There is that possibility, but as a cult of personality, no one could get his base as excited to vote as if he were running.

I think, if his named successor looks like they could possibly win, it will drive independents and liberals to the polls in droves....but who knows by then.

Then we disagree. I say prosecuting a criminal is never the wrong move, especially when so many insist it’s not over yet, and that there was election fraud so no democracy, and that the treasonous insurrection was a patriotic act by law abiding patriots. Showing the unedited video evidence might snap some back to reality, stopping another domestic terrorist.
As for wasting money, estimates are we’ve spent well over 1/2 BILLION because of the coup attempt. Trying for some accountability to give the next attempted dictator pause, and force the right to distance themselves from their cancer or publicly embrace treason, is well worth the price, if it avoids a repeat it’s a 100/1 savings.
Then there’s the ‘sending a message to Biden that this isn’t ok’ angle. If he loses, do you want a repeated attempted coup? Consider Biden’s approval rating is insanely higher than Trump’s ever was....and if a January coup has no consequences, he’s obligated to try.

I must point out that, if, as he now claims but lost the vote, you can’t hold trial on an ex president....didn’t McConnel intentionally subvert justice by delaying a trial until he said it was too late and now unconstitutional? Shouldn’t he have a consequence?

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He makes a very persuasive argument.

But then, I think about how there are lots of counterexamples to the "legislation that gets out will be good legislation" bit. Patriot Act. DMCA. Citizens United. Homeland Security and Aviation and Transportation Security Acts.

I dunno. If there is a weakness in the system, perhaps it is that while the separation of powers theoretically makes it hard to get garbage in, it sure as hell also makes it nigh-on-impossible to get it out when any sneaks through.

I am becoming more and more convinced that sooner or later, there will be either a war, or a major terrorist incident (which will be blamed on "activist judges who don't respect the President's authority") and that will have huge repercussions. 9/11 allowed them to push through the Patriot Act, and there will be a new such thing, that is far greater reaching.

"Really, Hillary is evil?"

Well, Bill, I suppose it depends on your definition of evil, doesn't it.

To me, voting for both the invasion of Iraq and the Patriot Act (twice!) is an absolute disqualifier. Like it used to be in '08 when HRC ran against Obama. Remember that one, Bill?

Now, looking at it from a country that had its leaders punished for waging a war of aggression, and rightfully so, Hillary meets my definition of evil. Her push for war in Libya, her immoral comments on the ghastly death of Gaddafi, her militaristic calls for a more robust foreign policy (aka war), her calls for a no-fly zone in Syria (aka war with Syria & Russia)... Bill, that shit is evil. And it's only the lesser of two evils because her opposition is Trump.

So spare me the horseshit. I don't even have to judge her economic policies which basically are the same flavour of neoliberalism as always, her hawkishness is enough evil for several lifetimes.

I'm not well-informed enough about the contents of each of the 4 bills to concur with your "they were all shit" assessment (though I can certainly believe that might well be true).

But I bigtime agree with being against "knee jerk legislation" ... cough cough Patriot Act cough cough.

On the other hand, a very legitimate gripe about the Legislative branch of government is that it doesn't even pass "knee jerk" legislation because moving one's knees requires being alive with basic brain function. The Senate (and House) might as well be a fuckin' corpse with rigor mortis. Sits around and accomplishes nothing except getting increasingly putrefied as time goes by.

That would be great, who should I speak to about changing that culture of ours?

As far as letting people fly, I never said I agree with it. I was referring to it because President Obama used it as an example. I said, somewhat sarcastically, that it wasn't a constitutional right. I never said we SHOULD ban people from flying.

I absolutely do not think we should limit a person's ability to travel based on an arbitrary list, especially since this incident pretty much proves that it doesn't necessarily stop terrorists. If a gun ban was in place, the shooter would still have been able to get weapons because he was removed from the list for some unknown (as of yet) reason.

Yes, in hindsight the Patriot Act should never have been passed. That is one of the main points of what I have been saying. We are in a crisis situation and people are knee-jerking the way they did after 9/11. Do we really need to have our government pass the Patriot Act Part Deux?

