“Don’t be distracted by Trump’s showmanship and buffoonery. Look instead at the essence of what he is trying to do: Save himself from possible impeachment by subverting the rule of law and enhancing tribalism at the expense of citizenship.” ~ The Washington Post
In a stunning revelation, The New York Times published a letter from Trump’s attorney to Special Counsel Robert Mueller asserting Trump’s “unfettered authority over all federal investigations.”
In a companion article, The New York Times wrote:
Trump’s lawyers have for months quietly waged a campaign to keep the special counsel from trying to force him to answer questions in the investigation into whether he obstructed justice, asserting that he cannot be compelled to testify and arguing in a confidential letter that he could not possibly have committed obstruction because he has unfettered authority over all federal investigations.
In a brash assertion of presidential power, the 20-page letter — sent to the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, and obtained by The New York Times — contends that the president cannot illegally obstruct any aspect of the investigation into Russia’s election meddling because the Constitution empowers him to, “if he wished, terminate the inquiry, or even exercise his power to pardon.”
The Washington Post responded on Monday with a fiery op-ed, aptly titled: “His Majesty Czar Donald I claims imperium.” [Imperium being defined by Webster as “supreme power or absolute dominion,” or “the right to command or to employ the force of the state.”]
The opening words of the article, written by Pulitzer Prize winning writer Eugene Robinson, set the tone:
Trump is a bald-faced liar who covered up collusion between his campaign and the Russians, tried to derail a federal investigation and claims to be above the law like some tin-pot dictator. This is not my assessment. It is what Trump and his attorneys proudly proclaim.
Don’t be distracted by Trump’s showmanship and buffoonery. Look instead at the essence of what he is trying to do: Save himself from possible impeachment by subverting the rule of law and enhancing tribalism at the expense of citizenship. In place of “E Pluribus Unum” he attempts to substitute a very different idea of the nation and what it stands for: “Just Win, Baby.”
A confidential Jan. 29 letter from Trump’s legal team to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, first published Saturday by the New York Times, gives copious new evidence — as if more were needed — of the president’s utter shamelessness and his smirking contempt for the people he is sworn to represent. [emphasis added]
After discussing the revelation that Trump himself dictated the initial “Don Jr. explanation” of the reason for the now-infamous Trump Tower meeting, The Washington Post wrote:
We have a president who lies constantly about matters big and small, a president whose word we can never trust. How can we accept that? How can democracy and constitutional order function in contempt, rather than reverence, of truth?
Trump is untroubled by this question because democracy and constitutional order, to the extent he understands them, do not seem to be what he has in mind. Rather, he claims imperium. [emphasis added]
After detailing and discussing more of the unmitigated audacity displayed by Trump and his legal team, The Washington Post turned to Trump’s Monday morning tweet in which he asserted he had “the absolute right to PARDON” himself, and concluded the article writing of the importance of getting out the vote in the November midterm elections:
Pardon himself? Is he President Trump or His Majesty Czar Donald I?
Trump has flagrantly abused his power. The Constitution gives Congress the authority to constrain or remove him, but Republicans in both chambers refuse to act or even speak out. We the people must take our stand in November.
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