Doing a bit of research I find that only a 1981 act prohibits someone in jail for more than a year from being an MP. Also bankrupts cannot stand for Parliament, which seems rather unfair to me. What if you're bankrupt due to something the previous government has done?
I was wondering if @Bishops Finger meant it was legally bizarre OR culturally bizarre, that a jailbird can be elected president in the USA.
<snip>
I meant legally, but maybe the legal oddity derives from culture? I don't mean that in a snarky way...
Doing a bit of research I find that only a 1981 act prohibits someone in jail for more than a year from being an MP. Also bankrupts cannot stand for Parliament, which seems rather unfair to me. What if you're bankrupt due to something the previous government has done?
I was wondering if @Bishops Finger meant it was legally bizarre OR culturally bizarre, that a jailbird can be elected president in the USA.
<snip>
I meant legally, but maybe the legal oddity derives from culture? I don't mean that in a snarky way...
Well, all laws, arguably, draw from culture, one way or another.
As I said, legally, I can't see any barriers to a person serving one year or less becoming PM. And, if it were pre-1981, I'd assume no duration of sentence woulda been a barrier.
I wonder if the new laws in '81 were brought in to prevent another candidate like Bobby Sands from getting in.
Well it would have been culturally odd in the US as well, until Trump. 10 years ago this situation would have been just as unthinkable in the US as it would in the UK.
Well it would have been culturally odd in the US as well, until Trump. 10 years ago this situation would have been just as unthinkable in the US as it would in the UK.
Yeah, Trump basically took all of the things that were just “not done” and thus never had formal rules preventing them, and then did them. Things which would have been political suicide before now, he just steamrolled right on over them.
I’m sad to think of the younger generation never knowing a world not like this.
Biden should have announced many months ago that he would not be standing again. He needs to be replaced ASAP.
This evening an MSNBC commentator said the only way Biden will withdraw is if his wife can convince him it is time to retire.
I blame the Democrats as well
@Telford, American parties don’t function the same way British parties do. The Democratic Party can’t just say “Yeah, we’re going with someone else.” Biden will be the Democratic nominee unless he decides to step down and release the convention delegates committed to him as a result of the primaries. There’s really no other mechanism for replacing him, short of some kind of party coup.
If party leadership had control over selecting the candidate, Trump would not have been the Republican nominee in 2016.
I never mentioned Party Leadership.
You said he needs to be “replaced.” There’s no mechanism for that unless he decides to step down.
Well there should be
So what method would you propose for the Democratic Party to override the will of voters in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the territories who, through the Democratic primaries and caucuses, have already chosen Biden as the Democratic Party’s nominee?
Biden should have announced many months ago that he would not be standing again. He needs to be replaced ASAP.
This evening an MSNBC commentator said the only way Biden will withdraw is if his wife can convince him it is time to retire.
I blame the Democrats as well
@Telford, American parties don’t function the same way British parties do. The Democratic Party can’t just say “Yeah, we’re going with someone else.” Biden will be the Democratic nominee unless he decides to step down and release the convention delegates committed to him as a result of the primaries. There’s really no other mechanism for replacing him, short of some kind of party coup.
If party leadership had control over selecting the candidate, Trump would not have been the Republican nominee in 2016.
I never mentioned Party Leadership.
You said he needs to be “replaced.” There’s no mechanism for that unless he decides to step down.
Well there should be
So what method would you propose for the Democratic Party to override the will of voters in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the territories who, through the Democratic primaries and caucuses, have already chosen Biden as the Democratic Party’s nominee?
Biden should have announced many months ago that he would not be standing again. He needs to be replaced ASAP.
This evening an MSNBC commentator said the only way Biden will withdraw is if his wife can convince him it is time to retire.
I blame the Democrats as well
@Telford, American parties don’t function the same way British parties do. The Democratic Party can’t just say “Yeah, we’re going with someone else.” Biden will be the Democratic nominee unless he decides to step down and release the convention delegates committed to him as a result of the primaries. There’s really no other mechanism for replacing him, short of some kind of party coup.
If party leadership had control over selecting the candidate, Trump would not have been the Republican nominee in 2016.
I never mentioned Party Leadership.
You said he needs to be “replaced.” There’s no mechanism for that unless he decides to step down.
Well there should be
So what method would you propose for the Democratic Party to override the will of voters in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the territories who, through the Democratic primaries and caucuses, have already chosen Biden as the Democratic Party’s nominee?
Removed due to serious illness.
I didn’t ask why you would remove him, I asked what process you would use.
And you can diagnose “serious illness” from one televised debate?