I understand the anger, the sadness, even the rage we all are feeling right now because of this incident. I've tried to remain relatively calm and not release vitriol on anyone I've replied to. I'm sure that I might have angered quite a few by not caving on my stance, but I refuse to back down because someone is pissed at me. I am not a member of the NRA. I am a fiscal conservative, a constitutionalist, and yet still a liberalist when it comes to personal life styles or choices. I've voted Republican, Democrat, Independent, and Libertarian. I think the fact that Paul Ryan ignored a possible discussion on gun laws is a bunch of horseshit. We should be able to at least talk about things, even if we might not agree with each other.

@Mordhaus

"We have always been a gun violence culture up until the post WW2 era. Think frontier, wild west, duels, and mafia shootouts. We glorify violence everyday, we even give sickos who shoot up groups of people mass media coverage. "

Don't you think that that idea is outdated in 2016? Fine, that's the culture. Change the fucking culture.

When I grew up in Ireland, nobody gave a second thought to driving drunk. Sunday after church, people went to the pub, had a few pints with the neighbours, the kids played space invaders and then the whole family got back in the car and drove home.

And most of the time, it was absolutely fine. People got home, there was the occasional accident, but ya know, what can ya do?

Until it wasn't fine. And it took decades, but eventually, it became socially unacceptable to drive drunk.

"I'm just extremely leery of package deals like lets ban everyone who ends up on a list from having weapons based on a government decision."
I get that. But be reasonable. You're ok with not letting people fly, but you draw the line at owning weapons?

That is some fucked up list of priorities. I would be far more concerned with restricting someones right to travel (essentially restricting their freedom of movement, or a lighter form of incarceration) than whether they can own a gun.

You say that owning a gun is a constitutional right whereas travel isn't. I say that freedom of movement is a fundamental basic human right... oh, look at that, Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights!
"Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state."

I'm completely willing to say that it should be a lot harder to put someone on this kind of list, but there's no way the right to own a weapon is more important than freedom of movement.

Finally, re: slippery slopes
"The Patriot Act, meant to be a well intended set of rules to help us protect ourselves, has been perverted to lessen quite a few of our rights."

The Patriot Act wasn't a slippery slope, it started at the bottom of the slope and went straight over a fucking cliff. It should never have been passed in the first place.

We have always been a gun violence culture up until the post WW2 era. Think frontier, wild west, duels, and mafia shootouts. We glorify violence everyday, we even give sickos who shoot up groups of people mass media coverage. For a person who wants to go out in a blaze of infamy, we are custom tailored to give them their last 15 minutes of 'fame'.

Again, we have a nebulous definition of what it takes to get on the watch list. I could be placed on it simply by stating something to the effect that "I support ISIS", even though I don't. Restricting people who manage to end up on a government list is the same as removing their right to a firearm after committing a felony offense, only you have removed every single bit of their right to a legal defense. There is no due process to being placed on a US watchlist, you get put on and fuck you if it was a mistake. Maybe they'll take you off later, who knows?

I am not going to defend a slippery slope argument on this, I don't have to. It's already happened in the years since 2001. The Patriot Act, meant to be a well intended set of rules to help us protect ourselves, has been perverted to lessen quite a few of our rights. Not only our rights, but other countries. We have violated their security, spied on their people and leaders, and we perform acts of war on their territories with impugnity. All because we lost two buildings and 2,996 people; a heinous act, but one our government exploited to put us into 2 wars with a death toll to people who may not even be our enemies that dwarf our loss. In short, we fucking have the slippery slope process down to a SCIENCE.

I've never supported loss of freedom for security, but yeah, it was one of the many things that the general public was willing to give up after 9/11. The Patriot Act is literally the stupidest thing we have ever allowed to go into place and the sad thing is that most of the people who voted for it didn't even bother to read it.

Gun violence is definitely part of our culture. It's almost a joke to see that the places that are the most restricted on guns usually have the higher rates of gun violence. Florida is the odd one out this time, they have relaxed gun laws and still got hit. I guess one thing that made it worse is that most places that sell alcohol for a certain amount of their profit (bars/clubs/etc) aren't allowed to permit concealed carry holders on premises. I fully understand the logic behind that, alcohol and weapons of any type don't mix, but maybe some armed security guards?

That is not the point. Government works a certain way and rarely is it in the favor of individual liberties. We knee jerked after 9/11 and created the Patriot Act, you know, the set of rules that gave us torture, drone strikes/raids into sovereign nations without their permission, and the NSA checking everything.

