Is Donald Trump a traitor?!

[Mystical]

And people do that, but they will still, and have every right to, judge a sitting president for what he says and how he behaves around other leaders.

Yes, of course. Diplomatic missteps, even grave ones, are not treasonous by definition. When politicians and pundits talk of treason it is simply ideological hyperbole. I do not take it seriously. Nothing Trump said constitutes treason, i.e. giving aid and comfort to an enemy in time of war.

Oh cmon, he did that as the President Elect when Obama kicked out all the Ambassadors! 

Not only did he offer aid and comfort--he subverted the Acting presidents national policy! That's a 2 fer. BEFORE he became president.

[Whateverist]

I don't think he is literally trying to hurt the USA I think he wants to make it how he thinks it should look.

White, gated and with plenty of serfs available who will work for food.

[Brian37]

I don't think he is literally trying to hurt the USA I think he wants to make it how he thinks it should look.

White, gated and with plenty of serfs available who will work for food.

If you are going to hire undocumented labor, doing that is not the issue for me. Paying them slave wages is. They are still human beings, regardless of their status. If Americans born here bitch about pay, I am with them. The GOP hypocritically pays migrant workers less, even though they are our fellow human beings while still refusing to pay people born here a livable wage. The businesses pull this crap like Daffy pitting Foghorn against the Beagle. 

I've used migrant labor myself. What I would not do regardless is pay shitty wages to anyone born here or not. 

And this is funny considering that the FLOTUS worked without a legal permit and got paid under the table. And not even for field work, but as a model and a migrant.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Yes, of course. Diplomatic missteps, even grave ones, are not treasonous by definition. When politicians and pundits talk of treason it is simply ideological hyperbole. I do not take it seriously. Nothing Trump said constitutes treason, i.e. giving aid and comfort to an enemy in time of war.

Oh cmon, he did that as the President Elect when Obama kicked out all the Ambassadors! 

Not only did he offer aid and comfort--he subverted the Acting presidents national policy! That's a 2 fer. BEFORE he became president.

I'm not clear about the specific Trump policy or action you want me to consider a treasonous act.

[Silver]

[SteelCurtain]

Traitor =/= treason.

[Cecelia]

Not surprised to see the usual suspects giving Trump a blowjob and a pass on pretty much evertyhing. He could kill a baby live on television, and they'd still worship him. Trump is their new messiah. Forget Christianity. Christians are now Trumpists.

[CapnAwesome]

I can't be sure that Trump's behaviour meets the definition of treason set out in Article III, Section 3 of the US Constitution:

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

Honestly, the way I see it, Russia is more of a rival whose policies are opposed to what we're supposed to strive for than an actual enemy at this point.

That said, well, this reminds me of The Manchurian Candidate; at one point in the film, one of Senator Iselin's rivals says “If John Iselin were a paid Soviet agent, he could not do more to harm this country than he is doing now." This was a nod to a real life-editorial which said much the same thing about Senator Joe McCarthy that inspired the original novel. It's the same way I feel about Trump and the treason question. Admittedly, it's more in the "gangster who's going from violent to psychopath just asking to get whacked" way than overt treason, but still.





If there's an Illuminati, not only is Trump a part of it, but he's the Joe Pesci in that particular dynamic.

Seriously, I wish I could vote for both Options 1 and 3 simultaneously.

Exactly. You have to be actually at war with someone to commit treason. We aren't at war with Russia. People call them our enemy, but I can't really see why. They are no more or less our enemy than half the countries of the world.

[Rev. Rye]

Exactly. You have to be actually at war with someone to commit treason. We aren't at war with Russia. People call them our enemy, but I can't really see why. They are no more or less our enemy than half the countries of the world.

I think it boils down to a couple things:
1) The Russians used to be our biggest enemy. Technically, the Soviet Union was our enemy, but in practice, the Soviet Union was over a dozen smaller countries whose governments were subsumed by Russia.
2) With ISIS falling and our Middle Eastern enemies being a lot more nebulous than they were during the Bush administration, there's a vacuum in our desire to fuck some shit up.
3) Russia is A) acting in ways diametrically opposed to what America is supposed to be for (even if those ideals were just barely honoured by America), B) Powerful enough to potentially be a world superpower again, and C) Actually fairly dangerous, even if the danger hasn't actually reached us.

It's not enough to actually be an enemy; In my post, I specifically called it more of a rival than an enemy, but that distinction seems to be lost on a bunch of people.

[Anomalocaris]

Exactly. You have to be actually at war with someone to commit treason. We aren't at war with Russia. People call them our enemy, but I can't really see why. They are no more or less our enemy than half the countries of the world.

I think it boils down to a couple things:
1) The Russians used to be our biggest enemy. Technically, the Soviet Union was our enemy, but in practice, the Soviet Union was over a dozen smaller countries whose governments were subsumed by Russia.
2) With ISIS falling and our Middle Eastern enemies being a lot more nebulous than they were during the Bush administration, there's a vacuum in our desire to fuck some shit up.
3) Russia is A) acting in ways diametrically opposed to what America is supposed to be for (even if those ideals were just barely honoured by America), B) Powerful enough to potentially be a world superpower again, and C) Actually fairly dangerous, even if the danger hasn't actually reached us.

It's not enough to actually be an enemy; In my post, I specifically called it more of a rival than an enemy, but that distinction seems to be lost on a bunch of people.

1. Ok
2. Ok
3. A) fair enough, B) not a chance. It has outsized military and intelligence capability for its economic strength because it is a wasting but still present legacy bequeathed by its Soviet past, but its minuscule economy and moribund demographics will prevent it from sustaining a major international role beyond its immediate borders over the long run. C) yes, but part of the reason why Russia restored some of the abilities lost with the fall of Soviet Union was a visceral sense that the US And NATO has been hell bent on taking over nearby nations that has tradtionally been in its sphere of influence of without which it can not maintain long term territorial security in order to make it permanently impossible for Russia to pursue an independent role in the world.

Yes, what putin has done is really a response to the Clinton and Bush policy from 1992-2008 to strip Russia of her traditional sphere of influence and to meddle in the domestic politics in Russia and nations traditionally in Russia sphere of influence boomeranging back on us. However, success in international arena does follow from letting my enemy do onto me what I’ve already done to him. So the fact that we enthusiastically meddled in the domestic politics of Russia and her traditionally satellites is no reason to not retaliate viciously against Russia doing the same to us.