Legal scholars dispute Trump’s claim to power ‘nobody thought the president had’ washingtonpost.com/politics/court…
John Yoo with all his legal training lacks a moral compass. He was the author of the memo rationalizing torture
and now he adds to his repertoire a rationalization of an authoritarian presidency. Has he never studied history?
and now he adds to his repertoire a rationalization of an authoritarian presidency. Has he never studied history?
Has he never heard of George Washington who to his credit declined to be a monarch. Yoo is Asian. Perhaps he should decamp and immigrate to China where Xi Jinping is now President for life.
Alternatively, he could go to Russia and live under "Czar" Putin if he really wants to live under Authoritarian (aka Fascist) rule.
Yoo met with the president last week in the Oval Office, to discuss the theory and a new book he has written. “Defender in Chief: Donald Trump’s Fight For Presidential Power” makes the case for an “energetic unitary executive”
with constitutional authority to act decisively and resist overreach by Congress and the courts.
This Yoo is a real whack job. We don’t have Kings or Dictators in this country and we do have LAWS and a Constitution.
Trump sure keeps maniacs around him.
Trump sure keeps maniacs around him.
Yoo simply highlighted a hole that Biden needs to plug -- shortening the length of time it takes for a legal remedy against a siting president.
The normal mechanism for engaging the judiciary -- lower courts, appellate courts, Supreme Court -- doesn't work when you're dealing with a 4 year presidential term. It simply takes too long, especially against a litigant, such as Trump, who is skilled at delaying
resolution in the courts. The solution: Any issue involving the executive should fast-track directly to the Supreme Court.
Biden should also tackle term limits. Trump's reign made clear that an obsequious Congress is simply useless. They won't legislate, they won't negotiate, they won't take a stand against the president if doing so might endanger their chance for reelection.
Term limits is the only solution. If they don't have to fret about reelection, perhaps they will do their job.
Both of these patently obvious flaws in our government will require constitutional amendments to remedy. That might be possible next term, if the Senate flips, Trump gets tossed to the curb, and some more states elect Democrat governors.
If Trump gets another 4 years, we won't need to fix these flaws. There won't be a government to rescue come 2024.
While Ellen DeGeneres tries to rehabilitate George Bush's reputation, it might be good to remember we have the Bush family to thank for William Barr and John Yoo.
Trump, you do have the power to self-waterboard.
Try it, you'll like it. I guarantee it. If you need help,
millions of people will volunteer.
Try it, you'll like it. I guarantee it. If you need help,
millions of people will volunteer.
Yoo is writing about political reality, that if a president does an unlawful thing it can take years to challenge and stop it.
That's exactly what Trump has been doing.
It's how corrupt leaders operate.
Pointing out how Trump operates is not supporting Trump.
That's exactly what Trump has been doing.
It's how corrupt leaders operate.
Pointing out how Trump operates is not supporting Trump.
The founding fathers never visualized a Senate that would ever become the sock puppet to the president.
This has given this president powers that none have held before.
This has given this president powers that none have held before.
Of course, Republicans will put their lives on the line to make sure that that no Democratic president has 1/10th the power of this golfing clown.
What is truly disturbing about all this is the Absolute Lack Of Substance of this would-be Ruler! Really?! This casino con man has mesmerized our Congress?!?
I find it ironic that the American Revolution purported to overthrow a monarchical tyranny, yet today, America not only grants to its President powers that George III could not have dreamed of, but elects a total moron and a lamentably flawed human being to the office.
The total idiocy of this administration defies America's Founding Father's Constitutional intent.
John Yoo, why are you trying so very hard to dictatorise the office of POTUS, as if Barr is not enough? You must take consequences for your written diatribes and not hide under the scholar's veil of a 'scholarly article'.
All constitution scholars and practitioners of eminence, call John Yoo out.
It seems fitting that Bush's legal advocate for torture, and its staunch defender would adopt some tortured logic here. Just execrable, and to think that Yoo is teaching law students this kind of woo in an esteemed university is shocking.
The so-called "power" Trump is talking about is mostly the gaming and manipulation of the judicial system that Trump has engaged in his whole business life
He flaunts the law, breaks it, and then outlasts the courts and wearies litigants that he has ruined, over and over. He's doing it now as president. Trump is completely hardened and without conscience now.
He thinks he can get away with anything. But there is a Judge that Trump will not be able to gainsay. He will be speechless as he stands before Him. That day of reckoning is coming soon.
Just what we needed during one of the most miserable times in US history -- one of the most miserable "leaders" in US history convinced he can cause more misery with impunity ... Great.
