A Pelosi Democrat

32 House Members favor impeachment. Donald Payne Jr. is not one of them. What has he accomplished as a Rep. other than being his father's son?

He probably knows more about Pence than we do.

Mike Pence as 'the lesser of two evils'? I don't think so.  Trump is getting really bad stuff done all the time.  Donald P's vision seems pretty limited to the status quo.

I'm not clear about what the point of this thread is.

If the point is that Rep. Payne supports Speaker Pelosi's strategy on investigations right now, that represents my point of view as well, so he's representing me on that.

nohero said:
I'm not clear about what the point of this thread is.
If the point is that Rep. Payne supports Speaker Pelosi's strategy on investigations right now, that represents my point of view as well, so he's representing me on that.

 My sentiments exactly. I think Pelosi has this right

des said:
Donald P's vision seems pretty limited to the status quo.

According to the page at des's link, two weeks ago Rep. Payne introduced the “Payment Choice Act of 2019”, because: "A growing number of retail establishments, across the nation, have adopted 'cashless policies', declaring that they refuse to accept United States cash payment from their customers and, instead, require that payment for the goods and services offered by such retailers be made only with credit cards, debit cards, or digital payment methods that result in electronic transfers of funds to the retailer."  If you define "status quo" as "being able to use real money at the store", then he is for the "status quo".

with Pelosi in this thread’s title, I think Mrs Pelosi needs to spend more time in her home state and San Francisco district....

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/22/opinion/california-housing-nimby.html

Why isn’t hypocrisy funny?

An impeachment in the house would involve investigation. So why not do it? Lack of spine? Afraid someone will say "boo"? 

The impeachment vote would be like a grand jury with the evidence looked at and brought forward to the public. A vote would be like an indictment, which if passed then is presented to the senate.

Its the lack of impetus, lack of will, that causes Democrats to often lose even though their policies are more popular. Democrats debate and discuss, Republicans do.

I see a 2020 Trump rally:

"Those Democrats and their fake investigations. Fake, fake, fake. You know why they didn't impeach? Because I did nothing wrong. Nothing. They had five Democratic committees investigating me and they found nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Was ever a president so persecuted as me? Democrats, a bunch of phonies." 

Crowd roars. Lock em [Democrats] up, lock up em up, keep America great, keep America great.

ps - just saw this, NYT Michelle Goldberg:

Nancy Pelosi’s case against impeachment is growing incoherent.

mtierney said:
with Pelosi in this thread’s title, I think Mrs Pelosi needs to spend more time in her home state and San Francisco district....
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/22/opinion/california-housing-nimby.html
Why isn’t hypocrisy funny?

 What this thread and that column have in common:  neither are actually about Speaker Pelosi.

mtierney said:
with Pelosi in this thread’s title, I think Mrs Pelosi needs to spend more time in her home state and San Francisco district....
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/22/opinion/california-housing-nimby.html
Why isn’t hypocrisy funny?

 Such an important article that you felt the need to link to it in two different threads despite the fact that it already is the subject of its' own thread.  

I'm not aware of Nancy Pelosi's power over state and local legislation in California. Can you explain how it works? Are US Congresspeople typically involved at the local zoning board level?

BG9 said:
An impeachment in the house would involve investigation. So why not do it? Lack of spine? Afraid someone will say "boo"? 
The impeachment vote would be like a grand jury with the evidence looked at and brought forward to the public. A vote would be like an indictment, which if passed then is presented to the senate.
Its the lack of impetus, lack of will, that causes Democrats to often lose even though their policies are more popular. Democrats debate and discuss, Republicans do.
I see a 2020 Trump rally:
"Those Democrats and their fake investigations. Fake, fake, fake. You know why they didn't impeach? Because I did nothing wrong. Nothing. They had five Democratic committees investigating me and they found nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Was ever a president so persecuted as me? Democrats, a bunch of phonies." 
Crowd roars. Lock em [Democrats] up, lock up em up, keep America great, keep America great.


ps - just saw this, NYT Michelle Goldberg:
Nancy Pelosi’s case against impeachment is growing incoherent

Impeachment is the correct course of action.  And for Pelosi not to consider it because she's afraid of some kind of (likely nonexistent) backlash is cowardice of the highest order.  People don't talk about it much, but by taking money for his wall that wasn't appropriated by Congress, Trump committed a very serious offense against the Constitution.  That alone should have been sufficient to impeach him.

nohero said:
I'm not clear about what the point of this thread is.
If the point is that Rep. Payne supports Speaker Pelosi's strategy on investigations right now, that represents my point of view as well, so he's representing me on that.

