC.
You go back to your Legislator and ask what happened, right? And that motherfucker shrugs and says, “Welp, Nancy’s right. We really don’t need houses when we have perfectly good homes like yours to give to the homeless.” And the next day, eminent domain is declared on your little house. You’re evicted into the streets and a homeless family with no income is given the home.
Nancy goes on the news and promotes how her plan to make a park in San Francisco has benefitted the homeless in Bumptown. Everyone’s happy, right? Well... not quite. You’re now homeless.
Maybe that’s a wild fantasy of something that couldn’t possibly happen, right? Right? Only, the Democrats just voted to do just that. By violating Article I of the Untied States Constitution, they’re consolidating power illegally to ensure that everyone who is a card carrying Democrat in a Congressional Seat is beholden to the party line. Their votes are now theirs.
They took away your voice. They took away dessent. They took away the very Freedom of Speech that even a Senator has. Because if twenty votes carry the strength over the majority of other Democrats, then there’s no House of Representatives anymore: There’s only Tyranny under a Dictatorship in the guise of a quorum of rich elitists who clearly know better than everyone else in their party.
That’s your Democratic Party: Welcome to the death of your personal liberties.
We all know that Kristi Noem is a dumbass whose only qualification to head the Department of Homeland Security is her preternatural ability to endlessly kiss up to Trump.
She put her ignorance on full display in front of a Senate committee when asked about Habeas Corpus.
Habeas Corpus is a right which dates all the way back to medieval times and was put into writing in the Magna Carta in 1215. Apparently Kristi Noem was too busy shooting dogs to notice.
The US Constitution which Kristi Noem apparently swore an oath to uphold says this...
The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.
That clause appears in Article I – the part of the Constitution relating to Congress, NOT the executive branch. Only Congress can suspend that right – not a halfwit Trump appointee who may still be banned from all tribal lands in South Dakota.
« Many observers have noted Trump’s seeming fondness for a regal conception of the presidency, or at least his gilded presidency. Just last weekend, this drove millions of American citizens into the streets in what were called “No Kings” rallies.
Nothing says imperial more than a president following his own gut or whim in deciding on war. The American presidency was never designed this way. The Constitution clearly limits its powers in this area and requires the country’s elected executive to obtain congressional authorization before launching into conflict overseas. Trump would merely be the latest in a string of American presidents who have ignored this requirement, if he goes to war with Iran. However one feels about Israel, Iran, and the Middle East, giving him a pass on this will powerfully ratify Trump’s sense of the regal dimensions of his authority, and will further weaken democracy in the United States and the ideals that inspired its creation. »
— Howard W. French in a column at Foreign Policy. (archived)
It's bad enough that Trump wants to start another Republican forever war. But doing so will just get him juiced up about assaulting democracy at home.
He likes having people think he's very powerful. But he's basically just a ho for foreign authoritarians.
US restores deleted portions after people noticed the Constitution had shrunk.
Parts of the US Constitution have disappeared – but not in the way you think. This is one assault on the constitution which probably had nothing to do directly with Trump.
The Library of Congress today said a coding error resulted in the deletion of parts of the US Constitution from Congress' website and promised a fix after many Internet users pointed out the missing sections this morning. "It has been brought to our attention that some sections of Article 1 are missing from the Constitution Annotated (constitution.congress.gov) website," the Library of Congress said today. "We've learned that this is due to a coding error. We have been working to correct this and expect it to be resolved soon."
Article 1 has to do with the powers of Congress. It implies that the legislative branch is intended to be the first among equals. To underscore that, it is the first part of the constitution which has to do directly with powers.
The deletion happened sometime in the past few weeks, as an Internet Archive capture shows that the text was still on the site until at least July 21. The deletions were being discussed this morning on Reddit and in news articles, with people expressing suspicions based on which parts of the Constitution were missing. The temporarily deleted sections of Article 1 consist of about 650 words, as can be seen in an Internet Archive version comparison. This included part of Section 8 and all of Sections 9 and 10. One deleted bit contains authorization for Congress to provide and maintain a Navy, and to call forth a "Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions."
There's really no need for Trump to try to minimize the powers of Congress. He has Republicans in both chambers acting like personal servants.
Another missing bit has to do with habeas corpus. That happens at a time when Americans are being snatched off the streets by masked goons.
Another victim of the temporary deletion was the section on habeas corpus. "The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it," it says. Other deletions included a provision allowing the slave trade to continue until 1808, a prohibition on bills of attainder, and several provisions detailing powers denied to states.
It's rather symbolic that parts of the US Constitution have gone missing at a time our rights are disappearing.
« The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, selfappointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny. »
— James Madison from The Federalist № 47 (30 January 1788).
The father of the US Constitution was clear about the separation of powers and keeping too much power from accumulating in the hands of a single branch. Though Madison was clear that Congress should be the focal point of constitutional government. The legislative branch has pride of place in the US Constitution, it takes up Article I.
Sadly, Capitol Hill Republicans have been cravenly ceding power to Donald Trump because they are too cowardly to fulfill their constitutional duties.
Conservative scholar Yuval Levin at the American Enterprise Institute wrote about Congress abdicating its responsibilities at The Atlantic.
Our Constitution created a republican form of government, and Madison was right to insist that, in such a government, the legislative power necessarily predominates. As long as Congress declines to at least try to predominate, though, our system will not work as intended. [ ... ] So for all that we will rightly worry about presidential power in the next few years, we cannot break out of our constitutional bind without looking down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol. Anyone contemplating where to seek change or how to direct reformist energies should take notice of a counterintuitive yet inescapable fact: Addressing the overreach of the judicial or executive branches requires first changing what members of Congress want.
The Power to Declare War
Now is as good a time as any to remember that, under the U.S. Constitution, the president lacks the power to declare or pursue war. Article I, sec. 8 of the Constitution gives Congress the power to “declare War.” What power does the president have? Article II of the Constitution gives the president authority as the commander-in-chief of the military. Donald Trump just joined Israel in its war…
