This is fucking brilliant

[ex-khobar Andy]

Many of the responses on line take the form: how dare he? Even from the partisan 'left' which can be every bit as hidebound as the right, we hear that the only way to take action is through the constitution: at the ballot box in 2018 and 2020; through impeachment; or through the 25th amendment.

At the risk of proving Godwin's Law, there comes a point at which the honorable course is to refuse superior orders. Actively preventing those orders from being carried out is more so. I see the actions of this person as similar to Warrant Officer Johnson at My Lai: he was the helicopter pilot, ranked lower than 2LT Calley, who prevented a greater loss of life by threatening to shoot fellow American soldiers who participated in the massacre (and I am well aware that that is a very simplified version of the incident). Johnson of course was never anonymous.

Some of this turmoil may be due in part to a phrase in NYT's justification for running an anonymous piece: "We have done so at the request of the author, a senior official in the Trump administration whose identity is known to us and whose job would be jeopardized by its disclosure." [My emphasis.]. That reads as if he (??) is just protecting his (??) paycheck. I doubt that this is the motivation: I suspect that many senior operatives could make much more elsewhere, and I would like to think that s/he is doing this because someone else may not have the same qualms and might in fact do what is necessary to enact Trump's crazier notions and bring down the temple around all our ears. I think that this person is doing us all a favor. There is simply not time to wait for election results: even if we have a Democratic Senate and House in November, it might slow him down but it won't stop him. Being a slow witted and vindictive fuckhead is not an impeachable offense. And good luck with the 2/3 majority needed for a 25th amendment removal even after November.

[Guinevere]

Not time to wait for election results? You’re advocating a coup? That’s not how it works, not how I want it to work, and certainly not in line with this persons swearing to support and defend the Constitution.

This is just more “Jeff Flake” level false hero worship. Stop talking about how great you are and do something. Openly. Use your name, position, and influence to make real change, in accord with the laws of this land. So long as people continue to be cowards, and refuse to uphold the Constitution, and put self-interest first (which is what this person is doing), nothing will change.

[wesw]

bravo, guin, bravo.....

[Big RR]

Guin--I agree. I cannot cheer this thwarting of elected authority (much as I vehemently disagree with the election outcome) because I cannot agree that someone unilaterally acting to thwart that authority and act on his or her own "in the interest of the country" is a good thing. It sounds a lot like Franco at the end of the Spanish Civil War. I far more trust the electorate than such an individual(s), who, frankly, scare the hell out of me.

eta: andy--re the refusal to obey orders, there is always that right when the order is illegal, but otherwise the chain of command must be respected, including the commander in chief. Here the orders may be unwise or idiotic, but they are not (to my understanding) illegal.

[ex-khobar Andy]

During the last days of Nixon, there were standing instructions to the military from Kissinger and Schlesinger (Secretary of Defense) that any presidential orders to use nuclear weapons should be cleared with them first. Nixon was the duly elected President; the 25th amendment had not been invoked and he had not been impeached. I for one am glad that even that old war criminal Kissinger had bypassed the constitution which was clearly inadequate to handle the then situation.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story ... xon-215478 is worth re=reading a year after its publication.

[Big RR]

Andy--understood, but as the Watergate tapes showed, these same individuals did the same things to thwart Nixon's ill-advised decisions a number of times, and that similarly scare the hell out of me, as well as a number of others who listened to the released portions/read the transcripts.

I for one am glad that even that old war criminal Kissinger had bypassed the constitution which was clearly inadequate to handle the then situation.

In retrospect, I can understand that because nothing bad happened (but what if it had been McArthur who ordered the nuclear bombing of China triggering a another world war? Or what if it took too long to find Kissinger or Schelssinger and we lost the ability to retaliate? Or what if...? the mind boggles). And I can think of many dictatorships that began with the same rationalization. If the Constitution is inadequate, make sure it is changed to made it acceptable, but it is the only way to protect our

[MajGenl.Meade]

World ends - agreeing with Sue, Guin and a bit of LJ at the same time? Yikes!

