A Republic, If You Can Keep It

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

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At least, there were the Byzantines to carry on.

Why did Constantinople get the works?
Thatā€™s nobodyā€™s business but the Turks.

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Read more. Republican Senators are saying ā€œnever happen.ā€

Weā€™ll see. The threat of a recess appointment for this one nominee appears to be quite real.

His lackeys have failed to grasp that the shit that falls off Trump sticks to those around him.

Regarding recess appointments, as always, thereā€™s plenty of ambiguity as to how much power the President has. The operative Supreme Court case, National Labor Relations Board v Noel Canning, seemingly grants the Executive broad leeway to make recess appointment to keep the government functioning.

At the same time, it reads that so long as the Senate states itā€™s in session and has the ability to conduct its business, it may block a recess appointment. Moreover, the Court ruled that a President may not make a recess appointment if doing so is to go outside the normal process of appointment (i.e. Senate confirmation).

Which is to say, Iā€™m sure the Roberts court would tell Trump to please go ahead and make whatever recess appointments you want.

https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII-S2-C3-1/ALDE_00001144/

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Iā€™m not sure why the outcry over this appointment. If not him, it will just be someone else who will do Trumpā€™s bidding. Thatā€™s given, considering Trump won. At least this guy is well known and hated by most everyone, and incompetent. Thus, heā€™ll make it easier to highlight Trumpā€™s excesses than if it were an unknown and competent appointee.

I am not as certain of things as you are, of course, but I expect the Senators, or at least most of them, to guard their powers and prerogatives closely. I think eventually Trump will be taught what checks and balances mean.

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Oh, Iā€™m not certain but I do see a fair amount of equivocating already by Senate stalwarts and branch protectionists where such comments would have been unthinkable a decade ago.

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Matt Gaetz, ā€œrecess appointment.ā€ Sometimes the jokes write themselves.

Trump is not going to get taught anything. The one thing he has learned is that the Supreme Court will let him do literally whatever he wants.

But Iā€™m with JBM. The bigger the caricature, the more incompetent the idiot, the better the immediate future. Of course all of these people are figureheads only, nominated as some sort of grand practical joke cum performance art while the people who will make the real decisions, the Leonard Leos and the Heritage Foundation goons, are lurking around in the background. But my sense is the more incompetent the nominee, the greater the spectacle, the less damage theyā€™ll be apt to do.

Itā€™s probably just a coping mechanism, though.

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We thought that 4 years ago. Heā€™s been enabled to expect otherwise.

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Fun fact: today was the first time Iā€™ve seen a Tesla parked in the parking lot between EEOB and the west wing.

Gaetz apparently resigned from the House of Representatives today. This ends the Ethics Committee investigation and the possibility of any ensuing report being released.

Thereā€™s a fair bit of chatter at the moment on right wing twitter/x that this is part of some sort of a back room deal between Trump, Johnson, and Gaetz.

Trump gets a performative gesture to own the libs and show heā€™s serious about folks who are loyal to him. Johnson gets rid of literally one of the worst members of his caucus. And Gaetz gets to escape culpability for under age sex trafficking.

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That sounds right. Iā€™m all for draining the swamp, but I think that will require a more credible choice for AG. Whether guilty or not, I would not be sad to see him still standing when the music stops.

It could be simply that Gaetz is a rabbit nomination set loose by Trump. While everyone is focused on that one guy, all the other equally deplorable nominations are sped through. Itā€™s entirely possible that the Senate GOP is in on the scheme.

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I do not believe that.

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You also didnā€™t believe that the conservative wing of the Supreme Court wasnā€™t comprised of serious jurists but rather thuggish political operatives.

For all I know you still believe that.

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The tell will be the Tulsi Gabbard nomination for NSA. Sheā€™s so intertwined with Putin that she shouldnā€™t have a chance at confirmation.

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Yep, I do.