Thread by @iHeartMerrill

Working through a (rare) migraine here, so please excuse non-sequiturs or other confusions.
“Pardon me.” HYPOTHETICALLY, if a President has broad powers to excuse himself of his own crimes, we could derive a few knowns:
1. A crime has been, or enough evidence suggests, committed

2. The risk of prosecution outweighs the risk of political backlash.
3. The inaugural oath was taken in bad faith as the President either attained his position or carried on under the guise of “faithfully execut(ing) the Office... preserve protect and defend the Constitution.”

4. The framework of a nation may be challenged in ways checks and balances have never encountered.
5. Any and all other ramifications I’ll think of seconds after I press send.

That said, examining this particular potential Constitutional crisis:

POTUS has terrible taste in lawyers.

America voted for drama. We are getting what we wanted. With the (d)evolution of traditional media, introduction of social media, instinctual tribalism and reality TV, we have trouble discerning reality from entertainment.

The shift in understanding of self governance is culminating at a time when it can do tremendous damage. True, too, that any misunderstanding of self governance leads to times of great peril. This isn’t the perfect storm, this is what a storm brings.

The trouble and the crisis:

Many conclude that if the President is asserting legal omnipotence that he’s broken the law. It’s a reasonable assumption but not proven.
Supposing he has/is broken/breaking laws; this leads to many more questions about what to do.

Can a President be indicted?
Legal theories split and it’s never been tested.
Challenging an indictment would likely end up at the Supreme Court faster than any case since “hanging chads.”

The “suspect” will have chosen one of his own judges. Is that judge obliged to recuse?

If that judge fails to recuse, to whom would the prosecution appeal the decision not to? If the SCOTUS were to hear an appeal re: SCOUTS jurisprudence, could that Justice sit on THAT hearing? If he doesn’t and there’s a split 4/4, the suspect would ultimately be given deference.

Result: tilting the balances as justice would certainly not be blind.

There’s chatter that a President would never risk pardoning themselves because it would surely mean impeachment.
Firstly, the President’s own political party is talking impeachment as a defense. #surreal

Foremost, There is a tremendous leap of faith to assume a non-politician President would be concerned with politics over criminal prosecution.
There is a tremendous leap of faith to assume a political party, in the most divisive of times, would have the will to impeach.

There is a tremendous leap of faith to assume the will of the majority of voters who opted for drama/reality in leadership would support voting their chosen “winner” off the proverbial island.
There is a tremendous leap of faith to assume more isn’t going on between DC players.

IF a POTUS is willing to collude w/ foreign entities, and IF those in charge of investigating (politically) are colleagues with a vested interest in exonerating the party (as the House Intel panel is), why wouldn’t we assume the two branches are currently colluding?

IF a POTUS is willing to obstruct justice and IF those in charge of investigating (politically) are colleagues with a vested interest in exonerating the party (as the House Intel panel is), why wouldn’t we assume the two branches are both obstructing?

It’s a tremendous leap of faith to assume there could only be one bad actor in one branch of government.

It is for this reason that the DOJ ideally has autonomy; so We The People can rely on honest and intelligent men and women to protect us from corruption.

The faith in that system falls apart when the DOJ’s autonomy is challenged, the FBI director terminated, the special counsel (or councel or counsil) threatened, subpoenas dismissed, A’sG threatened or fired, and the jury in that matter (Congress) supporting the self destruction.

And to what higher authority is there an appeal? The same SCOTUS where the POTUS chooses the arbiters.

Although, one could argue that We The Peope are the final arbiters and we can elevate men and women of integrity to these positions to right the wrongs.

Unfortunately, as stated, we conflate reality and entertainment. The current “Choose Your Own Adventure” government is likely to see people vote for another episodic event after this mid season finale.

Recap:
We have NO CONCRETE EVIDENCE before us proving criminality. We have lots of circumstantial evidence. We’ve heard no testimony, have no inculpatory statements on the record. seen no documents, read no subpoenas, received no indictments, taken no public depositions.

Everything we are discussing is HYPOTHETICAL. In other words, this is all part of the drama for which we voted. We are getting exactly what we wanted.
And in our self styled Clancy novel: here’s what we have:
POTUS suspected
>1/2 Congress colluding, complicit or cowards.

Justice(s) nominated by suspect.
Justice(s) confirmed by corrupted Congress
Investigators rebuffed by suspect
Potential investigators fired by suspect
Subpoenas possibly rejected by suspect
Indictment overturned by suspect Challenges go to SCOTUS (see prior points.)

“Pardon me?”
Not likely. Far more likely than a Constitutional crisis will be a timeline crisis. The Mueller investigation is taking time. If the President is avoiding criminal prosecution and/or impeachment his best tactic is the art of delay.

The easiest way to delay the whole thing is to add new wrinkles. Fire Sessions and that sends Mueller and his hounds on another rabbit chase. Fire Rosenstein and they’re off again in a new direction. Fire Murller and everything starts from scratch.

Each of these actions would come with more dramatic outrage from one side and equally dramatic excuse making from the other. In the end, POTUS continues to exercise omnipotence and the country equally divides over his right to do so. This is a political wash and legal victory.

And what are we left with???? More drama. Just what we asked for.

Have I mentioned this is ALL HYPOTHETICAL?

The drama, however, is real. So do we learn from it or catalyze it moving forward? Can we be satisfied with boring leadership or are we all political arsonists?