[wesw]

don t forget that you agree with me too....

....the end is nigh.

[Big RR]

Having a dish of sand Meade?

[ex-khobar Andy]

Big RR:

If the Constitution is inadequate, make sure it is changed to made it acceptable

Agree wholeheartedly. Case in point: if Trump is successfully impeached and convicted because of Russian collusion, we get Pence. How is that an improvement? - he would be just as illegitimate as President as his erstwhile boss. Of course it was the 12th amendment which did away with the originalist's idea that the person receiving the second highest number of EC votes would be VP - so had we stayed with the initial document Hillary Clinton would be VP and would succeed Trump on his eviction from office.

The constitution does not allow a do-over in the event of a flawed election. It should do: and perhaps you could have a sort of 'Regency' of ex-Presidents who would execute the office until such time as a clean election was held.

On the subject of illegal orders or what is sometimes called the Nuremberg Defence: the whole point was that even though the order was issued legally - proper chain of command and all that - if the order was to commit an illegal act such as murdering civilians, the soldier's duty is to refuse that order. Now the soldier does not have time to chase down the SCOTUS to determine if the action required is illegal, so s/he has to use conscience as the guide. By that same token if the President issues an order which, in the informed opinion of the person to who the order is issued, is likely illegal (e.g., separate children from their parents at the border and take them off to some camp somewhere and don't keep track) then it is his/her duty to refuse that order. If that person chooses to refuse it by sabotaging the order (e.g., by removing the paper from the President's desk) or purposely mangling the substance of the order so that underlings don't understand what they are asked to do, I don't have a problem with that.

I speak as someone who has a little experience of that in a work setting. I refused to carry out an order from the CEO; I was fired a few months later but I am under no illusion that it was unconnected to my original refusal - they waited long enough to make it difficult to draw a line from A to B. So far that decision has cost me around $200,000 by my estimate but I sleep well at night. I was somewhat, but not much, mollified to see that the company was later fined ~$250,000 by a state government because someone had not ignored a similar request. That CEO is still working for them (not as CEO) and of course I have no proof - I think that in today's business world I might be tempted to wear a bodycam and leave it on at all times.

PS - Meade - is that the strawberry incident?

[Burning Petard]

The 'conventional wisdom' is guessing the author is Mike Pence, the one person in the Administration that even Judge Kavanaugh would say Trump could not fire. The introductory statement by the NYT editors could be intentionally deceptive to further conceal the author.

However, the tweets about this from POTUS reveal a subtext about just how ignorant he is. Newspaper editorials are ALWAYS anonymous! They are supposed to represent the consensus view of that newspaper as an institution. The particular article in question was an OPINION piece, not an editorial.

This piece also informs just how far we are from the national government that was described on Saturday mornings on School House Rock.
The Senate and the House of Rep are nowhere near acting like an entity equal in power and authority to the Executive branch. This piece, and the forthcoming release of FEAR by Woodward present ample evidence that POTUS could and should be removed via the 25th amendment, section 4. The NY Times option piece clearly describes a white house staff already acting as if Trump is incapable of fulfilling his duty as president.

snailgate

[Big RR]

Andy--I cannot argue with you if the action ordered is likely illegal, I would have no problem with someone refusing to carry it out or even sabotaging it, but what if it isn't? What if it is stepping up the deportation of undocumented immigrants? Or rolling back some of the protections of the ACA? Or spending on a big parade? All legal things that are very stupid, and I would not support thwarting those policies even though I think they are boneheaded.

And even for the illegal policies, absent an emergency, I think it would be far better to come out publicly and let the people know what is happening. That's the way it should work in a democracy.

[ex-khobar Andy]

Andy--I cannot argue with you if the action ordered is likely illegal . . . All legal things that are very stupid, and I would not support thwarting those policies even though I think they are boneheaded.

