The New Yorker
The New Yorker article discusses the impeachment inquiry from the report on Tuesday and how Trump is reacting to this impeachment process. The article emphasizes how Trump attempts to shirk these inquiries and advancements in the hearing by directing his federal officials to refuse to testify even when compelled. Additionally, Trump ordered his subordinates to "defy all duly authorized subpoenas for records." In response to Trump's behavior regarding the investigation, Adam Schiff, chairman of the Intelligence Committee, responds, "This is the result of a president who believes that he is beyond indictment, beyond impeachment, beyond any form of accountability, and, indeed, above the law."
Considering in today's class we discussed whether the president has too much or too little executive power and how oftentimes the public holds the POTUS to a certain standard that it could never amount to, this article attempt to address some of these topics. John Cassidy from the New Yorker argues that Americans are not holding the president accountable for his actions. Cassidy argues this is detrimental to a trusting relationship between the president and the public. Cassidy argues that if Trump gets away with his antics then this would set a terrible precedent for future presidents that there would be no repercussions for obvious abuses of power. This would represent the president as being above the very own law he creates, which makes for a rather hypocritical position. Also, someone who puts the national security and well-being of his constituents in jeopardy just to advance his own political ambitions might not be the best person to represent the people as a whole. Just a thought...
Oftentimes the public is suspicious of authority. To what degree should the American people be trusting of the presidency and its role and to what extent should we be skeptical?
Should the president be able to refuse to testify and even compel those under him to do so as well? What could this mean for future presidencies?
16 comments:
I do agree that there hasn't been enough action/reaction to Trump's atrocious actions during his presidency, and I do think the public should definitely hold him accountable. Additionally, Trump should also not be able to compel other offending members of his presidency to not testify. The people should be outraged at this blatant disregard for their justice system, and respond immediately.
Trump has been a controversy from the start. Many people don't agree on his actions, but then still a lot of people said great things about him. Regardless of what the trial is for, everybody must be there for the case on anyone. At this point Trump is being held in impeachment inquires. Trump should be at the court at least. He has a subpoena that has been issued but he won't go. This is an obvious breaking the law anyone can see. I don't understand how a blatant crime is obviously there.
I also believe that the public should feel a need for Trump to be investigated, at the very least. At this point it's clear that Trump has committed "High crimes and misdemeanors," and given Trump's history (https://www.npr.org/2017/11/08/561059555/trump-used-to-disparage-an-anti-bribery-law-will-he-enforce-it-now is an interesting read), the public should be skeptical. Trump should not be able to refuse to testify; that's clearly breaking the law.
If suspicion is justified, then I see no reason as to why President Trump should be allowed to refuse, or prevent others from testifying. That's frankly a bastardization of our legal system and should not be put up with. The position of the Presidency is obviously quite coveted, but that's no excuse for the public to evade suspicion or disregard skepticality when it's absolutely warranted. President Trump is using his position and those surrounding him to lock himself away from potential accountability, and it's the job of the law and of the people to make sure such an action doesn't fly. Essentially, President Trump is like a child who gets in trouble at school, except whenever the parent is called in to talk with the teacher, the parent adamantly defends their child and talks for them to make sure the child never needs to take any responsibility for their actions and gets off the hook just fine. Not only does that prevent any sort of proper justice from being served, it sets a bad precedent going forward for both the child, and other students who repeat the same actions.
Our distrust of the presidency is in large part due to the Watergate Scandal and the anti-authoritarian bases upon which our nation was founded (although in practice, the former tends to outweigh the latter). My personal views on the current administration notwithstanding, I believe that a healthy skepticism towards authority figures is a ultimately good for democracy because it encourages the public to discredit demagogic or jingoistic authority figures. In the case of the current administration, skepticism towards the president's motives has contributed to the scrutiny of his possible disregard for the law (you can't actually ignore subpoenas). Given this, and the current president's conduct as head of state, I have doubts as to whether many future presidents will view him as an exemplar.
I mean with everything that has been going on, I feel as through Trump should be held accountable for his actions. Throughout his presidency, there has been several controversial topics and it doesn't seem to stop either. In my opinion, I do think that skepticism is somewhat necessary because as Franklin said, it "encourages the public." But then again it results in distrust. With the situation with Trump right now, I can say that there has been some large amount of distrust going on.