Biden should have announced many months ago that he would not be standing again. He needs to be replaced ASAP.
This evening an MSNBC commentator said the only way Biden will withdraw is if his wife can convince him it is time to retire.
I blame the Democrats as well
@Telford, American parties don’t function the same way British parties do. The Democratic Party can’t just say “Yeah, we’re going with someone else.” Biden will be the Democratic nominee unless he decides to step down and release the convention delegates committed to him as a result of the primaries. There’s really no other mechanism for replacing him, short of some kind of party coup.
If party leadership had control over selecting the candidate, Trump would not have been the Republican nominee in 2016.
I never mentioned Party Leadership.
You said he needs to be “replaced.” There’s no mechanism for that unless he decides to step down.
Well there should be
So what method would you propose for the Democratic Party to override the will of voters in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the territories who, through the Democratic primaries and caucuses, have already chosen Biden as the Democratic Party’s nominee?
Removed due to serious illness.
I didn’t ask why you would remove him, I asked what process you would use.
If you are happy for this man to be president I withdraw my suggestion
And you can diagnose “serious illness” from one televised debate?
Biden should have announced many months ago that he would not be standing again. He needs to be replaced ASAP.
This evening an MSNBC commentator said the only way Biden will withdraw is if his wife can convince him it is time to retire.
I blame the Democrats as well
@Telford, American parties don’t function the same way British parties do. The Democratic Party can’t just say “Yeah, we’re going with someone else.” Biden will be the Democratic nominee unless he decides to step down and release the convention delegates committed to him as a result of the primaries. There’s really no other mechanism for replacing him, short of some kind of party coup.
If party leadership had control over selecting the candidate, Trump would not have been the Republican nominee in 2016.
I never mentioned Party Leadership.
You said he needs to be “replaced.” There’s no mechanism for that unless he decides to step down.
Well there should be
So what method would you propose for the Democratic Party to override the will of voters in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the territories who, through the Democratic primaries and caucuses, have already chosen Biden as the Democratic Party’s nominee?
Removed due to serious illness.
I didn’t ask why you would remove him, I asked what process you would use.
If you are happy for this man to be president I withdraw my suggestion
My happiness is irrelevant to the question I asked you, which was what process you would use to remove Biden as the nominee.
Your “suggestion” is untethered to the realities—for better or worse—of how American political parties work.
And you can diagnose “serious illness” from one televised debate?
"Folks, I don't walk as easy as I used to," he continued. "I don't speak as smoothly as I used to. I don't debate as well as I used to. But I know what I do know — I know how to tell the truth ... I know right from wrong. And I know how to do this job. I know how to get things done. And I know, like millions of Americans know, when you get knocked down, you get back up."
Incapacitation or death: Timing is the key. Pre-convention, the party can simply choose another nominee. Post convention it's more messy. Post election and before taking office, it's in the hands of the electoral college / Congress / SCOTUS. I don't know what the constitution actually says on this one...
There are a couple of possibilities for when a presidential candidate dies between the general election and inauguration. None of these theories has been legally tested, so caveat lector. Timing is, of course, key. If a candidate dies after the general election (5 November 2024) but before the electoral college votes (17 December 2024), the presidential electors would theoretically be free to cast their ballots for another candidate. Some electors may be restrained by faithless elector laws, but those have never been tested in the case where the designated candidate was dead (and thus Constitutionally ineligible for the presidency).
If the candidate dies between the time the electoral votes are cast and the time Congress certifies the electoral vote (6 January 2025) things get a little trickier as there are two plausible interpretations of what happens. The first possibility is that Congress certifies that the dead candidate has been elected president. This means that there will be a vacancy in the presidency on inauguration day (20 January 2025) and the normal rules of presidential succession apply and the new vice president would be sworn in as president. (Unless the presidential candidate and their running mate were in the same plane crash.)
The second possible interpretation is that Congress says that the electoral votes for the dead candidate are invalid. Being dead is just as much a Constitutional bar to the presidency as being younger than 35 years old, being a non-citizen, or being an oathbreaking insurrectionist. In that case either the second place vote-getter becomes president (if the electoral votes for the dead candidate are discarded entirely) or there is no winner (if the electoral votes are counted as ballots but considered invalid). In the case of no electoral vote winner the presidency is decided in a contingent election in the House of Representatives with each state voting by caucuses. Note that in a contingent election the House can only choose the president from the top three electoral vote getters, so that may very well mean their only choice is the second place finisher.
If the president-elect dies between Congress certifying the electoral vote and inauguration day then there is simply a vacancy in the presidency and normal presidential succession would take place.