As it happens the incident I described very briefly is apposite. In my CEO's defence I thought his order was scientifically unjustifiable and just plain ignorant and (because we were an operation predicated on protecting public health) not in the public interest - in short, boneheaded; I don't think that he thought it was illegal. Nevertheless I refused to do it, told him so, and hung up on him. I later (a few months later) found that in fact the feds had previously thought of just that very situation and had made my boss's request illegal.

[Guinevere]

As unsatisfying as it is, the remedy for a political process like an election, is the political process. This is not only true at the federal level, it is also true at the state and local level.

That's setting aside the fraud issue, but the remedy there is most likely in the hands of Congress, so its ultimately political as well.

[Big RR]

Well andy, in a company setting I have far less of a problem with any activities counter to management--I am generally only concerned in a governmental context. It's a tough decision to put your job on the line to do what you think is right, and it is rarely rewarded.

The closest I came to that was when a company I worked for instituted random drug testing; even though it had been a long time since my toking days, I opposed this and eventually left, making sure HR and management knew why I did leave (of course, I was helped by having somewhere else to go; it would have been much harder to leave on principle if I just wound up unemployed).

Guin, I agree.

[Bicycle Bill]

... the country is far better off having people highly placed within the Administration who are undermining Trump's efforts wreck our alliances and subordinate US policy to an enemy regime than we would be with a President being able to pursue these borderline treason policy objectives unimpeded...

The question that needs to be asked — and answered! — would be, "Is it treason to try to stop or thwart a traitor"?  Was it treason to thwart General Benedict Arnold's plot with the British?

Remember too, people were hanged or imprisoned by the Allies at Nuremberg because they were supposedly in position to thwart Adolf Hitler's Reich of Terror, but chose to remain passive.  They "went along in order to get along", in other words, and let the Nazis, the SS, the Gestapo, and the "Final Solution" go on unchecked.

Therefore, I submit that whatever anyone who swore an oath to defend this country and uphold the Constitution can do — short of an "Operation Valkyrie"-type plot (and who knows, it may yet come to that) — to thwart that pissant in the Oval Office is not only the legally right thing to do, it is the morally right thing to do.

-"BB"-

[Sue U]

Not time to wait for election results? You’re advocating a coup? That’s not how it works, not how I want it to work, and certainly not in line with this persons swearing to support and defend the Constitution.

This is just more “Jeff Flake” level false hero worship. Stop talking about how great you are and do something. Openly. Use your name, position, and influence to make real change, in accord with the laws of this land. So long as people continue to be cowards, and refuse to uphold the Constitution, and put self-interest first (which is what this person is doing), nothing will change.

Needless to say, but I'll say it anyway: Ditto. If you are as senior and as well-positioned as you say, Anonymous Op-Ed Writer, your public testimony would get the message out in a way that can't be denied by Administration flacks and might help goad the Cabinet and/or Congress to do their jobs, or at least to inform the electorate so that the people can make the appropriate changes in their representatives.

[Big RR]

Sue--

To be clear, ours is not the popular “resistance” of the left. We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous.

This is why that person will not "inform the electorate so that the people can make the appropriate changes in their representatives". That's likely the last thing they want.

[Sue U]

Sue--

To be clear, ours is not the popular “resistance” of the left. We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous.

This is why that person will not "inform the electorate so that the people can make the appropriate changes in their representatives". That's likely the last thing they want.

Right, because above all else, this self-congratulatory twerp is complicit in all the horrors visited by the Trump Administration on the people -- particularly minorities and the poor -- as long as his/her own interests are served.

[Guinevere]

Sue--

To be clear, ours is not the popular “resistance” of the left. We want the administration to succeed and think that many of its policies have already made America safer and more prosperous.

This is why that person will not "inform the electorate so that the people can make the appropriate changes in their representatives". That's likely the last thing they want.

Right, because above all else, this self-congratulatory twerp is complicit in all the horrors visited by the Trump Administration on the people -- particularly minorities and the poor -- as long as his/her own interests are served.

Exactamundo. Same reasons why Flake, wouldn't stand up, and McCain only did so at the very end, when his political life was not longer impacted. Remember, all of these people voted for all these horrific nominees, possibly including the anonymous coward.