Please, take two seconds to read the statement. There's third graders who literally have a better grasp of the English language than Trump.
He's inarticulate, boorish and crude - but he's not stupid.
Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
371–380 of 498 posts
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#372Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's political grandstanding, nothing more. The DOJ reviewed the executive order and found it legal. Yates thought it would be better to go out with a bang than a whimper. I'm sure the DNC will find her a nice comfy job after this.
Do you have a source for that claim? Because everything I read indicates that there was little to no legal review of the executive order. In fact, given that the Attorney General would sign of that review (my understanding at least), it seems extremely unlikely that there was one.
From the analyses i've read, it's inferred from this part of Yates' statement.
She called out her role as different to explain why she doesn't agree with the OLC that it's legal.
My role is different from that of the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), which, through administrations of both parties, has reviewed Executive Orders for form and legality before they are issued. OLC’s review is limited to the narrow question of whether, in OLC’s view, a proposed Executive Order is lawful on its face and properly drafted.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#373Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not really where the consequences stop flowing though. Yes, the President has a right to fire an AG that refuses to implement a President's policy. At the same time, the public may draw certain inferences from that decision. If a big oil company fired its top lawyer for refusing to do something she though violated environmental laws, very reasonable inferences could be made about the leadership. The US Attorne…
Also it seems everyone here is ignoring the fact that the WH wrote this ignorant EO without talking to the OLC, has already gone 0/5 in the court challenges thus far. But still fired her for not doing his bidding.
Yate's letter of resignation specificall mentions that the OLC vetted the EO as legal when considered on it's own.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#374Earlier quoted context omitted.
Peter Thiel will go down in history as Trump/Bannon's useful idiot. He might have come up in short term betting correctly on Trump but he is down on long. If he thinks that he is going to get a piece of the pie after Kushner/Tillerson/Preibus(establishment) have had their take, then he is in for a cake.
What I think alot of Trump supporters are taking seriously is the phenomena that is the left feeding off It's own hyperbole, it's pretty disturbing.
No more disturbing than the right doing the same thing ala Fox News for the last... decade plus?
Many on the right are convinced Trump just did something with his immigration order to actually protect us, despite jihadists, political science experts, and even members of the Republican party saying otherwise. That it was a dangerous move, even. Nevermind that the largest terror sponsoring state out there right now in Saudi Arabia isn't on the list.
This is pandering to the hardcore for easy political gain. If it was a real effort, SA would be on there. But he knows he can't make that work.
Both sides are playing the same game. When it's not their team in the WH, the other side is vile and reprehensible and in gross violation of the Constitution!
Believing anything that comes from either side is foolish and irresponsible.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#375Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nitpicks over specific laws do not justify invocation of the oath of office. Despite what this thread is trying to pretend, it is not conventional for the AG to play SCOTUS and pre-emptively declare the administration's position indefensible. Ms. Yates has not offered any legal rationale for her position. She is failing to uphold the Constitution by undermining the operation of the executive branch and the authority…
See above: Green Cards confer full protection of law, including entry, to the extend of rights afforded to citizens. The exceptions are limited to people committing crimes or leaving the US for prolonged times. That is an exhaustive list (other laws include a generic clause like "and as deemed necessary by the Department of..."). EO cannot break laws, only modify their implementation. There is no room for interpretat…
You're going all over the place here. I understand your opinion that Mr. Trump's EO is illegal. That's fine, but it's not relevant, unless you're a federal judge who likes to post on HN in his free time? And even then, it's irrelevant until this case comes before the bench and gets a fair hearing.
In the Saturday Night Massacre, the two AGs in question did resign rather than carry out Mr. Nixon's order. They didn't claim a fundamental constitutional conflict that would justify defiance; rather, they claimed personal reservations and recognized that those reservations made it impossible to observe the established chain of command, so they stepped aside.
The issue here is whether it's appropriate for the acting AG to hijack the DoJ based on their private opinion on matters of nuanced legal interpretation, of which reasonable people can be on either side, and which have not yet been given a fair hearing in a court of law. That is absolutely not the convention and the oath of office does not require it (and indeed, Ms. Yates does not claim it does). Until such time as the constitutional violation becomes blatant, the DoJ has a constitutional obligation to serve the people's elected chief executive.
Ms. Yates was actively involved in blocking such fair hearings based on nothing but her personal proclivities. Following the precedent of SNM, she should've resigned over personal reservations. In this instance, there is no justification for defiance.
