General Trump hilarity free-for-all thread

[minuspace]

Yup. That

[PopeTom]

Roger Stone's sentence has been commuted.  Nauseating, but unsurprising.

I wonder who managed to talk Trump out of giving him a full pardon.

...actually, why didn't he just pardon him?  The optics aren't much different.  Is there some legal subtlety going on?

My understanding is that Roger Stone asked for a commuted sentence rather than a pardon.

Apparently if one receives a pardon that does weird things in regard to 5th Amendment protections and a person can, somehow, be compelled to testify.

By only having the sentence  commuted Mr. Stone cannot be compelled to testify if doing so would self incriminate.

[Cain]

Ah, that's the trick.

Yeah, to receive a pardon you are actually admitting guilt.

[altered]

It's more than that, because a pardon absolves you of any crime. Guilt isn't part of the matter at all, there's a legal fiction of "at this moment in time for you this action was not a crime". You can't "self-incriminate" if you did nothing wrong, so the Fifth doesn't apply after you've been pardoned.

The optics are also (in theory) very different between pardoning and commutation. I had to do a lot of looking and research to be able to say this with any confidence:

A pardon says "Crime? There's an accusation? We're deaf, never heard of it, go live your life." A commutation is more like "yes you're a criminal but we'll be nice to you." Commutation to release LOOKS more like thumbing your nose at the law than a pardon does: "yes, this person committed a crime. We're okay with that." Doing away with the part where you pretend they were an upstanding human being at that moment in time, and basically just celebrating a blatant criminal's blatant criminality.

[minuspace]

Thanks for clearing that up. My assumption was that a commutated sentence still implies the possibility of serving that time.

[Doktor Howl]

The execution of Lee, who died at 8:07 a.m. EDT, went off after a series of legal volleys that ended when the Supreme Court stepped in early Tuesday in a 5-4 ruling and allowed it to move forward.

Attorney General William Barr has said the Justice Department has a duty to carry out the sentences imposed by the courts, including the death penalty, and provide closure to the victims and those in the communities where the killings happened.

But relatives of those killed by Lee in 1996 opposed that idea and argued Lee deserved life in prison. They wanted to be present to counter any contention the execution was being done on their behalf.

(bolding mine)

Unless those sentences involve Flynn or Stone, of course.

[Cramulus]

You know those Bush Admin people who've been blasting out these anti-trump ads? Colbert's writers have not forgotten the Bush administration. This shit is BRUTAL:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNvuYPpX0C0

[The Johnny]

That Donald and Ivanka doing product placement for Goya in the White House, thats some next level cynism 

[Pergamos]

You know those Bush Admin people who've been blasting out these anti-trump ads? Colbert's writers have not forgotten the Bush administration. This shit is BRUTAL:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNvuYPpX0C0

Those guys look like Biden's path to the whitehouse to me.  He doesn't appeal to Lefties at all, he'll get plenty of Dem moderate votes, but that's not enough, the fact that he's also getting support from the Republican establishment is what can give him the edge over Trump.

Mind you, it also means he will be about as good a president as George W Bush.

[Cramulus]

oh yeah, I think it's a good cause and I don't object to it in principle.. right wing resistance to trump is the only way to move the needle.

but I also respect Colbert for not giving these guys a free pass - these exact characters spent 8 years kicking us in the stomach


and the dig about their overhead spending does make it all seem a bit suspect--but I can believe the guy's explanation that a lot of that first quarter is startup cost

[LMNO]

What sucks is that these neoliberal Bush-era Republicans don't feel like their ideals will be threatened under a Biden presidency.

Which means they feel Biden is functionally a moderate conservative.  Which... I mean, yeah.

If Warren or [that other guy] were the Democratic candidate, I doubt they'd be as energetic as this.

[Doktor Howl]

What sucks is that these neoliberal Bush-era Republicans don't feel like their ideals will be threatened under a Biden presidency.

Which means they feel Biden is functionally a moderate conservative.  Which... I mean, yeah.

If Warren or [that other guy] were the Democratic candidate, I doubt they'd be as energetic as this.

Given the option, I'm just gonna bite the bullet and deal with the situation for what it is, and vote against Trump.

[Doktor Howl]

Anyone else notice those DHS assholes disappearing protesters in Oregon?

[altered]

Yeah.

There's some heavy duty eyes on this shit, and the general consensus is it's about 50/50 disappearance and extraction, with the disappearances meant to cover up the extraction of scabs, and the Fear a nice side effect bonus.

Real Nacht und Nebel bullshit. However...

No one's made too much fuss about missing persons yet, so I'm personally assuming they're driving them around and letting them go later to keep things from getting too "cornered rat": people filming strangers being taken is terrifying enough for the N&N effect since no one immediately present can verify identity, let alone if they're okay or not a couple days later.

[Cain]

That's what it sounds like to me as well, catch and release: Stasi edition. Pick people up, refuse to say anything, drive them around for a while, give them a beating and then throw them out of the van.