 I think the status quo sucks, on all levels.  

How can we progress if our district's elected Representative has no vision, no leadership for change, no alliance with progressive voices?

des said:

nohero said:
I'm not clear about what the point of this thread is.
If the point is that Rep. Payne supports Speaker Pelosi's strategy on investigations right now, that represents my point of view as well, so he's representing me on that.

 I think the status quo sucks, on all levels.  

How can we progress if our district's elected Representative has no vision, no leadership for change, no alliance with progressive voices?

We don't progress. The district overwhelmingly favors his party. A situation that often guarantees a comfortable life tenure. Why put yourself out, risk being an outlier, when you're in comfort?

Sometimes, rarely, tenure can fail. As happened to Joe Crowley. In a heavy one party leaning districts its not elections that are a threat, its the primaries.

Pelosi is tough and the leader for Dems in the Senate.   She delivered the recent landslide 2018 victory and there's no reason to start doubting her political experience and intuition.

And I like how she triggers Trump and his minions.

The goal is to get Trump out of office, and there aren't the votes in the Senate to convict -- at least certainly not now. Republicans will have to break with Trump for impeachment to be a viable path to removing him from office, and that would take something like the economy cratering or one or two of the SCOTUS judges he appointed voting to uphold Roe.

Given this, I think Pelosi's strategy's been smart. Ramping up the investigations keeps pressure on Trump while avoiding handing him the vindication of a failed impeachment push. Depending on what the investigations uncover, best case scenario we actually do get something that causes significant Republican defections and makes impeachment plausible, but failing that it keeps Trump's lawlessness and corruption visible, making defeating him in 2020 more likely.

It also makes the Democrats look responsible, so that should it come to impeachment after all, it looks more like duty than politics. Compare this with, say, Benghazi, where Republicans took serious substantive questions around security of our embassies and turned them into baseless political attacks -- here we have a political process (impeachment) that Democrats have kept more focused on substantive issues (criminality by the president and his administration). If Pelosi times things well, should we get to impeachment proceedings they'll be happening as the 2020 election ramps up, with increasing exposure of Trump's misdeeds, so that the public rather than the Senate becomes the deciders.

PVW said:
The goal is to get Trump out of office, and there aren't the votes in the Senate to convict -- at least certainly not now. Republicans will have to break with Trump for impeachment to be a viable path to removing him from office, and that would take something like the economy cratering or one or two of the SCOTUS judges he appointed voting to uphold Roe.
Given this, I think Pelosi's strategy's been smart. Ramping up the investigations keeps pressure on Trump while avoiding handing him the vindication of a failed impeachment push. Depending on what the investigations uncover, best case scenario we actually do get something that causes significant Republican defections and makes impeachment plausible, but failing that it keeps Trump's lawlessness and corruption visible, making defeating him in 2020 more likely.
It also makes the Democrats look responsible, so that should it come to impeachment after all, it looks more like duty than politics. Compare this with, say, Benghazi, where Republicans took serious substantive questions around security of our embassies and turned them into baseless political attacks -- here we have a political process (impeachment) that Democrats have kept more focused on substantive issues (criminality by the president and his administration). If Pelosi times things well, should we get to impeachment proceedings they'll be happening as the 2020 election ramps up, with increasing exposure of Trump's misdeeds, so that the public rather than the Senate becomes the deciders.

+1 gazillion

it also signals that any future president can get away with virtually anything and not be impeached, provided he/she is popular enough with primary voters.  If Trump is not someone who should be impeached, who would be?  

ml1 said:
it also signals that any future president can get away with virtually anything and not be impeached, provided he/she is popular enough with primary voters.  If Trump is not someone who should be impeached, who would be?  

 +1

Also, if there is an active impeachment proceeding in place, Dems have a stronger argument in support of the for need for documents or testimony in front of panels.  Right now demands for such things are being met with the argument that they are only pursuing political ends.  

And it would be nice to get  a few more Republicans to start talking openly about impeachment and to grow on that momentum, so the Senate has to actually think about their careers before voting.

ml1 said:
it also signals that any future president can get away with virtually anything and not be impeached, provided he/she is popular enough with primary voters.  If Trump is not someone who should be impeached, who would be?  

 Impeachment is a political process. Being popular enough with enough voters is indeed insulation. So the question, again, is how to make Trump unpopular enough to ensure he's removed from office. I don't see that happening yet, but I think Pelosi's been doing a decent job so far of handing Trump a shovel and encouraging him to dig.