Ms. Yates's behavior looks very questionable and unprofessional to me. She stayed on board for Obama's EOs, which everyone knew were illegal at the time of signing, and was happy to allow the judiciary to make its call there, but is not willing to do so in Mr. Trump's case, where the legal justification appears much more sound.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#376Earlier quoted context omitted.
Speaking for myself, I'm mixed on this particular EO. I don't like the restrictions placed on people who were already determined to be legal residents via green cards / visas whatever. Fortunately, I think that's going to get struck down. So my support of this current EO is mixed. When would I not support him? Had he tried to do something permanent, had he tried to go forward with a ban all Muslims approach. Those bo…
> We're talking about two bans of 120 and 90 days respectively Proponents say they are temporary measures, so that there is time to 'figure out what is going on'. No matter how you feel about this EO it was implemented in sloppy and unprofessional manner. It was poorly written, Agencies were not notified or instructed on the exact intent, there was no time for review from Legal Council. How am I supposed to extrapola…
I don't disagree with anything you've said here, it's pretty spot on in my estimation, I just don't think it's a sky is falling kind of situation. I was trying to answer the question: 'What would it take for his supporters to turn away from him?' and keep it in the context of why this thing just isn't an abandon ship situation, though it is certainly a fumble in a number of ways.
|Proponents say they are temporary measures, so that there is time to 'figure out what is going on'
Wasn't there a report from DHS in 2015 or so saying that it was the case ISIS was looking to take advantage of refugee programs to get agents into various Western nations? And further, that dept. heads felt some concern about the efficacy of our vetting processes?
Whether such a vetting process could ever exist is unlikely, but it would seem this is kind of a 'get your bearings' order. Your criticisms still stand, of course, I'm just pointing out it's not a totally baseless idea.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#377Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're moving the goal posts. I have no position on whether this was good or not. The parent asked what this EO accomplishes. It accomplishes what it says it accomplishes; it gives the Trump admin time to review the policies. Is that a smart thing to do or not? I don't know. Does my opinion on whether or not it's smart have anything to do with whether its sufficiently illegal to have the acting AG openly refuse to al…
why do they need to halt immigration in this way while they review? they haven't presented any reason for that, and since they've been talking about it for a year i doubt they learned some new info after the election (that some terrorist was specifically trying to get in from these countries, when none ever has, historically) further, they are wasting a lot of the time they've given themselves in the fallout of how b…
>why do they need to halt immigration in this way while they review?
Their theory is that travel needs to be temporarily halted to ensure that insufficient vetting procedures do not allow any terrorists to sneak in while the review is ongoing. You may agree or disagree that that's a real/substantial threat, but there is valid reasoning behind suspending travel.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#378If I understand it right this is the first time an AG has been relieved for purely political reasons. If the AG doesn't think it's likely they'll win a defense, that usually doesn't cause an issue. As an edit: it probably wouldn't have been reasonable for her to put up an intentionally weak case, but if the order isn't able to stand up in court, then what? The major worry for me is Trump's seeking to punish anyone wh…
There is an expression that gained currency in Russia in recent years: negative selection. The Russian president nominates the worst possible people to the top jobs of government--people who take bribes, people who are incompetent and are known to have committed grave mistakes--because those are the people most likely to be loyal to him to the end. Any show of competence and independence leads to a summary dismissal.
Over here there is an old say which roughly translates into "you can get an idea of a person by seeing the ones he/she chooses to have near or work with him/her".
I have notice this behaviour in the corporate world as well, ie hiring incompetent but easy to herd yesmen, and usually is a sign of some sort of corruption.
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#379Earlier quoted context omitted.
>An E.O. that conflicts with statute or the Constitution is not law, in fact, it a violation of the law. And that is not the case, here. The Executive Order in question is firmly grounded in section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Get your facts straight.
"An EO conflicts/doesn't conflict the statute" is a decision that only the judiciary branch is qualified to make, not you or the president. If judiciary and president disagrees about whether something is a valid law or a violation of the law, the judiciary branch is right by definition.
Agreed. So why is the former acting AG's conduct justified?
Re: Trump Fires Acting Attorney General
#380Earlier quoted context omitted.
Would you write an app that stores important passwords in plaintext client side if your boss demanded it?
This is a great question, and one that should be asked of any engineer. If you answer yes to this question, you should find another career. Engineers have ethical responsibilities as well.
The vast majority of developers are not engineers even if they like calling themselves Software Engineers.