As I was driving home from Washington D.C. this morning, I was listening to D.C.'s public radio affiliate, WAMU out of American University. The show is called 1A. The discussion was about trump's firing of James Comey as FBI director. The discussion drew together the timeline along with the the differing claims from the White House made as to why and why now. But the main thrust was, is the trump story a political crises or a Constitutional crises?
Before diving in to that discussion, I have some house cleaning of my own to mop up that relates to this conversation. I found out, due to this incident that the independent prosecutor statute that I have quoted many times in this blog, timed out in 1999. Shame on me for not reading the whole law. If I had done saw, I would have seen that the law had an end of life built into it. So what I have learned is that there are currently two ways for an independent prosecutor to be assigned, neither of which will happen.
First, Rod Rosenstien, the deputy Attorney General, would have to create the office and assign someone to head that office. It needs to be Rosestein because jeff sessions recused himself (but the fact that a letter from sessions was included in the paper trail package surrounding the Comey firing clearly demonstrates how much sessions's word is worth). Be assured my friends, this ain't happenin'.
Second is that both houses of Congress would need to pass a bill creating and assigning a head to such an office, which is more likely, considering what I'm hearing from Republicans the past few days. But, and this is the big but, trump would have to sign said law. Again folks, that ain't happenin' either. No way!
Anyway, now to the question du jour, what kind of "crises" do we have, if any? Political crises? I'm not sure what constitutes a "political crises". There are no laws governing how politics are to be carried out. To be political is simply to influence people. Maybe we have a political crises, but that's not for me to say.
Do we have a Constitutional crises? Now here's something you can sink your teeth into. From where I sit, and it is obvious how I feel about trump and his associates, there is as of now no Constitutional crises. There has not been a clear case laid out anywhere showing steps taken that circumvent our Constitution. We're close, but we do not have the proof yet. Has trump run afoul of the Emoluments Clause in our Constitution? We need to see his tax returns to know that. Has he disregarded the Nepotism law? Seems that way, but it is an issue that the House and Senate need to address. If they don't address it then there still is no Constitutional crises, because that is their prerogative. If trump is found guilty of inciting violence in the law suit currently naming him as the defendant, in Kentucky, and then he is not removed from office, then I think we have a Constitutional crises. So, as you can see, we're not at the point of a Constitutional crises ....... yet.
Here's a definite problem we do have, but I'm not willing to call it a "crises". We have an administration in place that clearly and overtly lies We don't know when to believe them and therefore do not believe that anything they say is true. I discussed this previously, using the story about the Boy That Cried Wolf. I won't name this lack of trustworthiness as a crises, because it's not news, it's not a surprise. It's something we are all aware of and therefore we know that the sky is not falling. To label trump's lack of trustworthiness a crises would be like chicken little crying "the sky is falling". We are firmly grounded in reality. We know what is what. We just have to and must keep the pressure on and continue to turn up the heat. And that is exactly what we are doing. And more and more people in high places are climbing on board.
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