The Trump Presidency

[JayUtah]

...there's just not enough time [for impeachment]."

Probably not.  Rep. Omar's articles are probably seriously intended, but would be pro forma only.  But this is one of the few times form matters.  Because there's no codified list of "high crimes and misdemeanors," what qualifies as an impeachable offense is guided almost entirely by what the House decides is an impeachable offense.  The House impeached Pres. Trump on charges of "abuse of power" and "obstruction of Congress" even though his acquittal on those charges was a foregone conclusion.  That's to preserve the specific actions the President committed as impeachable offenses.  The next time a President tries to do those same things, the debate in the House can point to a precedent.  Similarly, here we have to preserve as precedent that calling upon an armed mob to seize the Capitol should probably always be considered an impeachable offense.  Not that the House is bound by precedent, but it's good to have on your side.

Pence would be put in the position of, first, having to oversee the last 2 weeks of the train wreck, and second, hav[e] to consider pardoning Trump.

Given that the President's actions Wednesday literally endangered the lives of V.P. Pence and his family, I think a pardon from Mike Pence is probably no longer on the table.

The only real concern I have is for any Executive Orders he might issue, but I believe those could be reversed by the next administration (someone please correct me if I'm wrong). Yes, being thrown out in disgrace may well be the fitting end to his administration and legacy in the eyes of many, but it just strikes me as not being the thing that is needed right now.

As far as Executive Orders go, yes, they can be rescinded by the next administration, subject to the protocols of administrative law.  Last-minute, last-ditch orders are the easiest to rescind because little will have been done to activate them before the new administration arrives.  But I don't see that as the only problem.  The President might decide to pardon the dozens of people who have so far been arrested in the Capitol insurrection.  And there would be little anyone could do to stop him or undo the action. What Donald J. Trump wants more than anything is power over people, so that they're compelled to feed his narcissism.

Less credible, but still not off the table, is the notion that the President still has sole authority to deploy the U.S. nuclear arsenal at any time for any reason.  That doesn't mean he gets to push the button himself whenever he wants.  There is still a military infrastructure that implements the actual deployment, and has rules and protocols to prevent an unhinged President from ending the world to suit his ego.  In theory the President can fire whichever officers don't obey his commands.  And last week I would have said that there are lines even fanatics won't cross in their devotion to Donald J. Trump, but I'm becoming less convinced as time goes on that my assessment of others' fanaticism is accurate.  I'd like to think that no officer in that chain of command would obey an illegal order to nuke somebody.  But I'd sleep more comfortably if Donald Trump simply didn't have the authority to test my theory.

[JayUtah]

And the @realDonaldTrump Twitter account is now permanently suspended.  Finally.  I wonder where he's going to vent his anger over this particular event.

[VQ]

Of course three officer is standing in front of a small crowd-control barrier will probably opt to stand down if confronted with dozens of angry, armed insurgents -- as you say, if not just from the sheer mass of the crowd press.  The question is whether those positions were manned that way intentionally, in contravention of all prior practice and common sense, so that only token resistance would be offered.  Of course I'm willing to see evidence of a simple foul-up, a miscommunication, or of unconventional wisdom.  But for me, this administration, this Congress, and a great many in law enforcement have lost my faith in those things as a default explanation for failure.  I want those people in charge testifying to Congress under oath about what the plan was to turn back the armed mob the President sent to invade the Capitol.  The one we all knew advance was going to happen.

There are reports that the initial requests to activate the national guard were declined. Taking selfies with the rioters crossed the line, but I do feel sympathy with the front-line Capitol police officers' attempts to deescalate. A charitable interpretation on their actions is that they delayed the crowd as long as necessary to secure the leadership (at at least one entrance USCP officers were pressed into the doors for about 20 minutes), but then let them come through rather than take further beating (over 50 officers were injured) or resorting to mass use of deadly force to drop everyone that crossed the threshold.

The failure is on the part of their leadership for putting the officers in that situation to begin with. And yes, they must account for this.

And the @realDonaldTrump Twitter account is now permanently suspended.  Finally.  I wonder where he's going to vent his anger over this particular event.

Hopefully not with the nuclear football. As you note there are formal and informal safeguards against this, but it would be super if those safeguards weren't at real, if remote, risk of being tested.

[JayUtah]

I do feel sympathy with the front-line Capitol police officers' attempts to deescalate.

Or better, declining to escalate.  As I wrote earlier regarding police provocation, in other situations I have seen clear evidence of police provocation and escalation.

A charitable interpretation on their actions is that they delayed the crowd as long as necessary to secure the leadership (at at least one entrance USCP officers were pressed into the doors for about 20 minutes), but then let them come through rather than take further beating (over 50 officers were injured) or resorting to mass use of deadly force to drop everyone that crossed the threshold.