I don't see impeachment as a path to removal from office.  I see it as congress fulfilling its' constitutional role of oversight, and to make his head explode.  I don't buy the argument that it will rile up his base and win him the election.  His base will be riled up about something regardless so might as well do what the Constitution dictates.  And once the House votes to impeach, the Dems should never say another word about it.  He'll know he was impeached, that is enough.  

Red_Barchetta said:
I don't see impeachment as a path to removal from office.  I see it as congress fulfilling its' constitutional role of oversight, and to make his head explode.  I don't buy the argument that it will rile up his base and win him the election.  His base will be riled up about something regardless so might as well do what the Constitution dictates.  And once the House votes to impeach, the Dems should never say another word about it.  He'll know he was impeached, that is enough.  

 I guess I'm having a hard time understanding what that accomplishes.

Same day as this thread was started, Rep. Payne was an original co-sponsor of this:

H.R.2975 - To protect a woman's ability to determine whether and when to bear a child or end a pregnancy, and to protect a health care provider's ability to provide reproductive health care services, including abortion services.

Donald Payne Jr is very comfortable in the seat his father held for so many years.  The fact that his son is named Donald Payne III probably gives us a glimpse of what the future holds for this district over the next 50 years or so.  

Personally, I think Representative Collum has a nice ring to it but, in its current configuration, I don't think anyone with a name other than Payne has much of a chance in this district.

dave said:
Pelosi is tough and the leader for Dems in the Senate.   She delivered the recent landslide 2018 victory and there's no reason to start doubting her political experience and intuition.
And I like how she triggers Trump and his minions.

I question her intuition. The landslide was due to disgust of Trump, not Pelosi's wonderfulness. Which is why we've seen Pelosi supporters like Joe Crowley get replaced by a progressive.

Remember Obama's refusing to act regarding Russian interference before the election? Obama was afraid that investigating and going public would cause the Democrats of being accused of playing election politics. Obama failed the constitutional duty to protect the country from the political by a foreign country, Russia. His fecklessness was supported by Pelosi, who advised him the safe thing to do is to sweep it under. To do nothing. So much for her intuition.

You can bet if the situation was reversed, that is a Republican president and Democratic corruption with Russia there would have been a full investigation.

The French had a corruption issue with the some of their presidential candidates before their general election, the one that elected Macron. They did not sweep it under the covers, fearing politicization. They publicly investigated. They did not assert the fecklessness Obama did because of McConnel's threats and Pelosi's advice.

So, continue Democrats, the fecklessness, the hand wringing. Be safe and don't risk anything.

BG9 said:
I question her intuition. The landslide was due to disgust of Trump, not Pelosi's wonderfulness. Which is why we've seen Pelosi supporters like Joe Crowley get replaced by a progressive.
Remember Obama's refusing to act regarding Russian interference before the election? Obama was afraid that investigating and going public would cause the Democrats of being accused of playing election politics. Obama failed the constitutional duty to protect the country from the political by a foreign country, Russia. His fecklessness was supported by Pelosi, who advised him the safe thing to do is to sweep it under. To do nothing. So much for her intuition.
You can bet if the situation was reversed, that is a Republican president and Democratic corruption with Russia there would have been a full investigation.
The French had a corruption issue with the some of their presidential candidates before their general election, the one that elected Macron. They did not sweep it under the covers, fearing politicization. They publicly investigated. They did not assert the fecklessness Obama did because of McConnel's threats and Pelosi's advice.
So, continue Democrats, the fecklessness, the hand wringing. Be safe and don't risk anything.

 You make valid points, but I think removing her from her leadership role would also be interpreted as a sign of weakness.   Catch 22.

At the very least, give Nancy Pelosi some time to see her hairdresser. Always, totally groomed, well dressed, and attractive, of late, however, she appears frazzled. I know I am being catty, but I view it as being observant. My cat agrees with me.

mtierney said:
At the very least, give Nancy Pelosi some time to see her hairdresser. Always, totally groomed, well dressed, and attractive, of late, however, she appears frazzled. I know I am being catty, but I view it as being observant. My cat agrees with me.

 Trump supporters should NOT go into hair commentary territory.

mtierney said:
At the very least, give Nancy Pelosi some time to see her hairdresser. Always, totally groomed, well dressed, and attractive, of late, however, she appears frazzled. I know I am being catty, but I view it as being observant. My cat agrees with me.

I guess this is the new right wing talking point -- it echoes Kellyanne's silly complaints that Pelosi treated her like her hair or makeup stylist when she was at the White House last week.  But I guess stupid memes like this are effective with the low IQ GOP voter.