So if a police officer chooses to overlook an instance of jaywalking because he is arresting someone for armed robbery, he may also overlook mass murder because he's having coffee and a doughnut. That's John Yoo's argument in a nutshell. And I use the word "nut" deliberately.
There were reasons Obama chose not to enforce the immigration laws against people who were brought here as children 1) the enforcement budget is finite and has to be prioritized obviously drug smugglers and other transnational criminals are a higher priority than law-abiding kids
2) Obama was vigorously enforcing immigration, deporting the undocumented at an incredible rate (and probably violating our laws on refugees in the process), and
3) it is illegal to deport people who are stateless; while DACA kids are not quite stateless, they share some characteristics, including the lack of a place to return to and a working knowledge of the language and society to which they are being deported.
John Yoo is a troll, a supporter of dictatorship, and a disgrace to the legal profession. No wonder Trump loves him.
Mr. Yoo. Xi Ping is ruler for life. Maybe that is what you have in mind. Sorry, but we are not down with that here; that is not the democracy the founders had in mind.
It will be interesting to see the GOP happily accept the unparalleled powers of President Biden since the GOP agrees that the President has virtually limitless authority.
If Lord Trump is so all-powerful, why can’t he get his tongue out of Putin’s sphincter muscle?
For Trump (and alas, for Prof. Yoo), Yes means yes, and No means yes, too.
This might remind women of some very bad dates they have had.
This might remind women of some very bad dates they have had.
If there are limits to trump's power but no one enforces them, are there really any limits? We can argue pro and con until doomsday, but trump continues to do whatever he wants. Senate republicans have imposed a dictatorship on us.
"Only I can fix this."
Waiting. Still waiting.
Waiting. Still waiting.
TRUMP: "I discovered previously unknown powers of the president. They were tucked under the mattress in the Lincoln Bedroom. No one else ever thought to look there. But I thought to look there."
Trump's super power: lying; with a side order of stupid-i-fying.
That this P.O.tuS. is able to subvert the legal system so easily suggests to me that the DOJ needs to be enrolled with the Supreme Court. Either that, or become its own branch of government.
Can't we just ship Yoo to The Hague?
Along with Cheney.
Obama should have used the republican trick of naming bills the opposite of what they really are.
Hey Barr, you better make sure you keep toeing the line for trump---Yoo's waiting in the wings for your job.
Muzzle Yoo. He's completely out of his league.
republicans who name their bills flat out lies in order to fool people into supporting them.
DUMP TRUMP:
D: Despicable
U: Unrepentent
M: Misogynistic
P: Petulant
T: Tyranical
R: Racist
U: Useless
M: Mendacious
P: Putz
D: Despicable
U: Unrepentent
M: Misogynistic
P: Petulant
T: Tyranical
R: Racist
U: Useless
M: Mendacious
P: Putz
Donald should resign and move to Moscow where he could succeed Vladimir Putin as President. The Grifter In Chief would be much more comfortable in that environment than here.
trump claims his powers are limitless. He said he raised 3 people from the dead last week.
Yoo (torture is just fine) again. Why does he still have a law license and why is any institution of high learning allowing him to spread his stupidity to the next generation?
What a superb, trash-the-Constitution argument from Yoo: president's have the power to do unconstitutional things because it takes so long to undo them through the courts that, in effect, they have the force of law. John Yoo, the anti-American with the ear of a wannabe dictator.
And love that Trump statement about the the Supreme Court giving him this magical power, even though the Supreme Court has no ability to grant executive powers.
Isn't the Trump era just great? What a wonderful ride to the end of the Republic.
All this alone should cause impeachment, trial, and removal of a president. But then we have the cowardly pseudo-patriots and Trump enablers in the Senate, who are willingly complicit in undermining the Constitution and the Republic.
During the Constitutional Convention, Franklin opined that the American people are predisposed to monarchy (see Madison's notes, which contain the letters Franklin submitted to the convention).
He was skeptical of the long-term survival of the Republic created by the convention. More and more, it seems he was onto something.
He was skeptical of the long-term survival of the Republic created by the convention. More and more, it seems he was onto something.
American exceptionalism is a myth. There's nothing exceptional about destroying a representative form of government. Rome, the Weimar Republic, etc. -- it's already been done aplenty.
The hole in Yoo's argument even if we take it seriously is that there is nothing in it 2 let a president relieve taxpayers of the legal obligation 2 pay taxes when due or to withhold taxes from employee paychecks -- only to stop enforcement. So what are businesses supposed to do?
If they don't pay the payroll tax they still owe the money. They still have to carry it on their books as a liability so it does nothing really for anything but their cash position. Enforcement could be restarted by the next administration.
