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Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

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Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#101
post #84

Hacker News is better without unrelated political news.

My knowledge of political events is sparse because I haven't dedicated the time it takes to acquire the prerequisite knowledge.

However, I'd be interested in learning more from those here who do have that knowledge and are willing to share perspective on these sort of events.

In general, I think it's valuable to be curious about things you're not necessarily interested in.

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#102

Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders. We are overdue for setting the precedent of a former President being charged with a crime, and we ought to go back and charge a few other former Presidents with crimes while we’re at it.

Sure if there’s an actual crime, but what exactly is worthy of charging here? The point of a fair justice system is not to charge a specific someone with something, it’s to go after a specific crime.

The legal gymnastics this DA is jumping through to attach charges here makes a joke of the entire justice system. I won’t be surprise if Bragg is disbarred for this.

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#103
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't the US credibly threaten to invade the Hague should any international court there decide to pursue charges against an American citizen? Best you could hope for is domestic charges or for Kissinger to make a visit to Viet Nam and get arrested there.

Which is really why this international criminal court has no real meaning - only the winner in a conflict gets to also win in the court. For example, do you really think that by charging putin, that he'd really get arrested in participating countries? Or would the warrant be ignored? And if putin does lose his war, and goes into exile, the ICC warrants would then be possible to enforce (now that no nukes is on the li…

There is the slim possibility that if the war goes very badly a small group of very senior Russian generals arrange to capture Putin, depose him, put themselves in place as some sort of junta, remove russian ground forces from Ukraine, and hand him over to the ICC to repair Russia's relationship with the rest of the world.

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#105
post #102

Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders. We are overdue for setting the precedent of a former President being charged with a crime, and we ought to go back and charge a few other former Presidents with crimes while we’re at it.

Sure if there’s an actual crime, but what exactly is worthy of charging here? The point of a fair justice system is not to charge a specific someone with something , it’s to go after a specific crime. The legal gymnastics this DA is jumping through to attach charges here makes a joke of the entire justice system. I won’t be surprise if Bragg is disbarred for this.

It seems wild to make this argument before the indictment has been unsealed. Shouldn’t we wait to see the allegations before we declare them baseless?

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#106

Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders. We are overdue for setting the precedent of a former President being charged with a crime, and we ought to go back and charge a few other former Presidents with crimes while we’re at it.

Not to mention finally becoming a signatory to the International Criminal Court. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_the_Internat...

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#107
post #102

Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders. We are overdue for setting the precedent of a former President being charged with a crime, and we ought to go back and charge a few other former Presidents with crimes while we’re at it.

Sure if there’s an actual crime, but what exactly is worthy of charging here? The point of a fair justice system is not to charge a specific someone with something , it’s to go after a specific crime. The legal gymnastics this DA is jumping through to attach charges here makes a joke of the entire justice system. I won’t be surprise if Bragg is disbarred for this.

> Sure if there’s an actual crime, but what exactly is worth of charging here?

... because there is a law on the books that says "it's a crime to do this thing" and this person pretty clearly did that thing.

Like, from a political perspective, I'm in the boat of "uggggh, I wish it wasn't this thing that is the first thing he is charged for". But from a legal perspective ... this is a thing you're not allowed to do ... which he did ... so ...

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#108

Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders. We are overdue for setting the precedent of a former President being charged with a crime, and we ought to go back and charge a few other former Presidents with crimes while we’re at it.

> Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders.

I thought the point of the US was to allow the president to do some sweet real estate deals? From https://www.econlib.org/archives/2016/12/bruce_bueno_de.html

> His stories about George Washington, none of which I knew, are even more fascinating. Bueno de Mesquita claims, quite plausibly, that a huge part of George Washington’s motive for fighting the Revolutionary War was to protect his substantial, and critically placed, landholdings in the Ohio Valley.

Remember that the 'Royal Proclamation of 1763' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Proclamation_of_1763 :

> The Proclamation forbade all settlements west of a line drawn along the Appalachian Mountains, which was delineated as an Indian Reserve.[2] Exclusion from the vast region of Trans-Appalachia created discontent between Britain and colonial land speculators and potential settlers. The proclamation and access to western lands was one of the first significant areas of dispute between Britain and the colonies and would become a contributing factor leading to the American Revolution.[3]

> British colonists and land speculators objected to the proclamation boundary since the British government had already assigned land grants to them. Including the wealthy owners of the Ohio company who protested the line to the governor of Virginia, as they had plans for settling the land to grow business.[15] Many settlements already existed beyond the proclamation line,[16] some of which had been temporarily evacuated during Pontiac's War, and there were many already granted land claims yet to be settled. For example, George Washington and his Virginia soldiers had been granted lands past the boundary. Prominent American colonials joined with the land speculators in Britain to lobby the government to move the line further west.

More context from https://www.econlib.org/archives/2016/12/bruce_bueno_de.html

> [...] his story made me realize that a large part of my belief in GW is romantic: because I learned about him so early in life, that romantic view is harder to shake and I’ve been less willing to put GW under the public choice microscope than with any current or recent president.

> An excerpt about GW’s wealth:

>> His last position, just before becoming President, was President of the Patowmack Canal Company–the Potomac Canal, as we know it, from the Potomac River. What that canal did was bring, make it possible to bring produce from the Shenandoah Valley–which George owned–up to the port in Alexandria, which had been built by Lawrence, by the Ohio Valley Company, in which George had a direct interest, and shipped goods out. So it was a very profitable undertaking–or so he thought it would be, in the long run, for him. And that’s what motivated him. Most people think of Washington as–besides a great hero, which he certainly was–as kind of a gentleman farmer. Economists have estimated the worth in real dollars adjusted for inflation, not appreciated, of George Washington’s estate, in contemporary terms; and it’s about $20 billion dollars. He is by far the wealthiest President. He is the 59th wealthiest person in American history. Three of the American founding fathers are in the list of the top 100 wealthiest Americans in all of history: Hancock, who was wealthier than Washington–made his money smuggling; and Ben Franklin, who was not quite as wealthy, who made his money because he had a monopoly on the printing press. These are the folks who led the Revolution. These were not the downtrodden. These were not the oppressed. These were people who stood to lose huge amounts of wealth because of the King’s policies. And so they fought a Revolution. Which was, by the way, not very popular. Sixty percent of the colonists either were neutral or opposed to the Revolution.

> Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders.

The Brits already had that system in place, so no need to secede because of that. Yes, the King was above the law, but he was a figurehead and by the time of the colonials' insubordination the country was already run by parliament and Prime Minister.

Re: Grand jury votes to indict Donald Trump

#109
post #102

Nearly the entire point of the United States at its founding was that the law should apply to political leaders. We are overdue for setting the precedent of a former President being charged with a crime, and we ought to go back and charge a few other former Presidents with crimes while we’re at it.

Sure if there’s an actual crime, but what exactly is worthy of charging here? The point of a fair justice system is not to charge a specific someone with something , it’s to go after a specific crime. The legal gymnastics this DA is jumping through to attach charges here makes a joke of the entire justice system. I won’t be surprise if Bragg is disbarred for this.

Do you have access to the case including evidence? The jury did and voted to indict, how can you be sure that this is legal gymnastics?
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