Thursday, January 9, 2020

Oath Takers [POLITICS]



        Does your word mean anything to you? Are your beliefs important to you? Have you thought about what your beliefs are? Your values? Do you consider yourself to be a moral person? Is morality important to you? Do you expect others to be truthful or to lie? Is how you act important? Do you care about others or only yourself?

        I don’t write to try and change people’s minds. That just doesn’t happen too often in real life. I do believe that records are important. I write to keep my own perspective. If you’re a person that finds some kind of value in that then good on ya.

Rant
        This is going to be a rant. If you read this it’s going to take a while. Seriously, it’s at 23 minutes of your life that you’re never going to get back. Yes you read that right. TWENTY THREE minutes. The average person reads 200-250 words per minute (WPM). That isn’t even correct words per minute (CWPM) but that’s a whole other ball game.
        If you’re a Trump supporter save yourself and stop now before you get yourself all worked up. You don’t need the aggravation.

Cult
        Presidents often have cult-like followings. I’m just not that into following any human being like that. Jesus, yes. Presidents—No. My identity isn’t tied to a President. Neither is my faith. I don’t have to defend a President in order to defend myself. A President being bad, or good for that matter, isn’t a reflection of me or my beliefs. If one turns out to be corrupt or of low character that’s on them—not me.
        If I voted for or supported a President that was a racist unbeknownst to me and he was then discovered to be one, I would acknowledge that and proceed accordingly. However, my continued support for any person that I believed to be bad or evil would also be on me. I won’t knowingly support a racist. I’m not talking here about someone just making a bad decision or two. We all make bad decisions at one time or another. I’m talking about a dyed-in-the-wool, full-on racist.
        A person simply has to decide how relevant and/or important whatever issues are to them and make a personal decision about how to proceed. However, there are some moral grounds where compromise is impossible.

Some Background
          I worked for and retired from the Boeing Company. During some of those years I was a union activist as well as dissident. (Thomas v. IAM) I remember one contract that was accepted that I had said we shouldn’t accept. It was really bad. The rank and file at the insistence of our union leadership voted to accept the contract. After going back to work I received a call at work station from a guy telling me how incredibly stupid I was and how good the contract was. A few weeks later he was gone along with a few thousand other people because the contract was indeed a bad one.
        The reason I mention this as an example is if you were just talking with people then it was hard to find anyone who admitted to voting to accept the contract. Including people that had told me at the time how ridiculous it was for me to think that it was a bad contract.
        People also hooted at me when I wrote in an underground publication that Boeing was going to sell their facility in Wichita, Kansas where the company began. For those that might not know there is no Boeing Wichita now. They did sell the facility. Not everyone believes this. There are those that to this day maintain that Boeing still secretly owns the Wichita plants. That’s the way it is. People often believe what they want to believe.
        Doesn’t sound like much of a rant yet does it? Sometimes it takes me awhile to warm up. I went for 16 pages once. I was younger then.
        When I joined the Army I swore an oath. That was to the country. Not any man. God comes before country or a man or woman. Has to if you’re serious about your religious belief.
        Barry Goldwater is the first Presidential candidate that I was really passionate about. (I was very young.) Over the years I have voted for Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians and even for a green party candidate once. I voted for President Obama the first time he ran but not the second. He said that he would accomplish some things and then he didn’t. He also had a horrible history with regard to immigration.
        As just another example I really Liked President Jimmy Carter. He just wasn’t a good President. He’s probably the most moral man that we’ve ever had as President. He has been an outstanding ex-President and human being. He and his wife truly have servant’s hearts. They are exceptional people.

Okay. Here we go.