The idea that a person in jail can actually be President is hard for this Englishman to grasp, though I imagine a post-election impeachment process would be complex and messy...
It gets trickier than that. In the American system impeachment is only for abuses of official powers, so it would depend on what the convict president was convicted of. In Trump's case it's arguable that his felony convictions in New York state court probably don't qualify, though the insurrection plot and stolen secrets cases probably would.
I would argue that a convicted president serving a custodial sentence would fall under the Twenty-Fifth Amendment's clause about a president "unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office" and that would be the appropriate Constitutional remedy for such a situation.
Thank you for a really full and detailed answer. I knew the outline but not the details.
I will quibble with the point about impeachment, though. I have read a lot on this and there are various interpretations of "High Crimes and Misdemeanours." Most of the thinkers I've read framed it this way so that a crime per se I.e. perjury should not be grounds for impeachment necessarily but also certain non-crimes could be. The best hypothetical I know for this is that having taken the Oath of Office, what happens if the President moves to Norway and refuses to engage with the government? No crime has been committed but clearly they are not doing the job. Part of this stems from the fact that the impeachment clauses predate the 25th.
I can definitely forsee a constitutional crisis with Trump though, especially if he's imprisoned by a State. Most commentators expect a non-custodial sentence in New York. No other case will get to trial before the election. So it is all probably moot.
Then I suggest you read carefully what US posters write regarding their politics, as they (although not necessarily *experts* - whatever you mean by that) are far more knowledgeable than you.
Then I suggest you read carefully what US posters write regarding their politics, as they (although not necessarily *experts* - whatever you mean by that) are far more knowledgeable than you.
Remember that @Telford is a self-declaredignoramus about the United States and anything that happens there. This doesn't stop him from having very strong opinions about a variety of American things and events.
Given @Telford's self-admitted total ignorance I'm interpreting his claim that he "listens to experts" to mean that he faithfully regurgitates whatever he happens to come across in his preferred news media, without the courtesy of providing us a link.
Then I suggest you read carefully what US posters write regarding their politics, as they (although not necessarily *experts* - whatever you mean by that) are far more knowledgeable than you.
Remember that @Telford is a self-declaredignoramus about the United States and anything that happens there. This doesn't stop him from having very strong opinions about a variety of American things and events.
Given @Telford's self-admitted total ignorance I'm interpreting his claim that he "listens to experts" to mean that he faithfully regurgitates whatever he happens to come across in his preferred news media, without the courtesy of providing us a link.
Just so. I'd forgotten about his previous admissions of ignorance.
If I remember rightly, senior figures in @Telford's chosen political party here in the UK dismissed expert advice and boasted about doing so.
We see the dire effects of that around us.
At least Telford appears to have learned from their mistakes. In his own mind at least.
He doesn't appear able to read for comprehension though. Over on another thread he assumed @Bishops Finger had voted Leave in the EU Referendum and here he seems to have completely over-looked US Shipmates' repeated questions and comments about their own political process.
The issue they've raised isn't whether Biden should or shouldn't be the Democrat Presidential candidate - although they clearly think he should remain that - but what process exists to alter that at this stage.
Telford is great at Bad Jokes - and his bad jokes on that thread are often a lot better than many people's good ones. But here, as on other political threads, he sadly reveals a lamentable lack of understanding of how electoral and other systems work.
The Beeb often comes in for some stick on these boards and with justification at times, but I heard a very helpful piece of analysis on BBC Radio 4 the other day which helped me understand more about the position the Democrats find themselves in and the processes involved in selecting a leader.
It's not the same as ours.
If Telford listens to experts I see very little evidence from his posts that he takes on board anything they say.
I must confess, I'm also puzzled as to why the Democrats have stuck with Biden. I don't wish to be age-ist but he's seemed well past his sell-by date for some considerable time now. But now I understand a bit more about the selection process and how the US system works, I can understand more what our US Shipmates are saying.
That doesn't necessarily mean I agree or disagree or that I think the US system is ideal - any more than I'd expect US Shipmates to think our system is better or worse than theirs or right, wrong, good, bad or indifferent.
I do not think Democrats necessarily want to stick with Biden as much as we have to play according to the rules. Several of us have already explained our rules. It is only Biden that can release his delegates.
I have seen reports the Biden family is meeting in Camp David to discuss the future of the campaign.
We will see what the outcome will be in the next day or so.
Rules aside, and lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Democrats aside, I really can’t see any realistic way that Biden could step aside at this point without essentially handing the election to Trump. There’s no obvious back-up candidate who has been tested and already has broad support. The election and the Democratic Party would be thrown into disarray. It would just be a huge implosion.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
FWIW two of the most frustrating things about the US political system for one accustomed to Westminster parliamentary rules are:
1) A lack of a vote of confidence in a President outside an election; and
2) Lack of an ability to dissolve Congress over matters of confidence, particularly spending items (BTW this would solve the persistent government shutdown problem instantly).