If you ban people from one of their constitutional rights because they end up on a government watchlist, then you have set a precedent for further banning. Then next we can torture people in lieu of the 5th amendment because they are on a watchlist (oh wait, we sorta already did that to a couple of us citizens in Guantanamo). The FBI fucked up and removed this guy from surveillance, even though he had ample terrorist cred. That shouldn't have happened, but should we lose our freedom because of their screw up?

As disparate and fractured as US society is, I think that one good catastrophe could still unite us.

Politicians used 9/11 that way, and we actually did come together quite a bit. They turned that unity into terrible purposes, (unnecessary and idiotic wars, Patriot Act, torture programs, stomping on constitutional protections, mass surveillance, etc.) but a lot of stuff got done.

I'm more optimistic (if that is at all the right word) about the unifying power of a Trumptastrophe, AND optimistic about our ability to spin a reaction to a Trumptastrophe in a more positive direction than what happened after 9/11, but I can easily understand your reservations also.

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I'm guessing that Clinton will say/has said she doesn't remember where Sanders was during the fight against the patriot act either....just like she 'didn't remember' that he was right there with her during the health care fight in the 90's, and like her supporters 'didn't remember where he was' during the civil rights movement.

Italy:
Renzi is creating the conditons for a new bubble? Through deficit spending on... what? Unless they start building highways in the middle of nowhere like they did in Spain, I don't see any form of bubble coming out of deficit spending in Italy. The country's been in a major recession for quite some time now, with no light at the end of the tunnel and a massive shortfall in private spending. But meaningful deficit spending requires Renzi to tell Germany and the Eurogroup to pound sand -- not sure his balls have descended far enough for that just yet.

Referendum in Switzerland:
"Vollgeld". That's the German term for what the initiators of this referendum are aiming for: 100% reserve banking. It's monetarism in disguise, and they are adament to not be called monetarists. But that's what it is. Pure old-fashioned monetarism. Even if you don't give a jar of cold piss about all these fancy economic terms and theories, let me ask you this: the currency you use is quite an important part of all your daily life, isn't it? So why would anyone in his or her right mind remove it entirely from democratic control (even constitutionally)?
If you want to get into the economic nightmares of it, here are a few bullet points:
- no Overt Monetary Financing (printing money for deficit spending) means no lender of last resort and complete dependence on the market, S&P can tell you to fuck off and die as they did with PIIGS
- notion that the "right amount of money in circulation" will enable the market to keep itself in balance -- as if that ever worked
- notion that a bunch of technocrats can empirically determine this very amount in regular intervalls
- central bank is supposed to maintain price stability, nothing else -- single mandate, works beautifully for the ECB, at least if you like 25% unemployment
- concept is founded in the notion that the financial economy is the source of (almost) all problems of the "real" economy, thereby completely ignoring the fact that decades of wage suppression have simply killed widescale purchasing power of the masses, aka demand

Visegrad nations:
From a German perspective, they are walking on thin ice as it is. The conflict with Russia never had much support of the public to begin with, but even the establishment is becoming more divided on this issue. Given the authoritarian policies put in place in Poland recently and the utter refusal to take in their share of refugees, support might fade even more. If the Visegrad governments then decide to push for further conflict with Russia, Brussels and Berlin might tell them, very discreetly, to pipe the fuck down.

Turkey:
Wildcard. He mentioned how they will mess with Syria, the Kurds and Russia, but forgot to mention the conflict between Turkey and the EU. As of now, it seems as if Brussels is ready to pay Ankara in hard cash if they keep refugees away from Greece. Very similar to the deal with Morocco vis-a-vis the Spanish enclave. As long as they die out of sight, all is good for Brussels.

I would add France as a point of interest:
They recently announced that the state of emergency will be extended until ISIS is beaten. In other words, it'll be permanent, just like the Patriot Act in the US. A lof of attention has been given to the authoritarian shift of politics in Poland, all the while ignoring the equally disturbing shift in France. Those emergency measures basically suspend the rule of law in favour of a covert police state. Add the economic situation (abysmal), the Socialist President who avoids socialist policies, and the still ongoing rise of Front National... well, you get the picture.

Regarding the EU, I'll say this: between the refugee crisis (border controls, domestic problems, etc) and the economic crisis, they finally managed to convince me that this whole thing might come apart at the seams after all. Not this year, though, even if the Brits decide to distance themselves from this rotten creation.