U.S. Code § 3331. Oath of office
“An individual, except the President, elected or appointed to an office of honor or profit in the civil service or uniformed services, shall take the following oath: “I, AB, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I’m about to enter. So help me God.” This section does not affect other oaths required by law.”
        This is from the United Civil Code NOT the Constitution. The original Constitution does not have the words “So help me God.”
        People don’t have to say the “So help me God” sentence because that would qualify as a religious test. Blame the Quakers. (Not really.) I’m with the Quakers on this one. Well, most of them anyway. President Nixon was a Quaker and he swore to God.
        Members of Congress as well as any employee of the Federal Government are also required to take an oath by either swearing or affirming.
From the Constitution:
“The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”
        The President of the United States takes the following oath.
From the Constitution: 
“Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:—"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

        There you have it. Oath takers are supposed to defend the Constitution. This used to be a kind of a big deal for some Republicans and Conservatives especially when it came to President Clinton when they were impeaching him for lying about getting a blow job and then obstructing justice for lying about getting a bj (I’m going to use the initials ‘bj’ to refer to it from here on in this. Presidents can be an embarrassment to the country.)
        It’s interesting to me that there were some biblical scholars that provided technical support to President Clinton’s claim that he did “not have sex with that woman” because he didn’t actually do the act. He only got a bj. I’m not going to get any more graphic than that.
        I told my elected Representative in the House at that time that the Senate simply would not convict a President for lying about getting a bj. It was just too tawdry. It still is. He responded with a lengthy letter about the Rule of Law.
        I did not and do not Like President Clinton. He was a draft avoider and sexual predator. But he did actually work at the job of being President. As a nation we were probably fortunate in that regard. I really could have done without NAFTA but that’s a story for another time.
        The Republican Conservatives that I know (I used to be a Republican) wanted to impeach and talked about impeaching President Obama for the majority of time that he was in office. They said that he was shredding the Constitution. They said that a LOT. They talked about it a LOT.
        Well, President Obama upheld his oath of office and Republicans never tried to impeach him. Well, I take that back. They did bring up the emoluments clause when they tried to stop him from accepting the Nobel Peace prize. Three Republican Representatives maintained in a letter to Obama that he didn’t obtain the permission of Congress to accept the prize first and had thereby violated the emoluments clause.
        Well crap. Now I’m going to provide the wording of the emoluments clause. I say crap because this stuff is boring and interrupts my stylistic flow. But it’s kind of necessary for people to actually know what’s being talked about.

From the Constitution: 
"No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State."

        Anyway, no charges were filed. President Obama donated the prize money and got to keep the Medal. There are lengthy legal articles about this that you can read if you want. In a nutshell the Nobel Prize Committee is ultimately considered a private foundation and there has been enough precedent established by previous Presidents and statutes to show that there was no violation of the clause. Since Republicans in Congress didn’t actually do anything impeachment-wise it’s safe to say that they didn’t really believe that he had committed any impeachable offense either and I think that this is important so I’m going to make it a separate paragraph all its own.

        Republicans controlled both houses of Congress during the last two years that Obama was in office.

        So if Obama had been guilty of ANYTHING, any impeachable offense, any trumped up charge, they would have been able to impeach him in the House. They might have even been able to obtain a conviction in the Senate. President Obama did NOT even come close to violating the Constitution or the Republican controlled Congress would have gotten rid of him.
        Now I also believe that this really is an important point. When the Senate voted not to convict President Clinton, 5 Republicans joined with the Democrats and voted not guilty on perjury. The vote on obstruction charges the vote was 50/50. On this vote 10 Republicans voted not guilty. So President Clinton was acquitted. A two thirds vote is necessary for a conviction in the Senate. That would be 67 votes. There were only 45 Democrats in the Senate at that time.
        There are only 45 Democrats in the Senate now. What that means is that 22 Republicans would have to vote guilty in order for there to be a conviction. That just isn’t going to happen. Twenty-two Republicans are NOT going to break ranks. From what I’ve seen in their comments thus far is that there aren’t that many that take their oath of office seriously. I’m certain that they will claim otherwise. It’s just politics.
It isn’t.
Charge it.
        The impeachment charges against President Nixon were Contempt of Congress, Obstruction of Justice and Abuse of Power. In each case a few Republicans broke ranks and voted with the committee. Nixon resigned before the House voted on the charges. He had been counseled by Senators that he was going to lose in BOTH houses of Congress. Now keep in mind that as crooked and criminal as his actions were there were still Republicans that were not going to vote against him.
        VP Gerald Ford did not support impeachment and ended up pardoning Nixon. Keep in mind that Nixon authorized criminal acts, payments of hush money and they had him on tape! We didn’t find out until years later that he had also committed treason.
        And now we come to President Trump. If you bothered to read the Mueller report, it’s clear that Democrats should have filed for an impeachment inquiry then. It would have required a lot of reading. People don’t seem to be up for that. I have read the report. It’s just sad. Really. People pled guilty because they were guilty. But Democrats didn’t hold an impeachment inquiry then. So here we are now.
        With this latest White House debacle of President Trump trying to blackmail the President of the Ukraine. the country really is in a Constitutional bind. The reason? The Vice President is in on it.  Has been from the beginning. Now what? People aren’t even talking about this.
        Now this is where people start saying that in this country people are innocent until proven guilty. That’s the politically correct thing to say for sure. It’s like with Nixon though. He knew that he was guilty. The Republican Party knew that he was guilty and the majority of the country knew that he was guilty because the testimony was out in the open. That’s why he resigned before anyone could vote and find him guilty. He resigned before the full House voted on the articles of impeachment.
        So they were going to impeach Nixon because he was a criminal. They impeached Clinton for lying about getting a bj and the Senate acquitted him.