50% of the time someone who calls for impeachment is really calling for a vote of non-confidence and impeachment really isn't set up for that. Just because something is politically unwise doesn't make it a high crime or misdemeanour, both couched in the language of criminal law. Likewise the involuntary relief provisions of the 25th
Amendment have never been used because certain actors (notably George HW Bush) felt they would be seen as a coup. The US system just isn't set up to relieve a president or a presidential candidate for political reasons.
Rules aside, and lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Democrats aside, I really can’t see any realistic way that Biden could step aside at this point without essentially handing the election to Trump. There’s no obvious back-up candidate who has been tested and already has broad support. The election and the Democratic Party would be thrown into disarray. It would just be a huge implosion.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
I agree with this. In particular, if Biden doesn't want to go, you could have a destructive struggle between him and the prospective nominee, leading to a Trump landslide.
I am afraid too that I am feeling pessimistic and part of my thinking is: "why waste a good candidate on this election, which Trump will win. Keep the new blood for 2028."
Rules aside, and lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Democrats aside, I really can’t see any realistic way that Biden could step aside at this point without essentially handing the election to Trump. There’s no obvious back-up candidate who has been tested and already has broad support. The election and the Democratic Party would be thrown into disarray. It would just be a huge implosion.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
I agree with this. In particular, if Biden doesn't want to go, you could have a destructive struggle between him and the prospective nominee, leading to a Trump landslide.
I am afraid too that I am feeling pessimistic and part of my thinking is: "why waste a good candidate on this election, which Trump will win. Keep the new blood for 2028."
Rules aside, and lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Democrats aside, I really can’t see any realistic way that Biden could step aside at this point without essentially handing the election to Trump. There’s no obvious back-up candidate who has been tested and already has broad support. The election and the Democratic Party would be thrown into disarray. It would just be a huge implosion.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
I agree with this. In particular, if Biden doesn't want to go, you could have a destructive struggle between him and the prospective nominee, leading to a Trump landslide.
I am afraid too that I am feeling pessimistic and part of my thinking is: "why waste a good candidate on this election, which Trump will win. Keep the new blood for 2028."
Assuming there is an election in '28....
A frightening thought, but who knows? Trump might be dead before then...
Rules aside, and lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Democrats aside, I really can’t see any realistic way that Biden could step aside at this point without essentially handing the election to Trump. There’s no obvious back-up candidate who has been tested and already has broad support. The election and the Democratic Party would be thrown into disarray. It would just be a huge implosion.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
The last time we had something like this was in 1968. Robert Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Eugene McCarthy were in contention. But Robert Kennedy was killed, and Johnson suddenly withdrew. Johnson released his delegates to Hubert Humphrey and the Kennedy delegates were free agents. Humphrey eventually won the nomination but lost the election to Nixon. But I think that was largely because of the antiwar sentiment, which was sweeping the nation, not necessarily because of a divided party.
Rules aside, and lack of enthusiasm for Biden among Democrats aside, I really can’t see any realistic way that Biden could step aside at this point without essentially handing the election to Trump. There’s no obvious back-up candidate who has been tested and already has broad support. The election and the Democratic Party would be thrown into disarray. It would just be a huge implosion.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
The last time we had something like this was in 1968.
Which was before we moved to the current primary (or caucus) nominating system in 1972.
I see that a Democrat House member from Texas has publicly urged Biden to step down. It is the worst-case scenario for the Democrats if some of the party are trying to get rid of him. They need to back him or sack him. (Of course the latter is easier said than done - but what I mean is that if they cannot be sure of convincing him to step aside, they should back him to the hilt).
The idea that a person in jail can actually be President is hard for this Englishman to grasp, though I imagine a post-election impeachment process would be complex and messy...
It gets trickier than that. In the American system impeachment is only for abuses of official powers, so it would depend on what the convict president was convicted of. In Trump's case it's arguable that his felony convictions in New York state court probably don't qualify, though the insurrection plot and stolen secrets cases probably would.
Sorry to drag this up from pages ago - I was on vacation last week - but this gets at something I have wondered for a while. If impeachment is only for political remedies, what if the president commits a normal crime?
If the president just walks out of the White House into the city and starts knocking over liquor stores, is there anything to stop him? Or if he physically abuses his family or his staff?
The idea that a person in jail can actually be President is hard for this Englishman to grasp, though I imagine a post-election impeachment process would be complex and messy...
