The question isn't if... it's when. We've already seen how far the left will go and the only reason they aren't jailing those they disagree with is because they can't.

Yet.

You don't have faith it would have been handled the same but you have faith that a Democrat would have had these charges against them?

Just for comparison... Hillary committed misdemeanors that LITERALLY was money crimes to influence an election. The exact same "crimes" that Trump had turned into felonies (without actual evidence of the crimes).

The problem we are in today is that these cases (4 of them) are obviously, blatantly and undeniably political and everyone knows that if Trump wasn't running for reelection or if Trump wasn't a Republican? These charges wouldn't be brought.

> it wasn't tested because

exactly. It wasn't tested. A draft grand jury indictment isn't an indictment.

> you aware of any former presidents where a prosecutor concluded that criminal charges were warranted

Are you aware of any prosecutors that were illegally appointed and paid for? because if you want to talk details, stuff like that is important as well. Florida wasn't appointed properly.

And, lets be honest... a lot of the "proof" is suspect. IE: The J6 committee that hid and deleted evidence from Republicans or the Jean trial where character evidence wasn't allowed showing that she's crazy. (Oh... statute of limitations be damned as well for a he said-she said civil trial).

The end of the story the main problem is you can complain that SCOTUS would do differently if it was another party... but you can't do that and ignore the fact that these cases are getting to the SCOTUS because the lower courts are treating Trump differently because of party and politics.

Weaponization of the "Justice System".

> Last thought - the classified documents case is one where Trump has gotten extreme leniency compared to what an ordinary defendant would get

Really? I find it extremly lenient to not charge a Senator for keeping classified documents unsecured in his garage. I find it lenient for another Senator to not get charged for storing classified info on an illegal server then deleting the evidence that was under subpoena.

Yet somehow... it's lenient that a POTUS who's working with the "archive" gets raided without warning and a photo op happens? then the prosecutor admits to doctoring evidence?

Trump is being treated leniently?

We have a different definition of lenient, I think :)

and now we are in a court full of conservatives who are doing judicial activist and that's bad and their decisions should be over turned, the courts should be expanded and those we disagree with should be charged with crimes, etc.

That argument goes both ways.

The reality is we are having the conversations as a result of the Justice System being abused SOLEY because one side is charging a political opponent with EVERYTHING they can think of by stretching laws in ways that were never intended.

Previous Presidents weren't presumed immune? That's never been tested because previous presidents weren't prosecuted - despite clear evidence that things have been done wrong but any president you can choose. Biden, Obama, Bush, Clinton, etc? Pick your president and we can probably find crimes worth prosecuting. Yet... it didn't happen previously.

What we have now is CLEARLY political persecution against a political rival. Crimes he's being charged with (IE: his "felony") are done by others (IE: hillary who was convicted of money crimes and paid fines to influence an election) and yet not thrown to the wolves via political persecution.

Why are we here? because of the weaponization of the court system.

"his own lawyer" lawyers talk shit... we now know, per SCOTUS, the correc tpath.

"presumed immune" I don't think that the President should be immune, per-se... but the crux of the current problem is Democrats going after a Republican - and vice versa, if that was to happen.

Remember... Trump said "lock her up". Then didn't. (and yes, she's not the POTUS - thankfully - but my point stands).

Trump's response through the courts is in response to Democrats prosecution through the courts.

For example... he was charged with and became a "felon" for misdemeanor charges (no clue what those were) bumped up to felonies for "election interference".

Meanwhile: Hillary was charged with and actually convicted of those things - misdemeanor charges that she paid a $130k fine for (if I'm not mistaken). Doing stuff to influence an election. The exact thing that should have been turned into a "felony" per the law as being used by Democrats.

We are at this place, arguing about presidential immunity, which we haven't been to before because one side is actively persecuting a rival who they LITERALLY wouldn't be persecuting if he wasn't running for office again.

So the "the president isn't presumed immune" was never tested because the Justice System was never weaponized before.

The good lawyers giveth... the good lawyers taketh away. Judicial activism overturned by judicial activism.

The trump immunity case put forth what has always been - Presidents aren't charged without being impeached first. Something the left was trying to change. because lets be real... others - ie: Clinton lying under oath. Obama bombing countries. Bush. etc. All have done "criminal" things. The only difference is both sides of elites don't like Trump so the left decided to try and treat him differently. Which got rejected as it should be.

and besides that... "direct contradiction to established law" is a direct contradiction to what actually happened. The left was trying to wrangle laws into directions not intended to be overly broad - like they are doing to jail "J6" people.