The impeachment of President Trump

        Yet another reason that we can say that President Trump is guilty of committing impeachable offenses is that he has been so incredibly BLATANT about doing it. I mean it’s kind of incredible really. For one thing he doesn’t really seem to even grasp the rudiments about the impeachment process. I’m by no means an expert but I have a better grasp of what’s going on than the President.
        President Trump just makes ridiculous statements about what he thinks that he’s ENTITLED to or should be entitled to as President. He’s led a life of entitlement. The trial is NOT in the House. It’s in the Senate. The impeachment process is provided by the Constitution.
        This is a good time to mention that Republicans have been involved in the impeachment process every step of the way up to and including the cover-up. President Trump was represented in the House. They were on every committee. The Democrats followed the rules set up by REPUBLICANS in the House when they were in control in 2015. Republicans are complaining even though the rules that they made have been followed.
        When I was a Republican I associated with people that I considered honorable at the time; men and women of integrity, or so I thought, that were in charge. I campaigned hard for the current Secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, when he first ran for Congress. I can’t count how many hundreds of miles we must have covered and the number of miles walked at rallies. I spent time in their campaign motor home with him.
        It’s hard for me to watch Pompeo now. It just makes me incredibly sad to witness his actions. I would not have said that it was possible for him to flip on his previous stated values and support the actions of what is taking place around him. Now Republicans are acting like it’s no big deal to blackmail a foreign government to investigate a political opponent.
        Should we be happy or sad that President Trump didn’t get caught lying about receiving a bj? Republicans take bjs very seriously, especially if the guy lies about getting one. So far he’s only lied about paying off a porn star. Oh yeah I forgot that there is a court case about that one. Then there is the 25 million dollar judgement for defrauding people with his Trump University scam. Then there is the 2 million dollar judgement against his misuse of his charity. The immediate Trump family was all in on that one.
        And Republicans have the gall to accuse others of treason and being Communists for impeaching President Trump. Yes, the party whose leader not only asked the Russian Communists to help him during the election, met and worked with them to receive help and then did receive help from the Communists is now accusing others of treason. Then as President, Trump demanded that the Ukraine government, a country that the Communists are trying to take over, investigate a political rival for dirt or they won’t receive military aid to defend themselves against the Communists.
        Then right afterwards he asked the Chinese Communists for help in investigating his political opponent. Well, not really. He wants his opponent’s family investigated. The Chinese Communists have already helped his daughter financially by fast tracking her trademark applications. BLATANT.
        Somewhere in this rant I should mention that President Trump has professed his bro love for the North Korean Communist Kim Jong Un. These are the kind of leaders that he appreciates. BLATANT. BTW he or his administration have yet to deliver anything of substance with the North Koreans other than legitimizing his brutal regime on the world stage. That would be the stage where President Trump was laughed at during his United Nations talk.
        And then people say that there shouldn’t be chants of “Lock him up” out of respect for the office of the Presidency because the world is watching. Heads up. The world is watching. The world already knows. 
        President Trump has alienated and worked against every ally that our nation has and supported Communist regimes whenever possible. He handed over the Kurds to the Communists and now they’re being slaughtered. Our allies. The very same Kurds that provided the crucial intel that helped us track down the head of ISIS. And the Communists are still helping the Republican Party. There’s a reason the Senator Mitch McConnell is being called “Moscow Mitch”. He earned the sobriquet. Republican leadership along with Trump supporters and Fox Pravda are passing along Russian propaganda. They did it in the last election and they’re doing it now.
        There is video clip after video clip of the positions that Pompeo, Graham and a host of other elected Republican representatives had before in regard to impeachment, the Constitution, subpoenas and the jobs that Oath Takers are supposed to do in order to defend their country and the Constitution. Now they have taken the opposite position in regard to President Trump, who actually is violating the Constitution. And as I mentioned before Trump’s blatant about it.
        While I’m at it I’ll bring up Hillary Clinton’s emails since that’s usually a “what about…” that is brought up. The State Department quietly found her not chargeable. President Trump’s State Department. The very same President that said he would have her investigated and thrown in jail. She’s been cleared and this was even after the State Department retroactively classified some of the emails. That’s the same conclusion that Comey reached only he was harsher about it.
        Over 20 years of Republican investigations into the Clintons and they came up with squat. Ken Starr spent just shy of $40 million in his investigation. All the investigations total just shy of $80 million dollars and that isn’t counting the eight different Republican Committees that tried to convict her of anything regarding Benghazi and came up with nothing. ZERO.
        Oops! I have to backtrack on the above statement. Over the several decades Republicans did manage to produce a truly inspiring amount of conspiracy theories. I had a friend tell me that in the last election that she voted against Hillary Clinton because of the information presented in one of those online attack memes. I mentioned to her that there wasn’t anything that was mentioned in the meme that was true. She countered with yeah but it could be. That was the narrative that she had been conditioned to accept by her comrades. 
“It could be true.”