It gets trickier than that. In the American system impeachment is only for abuses of official powers, so it would depend on what the convict president was convicted of. In Trump's case it's arguable that his felony convictions in New York state court probably don't qualify, though the insurrection plot and stolen secrets cases probably would.
Sorry to drag this up from pages ago - I was on vacation last week - but this gets at something I have wondered for a while. If impeachment is only for political remedies, what if the president commits a normal crime?
If the president just walks out of the White House into the city and starts knocking over liquor stores, is there anything to stop him? Or if he physically abuses his family or his staff?
I read this a few years back: Cass R. Sunstein: Impeachment, A Citizen's Guide which covers the history and the constitutional issues really well. Most of my thinking is based on this. I would agree that Falsifying Business Records does not meet the criteria for "High Crimes and Misdemeanours" whereas Inciting Insurrection clearly, clearly does.
At the heart of the Impeachment process is a dangerous contradiction. It is a process with a legal standard, laid down in the Constitution but because the grand jury is the House of Representatives and the trial court is the Senate it is a political process. The dangers of this pseudo-legal process are not theoretical but clearly born out in reality.*
There have been four impeachments of Presidents in the history of the USA. Andrew Johnson's was unequivocally a political stunt. There is a very strong argument that the impeachment of Clinton was also purely political. Both were correctly acquitted by the Senate. Trump's two impeachments were exactly the kind of behaviour envisaged by the Framers yet he was the beneficiary of a political acquittal - especially on the second occasion.
Of course, the final irony is that the Supreme Court has created the same problem for itself by becoming deliberately political.
Just my thoughts.
AFZ
*My favourite stat is that Trump has been the subject of 50% of all presidential impeachments and it rises to 100% if you exclude the ones brought for political reasons rather than because there truly was evidence of an impeachable offence.
There have been four impeachments of Presidents in the history of the USA. Andrew Johnson's was unequivocally a political stunt.
I would argue that Andrew Johnson's impeachment was done for very legitimate reasons, even if the pretext (the Tenure of Office Act) was somewhat bogus. For those who are not familiar with the background of this mid-nineteenth century dust up, the actual reason Johnson was impeached was that he was using the office of the presidency to sabotage Reconstruction. Johnson's attempt to remove Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War was made because Stanton would continue to implement congressional Reconstruction policy as long as he remained in office. Using the power of the presidency to aid those attempting to undermine the United States is exactly the kind of thing presidential impeachment was intended to address.
There have been four impeachments of Presidents in the history of the USA. Andrew Johnson's was unequivocally a political stunt.
I would argue that Andrew Johnson's impeachment was done for very legitimate reasons, even if the pretext (the Tenure of Office Act) was somewhat bogus. For those who are not familiar with the background of this mid-nineteenth century dust up, the actual reason Johnson was impeached was that he was using the office of the presidency to sabotage Reconstruction. Johnson's attempt to remove Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War was made because Stanton would continue to implement congressional Reconstruction policy as long as he remained in office. Using the power of the presidency to aid those attempting to undermine the United States is exactly the kind of thing presidential impeachment was intended to address.
Didn't Johnson interfering with the post office have something to do with it as well?
There have been four impeachments of Presidents in the history of the USA. Andrew Johnson's was unequivocally a political stunt.
I would argue that Andrew Johnson's impeachment was done for very legitimate reasons, even if the pretext (the Tenure of Office Act) was somewhat bogus. For those who are not familiar with the background of this mid-nineteenth century dust up, the actual reason Johnson was impeached was that he was using the office of the presidency to sabotage Reconstruction. Johnson's attempt to remove Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War was made because Stanton would continue to implement congressional Reconstruction policy as long as he remained in office. Using the power of the presidency to aid those attempting to undermine the United States is exactly the kind of thing presidential impeachment was intended to address.
Didn't Johnson interfering with the post office have something to do with it as well?
There have been four impeachments of Presidents in the history of the USA. Andrew Johnson's was unequivocally a political stunt.
I would argue that Andrew Johnson's impeachment was done for very legitimate reasons, even if the pretext (the Tenure of Office Act) was somewhat bogus. For those who are not familiar with the background of this mid-nineteenth century dust up, the actual reason Johnson was impeached was that he was using the office of the presidency to sabotage Reconstruction. Johnson's attempt to remove Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War was made because Stanton would continue to implement congressional Reconstruction policy as long as he remained in office. Using the power of the presidency to aid those attempting to undermine the United States is exactly the kind of thing presidential impeachment was intended to address.
Didn't Johnson interfering with the post office have something to do with it as well?