The Washington Post has obtained video that includes the fatal shooting of the insurgent (albeit blurred).  It shows what was happening at the door to the Speaker's Lobby (the hallway behind the dais side of the House chamber).  The doors are barricaded.  A half-dozen Capitol policemen bar the way.  At the beginning of the video, House Members can be seen in the lobby through the doors.  At a certain point the officers step aside and allow the protesters to begin smashing the doors; it's unclear why, but from their prior conversion they are clearly not colluding.  The woman is shot by an apparent plainclothes officer from inside the lobby, through the window, just as more heavily-armed officers come up the stairs behind her.

It's unclear why the officers outside the Lobby stood down to allow the attackers access to the doors, while the plainclothes officer just on the other side of the door drew his weapon, paused, and opened fire.  It's not clear to me that the officers guarding the door from the outside were armed.  If they were, they did not use their weapons.  The officers were calm and otherwise behaved themselves in an overtly professional manner.

The failure is on the part of their leadership for putting the officers in that situation to begin with. And yes, they must account for this.

Agreed.  While the chief of the Capitol Police has resigned, I suspect there is more going on that just a failure on his part.

[Peter B]

And the @realDonaldTrump Twitter account is now permanently suspended.  Finally.  I wonder where he's going to vent his anger over this particular event.

Parler?

[VQ]

The Washington Post has obtained video...

Yes, the videos make clear she was no innocent bystander, but questions about why deadly force was used here and only here will likely be unanswered for a long while.

Parler?

What do you think?  But speak not its name.

[Jeff Raven]

Indeed, at what point do we compel people to respect fact, and how do we do it?  We have allowed to come into existence an environment where people steep themselves in heavily-biased, often non-factual narratives, where neither they have the responsibility to conform them to reality, nor can the people who peddle them recklessly for profit be held accountable.

In this instance, I think that a mutli-pronged approach would help. First, people on all sides of the aisle need to condemn in a real manner what happened, not just on Wednesday but also in any of the riots that have happened. Condemn not just the acts themselves, but the actors and the message. They also need to acknowledge that while the actions are wrong, the feelings that people have are genuine, and that the issues need to be actually listened to, not just given lip service. For example, I think that an actual, bipartisan, as objective as possible panel on voter fraud should be implemented as well. This would help quiet those on the right who are upset, and could also lead to progress in terms of providing suggestions and systems to make voting even more secure than it already is. I also think that the Democrats need to resist very strongly trying to swing the pendulum too far, too fast. Moderate, centrist language and actions, especially at the beginning, are what is needed.

We know that a fact-based argument by itself doesn't work for those with strongly-held convictions, especially those that are fear-based, as many of these are. There needs to be more. Not to get too touchy-feely, but they need to feel heard and validated, not dismissed, and helped to find their way to actual truth, not just told how wrong they are. There will always be those who won't listen, but for those that still are willing to hear the other side, the techniques of persuasion can work.

Although I don't see it happening, if the media on all sides (I'm not including the radical ones) would call out the lies, exaggerations, half-truths, etc., and those in power would do the same on their own sides and colleagues, then trust could start to be rebuilt. However, I'm a cynic, and don't see that as likely. Instead there will calls for retribution/revenge, grandiose speeches and over-promises, vitriol and invective, and not nearly as much progress or healing as the majority of us would like.

[Jeff Raven]

...and the small (e.g. USB drives).

For nearly all my work, we don't get to use those.  When it's unavoidable, a numbered USB thumb drive is checked out to you from an inventory, used once for what is needful, then physically destroyed by the inventory officer.  Being caught with portable storage in some areas of my work is a fire-on-the-spot offense and, in some cases, likely a criminal offense.  And this is not especially uncommon, even outside my industry.  My understanding, for example, is that HIPAA-qualified institutions have similar restrictions on the kinds of computer storage that are allowed around protected information.

I've seen things like that at some places I have worked (e.g. IBM) but not many. It certainly makes sense in high-security environments, and as you also said, those that are HIPAA-qualified. I would imagine that those in Congress and their staff would raise holy hell if they were asked to do that on a regular basis.  I work in higher education, and I know that data are not as secure as they should be, although at least in my department, we do work to keep personal identification separate from data (we have to for IRB).

Yeah, autolock is a standard and annoying feature.  In some cases they seem to gimmick it so that things that would normally inhibit the lock (e.g., watching a video) don't work and you have to keep unlocking your workstation to resume your passive activity.  Good on you IT-type guys for closing that loophole.

