The Briefing Room

General Category => Editorial/Opinion/Blogs => Topic started by: EasyAce on January 14, 2019, 10:55:55 pm

Title: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: EasyAce on January 14, 2019, 10:55:55 pm
If Trump uses emergency powers to build The Wall, it will unlock a Pandora's Box of executive branch mischief.
By Charles Sykes
https://thebulwark.com/be-careful-what-you-wish-for/

Quote
The attribution to Mark Twain is probably apocryphal, but conservatives nevertheless ought to remember the adage that “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.”

For the moment, President Trump has backed off from his threat to declare a national emergency in order to build his wall, even though the Trumpian commentariat continues to insist that doing so would be a win/win for the president . . . [W]hile declaring an emergency might be temporarily good for Trump, it would be a worst-case scenario for conservatives (or people who care about constitutional norms) because it would be trading a short term political thrill for a long-term political catastrophe. At the very least, it would change both the rhythm and the potential rhymes of history.

After Senator Lindsay Graham endorsed the use of presidential fiat, former Obama speech writer Jon Favreau tweeted (https://twitter.com/jonfavs/status/1083488318115860486):

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Pumped for the next Democratic president to use “emergency powers” for a Green New Deal (climate emergency), Medicare for All (public health emergency), and a new Voting Rights Act (democracy emergency)!

This threat need not be taken literally in order for Republicans to take it seriously. An emergency declaration for The Wall would dramatically accelerate our tribal win-at-all costs, norms-be-damned politics and it takes only a minimum of imagination to guess what a President Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez might do with such powers . . .
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: Right_in_Virginia on January 14, 2019, 11:24:48 pm
Once the new, larger caravan starts marching out of Honduras  ........
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: Free Vulcan on January 14, 2019, 11:25:12 pm
The problem is the stained glass pearl clutchers are trying to to scare with a slippery slope that's already been slipped down.

Compared to FDR and internment camps, this seems a silly little line in the sand to draw.

Dems don't need a Trump precedent to do what they would have done already if this could have gotten away with it.
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: EasyAce on January 14, 2019, 11:34:20 pm
Dems don't need a Trump precedent to do what they would have done already if this could have gotten away with it.
Maybe not, but why hand them further cover?
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: Free Vulcan on January 15, 2019, 12:10:33 am
Maybe not, but why hand them further cover?

If we did everything thru that lense, we'd be paralyzed, which the Dems are also fine with. Damned if you do.

Doing this for the wall is Constitutionally legit, and we need to do it now. Things are out of control.
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: To-Whose-Benefit? on January 15, 2019, 12:52:25 am
Trump's wall would be the 32nd active national emergency

https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/07/politics/trump-wall-active-national-emergency/index.html (https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/07/politics/trump-wall-active-national-emergency/index.html)

I'm finding it difficult to view a 32nd State of Emergency, especially considering what this one would address, as the onset of an Executive Apocalypse.
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: Fishrrman on January 15, 2019, 01:20:51 am
"[W]hile declaring an emergency might be temporarily good for Trump, it would be a worst-case scenario for conservatives (or people who care about constitutional norms) because it would be trading a short term political thrill for a long-term political catastrophe. At the very least, it would change both the rhythm and the potential rhymes of history."

Dammit, enough of gobbledegook like the writer above.
We need to fortify and protect our southern border, because we're being invaded.

And we need to do what's necessary to STOP that invasion.
Let's get on with it.
Pronto!
Title: Re: Be Careful What You Wish For
Post by: Smokin Joe on January 15, 2019, 01:34:08 am
The wall will be built when TPTB want it to keep us IN.