From the Wikipedia article on Johnson's impeachment:
In 1887, the Tenure of Office Act was repealed by Congress, and subsequent rulings by the United States Supreme Court seemed to support Johnson's position that he was entitled to fire Stanton without congressional approval. The Supreme Court's ruling on a similar piece of later legislation in Myers v. United States (1926) affirmed the ability of the president to remove a postmaster without congressional approval, and the dictum of the majority opinion stated, "that the Tenure of Office Act of 1867...was invalid".
Johnson was impeached for breaching the Tenure of Office Act, of course. The later case involved the Postmaster.
I’ll vote for whomever the Democratic candidate is. I’m voting for Not-Trump, though I think Biden is generally okay. (I’d have preferred Elizabeth Warren in 2020, myself.)
I just find it very odd that Biden, at 81, is viewed as "too old" but Trump at 78 doesn't get that press. It is only 3 years difference. And it is not just that Biden has gaffes because, frankly, so does Trump. Honestly, Trump has far more gaffes (Kofefe!) but we are so used to him (a) lying and (b) saying utter nonsense that it is normalized. Why is only Biden portrayed as being too old when BOTH of them show signs of senility?
I am guessing it is because Trump has not changed that much, he was lying and saving nonsense for years.
Biden said it was very hard to keep up with Trump's lies during the debate, something like 50 lies.
So far, I believe I've heard Biden himself first claim 26 and then 28 lies, at the waffle house and the Stephanopolous debate respectively.
Personally, I don't think it's a good look to be inconsistent about the number of lies, especially when in both cases he cited the New York Times as his source.
I just find it very odd that Biden, at 81, is viewed as "too old" but Trump at 78 doesn't get that press. It is only 3 years difference. And it is not just that Biden has gaffes because, frankly, so does Trump. Honestly, Trump has far more gaffes (Kofefe!) but we are so used to him (a) lying and (b) saying utter nonsense that it is normalized. Why is only Biden portrayed as being too old when BOTH of them show signs of senility?
Democratic strategist James Carville believes that President Joe Biden is "going to come to the conclusion" that running for reelection is "not a good idea." In a recent New York Times op-ed, Carville suggests former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama should play a role in selecting candidates to replace Biden. He wants them to hold town hall meetings across the country, going into the convention with a plan in place as to who the new candidate should be. I find this to be an interesting idea that would gear up people's interest and excitement.
Democratic strategist James Carville believes that President Joe Biden is "going to come to the conclusion" that running for reelection is "not a good idea." In a recent New York Times op-ed, Carville suggests former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama should play a role in selecting candidates to replace Biden. He wants them to hold town hall meetings across the country, going into the convention with a plan in place as to who the new candidate should be. I find this to be an interesting idea that would gear up people's interest and excitement.
That would be exciting, but I see no indication that Biden’s going to quit, or that any Democrats with enough influence to convince him to quit will publicly say that he should.
Both Biden and Trump (who obviously would rather run against Biden) have said that having convention delegates (“party elites”), rather than primary voters, pick a nominee after primary voters overwhelmingly voted for Biden would be undemocratic.
Most prominent Black Democratic leaders are firmly behind Biden (I think too much is being read into Jim Clyburn’s hypothesizing), as is Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, representing the left of the party, and Senator John Fetterman of PA, representing a populist, blue collar, anti-establishment progressivism very different than AOC’s. I worry that the parts of the party that are most willing to stick their neck out to pressure Biden out are highly educated white establishment types like me. The activist grassroots and long-serving working class volunteers in the party seem to think party unity is the best way to beat Trump and that choosing a new candidate is opening a Pandora’s box. And quite a few of them, although they want Kamala Harris to be the nominee IF Biden steps down and would be mad if she wasn’t, think Harris’ chances against Trump are even worse than Biden’s.
So I feel caught in this weird limbo where most editorial writers and pundits in mainstream media make it seem that any sensible person wants Biden to not run, but most progressives I know on social media - who are much more politically active than I am - think that any talk of replacing Biden is West Wing fan fiction and Democrats need to hunker down and beat the fascists.
Comments
I meant legally, but maybe the legal oddity derives from culture? I don't mean that in a snarky way...
Well, all laws, arguably, draw from culture, one way or another.
As I said, legally, I can't see any barriers to a person serving one year or less becoming PM. And, if it were pre-1981, I'd assume no duration of sentence woulda been a barrier.
I wonder if the new laws in '81 were brought in to prevent another candidate like Bobby Sands from getting in.
Yeah, Trump basically took all of the things that were just “not done” and thus never had formal rules preventing them, and then did them. Things which would have been political suicide before now, he just steamrolled right on over them.