          In addition to being blatant about what he’s doing President Trump on a daily basis complains about how he’s being treated. This from a man that as a private citizen regularly complained about the job President Obama was doing. The man whines every day. He’s at least a WHINECON TWO status every day with occasional spikes to WHINECON THREE.
        I tell you one thing for sure, he’s the whiniest President we’ve ever had. I thought that Presidents Nixon and Johnson complained a lot but they aren’t even in the same league as President Trump. He has taken whining to an entirely new level. Go through his twitter feed. He has whined thousands of times. He whines more than he lies. To watch his videos is to know that he lies. And whines.
        He lies when the truth would serve him better. Seriously, he lied about where his grandfather was born. Who does that? It really doesn’t matter. His supporters cheer him anyway.
  • They cheered when he talked about building a border wall in Colorado. Yes, really. I watched it.
  • They cheered when he talked about how easy it would be to get Mexico to pay for the wall. That was a lie.
  • They cheer when he talks about locking up his adversaries.
  • They cheered when he talked about getting rid of Obamacare and replacing it with something better. Trump never had any healthcare plan and his Justice Department is now trying to reduce what coverage is being provided by the Affordable Care Act.
  • He lied about producing his tax returns.
  • He lied about giving a pay increase to the military.
  • He said that he would appoint the best people. He has had the highest turnover of staff in history. Not only that, but his appointees seem chosen for the specific purpose of destroying the department they head.
  • He lies about having the greatest economy. It is good but it isn’t the greatest we’ve had.
  • He lied about not having enough time to play golf.
  • Trump says that he’s a billionaire yet taxpayers are picking up the tab for his golfing. ($180 million so far.)
  • And his supporters cheer.
  • They cheered when he stood up for the Nazis.
  • They cheer when he stabs our allies in the back.
  • Separate families!
  • Cheers!
  • Stop Muslims!
  • Cheers!
  • He insults people!
  • Cheers!
  • Says that whoever it was that reported him out should be treated as spies used to be treated. (Killed)
  • Laughter!
  • He’s vulgar!
  • Cheers!
  • This is the man that Evangelical Party claims was chosen by God.
  • Cheers!
  • He is their Caesar!
  • Cheers!
        I have to mention here that those last two items seem to be a tad contradictory but here we are. He operates with the morality of a Caesar.
        What I have learned from all of this is that none of this really matters to the leadership of the Republican Party. They are only oath takers. They just say the words. Thought they may cry some crocodile tears in public at some of his more egregious behavior, still they support his agenda by marching in lockstep. They are not oath believers like the men and women of honor and integrity who have stepped forward at great personal risk. The risk comes from a President that wants them punished or dead for doing their patriotic duty as citizens.
        Republican Senators and Congressmen denigrate these patriots like the veterans and others that have served this country honorably. Within hours of coming forward during the impeachment hearings the conspiracy machine that has become the Republican Party was pumping out disinformation. They didn’t answer simple questions asked by the press. Like is it okay for any President to ask a foreign nation to investigate political opponents. Instead they responded with the Party line. Poor President Trump is the victim. Poor President Trump is being denied due process. (Hint, he wasn’t.)
        The reality is that poor President Trump doesn’t know what the process is other than some words that he has heard mentioned. He simply responds with what he has learned from Fox Pravda.
        We have never had a President that spends this much time watching television, tweeting, insulting individuals and incessantly complaining. Day after day. Month after month. Year after year. He has been whining, complaining and lying non-stop for 3 years now. He is the Energizer Bunny of complaining Presidents. Trust no one but him. One day he’ll say that the stock market crashed because of the ‘Dems’ and the next day brag about how good the stock market is doing because of him. BUT media is lying. If it isn’t about praising him it’s a lie!
        Conservatives don’t seem to believe in our form of government. For the first 2 years of Trump’s reign they were in complete charge of it. The message is Keep America Great and everything is horrible. The FBI is rotten. Media is untrustworthy. Our intelligence services are untrustworthy. The Deep State is running things. The Communists are our friends. And somehow not believing in our fundamental principles all makes them the true patriots.
 