Agreed.  The IT people do not get enough credit for what they do, nor are their warnings given enough attention.

[Jeff Raven]

I have always wondered why, when crowds are of sufficient size that they could turn to mobs, they don't have fire trucks with water cannons waiting as barricades. There literally isn't a person out there who is strong enough to stay on their feet if they get hit by one of the highest pressure cannons, and they can be quite effective in getting a crowd to leave.

That's a long-standing practice in crowd control I've seen used elsewhere.  The problem, usually, is that American firefighters generally don't want to get involved in altercations like this, and generally aren't trained in any way for crowds.

Another important consideration is that most defense scenarios incorporate depths or layers of defense.  It's possible that the outside officers stood down knowing that the Members of Congress and others had been secured, and that the crowd would only be able to progress to the next layer of defense which, for all we know, might be much easier to defend and much more difficult to penetrate.  The mob would be able to vent their anger on the building and the property, but not the protectees.

Both are very good points. As you said, firefighters aren't trained for that, and putting them into situations that present different dangers from those they are used to would be difficult. I suppose that NG or police could operate the cannons if need be. And the layer approach is definitely a tried and true one. Your point regarding property vs. people is also spot-on - tables and chairs can be replaced; lives can't.

[Jeff Raven]

As far as Executive Orders go, yes, they can be rescinded by the next administration, subject to the protocols of administrative law.  Last-minute, last-ditch orders are the easiest to rescind because little will have been done to activate them before the new administration arrives.  But I don't see that as the only problem.  The President might decide to pardon the dozens of people who have so far been arrested in the Capitol insurrection.  And there would be little anyone could do to stop him or undo the action. What Donald J. Trump wants more than anything is power over people, so that they're compelled to feed his narcissism.

I knew there was something else that was percolating when I wrote that, but it didn't jell. Pardons are definitely a concern.

Less credible, but still not off the table, is the notion that the President still has sole authority to deploy the U.S. nuclear arsenal at any time for any reason.  That doesn't mean he gets to push the button himself whenever he wants.  There is still a military infrastructure that implements the actual deployment, and has rules and protocols to prevent an unhinged President from ending the world to suit his ego.  In theory the President can fire whichever officers don't obey his commands.  And last week I would have said that there are lines even fanatics won't cross in their devotion to Donald J. Trump, but I'm becoming less convinced as time goes on that my assessment of others' fanaticism is accurate.  I'd like to think that no officer in that chain of command would obey an illegal order to nuke somebody.  But I'd sleep more comfortably if Donald Trump simply didn't have the authority to test my theory.

I think that as well, and do have faith in the members of the military as a group not to follow such orders. And the systems in place to help prevent rogue personnel from carrying out such orders are pretty good even if they do still rely on humans. As you said, we'll all rest easier though when he doesn't have that power.

I saw a headline that said that Nancy Pelosi was trying to do some things to restrict access to the nuclear football. Does she actually have that power?

[Jeff Raven]

And the @realDonaldTrump Twitter account is now permanently suspended.  Finally.  I wonder where he's going to vent his anger over this particular event.

A friend just texted me to suggest that Trump could always call in to his supporters at Fox (can't see his buddy Sean H not taking his call).  And if worse came to worst, there would be OAN and Newsmax.

[JayUtah]

Apparently he tried to hijack the @POTUS account, which he never had full (or any) control of.

[raven]

Apparently he tried to hijack the @POTUS account, which he never had full (or any) control of.

Ha! Oh, that is precious indeed. Source?

[JayUtah]

I think that as well, and do have faith in the members of the military as a group not to follow such orders. And the systems in place to help prevent rogue personnel from carrying out such orders are pretty good even if they do still rely on humans.

They include protections against rogue Presidents too.

I saw a headline that said that Nancy Pelosi was trying to do some things to restrict access to the nuclear football. Does she actually have that power?

No.

The "football" doesn't do anything by itself.  It's essentially a satellite phone to the Pentagon, a nuclear "playbook," and the authenticator.  The President has sole authority to order the use of nuclear weapons.  He does not have the ability to make the missiles fly.  The Pentagon does that.  What Speaker Pelosi has done is largely immaterial and unnecessary.

I mean, he could try entering eight zeros.  "It's an older code, sir, but it checks out." 

The converse danger is now that some country might believe the U.S. nuclear arsenal is effectively unavailable.

[JayUtah]

Apparently he tried to hijack the @POTUS account, which he never had full (or any) control of.

Ha! Oh, that is precious indeed. Source?

My spouse, from across the couch.  But I found this:
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tweets-from-potus-account-after-suspension-they-got-deleted-2021-1