I’m sad to think of the younger generation never knowing a world not like this.
Through what process?
And you can diagnose “serious illness” from one televised debate?
Your “suggestion” is untethered to the realities—for better or worse—of how American political parties work.
His age has been obvious. “Serious illness”? No.
Over Trump? In a heartbeat.
Nick Tamen: "His age has been obvious. “Serious illness”? No."
Agreed.
Amen.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-addresses-lackluster-debate-performance-age-debate-skills/
I am a person who listens to experts
Thank you for a really full and detailed answer. I knew the outline but not the details.
I will quibble with the point about impeachment, though. I have read a lot on this and there are various interpretations of "High Crimes and Misdemeanours." Most of the thinkers I've read framed it this way so that a crime per se I.e. perjury should not be grounds for impeachment necessarily but also certain non-crimes could be. The best hypothetical I know for this is that having taken the Oath of Office, what happens if the President moves to Norway and refuses to engage with the government? No crime has been committed but clearly they are not doing the job. Part of this stems from the fact that the impeachment clauses predate the 25th.
I can definitely forsee a constitutional crisis with Trump though, especially if he's imprisoned by a State. Most commentators expect a non-custodial sentence in New York. No other case will get to trial before the election. So it is all probably moot.
AFZ
Then I suggest you read carefully what US posters write regarding their politics, as they (although not necessarily *experts* - whatever you mean by that) are far more knowledgeable than you.
Remember that @Telford is a self-declared ignoramus about the United States and anything that happens there. This doesn't stop him from having very strong opinions about a variety of American things and events.
Given @Telford's self-admitted total ignorance I'm interpreting his claim that he "listens to experts" to mean that he faithfully regurgitates whatever he happens to come across in his preferred news media, without the courtesy of providing us a link.
Just so. I'd forgotten about his previous admissions of ignorance.
We see the dire effects of that around us.
At least Telford appears to have learned from their mistakes. In his own mind at least.
He doesn't appear able to read for comprehension though. Over on another thread he assumed @Bishops Finger had voted Leave in the EU Referendum and here he seems to have completely over-looked US Shipmates' repeated questions and comments about their own political process.
The issue they've raised isn't whether Biden should or shouldn't be the Democrat Presidential candidate - although they clearly think he should remain that - but what process exists to alter that at this stage.
Telford is great at Bad Jokes - and his bad jokes on that thread are often a lot better than many people's good ones. But here, as on other political threads, he sadly reveals a lamentable lack of understanding of how electoral and other systems work.
The Beeb often comes in for some stick on these boards and with justification at times, but I heard a very helpful piece of analysis on BBC Radio 4 the other day which helped me understand more about the position the Democrats find themselves in and the processes involved in selecting a leader.
It's not the same as ours.
If Telford listens to experts I see very little evidence from his posts that he takes on board anything they say.
I must confess, I'm also puzzled as to why the Democrats have stuck with Biden. I don't wish to be age-ist but he's seemed well past his sell-by date for some considerable time now. But now I understand a bit more about the selection process and how the US system works, I can understand more what our US Shipmates are saying.
That doesn't necessarily mean I agree or disagree or that I think the US system is ideal - any more than I'd expect US Shipmates to think our system is better or worse than theirs or right, wrong, good, bad or indifferent.
Our systems differ. Get over it already.
This thread is about the US presidential election.
la vie en rouge, Purgatory host
Meanwhile, echoing thanks to @Crœsos for the long and very helpful explanatory post some way back.
I have seen reports the Biden family is meeting in Camp David to discuss the future of the campaign.
We will see what the outcome will be in the next day or so.
For better or worse, the train left the station a long time ago, and we’re stuck with it.
1) A lack of a vote of confidence in a President outside an election; and
2) Lack of an ability to dissolve Congress over matters of confidence, particularly spending items (BTW this would solve the persistent government shutdown problem instantly).
50% of the time someone who calls for impeachment is really calling for a vote of non-confidence and impeachment really isn't set up for that. Just because something is politically unwise doesn't make it a high crime or misdemeanour, both couched in the language of criminal law. Likewise the involuntary relief provisions of the 25th
Amendment have never been used because certain actors (notably George HW Bush) felt they would be seen as a coup. The US system just isn't set up to relieve a president or a presidential candidate for political reasons.
I agree with this. In particular, if Biden doesn't want to go, you could have a destructive struggle between him and the prospective nominee, leading to a Trump landslide.
I am afraid too that I am feeling pessimistic and part of my thinking is: "why waste a good candidate on this election, which Trump will win. Keep the new blood for 2028."