The problem is that the conversation only focuses on the good parts of those systems and ignores the issues.

You can't have a real conversation and claim "have it better" when that may be true in parts but not in whole.

I don't claim the US system is better... or the best. But claiming that government ran or government overregulation leads to better is a lie. The VA is proof of that. the lies around the unACA is proof of that. The ever increasing prices and decreasing results due to government influence is proof of that.

Destroying what we have with something like the ACA isn't proof that government ran will be better... it's simply proof that people are willing to destroy what was working and claim that the destroyers will do a better job if only they have more money and more power.

That's like CA solving homelessness. "more money, more power and we'll solve homelessness" and there's never been more homelessness or less affordability in CA.

The problem is the suggestion that government solutions will solve government created problems.

I have no problem admitting things can be fixed... but stuff like the unAffordable Care Act which is built on lies (Like your plan? Like your doctor? save $2500/year) is not going to solve the issues - nor is single payer, government ran solutions.

You'll never solve government created problems with government ran beauracracy.

"it's not perfect" It's garbage and a prime example of government programs. Works for a few and fucks over the rest.

The ACA helps a few... and is built on lies - keep your plan? keep your doctor? save $2500 a year? Lies, lies, lies... a few million get help. The other 100m pay more, higher deductibles, lose their plans, lose their doctors.

But who cares about the 100m if the 1m get helped, eh?

the biggest problem is the wasted money, the lies and the people dying in the parking lots.

But who gives a f' about them eh?

Increasing taxes and removing alternatives is never a good deal.

"market forces aren't enough" government forces aren't enough either.

The VA is the penultimate example and I wouldn't wish that upon my worst enemy. That's where our veterans go to commit suicide in the parking lots waiting on help.

22 Veterans.

The reason life is so expensive OBVIOUSLY isn't because of the massive and ever increasing tax burden. NOOOO of course not. Its because people aren't taxed enough.

So lets increase taxes more so we can have goverment solutions to the government problem. Obviously we simply aren't governmenting enough.

Yo dawg... I heard you like government. So I got some government to put in your government!

Don't give up good in the pursuit of perfect.

If we get a few of these types of solutions - IE Growing algea to pull it from the air and burning it to get electricity and "putting it back"? If scaled? that can be the path forward - especially if we're getting electricity on both sides of the fence.

The issue with gas/oil/petrol is that the "cycle" is pull from ground and pump into air without a way to pull it back from the air.

So yes, this puts CO2 back into the air... after pulling it out of the air. So how is it not a step forward?

But seriously... stuff like this ("ZOMG MIRACLE BATTERY! MIRACLE SOLUTION! ZOMG!) seem to disappear because it takes years to turn an idea into a demo... and longer to get a demo to market and to scale.

We are surrounded by stuff that followed that route but I hope stuff like this actually makes it to market.

"more supply" which is why I included places like CA that have had DECADES of shortages because of regulation, corruption, NIMBY, etc.

When you add the need for "more supply" to the need for investors to recoup costs, increased costs to build (IE: More safety features, solar requirements, etc), increased interest rates, etc?

It's easy to say supply and it's easy to say "towns used to pop up"... it's harder to admit that there's only so much space and those easy to pop-up areas are becoming fewer because there's fewer places to put up "towns" out of nowhere.

Add to that "investment" in rentals and the like.

it all adds up. I assume it's going to get worse.

What we have is imperfect capitalism vs imperfect communism vs imperfect socialism vs ...

The reality is that imperfect capitalism, despite its flaws, is better than the alternatives, despite the attempt to ignore their flaws.

Because that's the only way you can argue socialism is better... is arguing the idea of socialism vs the reality of capitalism.

We can discuss the "line" that gets drawn but when that line crosses from one system to the other? We can absolutely judge Capitalism vs Socialism vs Communism.

Outside of the US, do people think that truth can be changed because you aren't in the US? Just deny literally 100+ years of history?

The only way Socialism works is in The Utopia that's never existed.

The real life examples of socialism are authoritarian nightmares. Thinking that outside of the US this isn't still true is an... interesting... attempt to deny history.