Where are we?
        We are in the chaos that is the administration of President Trump. I will hear and read where Conservatives say that the media isn’t reporting their accomplishments and the truth. The truth is that the stories are being reported. I’ll usually have already read what they maintain isn’t being reported. The problem is that the chaos that is Trump usually is a better story to report. Like turning our collective back on the Kurds and putting our own troops still in theater at risk. That story takes center stage over the other things that are taking place like making the lives of working people and the poor incrementally worse.
        The thing that I keep in mind is that one of the very people that he appointed is the one that approved the initial investigation. Yes. He appointed the Inspector General in 2017. Now they’re validating that the White House covered up the President blackmailing an ally. That shows consciousness of guilt. So in addition to violating the emoluments clause and abuse of power we now have obstruction of justice. The hits just keep on coming.
        The Democrats ran out of options with regard to impeachment. It was obvious that they believed that the President was violating the Constitution. In the political arena impeaching President Trump may or may not end up costing them. But when the chips were down they ended up acting upon their beliefs, did their job and put the country first.  
        Now what?
        Well, as it turns out President Trump decided that it was a good time to try and start a war with Iran. < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KV_nIgg008 > He has no exit strategy. He doesn’t do exit strategies < https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/450280-trump-on-possible-war-with-iran-i-dont-need-exit-strategies > The guy that avoided serving the country because of bone spurs is on the brink of starting a war. BTW war isn’t going to happen. Technically. Congress hasn’t had the guts to declare a war in decades.

Sending
        If Nancy Pelosi sends the articles of impeachment to the Senate there will be a trial. Republican Senators will dither and talk about how bad it all is but achieving the 67 votes required to get rid of their Ducé is probably unattainable. They just repeated the words of their oath. So yes, I think that President Trump will be found not guilty if the Senate has a trial and Republicans will use every excuse that they can think of to justify their political pusillanimity.
        The President is either above the law or he isn’t. And I think that the Democrats of the House did their duty and impeached the President of the United States because he isn’t above the law. He’s guilty of the charges mentioned so far and if you’ve bothered reading the Mueller report he’s guilty of doing far worse. He has done more damage to this country than the Communists friends of his could have dreamed possible.
        Yes, I think he will get reelected. That’s a whole other story.