Assuming there is an election in '28....
A frightening thought, but who knows? Trump might be dead before then...
The last time we had something like this was in 1968. Robert Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Eugene McCarthy were in contention. But Robert Kennedy was killed, and Johnson suddenly withdrew. Johnson released his delegates to Hubert Humphrey and the Kennedy delegates were free agents. Humphrey eventually won the nomination but lost the election to Nixon. But I think that was largely because of the antiwar sentiment, which was sweeping the nation, not necessarily because of a divided party.
Sorry to drag this up from pages ago - I was on vacation last week - but this gets at something I have wondered for a while. If impeachment is only for political remedies, what if the president commits a normal crime?
If the president just walks out of the White House into the city and starts knocking over liquor stores, is there anything to stop him? Or if he physically abuses his family or his staff?
Hope you had a great vacation.
I read this a few years back: Cass R. Sunstein: Impeachment, A Citizen's Guide which covers the history and the constitutional issues really well. Most of my thinking is based on this. I would agree that Falsifying Business Records does not meet the criteria for "High Crimes and Misdemeanours" whereas Inciting Insurrection clearly, clearly does.
At the heart of the Impeachment process is a dangerous contradiction. It is a process with a legal standard, laid down in the Constitution but because the grand jury is the House of Representatives and the trial court is the Senate it is a political process. The dangers of this pseudo-legal process are not theoretical but clearly born out in reality.*
There have been four impeachments of Presidents in the history of the USA. Andrew Johnson's was unequivocally a political stunt. There is a very strong argument that the impeachment of Clinton was also purely political. Both were correctly acquitted by the Senate. Trump's two impeachments were exactly the kind of behaviour envisaged by the Framers yet he was the beneficiary of a political acquittal - especially on the second occasion.
Of course, the final irony is that the Supreme Court has created the same problem for itself by becoming deliberately political.
Just my thoughts.
AFZ
*My favourite stat is that Trump has been the subject of 50% of all presidential impeachments and it rises to 100% if you exclude the ones brought for political reasons rather than because there truly was evidence of an impeachable offence.
I would argue that Andrew Johnson's impeachment was done for very legitimate reasons, even if the pretext (the Tenure of Office Act) was somewhat bogus. For those who are not familiar with the background of this mid-nineteenth century dust up, the actual reason Johnson was impeached was that he was using the office of the presidency to sabotage Reconstruction. Johnson's attempt to remove Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War was made because Stanton would continue to implement congressional Reconstruction policy as long as he remained in office. Using the power of the presidency to aid those attempting to undermine the United States is exactly the kind of thing presidential impeachment was intended to address.
Didn't Johnson interfering with the post office have something to do with it as well?
No. The articles of impeachment against Andrew Johnson mention the post office exactly zero times.
From the Wikipedia article on Johnson's impeachment:
Johnson was impeached for breaching the Tenure of Office Act, of course. The later case involved the Postmaster.
AFZ
Biden said it was very hard to keep up with Trump's lies during the debate, something like 50 lies.
So far, I believe I've heard Biden himself first claim 26 and then 28 lies, at the waffle house and the Stephanopolous debate respectively.
Personally, I don't think it's a good look to be inconsistent about the number of lies, especially when in both cases he cited the New York Times as his source.
The soft bigotry of low expectations.
That would be exciting, but I see no indication that Biden’s going to quit, or that any Democrats with enough influence to convince him to quit will publicly say that he should.
Both Biden and Trump (who obviously would rather run against Biden) have said that having convention delegates (“party elites”), rather than primary voters, pick a nominee after primary voters overwhelmingly voted for Biden would be undemocratic.
Most prominent Black Democratic leaders are firmly behind Biden (I think too much is being read into Jim Clyburn’s hypothesizing), as is Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, representing the left of the party, and Senator John Fetterman of PA, representing a populist, blue collar, anti-establishment progressivism very different than AOC’s. I worry that the parts of the party that are most willing to stick their neck out to pressure Biden out are highly educated white establishment types like me. The activist grassroots and long-serving working class volunteers in the party seem to think party unity is the best way to beat Trump and that choosing a new candidate is opening a Pandora’s box. And quite a few of them, although they want Kamala Harris to be the nominee IF Biden steps down and would be mad if she wasn’t, think Harris’ chances against Trump are even worse than Biden’s.
So I feel caught in this weird limbo where most editorial writers and pundits in mainstream media make it seem that any sensible person wants Biden to not run, but most progressives I know on social media - who are much more politically active than I am - think that any talk of replacing Biden is West Wing fan fiction and Democrats need to hunker down and beat the fascists.