I think the trust the public can put in the president is pretty dependent on who the president is at the time. Currently, with Trump acting as though he is above the law, I would say that the public cannot trust the president to make decisions that would be for the benefit of the people. In other situations of course, this could be different, if the president is showing/proving to the public that they are a representative of the people and are working to better the US rather than focus purely on their own political reputation/power/etc. I think Trump's behavior will definitely set an example for future presidents about what you shouldn't do (that is, if he doesn't get away with his antics. If he does, I'm sure some future president will try and act similarly considering the lack of consequences they would receive).
When America is faced with a demagogue such as the one heading the current presidency, America tends to split, as it usually does, into one faction, furiously suspicious of authority figures (which, with the right doses, is healthy for democracy) and another faction, loyal to the demagogue, fueled either by boilerplate nationalism (as is mostly the case for the current situation) or political interests and loyalties. Based on what America has learned from dealing with this past presidency, we will either see more leaders like Trump as politicians adopt his erratic behavior as a political strategy or his way of governing will simply die out; the latter only occurring if America succesfully holds him accountable.
Like everything else in recent politics, partisanship plays a significant role in the amount of trust people award government officials. Americans are more trusting of officials from within their own party because, for the most part, they hold the same values and points of view. By that same token, Americans are more skeptical of those outside their party. This is a result of party leaders and media personalities idolizing those in their party, while demonizing the opposing party officials. That being said, no matter the conduct of the President those already inclined to be skeptical or trusting of him will stay on their respective sides. I believe we should be skeptical of those in power (especially those with significantly more power, like the president or senate majority leader) because their primary priority is often reelection and fundraising over truth and good governing, no matter the party. Skepticism of officials should be bipartisan as American law (the Constitution) was built on a distrust in government.
In my opinion, one of the worst repercussions of an abuse of power is the example it sets for the future. If the current president is clearly abusing his power yet the public oversees it, it's going to make the following presidents believe they can do the same. The president should not be able to refuse to testify because this puts out the message that he is above the law. If the leader of the country conveys the message that it's okay to ignore the law if you feel that you're above it-- what will this imply for the rest of society? I think that a little skepticism never hurt anybody and therefore, believe that all authority figures need to be questioned somewhat by the people being "led." So I think it's important for the American people to notice and question this breach of power.
I personally don't think that Presidents should refuse to testify because they are still the leader of our country and they need to do their service whether they like it or not. If we allow the executive branch to have such leniency then, eventually, it will be taken advantage of and the balance between branches will be broken. I think Trump has to testify because it is an issue that he is involved and must take part of and shouldn't be allowed to deny his testimony.
I think the president should not be able to refuse to testify. The president is another human being like everyone else so he should take accountability for his actions and should have punishments. The fact that Trump believes that he shouldn’t be indicted, impeached, or take any accountability for his actions is outrageous. Future presidents or government officials may see this behavior and want to mirror it, thinking it’s okay to be able to dodge the law. That will create a lot of chaos in the future so Trump should be reprimanded now to prevent future messes. Trump also believes he is able to do things just because he is the president but I think he shouldn’t be able to just slip out of the consequences. He’s setting a bad example.
In this particular situation, the American people are trying to hold the President accountable for his actions, however the President is not cooperating with the attempts to hold him accountable. While it is true that the people usually hold the title of President with respect and trust, that does not justify the people if they are blissfully blind to actions that break the trust between the President and people. Especially because of the current trend of Presidents for the past few years, the people have been more skeptical of the Presidency which is healthy, however it seems that it has reached a point where there is an over saturation of skepticism where some people are giving up and not realizing what to trust anymore and when to hold the President accountable for his actions and when to not. This lack of confidence has led to events like Trump not being compliant with the impeachment inquiry among many things and the people can't decide whether or not its right or wrong, despite the flags that should be raised based on the actions.
I definitely think that the President should be held accountable for his actions. Especially with Trump's presidency, a topic of discussion that has emerged has been his lack of accountability. Many of his supporters seem to ignore when he does something wrong. An article which I posted about last week talked about how Trump's supporters kind of enable his behavior of online bullying via Twitter by not forcing him to take accountability for his actions and calling him out. I feel like in refusing to testify Trump is refusing to take accountability for his actions, which just makes it seem like he isn't doing anything wrong. In order for people to have trust in the Presidency, accountability is important. I feel like some degree of skepticism is healthy, but we shouldn't have to doubt our President all the time.
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